#mereology

If you define a "triangle" as a "three-sided polygon", you can objectively prove that a given polygon is a triangle or not, but you cannot prove that it is objectively true that "a triangle is a three-sided polygon"; you cannot prove that the definition itself is objectively true.

It is conventionally and universally true [among English language users] that "a triangle is a three-sided polygon", because everyone accepts the definition and takes it for granted, but that is not sufficient to make it an objective definition, because you cannot derive the definition from first principles:

Parts and wholes

(Pictured: ‘Sunday Morning’ (Philippe Faraut). Are the statue and the clay the same or different things? Why?)

Parthood has puzzled metaphysicians for a long time. How are parts of things related to whole things?

Take an object, say, a table. It has parts: wood, atoms, subatomic particles … Why is it the case that there is a whole thing called a table as well? The mereological nihilist claims that there are only fundamental parts (‘simples’ or ‘atoms’) merely arranged ‘table-wise’.

Yet philosophers of classic mereology offer some arguments we may want to consider before we subscribe to such a view. For example, there is composition, a mereological fusion of many parts (e.g. a cocktail); group membership (e.g. sports team); and constitution, a one-one relation between co-located objects, which takes us to an interesting example …

The statue and the clay

Take JJ Thomson’s example of a statue made from clay. The statue is one object; the clay from which it is built is another. The problem is that two objects seem to occupy the same space at the same time, upsetting the monist :’(

However, according to pluralism, it can be okay to accept this situation because the two have different identities.

But how? Well, we could use the concept of time to say that whereas the lump of clay appeared at t1, the statue came into existence at t2. We could also reference additional features the statue has (like ears), its aesthetic value (beauty), or some defining property.

Reversing intuition

Parthood follows intuition. In language we often tacitly suggest that there are ‘proper’ parts to things (e.g. ‘grains of sand’ and ‘organs’) which make up wholes (e.g. ‘a heap of sand’ and ‘an organism’), not the other way round.

But why let our dodgy common sense rule how we think the world is? We might instead talk of wholes first—wholes which possess emergent properties that parts as mere aggregates do not.

We might be tempted to believe in ‘gunk’: that all constituents of the Universe are infinitely divisible: that parts have their own parts, which have their own parts, and so on.

But then in what sense is a thing—such as a table—really a thing? Is there anything? If there is, where is the line? Does identity depend on the spatial proximity of its parts? Unscrewing a table leg ever so slightly, does the table’s identity change? Why more so than throwing the leg over the fence and onto my neighbour’s garden? The argument for proximity feels weak.

A final thought

As a metaphysical relation, parthood putatively comes as many modes. There is a part-whole structure to a statue and clay, to a set of prime numbers, to an espresso martini, to a fact and its constituents, to spacetime and its regions, to an immaterial soul ... Why? How?

CLUI envelope (back detail; leveled up)

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Moving on to another form of nihilism, we come upon mereological nihilism.

What is mereological nihilism?

Mereological nihilism is the philosophical position that objects with proper parts do not exist, and only basic building blocks without parts exist. Or, that "nothing is a proper part of anything". The parts of the object can be bothmmmspatial and temporal; mereological nihilism also asserts that objects existing in time do not have any temporal parts.

So what to make of these statements? Well, as we all know, appearances, lol when taken at their face value, appear very complex and also give the impression of being composed of many many parts; the complexity itself functioning as the demonstrative evidence as to the existence of fragmented objects. But what we should never fail to consider, is that an impression of complexity is not actual complexity; but only an appearance of complexity. An appearance of something means that an existential aspect is indicating something, that is not necessarily a truth of it's existence. It's “existence”, being a key point to remember in these considerations; for wherein is the existence of any proposed object? For an object to be existing, what is the fundamental requirement? It can't be shape or location, for there are many existential aspects that don't have fixed shapes, such as water or air, and there are many existential aspects that don't have any locations, such as time and space.

And if you have any misgivings about those assertions, then please explain what the fixed shape of water and air is. And please explain where exactly time and space are located. And all of this hasn't even broached areas where space and location cannot even be pin pointed, such as the case with atoms, and other various subatomic particles, that cannot be seen, and hence, not experienced directly with the perceptual senses; and as such, are only verified indirectly via emergent properties, such as a microscope, or any other such utility.

And while you are thinking about all that, wherein is the actuality of any "thing", that isn't permanent, never stops changing, is in a perpetual state of locational flux, has no discernible certain context, and, that will, given enough time, eventually lose it's identifiable state; which is the decisive definable feature to any object's capacity to be classified. In other words, the impression that an object is indeed an objectified property, that is to say, an externalized extant aspect, is illusory.

So, to focus on the very complex tapestry of mosaic detail that pervades these illusory projections is emphasizing the attention on the wrong avenue of investigatory inquiry. If indeed an object is not a mind independent embodiment, then it cannot be rightfully said that is has any “parts.” The very question of an object's existence is dependent on existentiality, for what else gives an object the context to be confirmed or disputed in the first place? So even if somehow it could be shown that an object has a solid profile independent of the agency that gives such notions a parameter, which it can't, it still wouldn't be an item of consideration without such agency to provide the platform to verify it.

In other words, any items of existentiality have no rightful existence outside of existentiality, and even if they did, the possibility of such is meaningless, for any phenomenal features can only be addressed from a context, and the context we are operating from is the agency of awareness, which is, as far as we are concerned, the only standpoint from which knowledge can be gathered, and, of which, is the only existential center that we can know to be for sure. With awareness being the only conduit of which the interaction with sensory data is staged, then awareness is dealing with a unified stream, which we call reality. The stream of reality has no parts, but gives off the impression of such. All such impressions of complexity, detail and fragmentation are literally a mirage. Yes, a mirage; that is to say, an illusion that the mind projected reality has an independent existence from the existential agency that produces it. That it is, in fact, substantial and if it's own individual origin. This kind of mind set serves as the binding shackles that limit your possibilities.

So much of everything that is seemingly out of reach, lost, and disconnected from your potentiality is due to the false conditioning of mind independent reality. The same is true when you dream. The default state of dream awareness is also preset into this assumptive navigational position. But, just as we can realize, to different extents, that the reality in dreams is a complete creation of the mind, we can too, also realize it in the waking state, which is really just a different degree of the same thing. It is more solidified, and reflects the anchored position with a continuity which enables confirmation bias, but it is still a dream state nonetheless. It's just has more mass and hence more density, which is indicative of attachment to a specific set of conditional circumstances. And so, the nature of reality itself, which is a projected stream of potentiality that reflects back to awareness various energetic vibrations that get translated via sense organs into sensory data for the consciousness, is whole and unified. Whether or not you recognize this, or, if not, and would rather stick to an externalized objective framework, you cannot deny that, besides the nothingness itself, all manifested aspects, at their core, are energy. Wherein a field of energy, do parts have a substantial actuality?

Just as if we were to look at the programming code for a computer simulated world, what would we see? Would we see anything more or less equal in the code? Would any of items of the simulated world have any other origin then of the code itself? Would any of the items in the simulated computer world be independent objects, or contain any parts? If we were to somehow walk through the computer simulated world, is there any real substantial separation or break in the unified field of data, beyond only an appearance of such? Would the simulated trees on the simulated landscape be any different then the simulated animals or simulated weather patterns? The code may have different patterns or valuations, but all the code is still just code, right? In this simulated world, would a powerful fire breathing dragon be fundamentally any different then a tiny tadpole? If so, wherein is the difference? And to whom does this difference occur? Perhaps to your playable character?

Maybe your playable character is something special or has some fundamental difference then anything else in the simulated world? None whatsoever; but for the agency that directs the playable character.

Ah, now we may be getting somewhere. And does this agency belong to the simulated world?

No. But could perhaps this agency be responsible for programming the simulated world?

Ahhhhh. Now can we see where we go wrong in the waking state by establishing an identification with the playable character and a world narrative?

A world view or an ego could only be said to be true if they had any substantiality. They don't. They are illusory, not just because of a story being told, but empirically demonstratively so, unto oneself, upon deeper examination of the phenomenal content. So hence, all sensory data is whole and unified, as it is a reflection of a whole unified field of energy, which constitutes everything and anything in the experience of the reality of a world. There are no parts, proper, but only an appearance of such when taken at face value, for even if we delve into the illusion itself and examine the fundamental building blocks of the mind projected reality in a so called objectified manner, we find the same kind of truth at the root of these manifestations.

The foundational materials that compose matter are without any parts. You cannot call any of the inner designs of an atomic structure "a part" of anything else. The atom itself is not composed of parts, but only of building blocks without any parts, and these elementary particles never unify into being non-individual. But individuality is not indicative of a part either, for the medium of all individual structures, nothingness, the supreme empty primary underlying potentiality that is the wellspring of all that is, cannot be distinguished as either a part or a whole. Subatomic building blocks are arrangements of wholes coming together to express individuality, none of which which can rightfully be called a whole, because in order for their to be a whole, there would have to be parts, but since there are no parts, and only a unity of wholes, there are no wholes either, but only an infinite oneness, expressing itself through various arrangements of itself.