Posted to LDL on 19. November.
Josh Cross submitted the following question:
I hope I phrase this correctly. When considering the nature of the universe are there any options other than a -primacy of consciousness- or a -primacy of existance- metaphsics?
He qualified it with the following:
The question came to mind when I was wondering about the foundation of any argument on philosophy (the starting place being metaphysics). The irreducible primary(ies) must be based upon some idea about metaphysics.(?) The possible ideas are finite, though, naturally, numerous variations exist, right? It then occurred to me that (and here's where my question comes from) the only two fundamentally different ideas about metaphysics would be a universe based upon objectivity and one based on subjectivity. Curious to know whether or not I was right, I asked the question.
For those of you who might be unfamiliar with some of this terminology, allow me to provide some context.
Metaphysics (or ontology) is the most basic branch of philosophy, the branch which studies the fundamental nature of existence, in Aristotle's words, the nature of "being qua being". Examples of metaphysical questions include: Is there a reality? Are there many realities? Who or what, if anything, creates reality? Is there anything that has to be true about a reality which might happen to exist, or can it be an indeterminate flux?
Objectivism answers these questions by beginning with one basic axiom: There is something. In other words, existence exists. Furthermore, the very act of grasping that second statement implies a corollary axiom: you are conscious of things that exist.
An axiom will always possess the following characteristics: 1) It is perceptually self-evident and cannot be proven, because 2) It is the foundation for the possibility of any and all proof, which means that 3) Any attempt to deny it would necessarily involve its use.
Let's hash these three characteristics out a bit. First of all, that there is something is self-evident. Look around the room in which you are sitting. What do you see? Something. This axiom does not specify what it is which exists, but it does nonetheless state that something does exist. Just as you are extrospectively aware of things, so too can you be introspectively aware of your own awareness -- consciousness is perceptually self-evident as well.
Upset about the idea that an axiom can't be proven? Are you demanding proof for it? Well, look at characteristic 2). The very concept of "proof" presupposes that something must exist, for otherwise, there would be no facts of reality to which one could point in the process of proving anything. Furthermore, the same concept presupposes someone who's doing the pointing, i.e., a conscious being.
Curious about the notion that existence is perceptually self-evident? What's self-evident to one person might not be self-evident to another, you say? Because of characteristic 3), this attempt to deny these axioms must eventually defeat itself. There are people, you say, who don't agree about certain things? What do you mean? After all, nothing exists. Oh. They do? Well, there's one axiom: existence exists. And you say that you know there are other people? You must be conscious of them.
There is a third axiom which completes the basics of Objectivist metaphysics: Identity. To say that something exists is also to say that something exists. Things are what they are -- they have definite, determinate natures. They are composed of specific traits and characteristics, and only these characteristics. Or, in the traditional formula: A is A. The same characteristics of axioms noted above apply to this one as well.
Getting to Josh's question, it is important to note the order in which these axioms were presented. Note that existence comes first. And it must, because to speak of consciousness is necessarily to speak of existence (because consciousness must be conscious of something), while one can speak of things existing without anyone being conscious of them. This is the Objectivist principle of "The Primacy of Existence". According to it, facts are facts, independent of anyone's consciousness.
The opposite view is the Primacy of Consciousness. This view states that it is possible for consciousness to create reality, which means that it is possible for consciousness to exist on its own terms, without having anything other than itself of which to be conscious.
If you're an Objectivist, then these are the only two possible kinds of metaphysics. This is because there are only two kinds of things to have beliefs about: existence and consciousness(*). Since a metaphysics is a belief about reality, and since beliefs must have objects in reality, then the only two meaningful worldviews are ones about either of the two kinds of things there are. This means that POE and POC are the only options.
Of course, if you're a believer in the Primacy of Consciousness, you might think that there are things other than consciousness and existence, because your consciousness could create them. In this case, you could advocate the Primacy of Something Else, although this would be highly illogical, in that you've already presupposed that your consciousness has created these new things, and that, presumably, they are existents. But besides, the Primacy of Consciousness is false.
There are of course, variations of the theme of POC, made possible by the different kinds of consciousnesses in which one might happen to believe. There are three basic varieties: 1) Personal. Your own mind creates reality. 2) Social. Society's collective mind (assuming falsely that there is such a thing) creates reality. 3) Supernatural. God's mind creates reality (assuming falsely that there is such an entity). But as Josh points out, these are all fundamentally the same in that they are all basically talking about somebody's mind creating reality.
So I think the answer is that these two are the only alternatives. I can't imagine any others. And I think that POE is right.
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