From Ultimacy to ‘Multi-macy’: The Problem of Ultimate Reality in the Context of the Paranormal

Michael Raposa has offered his readers a compelling method for philosophical theology in his Theosemiotic: Religion, Reading, and the Gift of Meaning—one that is steeped in the Peircean logic of relations, pragmaticistically oriented toward action, and advances a “semiotic consciousness” (to use a John Deely-ism). My task in this essay is to further query Raposa in order to learn the extent to which it might be compatible with the aims of Christian theology, specifically a form of which I call “semiotic theology.” Given theosemiotic's and semiotic theology's common conceptual grounding in Peirce's philosophy, there is, ostensibly, considerable promise; however, there are certain ambiguities that remain in Theosemiotic that require explanation, especially those which are rooted in the claim that it may make ground in theological inquiry “without any practical or strategic purpose.”1 I am hoping that Raposa might then clarify his project so that a confessional, philosophical theologian like myself might better understand its relation to semiotic theology.Toward that end, I have identified three specific subject matters about which I would be grateful for further elucidation: (1), the extent to which theosemiotic could endorse a kataphatic theology (or any specific theology at all), which would permit determining “God” in certain important respects; (2), whether theosemiotic would welcome any doctrinal claims about humanity's final end that might sharpen its emphasis on religious action; and, (3), whether semiotic complementarity is able to maintain the distinctions of lived religious traditions for preserving unified, communal practices. Having these questions answered, it would go a long way toward understanding how, and in what senses, theosemiotic might become partner with semiotic theology. But, before exploring these matters in depth, I will briefly address the character of semiotic theology.Semiotic theology may be described as an effort to revise Christian theology into a form of discourse that operates upon a semiotic rationale. It attempts to take the history of biblical, theological, and doctrinal reasoning and critically judge and reinterpret its conclusions according to a framework that embraces the paradigm-shifting work of semiotics, especially Peirce's and the community of inquiry that has followed in his footsteps. I believe this is important for Christian theological discourse to advance beyond various impasses that have been created by centuries of misplaced philosophical and theological bases (e.g., substance metaphysics; the division between nature and supernature; conception/perception dichotomies; and so on) and am personally committed to a project that seeks to rethink what a confessional theology should look like given the insights of semiotics.To give some concreteness to this project, my own attempt to describe the foundational structures of semiotic theology—insofar as it concerns the reasonableness of speaking about a meaningful relation between God and creatures—was offered in my recent book, The Analogy of Signs: Rethinking Theological Language with Charles S. Peirce.2 Therein, I argued that discourse about God in the Christian tradition is untenable if framed as sufficiently described through an analogy of being (i.e., an ontological principle establishing a connection between God's being and the creature's being), grammatical analogy (i.e., a linguistic practice that connects God and creatures through an expressive performance), or analogy of faith (i.e., a relation that enables the creature's acts of free obedience to God in imitation of Jesus Christ). That is because these views reflect a dependence upon deceiving metaphysical dualisms, largely derived from classical Greek philosophy. For instance, the distinction between matter and form has done much to create an unbridgeable gap between divine and human realms. It holds that, whereas form is the basis of the cognizable, matter is merely the unintelligible stuff that receives a form to be cognized. Such a distinction effectively negates any possible continuity between God and creatures when theologians presume God is pure form and human conception is inextricably based in sense experience mediated by material stuff (as in, say, Aquinas). On such a set of views, speech about God can only be non-sense, for no association of ideas to conceptual objects can be allowed to be determinately meaningful for an object totally different from what is conceived.By my lights, the only sufficient way to enable theological discourse is to found it on an analogy of signs: God and creatures are commensurate in the action of signs, for both are meaningful through the univocity of semiosis—that is, the triadic relational process wherein representamen, object, and interpretant interact. The pivotal, confessional component in such an account is establishing Jesus Christ at the intersection of the analogy of signs’ formula: Jesus the God-Man demonstrates by his life the compatibility of divine and human signs. So, in Jesus is disclosed the reality of semiotic univocity, and divinity is determinately knowable and interpretable in his person as a result. Any metaphysical claim is contingent upon that semiotic univocity, but inferences made from Jesus’ sign activity must be analogical insofar as those signs are abstracted and rendered generalizable with our own. Yet, whatever inequality those signs might express in their constant fluctuation (whether through growth or atrophy), the univocity of semiosis establishes their core commensurability.Having recognized the semiotic touchstone for Christian theology, the rest of it must be based on this prolegomenal framing for the discourse to be intelligible. In so doing, all doctrinal claims must be made semiotically interpretable—that is, they must be subject to semiosis's triadic relation, and potentially instantiated within a taxonomy of signs (which is not to say entirely reducible to any particular sign-type; but, rather, could be articulated as belonging among sign-types). The theologian cannot merely jump from a study of what appears in experience (i.e., phenomenology) to the most general categories of reality (i.e., metaphysics), but must mediate them with semiotic (including, in Peircean terms, both the study of signs proper in speculative grammar, and the study of arguments in logical critic). The upshot is that—to borrow a metaphor from Peirce—all religious reflection must have first come through the gate of semiotic, or be “arrested as unauthorized by reason.”3 Whether that concerns theology proper, protology, anthropology, Christology, ecclesiology, eschatology, etc., all theological expressions stand on the solid rock of semiosis. Conversely, putative religious or theological symbols that are incompatible with semiotic classification are useless at best, and—under the guise of meaningful expression—destructive at worst; in either case, a theologian should have nothing to do with such symbols.Thus, the theologian must not be simply aware of the discipline of semiotic, or have some speculations about how certain doctrines can be interpreted along semiotic lines; no, the theologian must be a semiotician. If Christians might generally agree with Paul Tillich that theology is “the methodological interpretation of the contents of Christian faith,”4 interpretation must here be understood as the practice of rendering judgments intelligible through sign-action and its specific classes. A theologian who cannot regard her claims with semiotic consciousness should be regarded with the utmost suspicion. This is not to say that her claims populate a semantic wasteland, but rather to advocate the suspension of judgment over their theological veracity until the claims are semiotically coherent.So much, then, for a précis of semiotic theology. What I hope has been made clear is the following about it: (1), operating within the Christian theological tradition, it does not seek to do away with that tradition's sources of theological truth, but to primarily reinterpret its contents while excising those elements that play no semiotic role;5 (2), it takes the insights of semiotics to be crucial to structuring theological discourse, both for establishing its intelligibility and acting as a judge over its constructive claims; and, (3), it understands the theologian as semiotician: as reasonably reflecting upon Christian revelation in semiotic consciousness.To turn to the main objective of this essay, my question for Raposa is this: to what extent may theosemiotic become a partner with semiotic theology in its efforts to rethink and reframe Christian theology? Surely, Raposa's goals for his book are not identical with mine for semiotic theology; however, our common interest in theology that is constructive, spiritually edifying, important for the health of living religious traditions, and keen to read the universe of signs purposively, seems to go some way to prepare a potential convergence and, perhaps, symbiotic relationship between the two. It is this potential that intrigues me about Raposa's project, and so I will begin by questioning him on theosemiotic's ultimate referent.“God, of course,” one might reply. But, Raposa continually reminds his reader about the imprecision of the idea of God, and this leads me to ask about what sort of claims can be applied to the object of religious thought and devotion. He writes that theosemiotic “embrac[es] a form of apophatic or negative theology, a theology of mystery,” and this is informed by Peirce's logic of vagueness, which consequently must hold that “all talk about God must be necessarily and exceedingly vague” (TS, 7). Much of chapter 3 explores what this means.Before proceeding, though, it is worth spending a moment to consider Peirce's logic of vagueness, for it will be important as the paper proceeds, and Raposa himself does not offer an explicit description of its logical function in the book. Peirce takes vagueness to be a property of signs, those gears upon which logic turns: “a sign that is objectively indeterminate in any respect is objectively vague in so far as it reserves further determination to be made in some other conceivable sign, or at least does not appoint the interpreter as its deputy in this office” (EP 2:351, 1905). In other words, a vague sign requires some other sign—and not the interpreter of the vague sign—to either affirm or deny some character or predicate to the vague sign. Until that other sign is presented, the principle of contradiction “does not apply”6 to that character or predicate. Thus, “That pen is mine . . . ” allows the recipient of the statement to neither affirm nor deny the pen is the black, blue, or red one in a group; rather, the speaker (or something else) would need to offer some other sign to further determine the vague sign (say, “ . . . the black one,” “ . . . not the black one,” or by gesturing in the black one's vicinity). We should notice three things here: (1), the initially vague sign itself is not entirely indeterminate of character: it is a statement about a known kind of object in some proximate space belonging to the utterer; (2), the recipient may still be successful in guessing the correct pen without the “other conceivable sign,” but nothing in the vague sign by itself will establish the correctness of the guess made; and, (3), only the other sign—the statement or gesture, in this case—is privileged to determine positively or negatively the character or predicate for the recipient. Thus, (a), the usefulness of vague signs is contingent upon the respects in which it is determinate; (b), vague signs will not affirm or deny the truth of further determinations made by the interpreter; and, (c), vague signs require another sign, not vague in the same respect, to further determine them.As I said, Raposa makes much use of the notion of vagueness, which for him seems to amount to “determining a range of possible meanings [wherein a symbol's] interpretation [is] left indeterminate to some extent and in certain respects” (4). But, compared to what was just said above, this presents an incomplete picture: specifically, it leaves out the interpreter's limitations in further determining the vague sign or symbol, and the requirement for the “other conceivable sign” to accomplish that task. It is not surprising that Theosemiotic presents this partial view of vagueness, since it is being used with an eye toward one of its particular aspects: it opens up the door to many possible meanings for the idea of God without affirming or denying their truth status. But the result is that the other side of the coin of vagueness, the consequent loss of particular meaning, is treated with less scrutiny. The upshot is that Raposa seems more concerned to avoid “idolatry,” and less “vacuous nonsense” (85). On the one hand, he says, theosemiotic need not hold to the “personal deity” of theism in order to pursue “genuine theological reflection” (TS, 75–76). Of course, following Peirce's lead in the “Neglected Argument,” Raposa will claim that some classical idea of God as creator is a legitimate and fruitful hypothesis; however, the idea that follows from that argument is itself quite indeterminate, and holding to its conclusion is no requirement for belonging within theosemiotic's bounds (hence the inclusion of Buddhism, Daoism, and contemporary forms of religious naturalism within its parameters [e.g., 76, 85, 218, 252]). Indeed, theosemiotic distinguishes itself by marking “the limits of semiosis,” and upholds the notion that takes ultimate reality to be “no-determinate-thing” (85), and potentially the totally different “ground of being” of all determinate things, which therefore would “not possess consciousness, have purposes, or display agency” (90).But, on the other hand, closing the door against a “collapse into meaninglessness” is Scotus's view of the univocity of being—the claim that ultimate reality and contingent reality share in a single sense of “being.” But, given theosemiotic's brand of apophaticism mentioned above, this looks to be a vacuous affirmation if not joined with some semiotic sense of similarity; alone, it is a distinction from non-univocity without a difference. The appeal to continuity between ultimate and contingent reality needs to be demonstrated in some specific way. Raposa is not ignorant of this problem: he writes that the apophaticism espoused by theosemiotic must be a qualified one, wherein the “extreme vagueness of [“God”] does not rule out the critique of various ways in which it might be interpreted, nor does it suggest that in the matter of such interpretation ‘anything goes’” (95). But, the explanation for this qualification leaves much unanswered.Raposa claims, with Peirce, that some kind of anthropomorphism is appropriate for understanding “God,” yet it is likely also a term more capaciously inclusive of senses than even “love” (TS, 87). He also says that God is “living” and “personal” as love's perfect object (95), but it is difficult to see how those terms could be made meaningful by theosemiotic, given how capacious the concept of ultimate reality may be within it. It is not satisfying to be told the idea is one that is instinctual (88). Instinct is that “inherited [or acquired] disposition” representing “some general principle working in a man's nature to determine how he will act” (CP 2.170, 1902); the judgments resulting from instinct are vague, yes, but not overly indeterminate, as evidenced by the fact that they lead one to act in general ways (“Fight back against an attacker!”), which then may be refined upon receiving some other information (e.g., “Strike the bear in the eyes!”).But, in the case of the idea of God, one sees a double challenge in its necessary and exceeding vagueness: first, discerning the particular character that may be known of its idea that leads us to act; and, second, securing the character and authority of the “other conceivable sign” that may affect the interpreter's thought and action about that vague idea. I am not so sure that theosemiotic meets this challenge adequately. In one case Raposa writes that, though “divine reality” cannot be “perfectly captured in signs,” these signs can somehow be “seized by” that reality to “get itself thought” (TS, 138). But, however that reality may “crus[h] our symbols, and then bring new ones to life in the semiotic debris,” we still trade in semiotic vocabulary that forms its residue—so, what is therein discerned about divine reality, if only so slight, fleeting, or fragmentary? do the new symbols have any authority in the for truth over those that In another case, he says that the God of Peirce's theosemiotic is mediated by signs,” but this seems to any if those signs “all of the signs that it is possible for one to Surely, if any particular is to make then some signs must be at of to But, how would one be able to judge their if ultimate reality is just as by nothing in particular as in a specific would be to the If theosemiotic might be used to a notion that God is if and so on (CP then it is to see how it could Raposa seems to suggest it the of (TS, or It would be one to say that theosemiotic makes no claims one way or the other about but such a of ideas would not for a philosophical theology that Raposa to So, to the double what does such an idea of God that is to such and what meaningful signs vague may to the vague idea to make it more determinate in a way that the interpreter's without being some to the idea of God or some authority to certain signs to make that idea more I am of what can be said for on these in the and the of wherein is the sort of inquiry that Peirce's it is not clear what about a in God is to one to The object of that form of inquiry is understood to have an in the of the and then to lead one into in with the (TS, But, what sort of about the object are that should then have this Surely, this must be more than the in a (EP what about the (TS, would suggest authority over my and practical What is there to in the in to simply does one for the being of because of it to questions like I to see how theosemiotic could its object of or what it could be I that being framed as a method many to itself into the of indeterminate and Peirce's anthropomorphism will not the to it into the the resulting vagueness both intelligible speech about the object of religious and other religious that would further determine the object signs may offer . . . potential of (TS, but that potential has to be other signs to something specific for there is nothing to lead our thought or action in one way or the I do not see how theosemiotic has the apophaticism and with respect to its kataphatic elements in this philosophical theology, then, I am to say that theosemiotic's God is it rather, just and Such a conclusion is, of course, to be incompatible with semiotic theology, which with Christian theology and other living religious traditions a to speaking reasonably about God as certain (i.e., determining and not (i.e., determining as (TS, because they are or that are of something general or living such as on a are things with of specific semiotic This seems to be for a should not be to some abstracted (i.e., or (i.e., but should be regarded as a wherein of through as Raposa the as living can only be so understood for this of is some through the and for some But it is this more view that I about when one the what is this specifically, what are the toward which theosemiotic the to seems to be a question for many of the book, but I will three to here: and the first, Raposa out the notion of as one that is to the one and that does so without any will not to what or but to whatever to just as it (TS, But what seems from this of is what one's in its should for the of the On the most we can say, as Raposa that it would the however, to that as the end of is to express something with use for What is the that is to be and that toward which one how is that with what is in the Peirce says in that seeks out the of in the it into and makes it for sees the as an of itself (EP Thus, seems to be for some in the hope of the by a (TS, something But the question what is the or of the that one might seek to into its is its own If and are in the way that Peirce seems to then what can we about them that makes them Raposa seems to be aware of concerns like He of as a as a in between (TS, The described is one made out of for the of that sign presents to one who is to and to But, while this might describe a of and in the it does not what the object of is other than that which to offer meaning, which could be does it address that for which one to be a for the of seems to be important for marking a between the that Raposa one Peirce's and the religious naturalism that would that on the one hand, for God as the vague of all is rather on the other hand, the religious of a for being as such at a vague of there that would make this of Peirce's theism more if a of is what a person should come to what is that to be If is to the of a theology as then what about that and for instance, the of the which Raposa upon at various for my (i.e., do I and do or just of what might amount to a in theosemiotic If in what regard to one of the of chapter we another of the least the form about which Raposa a to to through some (TS, Theosemiotic embraces the notion that theology is a that the religious of the in which we (e.g., and the one in it (e.g., But, the character of the to be in such is Raposa to or but what do these He on the of various forms of action that such a as as but the aims of these remain what do the and what is If the of is certain of the to to which ones should we and If theology toward what is the character of a better be I neither seek from Raposa that his will not nor some . . . in it is about the that might be offered about these to be to the in the of as would any should this be If there is some of (TS, that is for by a religious it seems important to what that if it is as a sort of (as in the of in to a of and advance into divine (say, the within of the to these would turn out to be quite those Thus, it makes sense that theosemiotic to take a more on the to This up against the first matter if the subject of is the as living and some of its growth is the of then we still must for what does one we into the of what an may and what sort of is within theosemiotic's Raposa reminds his reader that will some of the question is, what as He does that by theosemiotic must be and so as to what “all would (TS, I am not so certain that the final on would be so vague, but, at any the of ideas from and Peirce does not to bring to any clear rule for to the reader does to become something more than when a of it is the for to be to not own What are for that are to consider the to or believe is the object of the and theosemiotic to some and of these ideas to a concept for practical action, and that can toward Raposa at one how far the concept of community can without if and with I whether theosemiotic has itself been by vagueness so that it cannot these questions about of in chapter first seems to us in a Raposa writes that is act of (TS, as his is of love's relational not its or it is difficult to the and of what is one what is the of and in what sense are these done in “a certain in love's display as as and without a

This paper explores the account of ‘ultimate reality’ developed in the later philosophy of Paul Feyerabend. The paper has five main parts, this introduction being the first. Part two surveys Feyerabend’s later work, locates it relative to his more familiar earlier work in the philosophy of science, and identifies the motivations informing his interest in ‘ultimate reality’. Part three offers an account of Feyerabend’s later metaphysics, focusing on the account given in his final book, Conquest of Abundance. Part four then assesses Feyerabend’s related claims that ‘ultimate reality’—or ‘Being’—is both ‘ineffable’ and ‘abundant’, and tries to reconcile these two ‘doctrines’ with one another. I conclude in part five that into his later period Feyerabend offers a positive account of ‘ultimate reality’ which identifies it as receptive to a radical plurality of modes of inquiry and forms of knowledge. Such ‘abundance’ arises from the interaction of human cognitive and creative capacities with ‘ineffable Being’ on the other, such that ‘ultimate reality’ itself remains ‘forever unknowable’.

The question is how God or ultimate reality could be understood. Is it even possible to grasp or model God or ultimate reality? In Models of God and Alternative Ultimate Reality (Diller and Kasher 2013) Robert Cummings Neville hypothesizes that “ultimate reality is an ontological act of creation, the terminus of which is everything determinate, constituting and unfolding in spacetime” (2013: 19). Defined as such, he argues, ultimate reality cannot be modeled and anything that can be modeled cannot be ultimate reality. The question is, if we accept this definition, how could human beings and ultimate reality or God interact? Or, in the words of Philip Clayton and Arthur Peacocke (1924–2006), “[h]ow, in the light of the sciences, to conceive of God’s relation to the world as it is now perceived to be and to be becoming” (2004). Hence, in this chapter some models of God or ultimate reality will be presented and discussed; I will also explore how a relationship between humans and God or ultimate reality could be understood. Furthermore, philosophical problems such as the problem of time and of free will in relation to ultimate reality will be investigated.

The article analyzes the dynamics of the development of spiritual and moral searches of society in historical retrospect, including identifying current trends and evaluating the transformation of religiosity in the current period under the influence of postmodern ideas. Correlations between changes in fundamental paradigms and changes in the ideological foundations of the functioning of state and legal institutions are revealed. It is determined that each of the four types of society — archaic, traditional, industrial and post-industrial (informational) — has its own specific forms of religiosity that determine the worldview and directly affect the social (state) system. Thus, the early forms of religious beliefs of an archaic society did not create prerequisites for the emergence of a social hierarchy, and, consequently, statehood (which is confirmed by the social practice of preserved archaic societies of our time). The archaic society is gradually replaced by the traditional one, hierarchy, social inequality, Patriarchy appear, political Genesis is carried out, and power is legitimized through religious institutions. It is in traditional societies that polytheism is replaced by monotheism, which promotes (and is used for this purpose as a state ideology) the strengthening of statehood. The state-legal institutions of traditional societies have no alternative but to be sacred. The main form of government of the state is monarchy (theocratic or clerical). The transition to modernity takes place under the slogan of desacralization and rationalization, in the ideological field this is manifested in the formation of “quasi-religions” or secular “religions”: Nazism, communism, liberalism (these ideologies replace God in the public consciousness, Absolute (Ultimate) reality — the ultimate reality, while preserving certain features of the religious: ritual, dogmas, symbolism, meaning-making, mythological, etc.). These ideologies determine the global transformation of the geopolitical picture of the world in the XIX—XX centuries. There is the overthrow of the monarchy (or the transition to parliamentary forms of monarchies), the collapse of empires, the establishment of the Republican form of government as the dominant one, with the choice of the appropriate ideology as the basis for state-legal construction. Spiritual search in modern societies was pushed out of public discourse into the area of personal choice. By the end of the XX — beginning of the XXI century, the West begins processes that can be described as the beginning of the transition from modern to postmodern. The transformation of society’s religiosity is characterized by contradictory trends — the emergence of «hyperreal religions» (parody religions, Internet religions, alternative (non-traditional) religious movements), a return to archaic beliefs (neo-paganism), and the activation of fundamentalism. In the context of globalization and legal integration, these processes directly affect other countries (paradigmally still at the stage of modernity and even pre-modernity), which causes civilizational conflicts and destabilizes international relations. Taking these trends into account, as well as understanding the paradigmatic heterogeneity of both the world as a whole and Russian society, is necessary in the implementation of law-making and management activities, domestic and foreign policy.
 Acknowledgments: The reported study was funded by RFBR, project number 20-011-31235 “Non-traditio­nal religiosity as a form of social activity in the postmo­dern era”.

Mādhyamikas argue that ultimate reality, which is without any delimitation and hence cannot be verbalized in itself (anakṣara), can be expressed in words on the basis of the attribution or superimposition (samāropa) of the basis for the application of the word (pravṛttinimitta). The denotation theory of ultimate reality Bhartṛhari advances in the Dravyasamuddeśa of his Vākyapadīya convincingly explains that, insofar as ultimate reality is spoken of, we must say that it is denoted by the word; ultimate reality is said to be ineffable only in the sense that it is far from what is conveyed as something by the word; language is a pointer to the ultimate reality. The point that the application of a word to ultimate reality depends on the attribution of the basis for the application of the word to it naturally leads to an idea that one should not hypostatize the basis, although without resorting to it any word cannot be used to convey the ultimate reality; otherwise, it would have to be said that the ultimate reality to which the word is applied has in essence the property which serves as the basis. Such a property is precisely what the Mādhyamikas consider to be the svabhāva ‘intrinsic nature’. What they understand by the term śūnyatā is precisely that everything has no real basis for the application of the word to it.

Experience and the Ultimacy of God: In Memoriam John Edwin Smith

Religious pluralism, in my version of it, holds that all the ‘great world faiths’ are, so far as we can tell, equally effective contexts of the salvific transformation from natural self-centredness to a new orientation centred in the Transcendent; and that to account for this we should postulate an ultimate ineffable reality which is differently conceived, and hence differently experienced, within the different traditions. A frequent criticism is that, in believing this, ‘the transformational power of [the] religious tradition would be undermined for most ordinary believers’ (Clark 1997, 317). Speaking from a Christian point of view he says, [S]uppose that they [his children] learn that ultimate reality cannot be discovered and they just don’t know whether God is really a person or not, or loving and just, or even good or evil. Perhaps he/it/whatever doesn’t care about their transformation from self-centeredness into Reality-centeredness … Whether or not he/it/nothing is really concerned about human transformation is an enigma. (Ibid., 318)

The two works under consideration here defend claims that, although different from each other, are to a large extent complementary. Their arguments are to some degree overlapping; and, taken together, they herald a revival of idealism. Robinson argues that the main contemporary forms of materialism in the philosophy of mind are 'quite hopeless' (p. I 24). Foster contends that ultimate contingent reality is wholly non-physical and that the physical world is best taken as a logical product of facts about human sense experience. Although he does not claim to prove that ultimate reality is wholly mental, he suspects that it is (p. 294); and the position at which he arrives bears strong resemblances to the views of Bishop Berkeley. Both authors can be read as developing, in a most stimulating way, certain views advanced earlier by Professor H. D. Lewis. The central argument Robinson uses against materialist theories of the mind is 'quite sinriply, that the materialist cannot within his system allow for consciousness. Ayer has expressed this by saying that the materialist must pretend that he is anaesthetized' (p. 4). To drive home his point, Robinson asks us to consider the following thought-experiment. A deaf scientist becomes the world's foremost authority on the physiology of hearing. He comes to know everything there is to know about his subject except one crucial fact, which science will not tell him: 'what it is like to hear' (p. 4). Robinson emphasizes that the force of his argument does not depend on adopting a particular theory of what we perceive, e.g. that we directly perceive only sense data. Even if one rejects the sense-datum theory, adhering instead to direct realism or the adverbial theory, the problem remains. Something, regardless of how one wishes to characterize it theoretically, occurs when we are conscious; and this the materialist cannot explain. (This is not to admit that direct realism is a plausible theory of knowledge: see the discussion by Foster, pp. 58, 96 ff.) Robinson's argument will be familiar to all readers of Professor Lewis, as it is one which he has insisted on again and again in volumes such as The Elusive Mind and The Elusive Self Lewis succinctly states the main issue at the beginning of the latter book: 'At some point we have to recognize an

moral chaos of our civilization, modern man stands in desperate need of a faith which will release his spiritual energies for significant living and guide him to the realization of his spiritual destiny. It is Christianity's conviction that the Christian gospel is relevant to this basic need of modem man's predicament and that when the fundamental theological principles of this gospel are clearly stated, the reasonable person cannot fail to see both the relevance and something of the adequacy and validity of the Christian philosophy of life. I herewith submit a statement of twenty basic theological principles of the Christian gospel out of which we believe an adequate faith for modern man can be fashioned, because it is a faith which provides for man's fullest creative response to the challenge of life, calling for the fulfillment of his spiritual possibilities. By such a faith we therefore believe that our civilization may be saved from the destruction which to many of our most thoughtful and sensitive minds seems at times to be almost imminent. We believe: 1) That there is an ultimate or supreme Reality in the universe and that this Reality, which we call God, is the creative source of all goodness, truth and beauty. 2) That there is only one ultimate Reality, and that the true and the good are therefore two aspects of one reality and can never be inconsistent when properly understood. From this it follows that all good has a common characteristic which is determined by the essential nature of the Supreme Goodness, and that all truth is ultimately one, and that, therefore, the need for coherency is basic in man's ntellectual grasp of truth. 3) That the human mind is intrinsically related to this supreme Reality, and that personality is therefore the highest category we know in the light of which to understand and interpret the nature of supreme Reality. We think of this supremely important reality, therefore, as essentially personal. It is the creative fountainhead of all personal values and has an eternal stake in their creation and realization. 4) That every human being is incommensurably valuable and eternal in nature. This is the basic meaning of the biblical doctrine of the divine image in the human heart. 5) That a free fellowship of mature Christlike personalities is the goal of the process we call nature, and that, therefore, each person should treat his fellow man as an absolute end and never as a mere means to the realization of selfish ends. 6) That the human mind possesses an inherent capacity to attain an increasingly adequate and true knowledge of ultimate Truth, while yet inevitably always falling short due to human limitations and an imperfect world. Man's vision of Truth is, therefore, as it should be only if it is continuously growing and expanding. 7) That there is something radically wrong with man, that sin (missing the mark) characterizes human life at all levels of development, and that human life and thought therefore stand always under the basic need of being redeemed, individually and socially. 8) That all exclusively man-centered programs for attaining the good life (humanism, societism, nationalism, universal humanity, scientism) are doomed to failure, for they * Professor of Religion at George Pepperdine College, Los Angeles, California. Readers of this statement of twenty basic Christian principles are invited to make comments for publication in the Forum section of the Journal.

Changing approaches to domestic tourism

Chapter 12: Special Relativity, Time, Probabilism and Ultimate Reality

"A Reply to Prof. J. Patrick Mohr's 'Ultimate Reality and Symbol' Ultimate Reality and Meaning, 3: 316-329." Ultimate Reality and Meaning, 4(4), p. 317

This paper will present an overview of a Hindu process theology. The specific problem it will address, utilizing this theological model, is whether there is only one ultimate reality, or more than one. A source of recent controversy among process thinkers is the approach to religious pluralism that has been developed by John Cobb and David Ray Griffin. This approach operates with the idea that there is more than one ultimate reality. But does this not contradict the very notion of what an ultimate reality is? Or do Cobb and Griffin use an understanding of the term ultimate different from conventional understandings? This paper will suggest that Cobb’s and Griffin’s basic thesis can be preserved with the idea of a single, but internally complex, ultimate reality, and that this concept is available from within the Vedānta tradition.

Modern scientists are trying to find the basic unit of order, fractal geometry, in the complex systems of the universe. Fractal is a term often used in mathematics or physics, it is appropriate as a principle to explain why some models of ultimate reality are represented as multifaceted. Fractals are already widely used in the field of computer graphics and as a commercial principle in the world of science. In this paper, using observations from fractal geometry, I present the embodiment of ultimate reality as understood in Daesoon Thought. There are various models of ultimate reality such as Dao (道, the way), Sangje (上帝, supreme god), Sinmyeong (神明, Gods), Mugeuk (無極, limitlessness), Taegeuk (太極, the Great Ultimate), and Cheonji (天地, heaven and earth) all of which exist in Daesoon Thought, and these concepts are mutually interrelated. In other words, by revealing the fact that ultimate reality is embodied within fractal geometry, it can be shown that concordance and transformation of various models of ultimate reality are supported by modern science. But when the major religions of the world were divided along lines of personality (personal gods) and non-personality (impersonal deities), most religions came to assume that ultimate reality was either transcendental or personal, and they could not postulate a relationship between God and humanity as Yin Yang (陰陽) fractals (Holon). In addition, religions, which assume ultimate reality as an intrinsic and impersonal being, are somewhat different in terms of their degree of Holon realization - all parts and whole restitution. Daesoon Thought most directly states that gods (deities) and human beings are in a relationship of Yin Yang fractals. In essence, “deities are Yin, and humanity is Yang” and furthermore, “human beings are divine beings.” Additionally, in the Daesoon Thought, these models of ultimate reality are presented through various concepts from various viewpoints, and they are revealed as mutually interrelated concepts. As such, point of view regarding the universe wherein Holarchy becomes a models in a key idea within perennial philosophy. According to a universalized view of religious phenomena, perennial philosophy was adopted by the world’s great spiritual teachers, thinkers, philosophers, and scientists. From this viewpoint, when ultimate reality coincides, human beings and God are no longer different. In other words, the veracity of the theory of ultimate reality that has appeared in Daesoon Thought can find support in both modern science and perennial philosophy.

This chapter discusses the concept of Devī. Once the ultimate reality is visualized in personal rather than impersonal terms, then this ‘persona’ could be either male or female. The ultimate reality, when viewed as a male ‘person’, is called Īśvara. When the same ultimate reality is viewed as a female person, it is called Devī. This is the most common way the ultimate reality is referred to when conceptualized as a feminine principle; other names such as aādyā (the original one) and śakti (energy) are also employed, though less often.