Do ideas exist? What does your perspective imply for what "existence" means?
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Do ideas exist?
- Thread starter Quintessence
- Start date
Secret Chief
Vetted Member
What did this thread originate with?
Nimos
Well-Known Member
Not sure I really understand your question. But if I do, I would say anything that in one way or another can be observed, measured and that we are aware of. If it can't, then we can't be sure that it exists and it will just be speculation or theory, which might later turn out to be wrong and therefore exist.
My first instinct was to say "yes... sorta."
Thinking about it more, I think that I'd add that ideas exist as attributes of the thing holding/expressing/thinking about them and not as distinct things in and of themselves.
I generally think that when we talk about things "existing as a concept," this might be a handy shothand, but it's not really accurate. Thinking about a thing is not really having the thing itself "exist" in your mind; the concept of a thing is just a mental model of the aspects of the thing that you're aware of and think are important.
I'm not sure what you mean, but it was most immediately inspired by reading a few things around RF. It's not a new question for me, personally. It is mostly something for others to think about. I settled my thoughts on it a very long time ago.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
An idea is a thing that is in-between existence and non-existence. It is like a revolving door, the crux between a thing that becomes or a thing that isn't. Any idea ever had, is a potential
Feel free to interpret it how you'd like. There's not really any particular direction I had in mind for this thread - mostly a curiosity and to get folks thinking about the ontological assumptions that underly their worldviews. It is something I harassed adults with a lot as a kid, much to their irritation, and I never really stopped doing it.
Cooky
Veteran Member
No. And what's even weirder is that I can share a non-existent thing (idea) with someone else, and then that non-existent thing can be given to yet another.
...The spreading of non-existence.
I insist they exist, and I believe our natural world is evidence though not proof. I think there is no proof possible.
It implies that the idea comes before the discoverer or the thinker and is pre-existent, discovered rather than created.
Secret Chief
Vetted Member
OK. I mean that this thread originated with you having an idea. So yes, ideas exist.
Regarding your second question, I'm not sure I make the connection.
This is actually very interesting... thanks!
I'm not sure we can really know if ideas exist as attributes of something, but it is a way of looking at it. Another way is to view ideas as the foundation while everything else is an attribute of ideas. There's a name for that, I think. Was it idealism?
How exactly could an idea exist without someone thinking it? How woulf a pre-existent "idea" that's never been thought by anyone even be an idea?
Why do we say these things don't exist, then? If it is so weird and counterintuitive, if not illogical, why describe things that way? Is it an oddity of our language and its limits? Do we just not care about the contradiction here?
I think there's a way to know: find an idea that exists independently of anything else... an idea that isn't existing as an activity of a brain, as a communication as an arrangement of characters in a book or whatnot, etc. If an idea is found existing independently of anything else, then we'll know that ideas don't have to be attributes.
I see it kinda like colour: can you show me the colour blue without showing me something that is blue?
Yeah... I know that some people see the world as expressions of ideas... Platonic forms and the like. I geberally don't see these sorts of worldviews as reasonable.
they exist as abstracts.
I settle for two types of existence, actual/physical and abstract. The problem I see is that everything we are consciously aware of is actually an abstract construct. We presume this abstract construct is an accurate representation of something that has physical reality. In other cases, we are consciously aware that one of these abstract constructs has no connection to reality or anything physical. In these cases, it is fairly easy to be aware that it exists only as an abstract.
Since we make a strong connection with some things between the abstract we are consciously aware of and physical reality it becomes easy to confuse the abstract we are aware of as the physical reality.
The point being that just because something "exists" for us doesn't necessarily mean it has physical existence. Usually, I find it beneficial to keep aware of this.
That is kind of how I view things. It is its own brand of weird, and many don't really understand it, but that's okay. I don't know if I can do a good job of explaining it anyway.
