(Continued from volume 2)
In order to discover the ultimate origin of reality, one must avoid taking made-up concepts for granted and attempting to produce logical arguments with them as though they are fundamental constituents of reason.
In the previous volume, I have mentioned that my very own thoughts are the only ingredients from which my definition of reality can possibly originate, based upon the premise that the act of reasoning itself can solely be defined as a set of mysterious beings called "thoughts" and their mutual relations.
One may definitely question this viewpoint by saying that the concept of thoughts, too, must be considered arbitrary, and that it is thus quite inadequate to assume that it should form the basis of one's reasoning. And yes, I do admit that the so-called "thoughts" themselves are mere crumbs of intuition which just popped out of nowhere and thus are undefinable in the sense that there is no concept which is antecedent to them.
Another line of reasoning, however, evinces me that the nature of definitions and their collective system of logic do not necessarily require that every definition be preceded by another definition. That is, I do not perceive any particular reason to suppose that the scope of reality must exclude every definition which simply declares the presence of an arbitrary symbol.
Yet, it is also equally important for us to realize that we should not keep inventing truckloads of symbols for the sake of divining the essence of reality, since there is no particular reason to claim that reality can be understood by means of mere plurality of symbols, either.
The subsequent conclusion one is able to reach based off of the above speculations, then, is that the definition of reality as a whole must begin somewhere which may be characterized as arbitrary, yet such a groundless spot of reason must be kept as minimal as possible in order for us to avoid attaching superfluous ornaments on top of its surface.
From my point of view, I would say that my own thoughts, regardless of what they are, constitute such a groundless spot. The main reason behind this is that I cannot define my thoughts in terms of other definitions, which subsequently obliges me to base my reason upon the arbitrary concept called "thoughts" by assuming that it is the ultimate origin of all definitions other than the one which says: "Let there be thoughts".
Still, there may be objections which question the validity of such a conceptual choice. I will list some of the probable ones and try to refute them below.
(Question 1) "How can you so proudly say that nothing precedes your thoughts? Can't we suppose that there could be an external cause, such as your biological brain from which your mental processes originate, which comes before the occurrence of your thoughts?"
(Answer) What does it mean when someone says that something comes "before" or "after" another? Such a relation makes sense only when we presume some kind of order between at least two discrete entities. And this concept called "order" does not intrinsically show us that it is something so unique, that it cannot be made out of thoughts.
(Question 2) "Since you are a thinking agent and there is no evidence that nothing can possibly exist outside of your domain of thoughts, don't you see that there could be external observers (e.g. other people) who possess their own versions of reality which are made up of their own thought processes?"
(Answer) What does "outside" (or "inside") even mean, if all I can conceive are my own thoughts and absolutely nothing else? Unless I decide to split my area of thoughts into arbitrary subareas, there is no such thing as a boundary. And if there is no boundary, the concept of "outside" ("inside") will have no substance. And there is no such thing as an "external observer" either, since an object that is deemed as such is just part of my observation when it comes to pure sense data. I am the only observer in my definition of observation (unless the definition broadens itself out so that any object which functions as an information relay, such as a video recorder, claims its right to be referred to as an observer), which means that there is no reason to attach a special label called "observer" to myself for the purpose of distinguishing myself from "other observers".
(Question 3) "Why are you telling me so confidently that a set of logical definitions are necessary ingredients of reality? Where is your evidence that logic is required for the purpose of illustrating its nature? Can't it be just as equally valid to suggest that an illogical concoction of ideas could serve as an even more accurate representation of what reality is?"
(Answer) To be fair, an illogical juxtaposition of thoughts can be considered part of the initial condition of logic because a fully independent statement does not have to be bounded by a logical constraint (because there would be nothing antecedent to begin with). However, the course of deriving the definition of reality itself cannot be carried out by an illogical process, since it requires logic to derive a definition from an antecedent definition. If we exclude logic from our faculty of reasoning, any groundless supposition which popped out of nowhere will obtain a right to equate itself with reality (in which case any search for truth loses its volition).
(Will be continued in volume 4)