The Yijing as a Mathematical Metaphysics
نویسنده
چکیده
In this paper I weave together a number of apparently distinct threads of investigation: the spiritual function of mathematics, the Image and Number (Xiangshu 象數) approach to the study of change, information theory and reality, divination and consciousness. The general background to this discussion is the idea that the study of mathematics forms a spiritual pursuit; that the investigation of abstraction through precise formal language provides, at the least, an analogue of transcendent reality. This was once a key underlying assumption of mathematics, but it is largely neglected in the modern world. The Image and Number approach to the study of Change embodies this ideal and asks us to take seriously the idea that, just as mathematics can describe the physical dimensions of the world, so too it can provide a language to investigate the psycho-spiritual dimensions.
منابع مشابه
Mathematical Metaphysics
The fundamental question of metaphysics is what exists, not in any particular structure, but in general. To answer this question requires determination of the nature of existence, or more concretely, what it means for something to exist. Thus a worthwhile metaphysics should provide an explicit criterion for existence. A wide variety of such criteria have been proposed, and these can be divided ...
متن کاملNeglect of Metaphysics
Not even false” is a saying that is part of the lore of academic physics. Metaphysics is said to be meaningless. But there are compelling arguments, that originate from the work of the rationalist philosopher Spinoza, and from the work of Godel, Church and Turing in the foundations of computer science, which relate physics to metaphysics. The principle of possibility from Spinoza and the unders...
متن کاملThe Metaphor of Vision and the Construction of Sexist-Norms in Western Metaphysics
Current feminisms have emphasized the systematic nature of women’s oppression. Feminist scholars like Luce Irigaray insist that woman’s difference and otherness is a matter of male-dominated institutional definition: because the woman is theoretically subordinated to the concept of masculinity, she is seen and objectified by the man as his opposite, described as an absence, a lack, and, most no...
متن کاملThe Influence of Ibn Sìnå on Gadr ad-Dìn Qinawì and His Followers
This article is an investigation into the nature of the Sufi metaphysics of Gadr ad-Dìn Qinawì and his followers. In contrast to previous scholars, who have considered Qinawì to be dismissive of philosophy in a way similar to Ghazålì, the author shows that in fact philosophical metaphysics, and in particular the formulations of Ibn Sìnå, had a great impact on Qinawì and his followers in the sch...
متن کاملThe Fiber Bundle at the Gates of Metaphysics. Challenging Maudlin’s Proposal
In a recent book (The Metaphysics within Physics), Tim Maudlin reconstructs metaphysics by taking inspiration from the gauge theories interpreted in the fiber bundle framework. I call his project the “fiber bundle metaphysics”. Primarily targeted not to Humean Supervenience, but to any metaphysics employing the relation of resemblance among objects (D. Lewis, D. Armstrong), Maudlin’s project is...
متن کامل