“You are not the type of man. Pu-liang—I had the ability of the sage but did not know the teachings. I knew all the teachings but did not have his ability. But still I had to teach him. It was three days before he was able to transcend this world. After he transcended this world, I waited for seven days more and then he was able to transcend all material things. After he transcended all material things, I waited for nine days more and then he was able to transcend all life. Having transcended all life, he became as clear and bright as the morning. Having become as clear and bright as the morning, he was able to see the One. Having seen the One, he was then able to abolish the distinction of past and present. Having abolished the past and present, he was then able to enter the realm of neither life nor death … .
Where else does one find a passage this wonderful? Apart from the marvelous phrase, “he became as clear and bright as the morning,” there is the more immediately relevant phrase, “the realm of neither life nor death.”
The concept of the realm of neither life nor death comes closer to what I have tried to say in this essay than anything I have been able to say. It is a perfect example of why I so love Chinese philosophy!
I can think of no better conclusion to this essay than to quote a passage of the Chinese Zen master Huang Po (T’ang dynasty). Of it, the translator John Blofield says, “This paragraph is, perhaps, one of the finest expositions of Zen teaching, for it encompasses in a few words almost the entire scope of that vast and penetrating wisdom.” 7
If an ordinary man, when he is about to die, could only see the five elements of consciousness as void; the four physical elements as not constituting an “I”; the real Mind as formless and neither coming nor going; his nature as something neither commencing at his birth nor perishing at his death, but as whole and motionless in its very depths; his Mind and environmental objects as one—if he could really accomplish this, he would receive Enlightenment in a flash. He would no longer be entangled by the Triple World; he would be a World-Transcendor. He would be without even the faintest tendency toward rebirth. If he should behold the glorious sight of all the Buddhas coming to welcome him, surrounded by every kind of gorgeous manifestation, he would feel no desire to approach them. If he should behold all sorts of horrific forms surrounding him, he would experience no terror. He would just be himself, oblivious of conceptual thought and one with the Absolute. He would have attained the state of unconditioned being. This, then, is the fundamental principle.8
Notes
1
See the viewpoint of the realistic mystic in Chapter 5, “Simplicus and thc Tree.”
2
Daisetz Suzuki, Mysticism: Christian and Buddhist in World Perspectives, Vol. 12, edited by Ruth Anshen (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1957), p. 126.
3
On the whole I admire Dean Inge’s statement (W’illiam R. Inge, Christian Mysticism (London: Methuen & Co., 1912, p. 55n. ): “The allegation that the Christian persuades himself of a future life because it is the most comfortable belief to hold, seems to be utterly contemptible. Certain views about heaven and hell arc no doubt traceable to shallow optimism; but the belief in immortality is in itself rather awful than consoling. Besides, what sane man would wish to be deceived in such a matter?” Much as I admire this statement as a whole, there are three small points that disturb me somewhat. First, I wish Dean Inge had used a less harsh word than contemptible. Second, I find it surprising that he should regard immortality as somewhat “awful.” And third, I feel that his comment, “Certain views about heaven and hell are no doubt traceable to shallow optimism,” warrants the same criticism that he is leveling at those who dismiss belief in survival as traceable to mere optimism.
4
This principle is that every proposition is either true or false.
5
If it did, then there must have been a time before the beginning. If it didn’t, then an infinite past has come to an end, which (according to Kant) is also impossible.
6
A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, translated and compiled by Wing-Tsit Chan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 195.
7
John Blofield, trans., The Zen Teachings of Huang Po (New York: Grove Press, 1958), pp. 45-46.
8
Ibid.
10
What Is There?
This chapter is a bit technical. The reader who finds it too difficult can skip it without loss of continuity.
Ontology
One dictionary defines ontology as the science of being; the branch of metaphysics that investigates the nature of being and of the essence of things.
This sounds like a rather ambitious subject, don’t you think? I am reminded of the following passage from Sherlock Holmes in Tibet by Richard Wincor.1 Holmes is speaking.
On the 15th September 1891, the Vice-Chancellor advised me that I was to be one of several qualified Westerners to attend a special session conducted by Tibet’s leading metaphysician, Lama Nordup. The session was scheduled in a fortnight’s time; all of us were to clear out of Tibet a day later. Somewhat puzzled, I asked the Vice-Chancellor what the lama’s subject would be. His reply (translated literally in these notes) was, “The secret of life and death, and the mysteries of existence.” This reply captured my interest somewhat, and I resolved to attend.
Quine starts his famous essay On What There Is with the words, “A curious thing about the ontological problems is its simplicity. It can be put in three Anglo-Saxon monosyllables: ‘What is there?’ It can be answered, moreover, in a word—‘Everything.’”
A similar philosophy was expressed in Oscar Mandel’s delightful book, Chi Po and the Sorcerer: A Chinese Tale for Children and Philosophers.2 In one scene, the boy Chi Po is taking painting lessons from the sorcerer Bu Fu. At one point, Bu Fu says, “No, no! You have merely painted what is! Anyone can paint what is; the real secret is to paint what isn’t!” Chi Po, quite puzzled, replies, “But what is there that isn’t?”
Chi Po, though hardly a professional philosopher, was really expressing the same ontological viewpoint as Professor Quine—namely, that everything exists, and nothing else exists. Now, some of the medieval philosophers apparently had quite a different idea; they believed that existence is a property that some things have and some things don’t have, and the nonexistent entities can have lots of properties despite their nonexistence. So whereas Quine and Chi Po would agree that there are no centaurs at all—existent or otherwise—these medieval philosophers would say that there are centaurs but no existent ones. In other words, they would say that no centaur has the property of existence; but that does not imply that there are no centaurs, for there still can be nonexistent ones.
The philosopher Immanuel Kant vehemently denied that existence is a property, and so Kant, Quine, and Chi Po are in perfect agreement on this point. Indeed, Kant (though a devout theist) believed that none of the ontological arguments (which purport to prove the existence of God by pure reason) were valid because in all cases they rested on the false assumption that existence is a property.
Quite frankly, I don’t know whether existence is a property or not, but I am perfectly open to the possibility that it is. I take the position, however, that even if existence were a property, the ontological arguments of Anselm and Descartes are still no good. (I give my reasons for this in item # 241 of What Is the Name of This Book?,3 where I show that Descartes’ argument proving the existence of God could just as well be used to prove the existence of anything—such as a unicorn.)
A far better version of the ontological argument was given by the unknown Dutch theologian Van Dollard in an unpublished manuscript discovered by Inspector Craig.4 Van Dollard constructed an axiom system much in the style of the later axiom systems of Spinoza, but his system was far more rigorous! (Sometimes I wonder whether Spinoza ever had access to Van Dollard’s writings. Probably not; Spinoza was far too honest not to have mentioned it!) To fully appreciate the subtlety of Van Dolla
rd’s thought, I must ask the reader to try to put himself in the frame of mind of the medieval philosophers who believed that existence is a property that some things have and other things do not and that nonexistent things can have various properties just as well as existent things. In Van Dollard’s system, certain properties are called perfections, and a god is defined as any being that has all perfections. The system starts with the following two axioms:
Axiom 1. The property of existence is a perfection.
Axiom 2 (the ontological axiom). Given any perfection P, if all things having Property P also have the property of existence, then there is at least one entity having the Property P.
1
From just these two axioms, Van Dollard obtained a rather startling result!
Theorem 1 (the ontological theorem). Something exists, that is, there is at least one entity that has the property of existence. (Perhaps Theorem 1 answers Leibniz’s question: Why is there something instead of nothing?)
Can the reader see how to prove Theorem 1? (All proofs are given in the appendix to this chapter.)
2
Van Dollard next gave the following two axioms:
Axiom 3. Given any Class C of perfections, the property of having all the perfections in C is again a perfection. (For example, for any two perfections P1 and P2, the property of having both perfection P1 and perfection P2 is itself a perfection. The same is true of any three perfections P1, P2, P3, or indeed for any class of perfections [whether a finite class or an infinite one]. In modern mathematical terminology, this axiom would be more succinctly stated: The intersection of any class of perfections is a perfection.) 5
Axiom 4. There is a class of perfections that contains all perfections. (We shall henceforth refer to this class as the class of all perfections, and denote it by P.)
From these four axioms, Van Dollard obtained a rather basic theorem in theology:
Theorem 2 (the weak bible theorem). There is at least one god —moreover, an existent one!
To help prove this theorem, Van Dollard first proved as lemmas the following two propositions (which are not without interest in their own right):
Proposition 1 (rediscovered by Descartes). All gods exist, that is, every god has the property of existence.
Proposition 2. The property of being a god is a perfection.
3
This is as far as Van Dollard could get without using the following axiom:
Axiom 5. For any god g, the property of being identical to g is a perfection.
Using this axiom, Van Dollard obtained his major result!
Theorem 3 (the strong bible theorem). There is exactly one God.
Can the reader see how to prove Theorems 2 and 3?
Discussion. Van Dollard’s proofs (given in the appendix), unlike the proofs of Anselm and Descartes, are completely rigorous by the most stringent standards of modern logic. Of course, the proofs tell us nothing about whether Axioms 1 through 5 are actually true, but as pieces of formal reasoning, they are impeccable! That is to say, whatever meanings one gives to the term the property. of existence and to the term perfection, if the axioms are true under those meanings, then Theorems 1 through 3 are also true under those meanings. In other words, Theorems 1 through 3 are really logical consequences of Axioms 1 through 5. Moreover, it is easy to give meanings to those terms under which the axioms are true, and so, if nothing more, the axioms are certainly consistent.
And What about the Devil?
Good question; what about the devil or devils in general? Are there any? If so, how many are there? Do they have the property of existence? Is it possible that some of them have the property of existence and others not?
Fortunately, all these questions were settled completely in a remarkable manuscript written by a learned church doctor, Alphonso C. (Unfortunately, I am not allowed to divulge his complete name or the name of the manuscript [which, incidentally, was also discovered by Inspector Craig].) The manuscript was branded heretical by the Church, and the author was condemned to be burned at the stake. Fortunately, Alphonso escaped from prison and hid away his precious manuscript—probably the only surviving copy!
It appears from Alphonso’s philosophical investigations that there are also certain properties called antiperfections, and naturally a devil is defined as a being that has all antiperfections. Here are some of Alphonso’s postulates concerning antiperfections.
Postulate I. Nonexistence is an antiperfection. (Nonexistence is of course the property of not having the property of existence.)
Postulate 2. Given any antiperfection A, if there is no existent entity having Property A, then there is no entity at all having Property A. (An existent entity is of course an entity that has the property of existence.)
4
From these two postulates, Alphonso first proved this theorem:
Theorem A. There are no nonexistent entities. In other words: Everything exists! (This means that Quine and Chi Po were right after all!)
Alphonso then proved the following theorem, which may well be the most important theorem ever proved!
Theorem B. There is no devil, existent or otherwise.
Of course it was Theorem B that caused Alphonso’s break with the Church.
5
Alphonso had one very talented Polish student, M. Askanas, who (like all of Alphonso’s students) believed that there was no devil but would not accept his master’s proof. It’s not that he believed that there was anything formally wrong with it, but he couldn’t bring himself to accept Postulate 2 since it leads to Theorem A, and Askanas was not open to the possibility that there cannot be any nonexistent entities. He therefore proposed an alternative postulate that (with Postulate 1) also yields Theorem B but not Theorem A. Preparatory to stating this postulate, Askanas introduced the following definition: For any Property P, an entity is said to have the Property P + if it has both Property P and the property of existence. (For example, if P is the property of being a fruit, then every apple —existent or not—has Property P, but only existent apples have the property P +.)
Here is Askanas’s alternative postulate.
Postulate 2’. For any Antiperfection A, the Property A + is also an antiperfection.
This postulate strikes me as particularly plausible. Indeed, I would say that if A is an antiperfection, then the Property A + is, if anything, even a worse antiperfection than A! For example, if A is the property of being a tyrant, isn’t the Property A + even worse? That is, isn’t an existing tyrant worse than a nonexistent one? Surely, of the two, the existing tyrant can do the more damage!
Anyhow, as I have said, Theorem B can be derived from Postulate I and Postulate 2’. Can the reader see how?
Remarks. Someone once asked me if, instead of proving that there is a God and no devil, couldn’t one prove that there is a devil and no God? The answer is: Of course; just change the axioms!
I have heard that in the twelfth century there was a rumor that Alphonso G. had another student who constructed a system that sounds most intriguing! According to the account, this system (like that of Askanas) proved there was no devil and left open the question whether or not there are any nonexistent entities. The system, like that of Van Dollard, proved there was a God—in fact, a unique God—but the most curious thing of all is that the system did not prove that there is any existent God! In other words, the system proved that there is a unique God, but whether or not God has the property of existence was evidently undecidable in the system. (I’m not sure whether this proposition was proved undecidable in the system, or whether it was just that no one was able to decide it.)
This system sounds quite fascinating, and I wish I knew more about it! But, as I have said, it may be only a rumor. Moreover, I’m not sure whether there really was such a rumor, or whether I merely heard there was such a rumor.
Medieval Ontology and Solipsism
It has just occurred to me that the medieval ontology that espouses the possibility of nonexistent entities ca
sts a new light on the philosophy of solipsism.
Suppose a solipsist says to me, “I am the only one who exists.” How am I to interpret this? From the viewpoint of Quine and Chi Po, the statement can have only one meaning: “There is nobody else but me.” But from the viewpoint of medieval ontology, the statement could just as well mean, “I am the only one who has the property of existence.”
These two possible meanings strike me as having a drastically different significance. Frankly, I find it almost impossible to believe the solipsist if he intends his statement in the first sense. (I say almost for reasons that are dealt with in Chapter 12.) But if the solipsist intends his statement in the second sense, how can I know that he is wrong? Since I don’t quite know what this property of existence is, then how can I tell which people have it and which people don’t?
Chaudhuri’s Ontology
I shouldn’t leave the subject of ontology without at least a brief mention of some Eastern thought on the subject.
Many of you have heard the classic Hindu philosophical pronouncement: Nothing exists. Should this be interpreted to mean that no entity has the property of existence or that there are no entities at all?
The only Eastern philosopher I know who has seriously addressed this question is a certain Dr. Chaudhuri (whom I read about in some private notes of Inspector Craig). He vehemently affirmed that the statement was meant only in the first sense and that a lot of misunderstanding on the part of Western philosophers was the result of their interpreting it in the second sense. “Of course there are entities,” wrote Chaudhuri, “the only question is whether any of them have reality!”
I should mention that Chaudhuri translated all of his own works into English and that he used the word reality instead of existence. He referred to an entity as being either real or unreal, and we shall follow him in this respect. Obviously, he defines a real entity as one that has the property of reality and an unreal entity as one that does not. He stated his main theorem thus:
Five Thousand B.C. and Other Philosophical Fantasies Page 11
