Chapter 9

Existence as activity

There are some loose ends we have to tie together before we go on.

First of all, we said that there were three modes of consciousness as finite: the single stream of consciousness, the delimited period of consciousness, and the form of consciousness. Since these are similar as effect, then their causes must be analogous.

And as we can see now from the argument for the existence of God, what the cause of these other types of finiteness must be is some sort of existence (analogously, of course, because each effect is a case of limited consciousness, though not of it as formed, so the effects are similar); and, of course, since they are types of finiteness of consciousness, then in all probability, their causes will be different sorts of finite existence.

That is, the cause restricting my consciousness to "lasting" only for a day or so before it "shuts down" and I sleep must be in some sense existence as finite; and in all probability what this is is the fact that my brain as "producer" of the acts of consciousness has a finite ability to do so continuously; it's neurons get "filled up" with the information coming into them, and can't clear themselves out while more information is coming in; so periodically the whole brain must "shut down" and "erase itself," so to speak, "resetting the nerves to zero," so that they can take in new information.

That seems to be the most reasonable explanation based on what we know of the physiology of the brain; but in any case, it is because the mind can't unify the whole of my consciousness into one single stream that it breaks it up into periods.

Thus, the existence of the mind accounts for the (unified) "stream" of consciousness, and the finiteness of the mind accounts for the finiteness of a given stream, and the fact that it breaks up into a set of periods.

Similarly, the fact that my stream of consciousness is only mine is accounted for by the fact that my mind is only my mind, and is incapable of encompassing all of consciousness. In physiological terms, my stream of consciousness is what is produced by the activity of my brain, which is only one brain among many; and the fact that it is not any more than just this one cuts off my consciousness from anyone else's.

And, of course, since I recognize my consciousness as only mine and not anyone else's, then the cause of this awareness (the particular form of consciousness whose contents is, "I have only my own consciousness") is the existence of my mind, which forces me to recognize that my experience is not all there is to consciousness. Again, the form of consciousness which is the recognition of the particular period of my consciousness has as its cause the other mode of finiteness of the existence of my mind, its subjectivity to fatigue (as when I feel I "need sleep"). Finally, I recognize the act of consciousness in the very act, because I recognize the act as this finite existence in addition to the existence it "talks about" if it is a perception. So when I imagine the unicorn, I recognize the existence of the act of imagining, but not the existence of the unicorn.

Now then, I want to make a move which is basically just terminological. Since perception recognizes itself as not alone and therefore as caused by some existence, while imagining recognizes itself as spontaneous and not needing (now) any existence, it is here that the most basic notion of "acting" and "being acted on" comes. Any other form of "acting" or "being acted on" would be something recognized as similar to this. That is, imagining and perception are both recognized as "doing" something; but perception is recognized as "doing something in response to something else" or reacting-to.

To put this another way, the "prime analogate" of "doing" or "acting" is our own experience of our own consciousness (i.e. our own reaction to our own consciousness, our awareness-of-our-awareness), which is, of course, identical with the consciousness which is experienced. All other "doings" are bound (as far as consciousness is concerned) to be seen as similar somehow to "doing" in this sense in which the "doing" is directly and totally conscious of itself; or the other senses of "doing" are going to be analogous to the "doing" which directly experiences itself.

Hence, when we react and recognize the "doing" as "talking about" something else, we are aware that this "something else" is analogous to consciousness, because we are also reacting to the consciousness as it reacts to this outside existence. So the outside existence is "doing" something to our consciousness in a way analogous to what our consciousness is "doing" to itself.

And of course, what we are reacting to when we react to our consciousness is our consciousness as existence. Hence, the "doing" of our consciousness is its existence. And similarly, that analogous "doing" we are reacting to in perception is the (finite) existence which caused it.

We can therefore say the following:

Conclusion 24: Existence is activity. To be is to do.

This is "activity" taken in the broadest possible sense, since the reaction of consciousness to external existence is also recognized as existence (it is an activity-in-response-to).

Note that "activity" does not imply "acting on" something, because the spontaneous activity of consciousness is not acting on itself in any real sense; it is itself; it is just "being active" as opposed to "doing nothing."

Acting on is another name for causality; and it is what existence does to something when it accounts somehow for it. That is, "acting on," like "reacting to," deals with a relationship between two existences, and these are obviously the relationships of causality and being-affected respectively. But activity is the name for the cause whose causality is "acting on."

We can perform a little "thought experiment" to test whether "existence" and "activity" mean the same thing by supposing the opposite: that there is something that exists but is totally inactive, neither doing anything at all nor reacting to anything, but just existing. Would there be any meaning to the word "existing" in this case, or would it be identical in practice with its opposite?

Well, if we take a theoretically perfect knower, one who could react to any activity at all (who had all the instruments to detect any activity whatsoever), and we ask whether this knower could distinguish this "existence" from the nothingness that is beside it, we can see that he couldn't. None of his instruments could detect it, so that as far as that goes, there would be nothing there. If he sent out a probe into the nothingness and into the "existence," then the probe would, of course, not affect the nothingness in any way; and since the "existence" doesn't (by the supposition) react to anything, then it would not be affected by the probe either in any way. So there is no way, either by reacting to this "existence" or by acting on it, that a perfect knower could know that it existed. For the perfect knower, it is the same as nothing at all.

And of course, if we say, "Well, God created it and as creator he knows it (because he knows his creative act of causing it) even though he can't be acted on by it." But if he created it and there is no difference at all (which of course would be some act) after it was created from before it was created, then this means that he has created something which is no different from not creating anything at all; in which case, what sense does it make to say that he "created" anything?

So a totally inactive being--one that doesn't even resist action on it--is not a being at all; there isn't anything like this. And therefore, being is what is active, and existence is activity.

But this brings up the question of acting on something; and since the cause is no different whether or not it happens to be having an effect, we can say the following:

Conclusion 25: Existence need not be acting on a mind in order to be active or to be existence.

That is, esse is not percipi, as Bishop Berkeley held. Percipi (perceiving) depends on esse (existing, existence), but on the other hand, whether the sense organs or the receiving instrument is or is not in the way to be acted on, the activity itself is no different.

And you know that your mother doesn't go out of existence as soon as she gets out of the way of your being able to perceive her; and even if she's in a room without windows or mirror and is asleep (so that she's not even perceiving herself), she doesn't stop existing; she's still active in all sorts of ways even if there is no one to perceive her.

"Ah," the good Bishop would say, "but God is perceiving her." No, he's not. He can't be acted on by her, and so be the effect of her finite existence.⁽¹⁾ God can't be acted on in any way at all; he is totally self-sufficient, as we saw. So God does not "perceive" your mother. Now it's true that your mother can't be active in the finite way she is active if God is not making the act this finite act; but that has nothing to do with whether anyone is perceiving her⁽²⁾.

At any rate, we can see from this that there may very well be many existences that we know nothing about, and which we could perceive if we happened to be in the right place at the right time, but which for us are just "possible beings," because we have no evidence one way or the other (i.e. they aren't in fact acting on anything that is acting on us, though there is no contradiction in supposing that some acts that haven't done so so far could act on us directly or indirectly).

There may also be existences (acts) that we have no senses to perceive, and which we have devised no instruments as yet to perceive. No one knew about the acts called "radio waves" until instruments that could receive them were built; and if those instruments had never been built, we would never have known that there were such acts. But the sun has been emitting radio radiation for millions of years, and it was doing so long before any human being or anything else was aware of its doing so. And who is to say that there aren't a host of other acts that we don't have any way of reacting to because we don't have a reacting instrument, and which will be forever unknown because the proper instruments for detecting them will never happen to be devised? We can't exclude this possibility.

Hence, we know that existence goes beyond just the world of our immediate experience, and even the world of our direct and indirect experience of the moment; and there is no reason for saying that there are not "more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy." Existence in all probability is wider than (a), the cause of my perception; (b), (a) + all the conditions for my perceptions; (c), (a) + (b) + the causes and conditions for all my past, present, and future perceptions.

Now if we look at these similar cases of finite consciousness and their cause as finite existence, recognizing that existence is the cause of the finiteness of the consciousness in each case, and existence is the cause of finite existence, we find that "finite existence" is actually just the most general way to formulate the problem of finiteness; since any case of finiteness must be a special version of finite existence. That is, finite consciousness is the case of the finiteness of the existence called "consciousness"; finite heat (temperature) would be a case of the finiteness of the existence called heat, and so on. As "special," these cases of finite existence can have as their causes other finite existences; but as finite existences, only God can be their cause.

This allows us to say several things about God. First of all,

Conclusion 26: God is pure activity.

There is no question of "permitting the sin"; he actively wills it to be this act if this is the act I will; and so if I knowingly choose to frustrate myself, then God wills that I do so, and it doesn't bother him if that's what I want.⁽³⁾ He lets me know (by his law) that that's what I am doing; but if I want to do it, this is what he wants me to do--and causes me to do in such a way that I am the cause of the specification of the act.

If, then, you want to interpret God's "permissive will" as being a "hypothetical will" with respect to human choices, I could go along with it: God wills, actively the act which I actively will; and so he wills me not to frustrate myself if I will not to do so⁽⁴⁾.

In other words, what this means is that if God wills that there be a self-determining act, then it would be contradictory for him to will this act to be other than what it determined itself to be; or in other words, if he wills a self-determining act, he cannot have any "stake" in the outcome: whatever act is self-determined has to be "all right" with him. He doesn't allow us to frustrate ourselves or bring suffering on ourselves; he helps us do so if that is what we want to do with ourselves, because our becoming what we choose to be is what it means for us to be ourselves as self-determining; and God wills us to be what we are--and to "will" or "prefer" anything else for us (like our "happiness" even if we didn't want it) would be to want self-determining beings to be other than what they determined themselves to be--which is a contradiction.

This whole issue is clouded over by the sentimental notion we have of God as "sorrowing" over our sin and suffering because of it. It prevents us from seeing that the "sorrowing" God would actually be a God who regrets that we are free to do with ourselves what we want, and only reluctantly lets us set goals for ourselves.⁽⁵⁾

But as I say, more of this later, when we discuss goodness and badness. To resume,

Conclusion 31: God cannot delegate his causality to any other being.

The reason for this is that any other finite existence, whether it is "being caused" or not, cannot be the cause of the fact that any other existence is finite, because if that were the case, as we saw so often, it would be identical with the effect it was causing, and would be a case of finite existence which at the moment made sense by itself. But no finite existence makes sense by itself, and so it doesn't have, and can't have, "what it takes" to make sense out of the fact that any other finite existence is a finite existence. Nor can it be given this, because after it had been given it either (a) it would be infinite and no longer finite, or (b) it would be a finite existence which made sense by itself.⁽⁶⁾

Thus, the motion of my arm, which is a finite act, is caused as this motion now, by my choice to move my arm; but it's not caused as a finite act by my choice or by anything else about me, because my choice and everything else about me is also a finite act. So the movement of my arm, as a finite act, needs God to be acting on it, making it an existence-which-is-less-than-existence; even though it also needs my choice in order to be occurring now and in this particular way in which it is a finite act. So God's existence and my existence together explain the finite act of moving my arm; it wouldn't be what it is if either God or I didn't do what we did⁽⁷⁾.

--I told you we could resurrect medieval metaphysics (not that it was my intention to do so) from the tomb it was sealed in by Descartes' mistake of taking "truth" as "matching the perception with what is 'out there.'" The rock has been rolled away; but be careful: the resurrected body is not going to look the same as it did before it was killed--I think I had better drop this metaphor before it gets too ridiculous.

At any rate, what I want to look at in the next chapter is precisely what all of this implies with respect to subjectivity, objectivity, and truth.

Notes

1. This sort of thing is what is apt to happen if you start with the "perception" and aren't very, very careful. We know that we "perceive" the perception, and so it's apt to be taken to be the object of our consciousness, rather than the form under which we are conscious (generally, of something else). True, we are conscious of our perceptions or imaginings, because the act is self-transparent; but in perceptions, the form of consciousness is simply the way in which we perceive the external being, not a something which we perceive, arguing to the being as its cause or "object." True, I did construct an argument proving that there had to be an existence "out there," but that is not the way we actually do it ourselves; we simply see the object, and see it in this way.

Put it this way: we know by the analysis above that we have to be seeing some existence, because the percept itself is unintelligible without it; but the percept recognizes itself as a reaction, and so obviously immediately "talks about" the existence which caused it.

The point here, however, is that if you take the perception as the object, then you have poisoned the well, and you get into silly positions such as Bishop Berkeley's, where the existence not only depends on but is identical with the perception itself. But then what do you do with imaginary "images." They would have to "exist" in the same sense that the page you are looking at exists.

2. If God can be said to "know" (and, as we will see later, he can), then this has to be only his knowledge of his own activity as cause (of whatever effect), and it can't be by being affected in any way by the existence which he knows. Hence, if God knows in any way at all, it is not analogous in any way to "perceiving," which is passive.

3. I will get into the implications of this later, in the next section when I discuss goodness and badness.

4. Of course, much of this would depend on what you mean by God's "will"; but clearly if he is simple, his "will" is absolutely identical with his act of causing what he "wills." All his "will" would mean is that he doesn't have to cause this particular finite act--which must be true or he would be dependent on the finite act, and this would make him an effect of his own effect, which is absurd.

5. There is actually more to it than this for a believer, who (from revelation) is aware that God is good. As we will see, "goodness" is relative to a person's subjectively set standards, and so has meaning only from the human point of view; and if God is good, this means that every human being will ultimately come to recognize that God is good; that is, that any harm the person has received is exactly what he asked for, and isn't "God's fault."

6. On the supposition that God, in His "self-duplication-without-multiplication" implied in consciousness "duplicated" Himself in a finite way (e.g. as human), then that human (Jesus) would exist with the Infinite Existence, and would in fact be God, just as your "formed consciousness" is as it were a finite "duplication" of the "consciousness of the consciousness" which in a sense is beyond it (as it must be since it recognizes itself as greater than just this act, as we saw). In that sense, a "finite" being (which is one of the "duplications" of the infinite being) could cause the finiteness of other things. This is alternative a).

7. Note that, since my choice as conscious contains itself within itself, it is self-determining--it "chooses itself," as we will see later; and as self-determining it is self-explanatory and "uncaused"; but as a finite (self-determining) act, it is caused by God. So God's causality over my act does not "take away" its freedom; God causes it to be free because he causes it to be what it is: self-determining. But we will discuss this more at length much later.