Christian Thomas Kohl The Metaphysical Foundations of Buddhism and Modern Science

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environment which is in truth a necessary factor in its own nature. Such an abstraction is a necessity of thought, and the requisite background of systematic environment can be presupposed. That is true. But it also follows that, in the absence of some understanding of the final nature of things, and thus of the sorts of backgrounds presupposed in such abstract statements, all science suffers from the vice that it may be combining various propositions which tacitly presuppose inconsistent backgrounds. No science can be more secure than the unconscious metaphysics which tacitly it presupposes. The individual thing is necessarily a modification of its environment, and cannot be understood in disjunction. All reasoning, apart from some metaphysical reference, is vicious. Section VI. Thus the Certainties of Science are a delusion. They are hedged around with unexplored limitations. Our handling of scientific doctrines is controlled by the diffused metaphysical concepts of our epoch. Even so, we are continually led into errors of expectation. Also, whenever some new mode of observational experience is obtained the old doctrines crumble into a fog of inaccuracies. Our coordinated knowledge, which in the general sense of the term is Science, is formed by the meeting of two orders of experience. One order is constituted by the direct, immediate discriminations of
particular observations. The other order is constituted by our general way of conceiving the Universe. They will be called, the Observational Order, and the Conceptual Order. The first point to remember is that the observational order is invariably interpreted in terms of the concepts supplied by the conceptual order. The question as to the priority of one or the other is, for the purpose of this discussion, academic. We inherit an observational order, namely types of things which we do in fact discriminate; and we inherit a conceptual order, namely a rough system of ideas in terms of which we do in fact interpret. We can point to no epoch in human history, or even in animal history, at which this interplay began. Also it is true that novel observations modify the conceptual order. But equally, novel concepts suggest novel possibilities of observational discrimination. The history of thought cannot be understood unless we take account of a grave weakness in the observational order. Observational discrimination is not dictated by the impartial facts. It selects and discards, and what it retains is rearranged in a subjective order of prominence. This order of prominence in observation is in fact a distortion of the facts. Thus we have to rescue the facts as they are from the facts as they appear. We have to rescue the facts in the discard, and we have to discard the subjective order of prominence which is itself a fact of observation. For example, consider the observed facts in early stages of civilization. The observed fact was a flat Earth with the arched dome of the Sky. Even to
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Christian Thomas Kohl The Metaphysi
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1.Summary The key terms. 1. Key ter
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ideas of substance or subject, two
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2. Nagarjuna Preliminary note We sh
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distinction between two forms of be
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(4) Instrumentalism Instead of favo
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19. “That which has arisen depend
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A brief review of the 25 chapters o
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Chapter 2: A mover and the distance
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Chapter 10: Fire and fuel. Photogra
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Chapter 12: Suffering and the cause
Page 24 and 25: Chapter 13. A teenager and an aged
Page 26: Chapter 23. Pure and impure. Rio Ne
Page 29 and 30: A solar storm. Something is happeni
Page 31 and 32: sometimes three complementary bodie
Page 33 and 34: 5. The metaphysical foundations of
Page 35 and 36: Albert Einstein’s contribution to
Page 37 and 38: Niels Bohr’s contribution to the
Page 39 and 40: The atoms arrive in discrete lumps.
Page 41 and 42: Figure 1: In this Feynman diagram,
Page 43 and 44: centimeter) and are so weak that th
Page 45 and 46: philosophers and physicists have be
Page 47 and 48: What is reality? We have become acc
Page 49 and 50: 4. as an intermediate state by Roge
Page 51 and 52: Appendix 3: Alfred North Whitehead:
Page 53 and 54: of Miletus, alive at the date 600 B
Page 55 and 56: Christian scheme of salvation. Its
Page 57 and 58: accordance with his clear-cut intel
Page 59 and 60: seemingly obvious, are infected wit
Page 61 and 62: Of course in this action, and react
Page 63 and 64: temporal realization of ideas. The
Page 65 and 66: qualification not to be analyzed in
Page 67 and 68: Plato, the mathematician, for long
Page 69 and 70: now that it is dead, it is stone-de
Page 71 and 72: Italian Renaissance. In truth, they
Page 73: for the expression of high abstract
Page 77 and 78: Greeks, Jews, and Muslims from such
Page 79 and 80: F.H. Bradley for instance, fall int
Page 81 and 82: merely that the equality of two and
Page 83 and 84: Alfred North Whitehead: Adventures
Page 85 and 86: occasions, can be validly used to s
Page 87 and 88: element shall have the character of
Page 89 and 90: that if there can be any intellectu
Page 91 and 92: The difference of ancients and mode
Page 93 and 94: course of such physical activities
Page 95 and 96: Section VIII. We have now reached t
Page 97 and 98: The common practice, interpreted by
Page 99 and 100: and in its forms. Thus we discover
Page 101 and 102: distinct meanings. It is to be reme
Page 103 and 104: This consideration is the basis of
Page 105 and 106: example consciousness, if it be pre
Page 107 and 108: together for common ends. Such unit
Page 109 and 110: monad can take account of another,
Page 111 and 112: facts and species are the product o
Page 113 and 114: adopted. Then the word Creativity e
Page 115 and 116: When a general idea has been obtain
Page 117 and 118: eality. The important invention of
Page 119 and 120: the correspondence between a model
Page 121 and 122: E. D. & Feldman, G. J. Quarkonium.
Page 123 and 124: 8. Bibliography Bloom, E. D. & Feld
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'T Hooft, G. Symmetrien in der Phys
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Christian Thomas Kohl The Metaphysical Foundations of Buddhism and Modern Science

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