08-04-2010, 12:07 AM
This post is about imputing inherent essence to objects...
I was going through a desk drawer and throwing out paper, little notes of things written down, these notes were the size of a post its and such. I then had in my hand a banknote I picked up from the drawer. I held it in my left hand and kept throwing out the paper notes in my right. After I finished, I felt the paper note in my left hand and without looking at it (and forgetting what it was), I tossed it into the garbage. Upon seeing it was money, I pulled it out...it had value whereas the other paper notes didn't.
The act of imputing is powerful, it is done collectivly and this collective agreement seems to further validate it. Such as with money, lets face it, its only a piece of paper like the rest of the paper in my desk drawer, BUT...I know everyone will recognize it as money and impute value to it, so even though I see its paper, I see it as more than just paper because of what its collectively agreed as.
We do the same with cartoons (or any character). We watch them, say the Simpsons, and we may for a while think Homer is actually a person. We can remind ourselves he is not, that Dan Castellaneta is doing the voice over and an animator is drawing the character and then its all put together, but the act of imputing things to objects can make it all appear different then it is.
So to say objects are empty is to say that all that is being imputed to objects is only appearance of inherent essence when there is none.
Imputing is done collectively and this creates a sense of "realness", the mass support of belief in something. It does not make it true, it just creates a quality of inertia around such intending on objects.
I was going through a desk drawer and throwing out paper, little notes of things written down, these notes were the size of a post its and such. I then had in my hand a banknote I picked up from the drawer. I held it in my left hand and kept throwing out the paper notes in my right. After I finished, I felt the paper note in my left hand and without looking at it (and forgetting what it was), I tossed it into the garbage. Upon seeing it was money, I pulled it out...it had value whereas the other paper notes didn't.
The act of imputing is powerful, it is done collectivly and this collective agreement seems to further validate it. Such as with money, lets face it, its only a piece of paper like the rest of the paper in my desk drawer, BUT...I know everyone will recognize it as money and impute value to it, so even though I see its paper, I see it as more than just paper because of what its collectively agreed as.
We do the same with cartoons (or any character). We watch them, say the Simpsons, and we may for a while think Homer is actually a person. We can remind ourselves he is not, that Dan Castellaneta is doing the voice over and an animator is drawing the character and then its all put together, but the act of imputing things to objects can make it all appear different then it is.
So to say objects are empty is to say that all that is being imputed to objects is only appearance of inherent essence when there is none.
Imputing is done collectively and this creates a sense of "realness", the mass support of belief in something. It does not make it true, it just creates a quality of inertia around such intending on objects.