Following on from my introduction here I will compare two models, or metaphors about the cosmos.
Artefact Metaphor
The western metaphor for the cosmos is that of a Potter and a Pot, or a Painter and a painting, the Artefact model.
It picks up on the Subject-Object distinctions in western philosophy (That its western is a crucial point).
It looks at Subjects like ourselves who manipulate Objects with our ability to make choices, our will or our agency.
In the design for God for example, the argument is a Watch needs a Watchmaker.
For the Cosmological argument, the cosmos must have a cause: God, a Cosmos Maker. The Free Will Argument for God claims there has to be a god who makes choices, and therefore a will and so on.
The idea is based a lot on ideas from Plato and Aristotle, further developed by later thinker like Aquinas.
They all use the same metaphor, a creator/designer making an object. They all grasp towards the idea, the belief, there is a fixed bedrock of existence, upon which we can rest our understanding of the cosmos and ourselves.
The God is considered outside of space and time, make plans, care for his creation and more.
I have problems with this model of the cosmos as I outline in another essay.
Organism Metaphor
Consider an alternative to the artefact model, the Organism model. Think of a Web or net; every thread is interconnected with other threads.
In the Buddhist view is, nothing is separate; the cosmos is ongoing due to an interconnected web of causes and conditions. Therefore impermanence is a feature of the cosmos.
Impermanence, No Self, and Suffering are the Three Marks of Existence in early Buddhism.
What transpires or unfolds is because of causes and conditions in a complex web of influences, and feedback loops.
‘A tree does not require a tree maker, therefore a cosmos doesn’t require a cosmos maker.’
Therefore, the cosmos is like a tree, a self-organising complex system.
The Atomos, the Self
A noticeable feature of the above metaphors is the different attitudes toward a bedrock for our existence.
In philosophy is called Hypostasis.
‘Hypostasis is (Greek: ὑπόστασις, hypóstasis) is the underlying state or underlying substance and is the fundamental reality that supports all else.’
This Hypostasis can be likened to the personal Soul, but it’s much more than that. It’s the uncuttable, unchangeable bedrock or ground of being, what the Greeks thought of as the Atomos.
A related term I get into elsewhere is Hypostatisation is to regard abstract ideas and mental constructs as actually existing beyond the mind, a real thing. That is, our ideas have an existence beyond the mere idea. In philosophical terms, it’s called Realism.
The Atomos, can be seen as;
- The personal Self or soul
- the Self of objects, their essence,
- the cosmic Self or a God, or fixed ground of being.
The crux of this debate rests a lot on our beliefs about this fixed Self.
Western philosophy searched for it the fixed Self, the Atomos; western religion searched for it, that is, God. So did science with Atomic theory. The Vedic religion of India claimed it exists with the personal Self Atman and the cosmic Self, the Brahman. So the idea of a self is very popular and widespread.
What I notice about theists is how much they cling to the idea that there is an underlying substance or or Self. However many Atheists along with Buddhists reject the existence of the Fixed Self, so has physics with the Quantum realm, and I discovered the illusion of the Self a few years ago..
The Buddhist view is that there is no abiding, unchanging existence. This Non-Self or Anatman in early Buddhism and later with Nargajuna, Sunyata or Emptiness.
What we have here is a rejection of what Aristotle or Plato taught. In Philosophical terms, western thought is Essentialist, and eastern thought is anti-essentialist.
Linear vs Circular Time
Another point worth making when comparing Western vs Eastern Cosmology is In the West, we think of time and the cosmos as following a linear path, with a begging to end. But in the Eastern religions, time is seen as circular. There is no begging or end, just cycles of change, like the seasons. It’s a line of thought not addressed in the debate between atheists and theists.
What we have in this debate are different ideas about how the Cosmos is working, one based around an agency, a creator that builds the cosmos like Potter and a Pot. The eastern system of thought sees it more as an Organism, an interconnected web of causes and conditions.
The implications of these diverging ideas I will elaborate in other essays.