From Lifestyles to Metaphysics

[By Hassaan Hyder]

In lay men’s understanding metaphysics is the belief/ theory/ idea or thought which is the point of reference of and for anything.
Intention is the purpose/ the “why”/ the driving force behind anything. This intention is derived from the metaphysics.

Knowledge is the outcome of the intention which is fueled by the metaphysics. This knowledge can be accumulated in various ways.
Lifestyle is the way we act/ behave/ live/ socialize/ do things/ view things. The lifestyle is shaped by the knowledge we have accumulated.
It is far easier, efficient and effective to make changes on a lifestyle to directly affect/ modify/ transform the metaphysics.
Thought becomes things but that takes too much time and effort. It is easier to change things around so that thought can be affected. 

Thoughts   =    metaphysics
Things       =    lifestyle
Descartes thought/ beliefs/ theory/ ideology/ is a metaphysics in itself. The reason for that is that his thought gives a framework which is capable of presenting itself as a metaphysics.
His work has been used to create many social systems that we religiously follow which directly affect our lifestyle and thus have a significant impact on our metaphysics.
Now that we have covered some basics of metaphysics and how they operate we can delve further into the application of metaphysics in society.
Following that will be an explanation of how Cartesian and post Cartesian thought affects how we do what we do which directly affects why we do anything.
In sociology and anthropology the process of socialization is whereby humans learn how to be humans.
  • Every society has different  rules that define what is human and what is not.
  • What is human is in one society may or may not be human in another.
The metaphysics which is dominant in a society provides these rules of interpretation of human behavior.

The interesting observation is that if people adopt the life style of an alien culture they imperceptibly also adopt the metaphysics of that culture without realizing and in such a manner that they realize it when it is too late. This is shown by the dotted line in the above figure.

This is what is happening in Pakistan when people adopted the western life style, they also eventually adopted their metaphysics. Similar process can now be observed in their adoption of the Hindu customs of marriages and lifestyle from Indian cinema which has begun to show in the transformation of their metaphysics.

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Comments

  1. Anonymous Avatar

    Metaphysics is the idea about the universe, God, world or nature that HOW it exists. it is based on reasons but it is not verifiable empirically or it is non testable. so yes we can say it is an idea, belief or in terms of few known philosophers it is the cause of everything in the motion in this universe or in multiverse (concept in quantum physics). Connecting Metaphysics with the research, philosophy behind the concept, theory or research question could be the Metaphysics of the study
    now intentions: I can't relate or derive the intentions after metaphysics.
    In my point of view Knowledge should be the 2nd ladder in the staircase. because we cannot develop any intention without knowledge of the particular idea or belief.
    Knowledge. philosophers basically still arguing on the definition of the knowledge but a generally accepted definition is (“”Justified true belief””)
    If I have knowledge that I am holding a book. Then it is necessary to believe that the object which I am holding is an actually a Book
    Justified: evidence, other support for the belief, testimonials (you saw same objects at other places called books)
    Truth value: state of being true or false
    Belief: A propositional attitude of truth (See explanation of PROPOSITION in the end)
    Knowledge is the relationship between knower(person) and known(object-tangible/intangible)
    So intention (intend, purpose, object, why) should be the third level because if knower or the known-any of them is missing, knowledge cannot be generated and without knowledge can we develop intentions?
    Explanation of Proposition
    Proposition and assertions used synonymously though
    Assertion: is a linguistic act which has a truth value (can be spoken and written)
    Truth Value: state of being true or false or undetermined (declarative sentence has truth value, they can be true or false or undecided (because future assertions can or cannot be true). This is a cat and it will drink milk. It can be true or false or undetermined)
    Proposition: a linguistic act which does not assert anything like this is a book is an assertion it has truth value (can be book and cannot be a book) but “is this a book” a proposition it does not have a truth value it can be YES Or NO but it can not be true or false. like this is a pen- Yeh ek qallam hai- He hik qalaam aahy. The proposition (content) is same in any language. It is not changing but assertion can be changed.

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