Sense

  To occur is to come about, or become real. Like an apple begins to occur on an apple tree becoming real. 'Occurrence' is here being referred to the becoming of things, or how a thing becomes part of reality. New things occur every day in the world, non-stop. The newer they are, they tend to get increasingly complex as well. We turned out to be quite complicated in the history of reality, right? Even things we build today are more complex than the ones we did yesterday.

  It is fair to say that reality must have been straightforward early on, gradually becoming complex with an increasing variety of things. A question then is: what were the things at start, and what did they mean? Did it start with nothing for no reason? Did it start with one thing, or a set of things in it?

  Well, a world cannot begin with nothing for sure. 'Nothing' cannot turn into a thing. 'Nothing' is void of meaning as well.

  How about a world with one thing to start with? It sounds like an idea, but vague. Its dificult to make sense of it. A lone thing can have no interaction, and what is a world without interaction?

  Interaction is the key to a living world. There has to be interaction for things to multiply and gain variety, and interaction means two at the least. Besides becoming more things, two also allows comparison and counting. As in how many things are there, or which is larger or smaller. A thing being smaller than another is by comparison, which isn't possible for a thing alone.

  Being small or large is a meaning. Small isn't a thing. A meaning says something about a thing with respect to another. Meanings signify relation between things by referencing one another.

  Count is a meaning as well, in the same way. It is based on relation. Having a count means there are things together that are somehow related in their given situation. It is pointless counting if there's only one thing in the entire world. Much like a single thing has no point being large or small.

  With two, a world has things and meaning.

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- Reference form meaning, the same way occurrence form things.
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  Reality is composed of things and meanings. Things are everywhere in the world, and they are bound by meanings. The adherence of meaning between things is what makes the world coherent and realistic. Meanings aren't all human-centric. Meaning applies to every single thing in the world, living or non-living. All things connect with relevant others forming relationships like we do. Of course, simpler things have simpler connections, and complex ones can have complex connections. The connection formed by meaning between things isn't physically part of a thing but is outside of the thing. It is no surprise that meanings aren't physical, like things are. Meanings are abstract, and the abstract of meaning is an outcome of 'process.' The process is here elaborated as an abstraction.

  When things interact, their interaction can reveal how they influence one another. An influence, if there is any, signifies a commonness that the things share to form a connection. Such a connection of commonness is meaning. Friendship, for instance, is a connection of commonness between people that is formed via interaction of people. Such a process of establishing commonness via interaction is the process of abstraction.

  Things in the world continually move around and come across other things. Say a magnet comes across another magnet and they attract each other. Their attraction signify influence, which is due to magnetism. Magnetism is meaning, as magnets are things. Magnetism isn't physically part of a magnet, although it is associated to the magnet's physical properties. The magenitism can in-fact be practically in-existent if nothing in the world is influenced by magnetism. Such attributes of things that manifest only upon relevance, or upon finding commonness with others, constitute the abstract aspect of our world. Such an aspect of reality simply cannot be physical as they are shared between things. As abstracts, they don't exist all the time but only upon relevance as influence.

  A chemical reacting with another chemical manifest meaning the same way. Their reaction is the process of abstraction, and their chemical affinity is their shared meaning. All meanings, be it count, size, chemistry, or friendship, are all an outcome of things encountering other things as they come by. Such a process of interaction never stops in the world and continually goes on revealing new meanings.

  There is another form of interaction that takes place in the world. It is the interaction of meanings, as opposed to the interaction of things. An interaction of meanings reveal meaning as well, but a different kind of meaning.

  Suppose two chemicals share some meaning such that their reaction indicates a new chemical. The new chemical is a revelation of meaning. It is 'meaning' because the new chemical doesn't really exist as a thing, but exist in meaning only, or it is meaningful for it to exist. In other words, the new chemical exists in an abstract form. All things have their abstract significance in the world, besides their physical significance. The two chemicals whose reaction foresees a new chemical didn't really interact as things. Their meanings did, or their abstract forms did, which led to the abstract of a new chemical. Such an interaction between meanings is also a process of abstraction. Such meanings revealed by the interaction of meanings signify the 'conception' of new ideas or things. It also implies that the abstract of a thing comes prior to the thing itself. Or, a thing is conceived in meaning first, only then it comes to reality. It is no different than an offspring being conceptualized by its antecedents, upon which the offspring comes to reality.

  The two modes of abstraction not only differ in the type of meaning they produce, they also differ in direction. One feeds onto the other in a mutually inclusive manner. Both are part of a larger whole, which is the natural process of reference. Both play a distinctive role in the revelation of reality, but both reveal meanings only. The revelation of meaning via interaction of things is here being referred to as 'downward abstraction', and revelation of meaning via interaction of meaning is here termed an 'upward abstraction'.

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  The distinct characteristics apparent in the two modes of abstraction imparts some clue to understanding the onset of reality, and to its growing variety as well. At a glance, new ideas and things coming into the world can appear to be solely the creative output of an upward abstraction. However, there's more than so. A holistic look at the two makes it evident that the downward counterpart plays its subordinate role in the progression of variety.

  An upward abstraction conceives new ideas from existing meanings. So an increase in the number of existing meanings will naturally increase the conception of new things. What comprises an existing meaning? Existing meanings are nothing but meanings revealed by interaction of things in a downward abstraction. In brief, things interact and produce new meanings, and the meanings interact to produce new things. Or, more meanings lead to more things, and more things lead to more meanings.

  Clearly, the two symbiotically depend on each other in cycles. Such a continuous cycle of the two, feeding one onto another, is what perpetuates the progression of a world.

  Which comes first naturally becomes a question then. Well, both forms of abstraction can be seen taking place in the world today. Does that mean both are viable of taking place in the primitive condition of reality? The primitive condition being a world with just one thing alone.

  The downward abstraction involves interaction of things, which means a single thing alone cannot have a downward abstraction. The upward abstraction, on the other hand, is an interaction of meanings. What meanings are available for interaction in a singular world, and what new meaning can their interaction reveal? Can a single thing abruptly mean to become a car? Of course not. A car's meaning is an interaction between the meaning of wheel, axle, and body. The meaning of wheel or axle wouldn't have existed then. Moreover, their meaning further depends on other meanings and so on. It comes down to what fundamental meanings possibly exist in a singular world for an upward abstraction.

  A thing by itself as the entire world is a strange situation for sure, and the thing itself isn't any less stranger. Real things have real attributes such as size and color, but size or color cannot be applied to the singular one. Without another thing around it can neither be large nor small. The lone thing wouldn't move either, as there isn't anything else around to move by.

  To the contrary, the singularity can be considered to be something that has all attributes that there possibly can be, or something that is present everywhere in its movement. Regardless of such ambiguity or strangeness, the single thing for sure means to be one. 'Oneness' is meaning avaiable at the start.

  It is also evident that the only possibility forward for such a lonely 'one' is for another thing to occur next. In other words, 'two' is a meaning that 'one' can find to move ahead as reality. So what meaning can the meaning of 'one' interact with and become two?

  Suppose, all shirts in the world are one size fits all, one color and one style. Will there be any telling if I ever change shirts? No. Having another kind is the only way to validate change, which means change is a meaning that goes along with two as well.

  Can change be the meaning that one interacts with to become two? Possibly. Does the meaning of change depend on any other meaning, like car depending on the meaning of wheel? The meaning of change only depends on the unchanging, which is also what one is. So change is a meaning available for one to interact with at the very start. What really is change then, how does it manifest? Change simply means prior different than later. Prior and later is nothing but the process of time.

  In essence, the world onsets in an abstract manner. Like the way abstract of car precedes the physical car, or abstract of a child precedes the child. It is time that set the abstract into motion, to become real.

  All meanings derive from time. Color, for instance, inherit the meaning of time. Color is an outcome of electromagnetic frequency, and frequency is a function of time. The meaning of large and small succeeds time as well. Size is nothing but the amount of space occupied by a thing compared to others. Space occupied by a thing compared to others equates to the expansion of space over time.

  Motion can be viewed the same way, as an outcome of time. Mass, which is a thing, is static by itself. It is the relationship between masses that makes them move. Gravity is one such relationship between masses that makes them move. Gravity being the connection of time between masses.

  Every single thing in reality is tied to every other thing by a specific connection of time. Such an interconnection of time gets increasingly elaborate and intertwined as newer things and meanings come by. We are an outcome of such elaborate interconnections of time. The increasing complexity also means abstracts further and further away from time, and the element of time in such complex meanings can appear lesser and lesser obvious.

  Say a car is moving at a certain speed. It's easy to determine where it will reach at what time knowing its speed. However, if the car is accelerating, it gets a little more difficult to determine so. The element of time is no longer straightforward in the case of acceleration. It is because speed is distance over time, and acceleration is distance over time squared. Speed has one connection of time, and acceleration has two connections of time. abstracts time twice. Much the same way, complex meanings can appear less obvious of time.

  We deal with many complex meanings in our world, such as the meaning of Love. They are beyond our comprehension. They are hard to comprehend not only because they are complex, but the meanings themselves precede our being. A barrage of such complex meanings constitute our abstract form. Of course, there are ugly meanings in it too. Hate, spite, and so on, which are equally complicated. They are bound to exist as part of our world. However, if we begin attributing ourselves more and more with the ugly possibilities, we can cease ourselves from reality. Between the two abstractions, the upward finds possibilities, and the downward finds realistic attribution of the possibilities. A surge of unrealistic possibility is naturally unfavorably to reality. It is analogous to the fact that an invention, upon finding no use, ceases away from reality.

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  Quantum entanglement suggest that entangled particles continue to cohere influence when seperated by unproportionate distance at unimaginable speed. Such a mysterious quantum world, also the hypothetical portion of universe that has managed to not show any influence on us so far, can perhaps be better understood with our arm wide open understanding of time. ___

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Sago.
May 25th, 2020 CE
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