George F. R. Ellis - What Exists?

Lots of things exist. But what is so absolutely fundamental in that it cannot be further reduced into anything more fundamental, but other things that exist can be reduced to it? The challenge is to discern the minimum number of basic categories that can explain the entirety of existence.



George Francis Rayner Ellis is the Emeritus Distinguished Professor of Complex Systems in the Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics at the University of Cape Town in South Africa.


Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[soubhikmukherjee]

Listening to George is always a huge pleasure.

[ili]

We investigated this question a lot in a Buddhist Studies graduate level discussion decades ago, and none of those scholars would agree with RLK’s first assumption in this video, that “..the bench exists, the tree exists..”, except in the most conventional sense. Ultimate existence is another thing entirely

These scholars were quite impressive. They all knew about five languages, including Sankrit, and a few were interpreters for the Dali Lama. A few also had scientific and mathematical degrees. I was merely a curious undergrad, quite happy to simply listen.

[TheTroofSayer]

I like Ellis's idea of possibility space. It fits with my own interpretation of "infinite possibility". Possibility space (infinite possibility), begins with the quantum void and the yearning for "somethingness" to precipitate from "nothingness". Virtual particles, and all that. And what defines possibility space (and its constraints)? The mind-body does. Which brings us back to the mind-body problem, which should be central to the consciousness debate.

[charlesmadison]

"There is nothing either good nor bad but thinking makes it so."
~ Shakespeare

[KevinZimmerman]

With the little bit of discussion presented here, I don't think of "possibility spaces" as having much value. When he brought up ethics as existing in the possibility space, I think Kuhn was right to counter that everything exists in that possibility space. Someone can think of amoral thoughts, or pragmatic thoughts, or thoughts which are specifically manifested to further beauty of some kind. It felt he focused on "ethics" probably for some personal, subjective reason, when in reality the way that he had described possibility space it would allow for everything to be possible and thereby make nothing particularly noteworthy.

[ezthatsme]

What exists, is unlimited possibilities collapsing into a finite reality.

[TheUltimateSeeds]

Anything that resides on the opposite side of absolute nothingness, "exists" in some context or another.

[markfischer]

The only thing we think we know for sure exists are questions. Just questions, no answers. Will we ever find out anything else? That's just another question with no answer.

[wayneasiam]

Another enjoyable video from Robert Kuhn's channel Closer to TRUTH. I wonder if EXISTENCE is dependent on TIME. Not even one strand of string Theory exists without TIME being involved...I suspect that TIME is the progenitor of all EXISTENCE. All of everything. Not a result of something or other.

[ban_gali]

Only CONSCIOUSNESS exists nothing else exist.

Brahma Satya Jagat Mithya, Jivo Brahmaiva Naparah 🌸

[Nate]

How the "possibilities" came about to begin with? Why these possibilities not different possibilities? If if these particular possibilities what is the end porpoise?

[-by-_Publishing_LLC]

(5:55) *GE: **_"You can only think a thought if it is possible to think it."_* ... Existence (Consciousness) equals _"all information."_ Anything that has information attached to it constitutes "existence." My thoughts form the basis for my comment. My thoughts can be orchestrated using letters. These letters form words. These words form sentences. These sentences form a complete statement that communicates my thoughts.

... ALL of these represent "information" and equally represent *Existence.*

[johnpayne]

Fabulous discussion … and a very real one
Question: is reality a collapse of possibility space vis-a-vis the wave function?

[austromusician]

65 million years ago, when an asteroid impact wiped out almost all life on planet Earth, the mechanism of evolution realized that growing life as big as a mountain would not be a defense against such an external threat. Life had only a chance to survive if if it understood it. And thus it evolved a species capable of just that. Luckily for us, we are an evolutionary necessity.

[julian]

You know what? Screw it — im a platonist. Ill work out the arguments for it debating literally everyone in modern society. This will be fun! 😅

[jayb]

I like possibility spaces. I personally view the universe as a zero energy field which is a potential infinity just depends on how energized it is.

[scooby]

How about a video about "How are living things born with preprogrammed instincts and predispositions?"
Morality is often talked about like it is exclusive to us. Same with consciousness.

[yinYangMountain]

In my opinion, here is the basic answer:

At the highest and widest level of reality there is…

1. A bedrock foundation which, at minimum, won’t allow a paradox (logical contradictions).

2. A bedrock foundation which (if we could understand it) allows for the whole of reality and not any other.

3. Given conditions understood in the same way and in the same sense, it seems there must be an explanation as to why things happen the way they do/did as opposed to another.

If, for the sake of argument, we grant 1., 2. and 3., it seems these rules (for lack of a better term) are eternal and why there is something rather than an absolute nothing. So, for example, without 1., 2. and 3., and in light of an absolute nothing where a paradox is allowed, there would be no reasons for anything. This ‘no reason’ hypothesis leads to an overflow of paradoxes and a reality based upon reductio ad absurdum.

Based upon the above, in the end it may be the case where the existence of ‘something’ as opposed to ‘nothing whatsoever’ must be the case.

[ingenuity]

Things exist if we can sense them, but things still exist even if we are not there to sense them.

[bluelotus]

The gross and subtle, or abstract, material elements constantly manifest and do not manifest under the sway of time, but they both exist eternally on the potential level. Beyond these manifest and non-manifest material energies there's the eternally manifest spiritual energy.