Ontological Monadology [13]
The difference between seeing yourself in a mirror and knowing yourself seeing a mirror
Here is a puzzle based on the first few parts of Leibniz’s Monadology. This puzzle refers to beings (as in ontology), whereas Leibniz referred to monads (as in simple individuals).
The statements below define a basic framework for the puzzle. Think of it as a possible world-view. For a moment, try to envision your world according to this framework. Imagine you are one of these individual beings among all the others.
Here is the framework:
Imagine that the universe contains individual beings who are aware and perceptive.
Each being is infinitely small, and the universe is completely filled with them.
Beings have no constituent parts or components, and yet no two are identical.
Beings differ according to their perceptions—their feelings, memories, ideas, and so forth.
Some perceive place in order to organize perceptions that occur together.
Some perceive time in order to organize perceptions that do not occur together.
Some perceive number in order to organize perceptions by sequence or quantity.
Some perceive ignorance in order to organize perceptions into loosely-related collections.
Further considerations:
Ignorance refers to the ability to completely ignore some perceptions and to significantly compartmentalize perceptions by ignoring relationships among them.
A being may have a wide variety of perceptions, such as insights, expectations, sensations, desires, representations, dreams, fantasies, and so forth that are not specifically mentioned in the basic framework.
Each being is capable of very complex perceptions and very complex collections of perceptions, including such things as perceptions of other perceptions.
Some beings may perceive confusion, even to the point of overwhelming disorientation or being unconscious of most of their perceptions.
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How do you know where one being ends and another begins?
How many beings are there, really?
What is the universe of all these beings, and where does it exist? (The simplest and most obvious answer.)
How does this relate to knowing and intuiting?
How does this relate to the previous stories?
Remember Being Dreams Forgetting.
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