O1

conceptual inquiry regarding meaning » intelligibility

 
In formal terms, intelligibility is what occurs when experiencer, experiencing, and experienced are brought into relation with one other in such a way that their common ground is not their simple identity. The simple identity of the three is just experience as such, which is the experience of no-thing in particular, which is unintelligible—a Mystery. But as the three are expressed in terms of each other—that is, when each is expressed as self, dynamic, and world—this opens the possibility for intelligibility. This 3 x 3 formal expression produces nine terms, and from these, three sets of three form three modes of intelligibility—namely subjectivity, activity, and objectivity. Again, these name different ways that experiencer, experiencing, and experienced relate to each other—i.e., different ways that the three share common ground.

As particular modes of intelligibility (and not just intelligibility as such), the ground of each mode (subjectivity, activity, and objectivity) is a particular type of experience—namely, qualitative, practical, and factual, respectively. These types of experience are complementary and always occur together and by similar degree. Each mode involves a different way of attending to experience, and each tends toward a different kind of knowledge, but all three must occur together to maintain the integrity of their common ground. This grounding relation keeping the three modes together—that is, the common ground of the three grounds—is just intelligibility as such. Formally, intelligibility as such is identical to experience as such—the experience of no-thing in particular—an unintelligible Mystery. It is the unintelligible experience of no-thing in particular that grounds the three modes of intelligibility. In the identity of this unintelligible experience with intelligibility as such, intelligibility serves as its own ground—its own condition of possibility.

Graphically, the modes of intelligibility are represented as three cones pointing/opening laterally. (In the chart above, the cones are represented by the '<' sign.) The cones' apexes represent three different modes of experiencing/attending, and their bases represent three different ways that experiencer and experienced establish common ground in relation. As attending means stretching toward, in each case the modes of attending (apexes) stretch toward a particular type of experience that is characterized by a particular relationship between experiencer and experienced (bases). Successfully attending to experience in these ways brings knowledge. Each way of attending has its own kind of knowledge and its own success conditions for knowledge. In each case the success conditions for knowledge are those conditions that allow the relationship between experiencer and experienced to be established on the ground of truth. Truth, understood as the ground of intelligibility as such—that is, the ground for any type of intelligibility—keeps the modes of attending with their types of knowledge connected on common ground. Each mode refers to truth in its own way, yet it is a common truth to which the success conditions for knowledge are determined. (Details will be addressed at the node level.)

In sum, to repeat, the question of truth addresses the ground of intelligibility as such—that is, the ground for any type of intelligibility. This ground is that which experiencer, experiencing, and experienced have in common, and this, of course, is experience. The three are immediately connected through experience as such. Intelligibility thereby serves as its own ground. But experience as such is just experience of no-thing in particular. For particular experiences to be possible, intelligibility must be grounded in different ways, and these must, all together, "add up to" the common ground of experience as such. Said another way, the ways must formally cancel each other out such that the integrity of their common ground—namely, experience as such—is maintained even as particular experiences occur. So, the question becomes, how is the experience of particular experiences grounded? What are the different ways that intelligibility is grounded such that particular experiences can occur? To address these questions in detail, we need to consider how the modes of intelligibility show themselves.

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