Monism/ oneness, dualism - and pluralism

The metaphysical idea of monism, or oneness has apparently always held a powerful attraction for intellectuals - at least since the times of ancient India and ancient Greece; and this continues to be the case - including that many self-identified Christians espouse oneness ideas or push Trinitarian concepts a long way in that direction. 

Pluralism, on the other hand, has not been taken seriously as a metaphysical assumption except by William James; despite that (or, more likely, because) it seems to be the spontaneous way of thinking of all children and all hunter gatherers - where it gets called 'animism'. 

The main group of literate explicit pluralists on earth are the millions of Mormons - but they do not seem to be at all interested in the staggeringly radical implications of this foundational assumptions of their faith - and have instead (historically) focused on creating a distinctive church and lifestyle (which is, like other Christian churches under global totalitarianism, rapidly collapsing and being corrupted into The System).

Consequently, monist/ oneness criticisms of dualism, and dualist counter-arguments to monism, take up the whole of the discussion of possibilities that I have come across. 

One main intuitive appeal of monism of the kind that (in the West) is associated with Vedanta Hinduism, Buddhism, Sufism and the various syncretic advocates of a Perennial Philosophy - is that it includes everything; and therefore creates a deep and spiritual connection between man and 'nature'. 

Whereas, by contrast, dualistic Christianity focuses almost wholly on God and Man - and modern Christians tend to regard ideas about nature (animals, plants, landscape) as being in fact alive and conscious and in spiritual contact and communication with Men - as being a demonic delusion, a return towards the evils of paganism, magic, etc. 

This attitude of dualist Christians is deep and recurrent, because it stems from metaphysical assumptions - therefore even when Christians personally feel the kind of 'contact' with nature; they have difficulty explaining it it any way which does not subordinate it almost out of existence, which gives it sufficient weight and reality. 

In other words, the dualism of most Christians has been a strong factor working against the kid of Romantic Christianity that I advocate. It can be overcome, and is overcome - nevertheless dualism presents a structural obstacle, a centrifugal tendency. 

If, on the other hand, one adopts a pluralist attitude to reality; which regards ultimate reality as consisting of many, many Beings - with God (the creator) and Men being two of these types of Being; then there is immediately a metaphysical basis for that community with nature which the oneness-advocates put forward as pantheism. 

The difference is that monism/ oneness-advocates regard Man and nature as one with each other only in terms of being aspects of deity - and with the ultimate aim of removing all separation towards an undifferentiated unity.  

Whereas a pluralist hopes for increasing communication and harmony between Beings that shall remain forever and irreducibly separate. The emphasis is on the harmony of aim and methods between Beings, each of whom is alive conscious and with purposes. 

Indeed, the role of God the Creator can be seen as providing the basis for this harmony; so that the pluralist view is 'developmental'. It begins with a chaotic clash of each Being against all; and works towards that harmony of multiple separate Beings which is called Heaven. 

Thus pluralism offers a third possibility - very seldom considered; but which - I believe - combines the best of both monism and dualism. 

Pluralism of Beings, oneness of consciousness - the metaphysical starting point

I accept the intuition of most young children and tribal peoples that reality is made of many Beings - thus I am a pluralist. 

I therefore reject the usual 'monist' mainstream metaphysical and theological assumption that every-thing began as one thing; e.g. the pantheistic assumption that everything is really one deity, or the monotheist assumption that one God created everything from-himself. 

Instead I regard God as one (or, in fact, two) of the original Beings; and that God creates 'using' pre-existent Beings from-which to create. 

Like most pluralists - I regard linear and sequential Time as real, essential - thus reality has a history. Things have changed through history and there is a future aim; thus reality is 'evolutionary' or more exactly developmental.   

But while I believe that there always-have-been many Beings in reality; I also believe that these Beings originally shared in one original consciousness. 

Therefore history has been a developmental separation of the consciousness of Beings; so that by now (especially in The West) Men experience the world as if they each had a completely separate consciousness. 

Indeed many Men believe that this is a 'scientific fact' and that Men can only 'communicate' indirectly and symbolically - hence unreliably and distortedly - via language. 

So I regard the developmental history of Men as having gone from a single consciousness with minimal self-awareness and minimal autonomy of thought and agency of action; through to the current situation when (adult) Men assume a complete separation of awareness and agency: each locked inside his own mind/ brain. 

I regard this current separation of consciousness as ultimately a choice, albeit a choice based upon deep assumptions and ingrained habits. 

My understanding of God's motivation is that the destiny of men (that is, what God hopes from us, each individually; and makes possible) is that from our state of self-separated consciousness; men will individually choose to re-enter the common consciousness of Beings. But not as a return to the primal situation of minimal awareness, autonomy and agency... 

This time, Men are given the choice to enter a creative group-consciousness in Heaven; a group-consciousness of resurrected eternal Men. 

In other words; Men will have gone from an involuntary pluralism of Beings with oneness of passive unconsciousness...

Through the current situation of pluralism of Beings with a chosen pluralism of consciousness...

To a pluralism of Beings with a chosen oneness of creative consciousness. 

How Not to conduct a metaphysical enquiry! (Further responses added 3 May 2024)

Kristor, of The Orthosphere, is very good at expounding his own metaphysical assumptions (which are essentially those of Thomistic Roman Catholicism); but when it comes to making a comparative evaluation of different metaphysical "systems"... well, he just doesn't ever do it!

Kristor is an old internet pal, going back to the time before I was a Christian, and we interact affectionately offline. Indeed I would regard him as a pen-friend, a good person, honest and trustworthy and (so far, at least) On the Right Side in the spiritual war of this world!

But for more than a decade this matter of what it is to conduct a metaphysical enquiry is one concerning which I have been apparently (across multiple online interactions) utterly unable to get across my argument.

In a recent post; Kristor discusses the matter of whether reality is ultimately one (monism) or many (pluralism). By his argument, Kristor apparently supposes that he has logically rejected pluralism as in essence incoherent, therefore necessarily wrong. 

Yet what he has done in his discourse is merely to demonstrate that when someone has accepted the assumptions of monism - then swapped-out the assumptions that everything is one and replaced it with an assumptions of pluralism, the result does not make sense. 

I say again: Kristor believes he is conducting a metaphysical enquiry and comparing different metaphysical systems - but he is not. 

In actuality he is just expounding his pre-existing metaphysics, rooted in pre-existing assumptions (and I assert they are assumptions) concerning the fundamental nature of reality. And then Kristor is correctly demonstrating that his Thomism becomes incoherent if one was to introduce pluralism into it... 

Which is - of course - true! Pluralism does not (and cannot) cohere with an otherwise monist metaphysical system! 

Kristor's argument does not at all mean that pluralism is necessarily incoherent; for example when pluralism is one part of a different set of fundamental assumptions concerning the nature of reality.

I think the fundamental reason why I "cannot get-through" to Kristor on this matter, why we keep having the same non-argument over and again, is that he regards his own metaphysical assumptions as necessarily true; and this blocks his ability (and interest) in making any other assumptions - even for the purposes of philosophical debate. 

And perhaps Kristor regards his own assumptions as necessarily true because he does not acknowledge that they lead to any fundamental problems. 

For example, I think he does not acknowledge the ineradicable depth of the problem of explaining genuine free agency for Men in a reality conceptualized as created from nothing by an "omni-God". Nor do I think Kristor appreciates the ineradicable depth of the problem of accounting for the existence of evil in a reality wholly-created by a wholly-Good (and omnipotent) God.  

And, to speculate further! - I think Kristor does not acknowledge the depth of these problems, because he is satisfied by those abstract and complex "answers" provided by Thomism. 

And (to complete the circle) these are answers that themselves assume the metaphysical primacy of abstractions. 

(As examples; Kristor - following traditional RC teaching - assumes the fundamental and necessary truth of God's omniscience/ omnipotence/ omnipresence (etc) - and these are abstractions. Similarly; creation-from-nothing (ex nihilo) is assumed to be necessary, and that is an abstraction. More fundamentally; Kristor's understanding of God as God, is an abstract one: his understanding of God is in terms of the definitional necessity of God having certain abstract attributes - such as those above.) 

Although we can note that such a focus seems to date from early in the history of Christianity (albeit there is no evidence of it in the contemporary eye-witness account of the Fourth Gospel) we can still ask why is it that abstraction occupies such a fundamental position in Christian metaphysics? 

And our answer will depends on further assumptions regarding the nature of Christianity. For Kristor (and apparently for most Christians since some time after the ascension of Jesus) there can be no such thing as Christianity except from within the perspective of The Church (however that "The" is defined). 

For Kristor; "The" Church just-is Christianity; and this is not a matter for legitimately Christian metaphysical enquiry. To challenge or doubt what has been assumed for maybe 1900 years; makes no Christian sense: to do so is simply Not to be a Christian. 

To assume (as I do) that "being a Christian" is a primary reality that has no necessary link to any particular metaphysical assumptions; and no necessary relationship to any church in general or particular; does not for Kristor imply the legitimate possibility of further enquiry - but invites explanation in terms of ignorance, insanity or sin. 

This is related to other matters concerning what Christians ought to be doing, here-and-now. 

For Kristor; Thomism is just true, the nature of Christianity derives from the truth and necessity of the RCC; and therefore all legitimately Christian futures must build upon these. 

But for me; this version (as I regard it) of Christianity has deep metaphysical problems, that require better metaphysical solutions (or else, Christianity will continue to disappear). For me; "modernity" has been - in part - an increased conscious awareness of the unsatisfactory nature of traditional Christian (e.g. monist, omni-God, abstract) understandings of human freedom and the origins of evil. 

I regard metaphysical awareness and enquiry as non-optional, as absolutely necessary if Christianity is to avoid (what I see as) the long-term, relentless, and accelerating trend of either explicit or de facto apostasy; which (for me) was made evident in 2020 - when all the Christian churches (including RCC) willingly (and without later repentance) subordinated themselves to the globalist agenda of totalitarian evil. 

So! These apparently trivial interpersonal debates between myself and Kristor - or, failures to debate, as I regard them - are like the tip of an iceberg of differences; that I regard as ultimately sustained by a deep and long-term problem of wrong metaphysical assumptions about Christianity being instead regarded as necessary and true metaphysical assumptions. 

Note added: 

Kristor responded to this post here. 

@Kristor - I - like you - reject "radical ontological pluralism" - as being incoherent - so everything you say about that subject is (I'm afraid) irrelevant.

Instead, you can and should assume that I regard every single theologian of the past as significantly in error; and that there really is nobody else who has the same metaphysical assumptions as I do.

You are candid enough to acknowledge your assumption that since I am in a minority of one, therefore I must necessarily be wrong - so (from your perspective) there is no point in wasting time on finding out what I do believe!

I don't blame anyone for ignoring anything - we are each responsible for our own salvation, primarily. But I personally believe that this attitude of seeking truth in (some kind of) consensus of past and status, is both anti-Christian (in the sense of being opposed to what Jesus said and wanted), and (here and now) a guarantee of choosing the wrong side in the spiritual war of this world.

(We are not so alone nor so ignorant as you assume! Much true knowledge is born into us as children, and God has ensured that each of us has sufficient wit to discern his own salvation - with the personal guidance of the Holy Ghost. God would surely not have been so foolish as to depend upon each and every person getting good guidance from his external social environment!)

But, there again we are up against utterly different basic assumptions! Yours is that anything true and important on the subject of Christian theology has already been said - and therefore truth should be sought among external authorities.

My assumption is that the prime reality of our life of salvation and theosis is rooted in a personal relationship between ourselves and Jesus Christ, and that we not only can but must (post-mortally if not before) take personal responsibility for our ultimate choices.

You complain that I do not explain myself in the comments sections of blog posts. True enough! I have given up on that mug's game!

Instead; I have written hundreds of blog posts (as well as the Lazarus Writes mini-book) over the past decade, explaining and re-explaining my metaphysical assumptions and arguments from as many different angles as seemed helpful - and as simply and clearly as I am able.

I have also addressed the specific critiques you make. But I expect you would not find my points acceptable - exactly because your basic assumptions are so completely different.

(For example, your discourse takes place outside of Time/ Time-less/ in simultaneity of Time (sub specie aeternitatis); whereas I assume that Time is (as it were) intrinsic to reality (because the pluralism of primal reality is made of Beings, and Beings are living and "dynamic" conscious entities). Therefore, for me, all fundamental explanations require allowance for Time. This has many consequences. For instance, I believe we began with pluralism, with many uncoordinated entities; and God's creation - which is happening in Time - has-been and is progressively imposing "unity" or cohesion upon that primal "chaos". For me, this explains why both oneness and pluralism, creation and chaos, are part of our mortal experience.)

It's all there, on my blog, for anyone who is interested - of which only a handful of people have been, but those few seem to understand me accurately enough. And if someone is Not interested - well, that's his business, but not mine. After all, my main motive in writing so many hundreds of posts per years, is to clarify and critique my ideas for my benefit. The readers are mostly just looking over my shoulder.

In sum, you have clearly set-out some of the Many reasons why you do not want to engage with what I actually believe. You feel no Need for it, and already assume I Must Be wrong.

While, on my side, my unique theology has happened only because I have already (to my own satisfaction) known and rejected that which you regard as true.

What I am saying is that our decisions rule-out any genuine metaphysical discourse - which explains why this has never actually happened!

While it only takes one side to make a war - it takes at least two people to have a metaphysical discussion!

Monism ("oneness") teaching and theory is (in practice) always Dualism

I've written recently about 'oneness'- distinguishing it from what I believe to be the correct understanding of Christianity.

But I should clarify that the teaching of oneness as an ideal always entails duality in practice: monism is always really dualism.


And this has been the case since the very earliest, pre-Socratic philosophers and Plato and the Neo-Platonists; Hinduism and Buddhism, and the Platonic-influenced but mainstream versions of Christianity... Some of these claim variously to be monisms, but all actually are dualisms.

This can be seen in the attitude to change and changelessness. All assert that ultimate reality is changeless, outside of time, unified and perfect.

But all are forced to account for the fact that the world as we know it is changeable - characterised by with disease, decay and death - and im-perfect.


This is regarded as an illusion (maya), a temporary misunderstanding and/or misinterpretation (eg. due to sin, perhaps due to a 'fall') - nonetheless, this claim only kicks the can; because if all is truly one-ness and perfect - where/ why/ how, then, does illusion come-from?

Sooner or later, some kind of dualism of reality must be introduced; and always is introduced.


Total reality is - in effect - divided into two abstract categories; one true real-reality and the other erroneous mere-appearance. The key assumed fact - needed to complete the basic picture - concerns the source of that error. 

*

The only alternative to dualism (or the ultimate two-ness of reality) is not oneness (which simply does-not-work), but pluralism: more-than-twoness. I am a pluralist, and my ultimate category is Beings, which are living/ conscious, eternal, many, and remain them-selves - through whatever transformations they undergo. Other pluralisms are possible (e.g. pluralism seems to be the spontaneous assumption of children and hunter-gatherers; and is proposed theoretically by William James and Mormon theology), but the assumption has never been popular among philosophers; and is regarded as a mere mistake in reasoning by the vast majority. Regardless, I believe it to be true!  

AI-dolatry among Christians is the flip-side of fundamentally anti-personal metaphysical assumptions

I have commented before about my dismay at AI-dolatry among so many self-identified Christians - specifically their failure to recognise and grasp that the current iteration of "Artificial Intelligence" (which was top-down launched nearly three years ago, at the end of November 2022) is primarily a totalitarian - hence evil - strategy; designed for the accelerating corruption and damnation of Men. 

But vulnerability to AI-dolatry is the other side of a coin which in practice asserts and assumes the abstract impersonality of God and created reality - despite that Christians are supposed to recognize God as a person, as our Father, and we his children. 

That this is "in practice" and almost indifferent to theological theory, is evident from the official Mormon church's positive response to AI, describing it as: "a rapidly developing technology that has significant potential to assist the Church in accomplishing God’s work of salvation and exaltation." 

This despite that the CJCLDS officially regards God as an exalted and embodied Man; indeed as two Men - a Heavenly Father and Mother; which is an explicitly non-abstract primary understanding of the creator and creation that, one might have supposed, should have protected Mormons from AI-dolatry. 

But no. 

The fact is that modern Christians get their fundamental metaphysical assumptions from mainstream society, not from their religion; and our society is bureaucratic hence fundamentally anti-personal, anti-human. 

We have, for many decades, denigrated individuals and their personal judgments and evaluations; and instead given primary moral authority to the impersonal: to system; laws and regulations; process and procedures; voting and committees. 

(And all churches operate internally by these same assumptions; all churches are bureaucratic, procedural, deploy committees and voting at their fundamental levels of decision-making etc. - which of course affects their evaluations.)

It has been a "natural" extension of this abstract-impersonal way of thinking; that the human element ought ideally to be minimized or eliminated - such that computers, robots, "AI" are by their nature potentially superior to humans... 

Supposedly superior because less prone to corruption, error, variation; and (by our false but common mainstream understanding of these terms) more informed, more knowledgeable, more intelligent - hence wiser and authoritative; than any possible human or combination of humans.  

In short: the assertion is that "AI" is potentially superior because (and insofar as) it is not human.      

In theory, Christians ought to be immune to such self-destructive and deluded foolishness - but in practice they are qualitatively as bad as everyone else! (ie. Any measured differences between modern Christians and the mainstream - e.g. in surveys - are merely quantitative, and insufficient to make a qualitative difference.) 

My understanding of this, is that Christians are now reaping the consequences of ancient errors in their metaphysics - in particular of rejecting our spontaneous knowledge that reality is plural and animated: in other words that the ultimate reality includes many living, conscious, purposive and eternal beings - and these are the basis with which divine creation has worked. 

(That is; God created from and by-means-of many pre-existent Beings.)

There was, very early, a capture of the Christianity of Jesus Christ; by a metaphysics of oneness (hence monotheism) - and the adoption of multiple abstract assumptions (which became dogmas) such as: creation from nothing; omnipotence/ omniscience, omnipresence; and the conceptualization of God's creation as including unalive/ non-living aspects such as minerals...

This metaphysics imposed itself upon the simple teachings of Jesus (essentially, the promise of resurrected eternal life in Heaven to those who followed Him) to make a complex systemic religion of this-world and its institutions - in which the essential teaching became obscured, distorted... 

(And indeed all-but denied at times and in some places, such that salvation became so complex and contingent-upon-this-world, as to be regarded as actually impossible for some/ many people.).  

Many centuries downstream; and in the unique and unprecedented actual conditions of our modern society; these have led to underpinning assumptions that dominate (often unconsciously) most Christians - and almost everybody else. 

We see physics or mathematics as the primary reality, and the unalive as existing prior to (what we regard as) living beings - and as life and consciousness as having been made-from and/or added-to dead materials.   

In a nutshell; even those who believe in creation imagine God as starting with non-living materials; then making plants, animal, then Men by adding life, movement, consciousness etc. 

Whereas we ought instead to imagine everything created as alive (and outside it, only incomprehensible chaos); spirit as coming before matter; with matter "condensing" from spirit - so that spiritual life and consciousness are basic, have always-been - and always shall be. 

I think this is how we spontaneously (but mostly unconsciously) come into this world understanding things; and that young children still think this way. And I think the reason for this is that God implanted such knowledge in us, as innate knowledge which we (nearly always) need in order to live well and attain salvation. 

The discarding of our innate animism and pluralism did not matter much when Men spontaneously retained "participation" through into adulthood. 

Because in effect these Men (e.g. in the Classical and Medieval times) continued - but unconsciously and unavoidably - to perceive the world in the same way as young children, or could return to this way of thinking via the methods of religion (ritual, symbol, scripture etc). 

But now we all become alienated through adolescence; becoming cut-off from this innate knowledge and the spontaneous sense of being part of a living world - and from this state of alienation; modern Men therefore consciously need to choose to return to our innate knowledge and understanding. 

And we need to do this conscious act of return for-ourselves, because there are no institutions - not even churches - that will teach or encourage us to do so. 

Not just for-ourselves; but from-ourselves; because it is actually contradicted by many of the actual, here-and-now dominant and mandatory, Christian church teachings. 

And therefore church-orientated Christians (those who regard a church, or any external source, as having primary authority over Christian understanding) are stuck in delusional materialism; including AI-dolatry... 

Which, unless identified and repented at some point, has the potential to lead to their self-chosen damnation.   

My take-home message here, is that anyone who hopes to escape their own self-chosen damnation - which will eventuate for those who follow external "authority" in this actual world, including church authority; would be wise to bring to consciousness, and reflect deeply upon, their most fundamental assumptions concerning the nature of reality.