~illusivemind

Think about this claim.

It is questionable as to whether it is meaningful at all. Upside down in relation to what? Well, we have designated a northern and a southern hemisphere on our fair planet, with the representation being that the north is on top and the south is down below.

But of course, it could just as easily have been the other way around. There is no objective reason for preferring one to the other. We might discover alien civilizations that position their planets 'upside down' in relation to our own.

To declare the universe is upside down is to suggest that our directional preference has some 'truth' or objectiveness that the rest of the universe has failed to observe. This is absurd because no such objectiveness exists. We have forgotten that we invented this idea of direction.

This is a metaphor for the absurdity of applying objectivity to human 'reason'. Just like north & south we have designated certain ideas and limits to better understand and navigate the realms of human knowledge. For something to be outside the limits of human logic (and there are competing logics that each rule out different absurdities) means simply that it falls outside the rules we have invented. The rules so implicit in the functioning of out brains and our language that it is easy to forget we have invented them.

Were our brains and our language different it is easy to conceive that so too our logic might be different. Thus, 'truth', like 'north', is a word, we invented to describe an idea particular to our place and time. To think that it extends to and beyond the reaches of existence… well the universe might as well be upside down.

I wanted a metaphor [link] and now I have one.