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+--- Thread: The mystery of questioning (/thread-15064.html)
The mystery of questioning - Magical Realist - Dec 4, 2023
How is it that questioning, which is to all appearances a wholly linguistic self-contained act, can touch upon and open us up to the nature of realities totally beyond language? By questioning, we frame reality in terms of the open-ended, in terms of the possibly knowable, and somehow we come up with answers and information that didn't exist to us before. We have much to understand about this elusive universe we find ourselves embedded in, not the least the very consciousness that can illuminate it and reveal its deepest meanings if not its very essence to us. "I think, therefore I am?" Yes, but also "I ask, therefore I know!" Asking the right questions is an epistemically transcendent act. It opens one up to knowledge that was formerly concealed.
RE: The mystery of questioning - C C - Dec 12, 2023
It might be a consequence of humans being able to reflect on the past and being preoccupied with the future, more so than animals who arguable live in the present. Our imaginative abilities enhance that "time-traveling", too. Along with tool-making capacity, such makes us more aware of cause and effect -- where inevitably, in the course of following the chain, one runs into wondering about the ultimate origins of things. We're also more aware that our deaths are certain, which in itself triggers both numerous questions and invented answers that later cause apprehension.