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The Lógos (mind map of the Reality) - Coggle Diagram

- - - - The Concept of Truth
        
        Jesus: I came to bear witness to the Truth!
        Pilate: What's "truth"?
        This is not about knowing what is true, not yet. To start, we must figure out what is truth, as in what makes something true! And, by that measure, what makes something untrue, or false ... In other words, we must figure out what separates things that are true from everything that isn't.
      - Freedom As Recognition of Necessity
        
        (why limitless possibilities rob us of freedom)
        
        If this sounds like a paradox, it's because it's easy to confuse two distinct kinds of freedom. One is about doing things -- anything you want. The other is about actually getting something -- anything -- done.
        To see the difference, imagine being blindfolded in an open field. You're not tied up and you can move in any direction you want -- except you won't be going anywhere! You won't because w/o peeking, w/o limiting your choices to the ones that keep you on desired path, you won't be able to walk a straight line. Walking in endless circles instead, you could be on a leash to the same effect!
        (now imagine walking blindfolded through dense forest and you'll see why our lives could end up nasty, brutish, and, ultimately, senseless)
        The true freedom, then -- the freedom to actually accomplish things -- is only possible when we can foresee the outcomes of our actions, when we can tell the right steps from the multitude of the wrong ones...
        And that's why, if we can't be wrong, then we can't be free.
    - - Assuming Science
        
        (or, rather, the possibility of doing it)
        
        It would be tempting for me to say, “We leap toward the light!” – following the logic of the proverbial drunkard who, having lost his keys somewhere in the park, was found, at some ungodly hour, searching for them under a lone streetlight… Not because, mind you, it would be the first place to look (that honor, sadly, went to a ditch 40 yards away). The reason he was looking under the light was far more basic: That was the only place where he could see.
        And so are we, leaping toward the place where we could see. Except in our case, it is not a bright spot in the sea of darkness – it is, literally, the opposite: We trade the blinding lights of the infinite possibilities for the shadowland of the [objective] Reality. A place where some things are black and some white; where some shine brightly, while others cast long shadows; where some things are possible, and some aren’t. A place where we could be free because we could be wrong… objectively wrong!
        This is, then, our concept of truth: "True" simply means "real". Or, rather, the Logos is the Truth. That's why you can only know the Truth if you succeeded in assembling the Logos, a comprehensive model of the Reality.
        "Assuming science", then, means assuming that you can know the Truth, that you can build, in your imagination, your own copy of the Logos -- your own model of our shared Reality.
  - - - But What About Quantum Effects?
        
        Quantum Mechanics is real, which makes it possible, for example, for me to teleport (sorry, tunnel) into your living room, fully dressed and in time for afternoon tea. Don't hold your breath though -- a pleasant surprise as it may be, it might take a few lifetimes of the Universe for it to actually happen... and by "a few" I mean a trillion gazillion.
        In other words, even though quantum effects play significant role on subatomic scale, on macro level it's safe to assume a deterministic Universe.
        
        But What About Free Will?
        
        This is where things get technical. The Universe being deterministic means that our future is predetermined, yes. However, we still don't know what the will be! Only in retrospect we can say that our choices were predetermined. As for the future, suppose you choose A -- then you will know that in our Universe A was the only possible choice. If you choose B, however, then you will know that B was the only possible choice.
        See what I mean? Even though our choices are predetermined, the only way we can find out what they are is by making them. So choose wisely ;)
      - 3. In God's Image
        
        That's us, that's what we are (or, at lest, that's how everyone of us should turn out). The third and last item is an assumption not about Reality, but about us. It states that not only Reality is fundamentally understandable, but it is so by us, humans. Essentially, it claims that we – as in every one of us, every human individual – can understand/know everything!
        As ambitious as it sounds, it is just as true owing to the hierarchical nature of knowledge itself. The three assumptions above, the science-as-theory is the first principle at the top of the hierarchy – that’s where every chain of reasoning ends.
        And that's how every one of us can "understand everything": By putting together the whole picture in good enough resolution, by learning only a few top levels but deep enough to recognize what’s on that picture. That kind of general understanding of things everyone should be capable of before they are old enough for high school! And after that, if you want to take a closer look at any particular part of Reality, then please, knock yourself out, get your PhD or a few … sky is the limit!
        
        The Second Commandment
        
        And that's why that last assumption is also your Second Commandment (and my favorite): “DO NOT PUT OTHER GODS BEFORE ME!”
        The Reality is the Truth, it is its only source. That’s why you should not stay content with others telling you what the truth is, including but not limited to: God Herself (I’ll explain), yours truly, Jesus,* the Holy Scripture, your favorite guru, your role models, your influencers, etc., etc.
        Instead, why not remember whose image you were made into, personally, and, I don't know, start acting like it? Because yes, you can!
        Beyond simply learning what is, you can figure out why it is so, and all the rest of the why’s – how things came to be like this; how they could have been otherwise (your options); and, eventually, how things ought to be (as your conscious choice). That is how, every one of us can understand creation – and ourselves – to become a human soul in God’s own image, a virtual copy of God-As-Reality, including a copy of God’s own soul.
        Call the latter the “Laws of Nature” or the “Divine Spirt” – God’s soul is the eternal force driving every change and every creation, breathing life into the Universe, and making the world go round.
        
        * “It is necessary to know how to distinguish the sacred treasure from the vessel which contains it; otherwise, one risks falling into idolatry.” (Lev Shestov).
        Well. There goes Christianity.
        
        Why Don't I Believe You?
        
        (... about us, humans, being in God's Image)
        
        The reason we don't look exactly God-like is that the part of our psyche, the one that would make us in God's image, is not, umm... fully functional.
        We still have the brain's "hardware" for it, everyone of us does. It can make everyone a genius, like Jesus or Einstein. Problems is, we don't come preinstalled with its "software", the Logos. We don't, because we weren't actually intelligently designed. We are the product of evolution, and there is only so much information our DNA can encode!
        So, instead of being born with the knowledge of being human, every individual must assemble their own copy of the Logos, piece by piece. Which they can't even start on until they master the basic skill -- the art of connecting the dots, of fitting low-end models into the higher-end ones (your copy of the Logos becomes complete when you have assembled the highest level, the one that lets you you see the whole picture).
        None of it is given, and that's why we have evolved to spend extra 5-7 years in our childhood* -- so we can learn, under the guidance of the adults and older children, the art of assembling the models of things we are trying to understand.
        
        * Compared with Chimpanzee, our closest animal relatives.
        
        Being in God's Image is Optional
        
        And not only assembling the Logos is not easy, it is also optional. And so is being in God's image -- optional.*
        That's why most of us aren't, presently, and that's the reason for all evils and suffering. Which is to say that, ultimately, our suffering is of no one's fault. If you want to blame, blame evolution -- that's how we evolved, evil and ignorant by default, simply by doing nothing.
        Or, rather, we have evolved in the way that makes it everyone's personal choice whether to develop their human potential and become in God's image... or not.
        
        * Optional in the comfort of civilization, that is. For the most of our 300,000-year history as anatomically modern humans, being an idiot was not a survivable condition.
      - How We Understand
        
        (the process of understanding)
        
        To understand something means to build, in one's imagination, a mental simulation of it. We start by identifying observable patterns -- from those in the movement of celestial objects to those in our romantic relationships. Then we try to imagine a process that could be driving those patterns -- visualizing it as a machine of some kind.
        
        The Lógos
        
        (your model of the Reality)
        
        The Reality’s internal consistency means that our mental simulation of it -- the Lógos -- must also be internally consistent: Like a well-designed machine, it must run, first and foremost. Then, it must run in the way that would re-create the patterns we observe in the real.
        That give is the ultimate truth test -- if something fits perfectly with the rest of the puzzle, then, however improbable, it must be true.
        
        The Mad Scientist Syndrome
        
        It is the "however improbable" part that can make an ingenious idea appear crazy. Most people don't have the Logos completed enough to test ideas against. They must, therefore, judge things by their superficial appearances. That, in turn, often puts them at odds with those few who has the Logos completed and can see how an otherwise improbable idea fits perfectly in the larger model of the Reality.
        A good example is such an idea would be the model of our Solar system. It is counterintuitive because our senses clearly suggest that earth is flat and sit motionless at the center of the Cosmos and everything celestial revolves around us. And that's only one reason why Galileo had such a hard time convincing people othervise.