Existential angst of being physically at the center of my universe

Doesn't seem that this question is coherent. Why is it like to be this, assuming being like this (whatever this is) is a universal experience for beings like me. How else is it supposed to be like?

If you weren't at the center of your own perspective where would you be and if you were blind, would you have use for stuffing strange significance in the metaphor of looking from a center?

"God (or Bob) is an (un)intelligible sphere (body), whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere." ~ Quoted Through the Ages

Quoting Scott South

Is there a specific term for this?

Schopenhauer talked about it.

Quoting Scott South

I know I'm not the center of the universe. But physically, I am the center, from purely my own perspective, looking out at the world and all other beings. The occasional angst I get is: Why am I the person who is physically at the center looking out? Is this about the "meaning of life"? I don't care about the meaning of life. I only wonder why I'm at the physical center of it, looking out. Do others feel that way?

"Headlessness", but some people find commonality in it. I'm headless too!

Simply because you have a nebulous feeling that you are at the center of the Universe, does not translate to the fact that you are at the center of the Universe. Indeed, I would give you odds on a small wager that your feelings of such are mostly in error. But that's just how we are, eh? - error prone. It's kinda part of the human condition, perhaps.
>?<

Reply to Scott South

There's something logically questionable here. Everyone is "the person who is physically at the centre looking out"... So regardless of who you are, you will be "the person who is physically at the centre looking out"...

Hence, there is nothing about "the person who is physically at the centre looking out" that is specific to you.

More generally, arguments and considerations such as this persuade me to a disregard for phenomenological thinking.

Quoting Scott South

I know I'm not the center of the universe.

You are at the centre of the universe. I'm so glad to meet you at last. The rest of us are circling around you. You are in the middle of everything with a clear view. For everyone but you, reality is skewed off to one side depending on where we are in relation to you. Everything you do is a sign. Everything you say is analysed for its hidden meaning. Every moral choice you make determines the fates of millions. You are what the entire universe is all about!

Reply to Banno Reply to Nils Loc Yeah, yeah, thanks for the condescending lecture. I'm not interested in philosophy, but what I really want to know is--do you get the same feeling, or thought, and is it unsettling? It's more of a psychological question, I suppose. Now let's see if you can answer politely, otherwise don't bother.

Reply to Scott South That was polite...

Reply to Scott South You ARE the centre of your universe. There is no other way perspective could work. You are the centre of your universe in that everything is identified relative to it's relationship to you. There is a Calvin and Hobbes comic (yep, going to humour on this example) which has Calvin and his stuffed tiger, Hobbes, looking out while Calvin muses... "six billion years of evolution...to create me." It is funny, but also completely accurate. Absolutely there are countless other things which exist in your universe, logically this is accepted as fact, however, until YOU know they exist...they are effectively irrelevant in your universe, and, therefore are non-existent. If you were to be removed from your universe, that universe would cease to exist, as you are not there to look upon it.

And No, I do not find this unsettling in the least. I find it soothing.

Thanks--that's helpful. You have described it neatly. It appears that some others describe it as "why am I me?" I simply feel uncomfortable from time to time if I have the time to remember that thought. Maybe it was the origin of people believing in reincarnation, and life after death.

Quoting Scott South

The occasional angst I get is: Why am I the person who is physically at the center looking out?

Everything is at the origin of its own reference frame. The Sun is at the centre of it's, the Earth of it's, the Moon of it's. And how things are in the world is unique to each reference frame. From the point of view of a current-carrying wire, the force on a moving charge outside it is magnetic. But from the point of view of the charge, it's electrostatic. Very different stories. The distance from the Earth to the Moon depends on your reference frame. The time it takes for a ball to hit the floor likewise. Every frame is special, therefore no frame is.

Quoting Scott South

I know I'm not the center of the universe. But physically, I am the center, from purely my own perspective, looking out at the world and all other beings. The occasional angst I get is: Why am I the person who is physically at the center looking out? Is this about the "meaning of life"? I don't care about the meaning of life. I only wonder why I'm at the physical center of it, looking out. Do others feel that way?

I have already expatiated on the subject extensively here on the forum and on the concept of "egocentrism", which proves that the Universe, yes, does have a center - one that, individually, is dispersed - and that the nucleus is simply the individual's perception within of existence.

Your doubts are not irrational, since they are founded on the rationality of egoism. What everyone forgets is that by applying dialectical metaphysics within the substance of reality, we are able to perceive the exclusive and unique existence, therefore:

[i]The Universe exists;
"I" exist in the Universe;
"I" am the center of the Universe.[/i]

Thank you. My thoughts have evolved on this thanks to yours and others' feedback. I'm no philosopher. I suppose I'm interested in the psychological aspect of the question, so I suppose I should also visit some Psych forum. At the essence: the reality you pointed out clearly bothers me from time to time, because I'm sitting in it. Does it bother others? Or do they just analyze it?

I suggest you google Nelson Goodman and his ideas concerning irrealism that more or less convey the basic structure of community-level solipsistic logic. His argumentation embraces and accommodates, rather than rejects, the inevitable conflicts of speech that arise in community discussions of truth, such as when every member of a community of solipsists declares himself to be the centre of the universe.

The traditional way of thinking is to assume that whenever a community of speakers discuss the universe in an absolute sense, they must be referring to the "same" universe. But this is proposterous according to a Goodmanian irrealist, according to whom each and every speaker cannot transcend their personal frames of reference and so cannot refer to the same universe in an absolute sense, even when they insist otherwise.

Consquently the irrealist understands every assertion, including assertions of absolute truth, as being relative to the speaker and of the form "according to speaker X assertion Y is true".

Quoting Gus Lamarch

The Universe exists;
"I" exist in the Universe;
"I" am the center of the Universe.

Is the third supposed to follow from the other two?

Quoting Scott South

. But physically, I am the center, from purely my own perspective, looking out at the world and all other beings.

Well, you're part of the world, and having sight you look at the rest of it, just as all who have sight do. So, you're like many, many other people. I'm not sure why you think that makes you the center of the universe, though. We can all claim we're the center of the universe for the same reason, something which it seems to me is nothing for any one of us to be excited or concerned about. If you're speaking metaphorically, that's all well and good, provided you understand that's the case.

" [F]rom purely my own perspective." I meant the physical perspective. First, I suppose it's along the lines of "Why am I me?" and secondly what I was getting at was, is this condition bothersome to others sometimes? That's partly a psychological problem.

Reply to Scott South
Is there a reasonable possibility that you are, or can be, someone/something else? If not, then the question "Why am I me?" seems more like the question "Why do I exist?" That question can be answered if it's intended to mean "How did I come to exist?" We can come up with answers regarding how we or others come to exist. Otherwise, though, "Why" asks for a reason, and there need be no reason that things exist. Things simply are, regardless of what we think or believe.

Quoting sime

I suggest you google Nelson Goodman

:party:

Quoting sime

and his ideas concerning irrealism

... well, not to the extent that anyone would (that I can see) benefit from searching for definitions of that ism.

Quoting sime

that more or less convey the basic structure of community-level solipsistic logic.

If you say so... very keen to see how you would flesh it out. Are you starting from his treatment of indexicals in Structure of Appearance? Or perhaps from the phenomenalist basis of that book? Or from later ruminations about "world-making"?

On the face of it (while eager for more) I wish to protest in the strongest terms. :gasp:

Quoting sime

The traditional way of thinking is to assume that whenever a community of speakers discuss the universe in an absolute sense, they must be referring to the "same" universe. But this is proposterous according to a Goodmanian irrealist, according to whom each and every speaker cannot transcend their personal frames of reference and so cannot refer to the same universe in an absolute sense, even when they insist otherwise.

With that emphasis, yes, fine. "The world" is mysticism. But without the mystical baggage, "worlds", or universes of discourse or of quantification, become the perfectly good basis for a completely general (e.g. analog) semantics, in Languages of Art.

Quoting sime

Consquently the irrealist understands every assertion, including assertions of absolute truth, as being relative to the speaker and of the form "according to speaker X assertion Y is true".

Sounds like you have a very particular take. Interested to hear more. My take is nothing at all like a "community of solipsists".

Quoting Kenosha Kid

Is the third supposed to follow from the other two?

The logic is simple and direct: - If something exists, but it cannot be experienced, and there is something in this existing "something" that is capable of perceiving himself and perceiving the former, this "object" is undoubtedly the center of the first. Information does not leave the individual, but is transformed by the individual - its primary form is that of the Universe -.

Cosmologically and astronomically, Earth is the center of the Universe.

Therefore:

- Humanity is the existential center of the Universe;
- Earth is the cosmological center of the Universe.

- Until proven that there is life elsewhere and not only in our planet, my argument remains valid -

Quoting Gus Lamarch

If something exists, but it cannot be experienced, and there is something in this existing "something" that is capable of perceiving himself and perceiving the former, this "object" is undoubtedly the center of the first.

It's weird how people only say "undoubtedly" when about to say something completely unjustifiable.

Also the universe can be experienced. You're experiencing it right now.

Quoting Kenosha Kid

Also the universe can be experienced. You're experiencing it right now.

Quoting Gus Lamarch

If something exists, but it cannot be experienced

As in "It cannot experience itself".

You're not even trying.

Quoting Gus Lamarch

As in "It cannot experience itself".

You're not even trying.

That sentence has quite a different meaning to the one you originally wrote. Perhaps if you tried to achieve the bare minimum, I wouldn't have to try so hard to decipher bad writing.

Anyway...

Quoting Gus Lamarch

"I" am the center of the Universe.

still doesn't follow, and repeating it prepended with "undoubtedly" doesn't make it any better.

Reply to Scott South This guy feels the same as you..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjYQUmNtwt0&list=PLCdW3jMJiDFAYG5-VFQy0eLyHqdGnstnB

Skip to about 31 mins.

And physically, everyone is the centre of the universe.

Quoting Kenosha Kid

Perhaps if you tried to achieve the bare minimum, I wouldn't have to try so hard to decipher bad writing.

Ad Hominem will not take you anywhere.

Quoting Kenosha Kid

still doesn't follow, and repeating it prepended with "undoubtedly" doesn't make it any better.

We, humanity, are the only expression within existence of the concept of "experience".

We are the only ones able to consciously absorb information from the Universe and transform and/or shape it in any way we want.

"We are gods tied to a body eternally trapped in the present of existence."

However, this does not claim that the concept of "humanity" creates a sense of "centrality". What I say is that the individual capacity of the human being to consciously experience existence makes the "existential" center of the Universe, "Humanity" - the individual - the Ego - -.

My argument is simply logical deductive. So, if you disagree, feel free to make an refutation based on logical substance.

Cosmologically, planet Earth is the center of the Universe - if you don't know, the observable universe is a spherical region - centered on Earth - comprising all matter that can be observed from Earth or its space-based telescopes and exploratory probes at the present time. Its diameter is 8.8 × 1026 m -.

As I've said:

"You're not even trying"

Quoting Gus Lamarch

We are the only ones able to consciously absorb information from the Universe and transform and/or shape it in any way we want.

Unshown.

Quoting Gus Lamarch

What I say is that the individual capacity of the human being to consciously experience existence makes the "existential" center of the Universe, "Humanity" - the individual - the Ego - -.

Are you just verbally mangling the already stated idea that man is the centre of their existence? Jesus Christ.

Quoting Gus Lamarch

"You're not even trying"

You might be simultaneously trying too little (to make a salient point) and trying too hard (to seem like you are). What a waste of time.