2010-04-10

The word individual means something which cannot be divided. But if we think about what the notion of a person represents, it's a body, it's a mind, it's an identity, it's a collection of relationships. At least mentally, we can divide these components up and examine each of them separately. That's not something that can't be divided. Individuals aren't.

Separate objects aren't, either. If we examine experience closely, it's easy to see that experience never includes objects. It includes sensations, emotions, and thoughts. What we call physical objects are bundles of color, shape, sound, taste, smell, tactile texture, pressure, warmth or coolness, etc. All we experience of the physical world is qualities. Thought parses those sensations into objects. This sound goes with that shape, the other sound goes with the other shape. That smell goes with this one. This feeling goes with that one. And the world appears. The boundaries between objects are arbitrary and culturally defined. Different cultures have different approaches to time, space, relationships, events, and so forth.

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