Adapted for the Internet from:

Why God Doesn't Exist

    1.0   The definition of property

    The differences between bundle and substance ‘theories’ of objecthood are ultimately traceable to two incompatible
    perceptions of the word property: ‘something owned’ versus ‘an attribute possessed by all members of a category.’
    The bundle theorists think of a property as ‘something owned’ and predictably focus on words that describe features
    or highlight behaviors of an object or relations between objects. These philosophers think of an object in terms of:

    “ A property is that which not at all Can be disjoined and severed from a thing Without
       a fatal dissolution… touch to corporal things, Intangibility to the viewless void.”  [1]

    The bundle ontologist focuses on:

    •        what it looks like:

    “ table: An article of furniture supported by one or more vertical legs and having a flat
       horizontal surface.”  [2]

    •        what its purpose is:

    “ An anvil is a manufacturing tool, made of a hard and massive block of stone or metal
       used as a support for chiseling and hammering other objects.”  [3]

    •        how it is built:

    “ In physics, a physical body (sometimes called simply a body or even an object) is a
       collection of masses, taken to be one. For example, a baseball can be considered
       an object but the baseball also consists of many particles (pieces of matter).”  [4]

    •        whether it is real or ideal:

    “ For Plato, these Forms are perfect Ideals, but they are also more real than physical
       objects.”  [5]

    •        what it does:

    “ A tape recorder… records and plays back sound.” [6]

    The substance ontologists, on the other hand, think of a property as ‘that which is common to all.’

    “ Categorization is the process in which ideas and objects are recognised,
       differentiated and understood. Categorization implies that objects are grouped
       into categories”  [7]

    “ In mathematics, category theory deals in an abstract way with mathematical
       structures and relationships between them.”  [8]

    The substance philosophers have converted the word object into a category. What they failed to do is identify what
    it is that is common to all objects. What is this mysterious ‘property’ called substance?

    Most of the difficulty in deciding what properties to include and which to reject can in turn be traced to the misconceived
    notion that a property of an object is that which an observer can detect. Thus the philosopher unwittingly reduces the
    definition of object  to a proof:

    “ In philosophy, mathematics, and logic, a property is an abstraction characterizing
       an object.  [9]

    “ A physical property is an aspect of an object that can be experienced using one
       of the five human senses without changing its chemical composition: touch, taste,
       smell, sight or sound, or, in an extended sense, detected through any measuring
       device… In Quantum mechanics, physical properties are referred to as observables. [10]

     “ In physics, particularly in quantum physics, a system observable is a property of
       the system state that can be determined by some sequence of physical operations. [11]

    The question, then, is whether there are properties which an object has that are independent of observers.

    Aristotle and Euclid vaguely seem to have stumbled on at least one fundamental attribute which is not contingent on
    opinions:

    “ by form I mean the essence of each thing, and its primary substance”  [12]

    “ A boundary is that which is an extremity of anything.”(Bk. I, Def. 13)…
       A figure is that which is contained by any boundary or boundaries.” (Bk. I, Def. 14)  [13]

    The notions that Aristotle and Euclid had in mind were not too far from the mark, especially considering that these were
    the first attempts to formalize a definition. Certainly the mathematicians and philosophers who came afterwards didn't
    do any better.

    The problem with what Aristotle and Euclid proposed is not that it is wrong, but that they didn't use it. The Greek
    geometers and philosophers gave lip service to what they had just defined. They never realized the significance of
    what they had discovered. The Greeks never used these definitions in their geometric analyses of Geometry. All of the
    geometers at least since the days of Pythagoras referred to a boundary, but used the notion of perimeter. A perimeter
    is a dynamic concept. It is the distance traveled around a plane. In contrast, a boundary is a static concept. It refers to
    the line that envelopes a plane in a cross-section of time. A perimeter is to a movie what a boundary is to a photograph.
    A perimeter is what an observer does. A boundary is what a plane has itself. A boundary also runs perpendicular to a
    perimeter. The boundary is conceptually what you encounter after moving radially from a center. A perimeter is
    something you trace by going around a center. The idiots of Mathematics have no use for boundaries. Mathematics is
    exclusively a discipline that studies motion. Mathematics deals exclusively with perimeters. Conversely, Physics has
    no use for witnesses and their testimony. Physics deals with boundaries and not with what an observer measures
    around a figure.

    Therefore, Aristotle and Euclid were right on the money. The ‘property’ that all objects have in common, whether real
    or imaginary, irrespective of observers, is shape:

    shape: the inability to blend or to be continuous with space; possessing a surface
    or boundary; potential to have location. (syn.: discrete, finite, bound, outline, figure,
    form, contour, mold, configuration, cut, silhouette, carving, sculpture, cast).

    object: that which has shape. (Synonyms: exhibit, thing, physical, something, entity,
    stuff, body, structure, architecture, substance, medium, particle, figure, essence,
    element, point, item, it, island, statue, bulk., encased, contained, enveloped.)

    By shape, I mean that the word under scrutiny represents that which lacks the potential to blend with space or,
    conversely, that space does not interfere with it (Fig. 1). Shape is a static concept. The word refers to what we would
    see in a single frame of the Universal Movie. The Moon has shape because it doesn't instantly become one with
    space. Shape is distinct from appearance, aspect, look, or likeness in that it is intrinsic. These words denote shape
    from an observer’s perspective. Genuine shape has nothing to do with observers. The Moon has refused to blend
    with space even before life arose on Earth. For that matter, a fish doesn’t blend with the waters that surround it either,
    but each of its atoms has space as its background.  A particular set of atoms is bound by the skin of the fish, which
    in turn is contained within the sea, which is constrained by the Earth, which is enveloped in air, but individually and
    collectively, these entities are surrounded by space. Without this insulator we call space, the Universe would be a
    continuous, infinite block of matter. Shape denotes that which you can point your finger at and name. You cannot
    point with your index finger in the same way and call ‘it’ love or energy. When you point to a shape and say table,
    you are treating the table as a discrete unit. For the moment, it is made of a single piece, as if it were physically
    continuous.

    You may argue that this is my particular definition of object.

    You would be wrong! This definition is the scientific definition of the word object. The reason the Greeks don't get a
    cigar is that they failed to recognize this important point. The term, noun, subject, and object-concept notions of object
    belong to ordinary speech. These notion are not scientific because they cannot be used consistently in a dissertation.
    Not one philosopher in the last 3000 years ever realized this.
So then, what really
is an object?
Our Lord has blessed
Bill with the Heavenly
Wreath and bound him
with Love.
And the heavens have covered
Bill with Grace and cloaked him
in the Holy Spirit. Please
welcome him as your new king.

    2.0   Shape doesn’t depend on opinions

    The seasoned philosopher may point out that my definition of object nevertheless invokes space. The observer is staring at
    a sphere as well as at the space that gives it contour. Therefore, there is at least an involuntary comparison.

    Let's put this objection in perspective! The adjectives big, rough, round, and beautiful absolutely invoke an observer. We
    cannot talk about big without comparing two objects. Big necessarily invokes a second object. An adjective such as yellow
    is trickier. From the observer’s perspective it is actually an adverb: how the signal of light arriving from the surface of the
    Moon is behaving in comparison to the signal coming from Mars. From the Moon’s point of view it is again an adverb: the
    specific frequency of light its surface emits. Color is a dynamic phenomenon and, therefore, does not qualify as an
    adjective for the purposes of Physics. We need at least two frames of the Universal Movie to conceptualize yellow.

    Shape differs from such attributes in that it is stealthily independent of observers. Shape is not what the observer visualizes,
    but an intrinsic property of an object. Shape is a very particular attribute that refers to the inability of matter to interface with
    space. Space does not really ‘contain’ or ‘restrict’ an object. Space does not ‘mold’ shape because space is nothing. There
    is no struggle for encroachment between matter and space because space doesn’t offer battle. They are of two radically
    different natures. An object has no possibility of interacting with space because space does not possess a surface.

    From the observer’s perspective, space gives form to and contours the Moon like the ocean seemingly gives shape to a fish.
    From the Moon’s perspective, on the other hand, we have the correct notion of form. The Moon is as big and as extended as
    it can be. If more matter fell on the surface of our satellite, it would now expand at the expense of space. Conversely, if the
    Moon lost a mountain in a collision with an asteroid, it would now contract without protesting and space would be neither
    the better nor the worse. What the observer sees or measures has nothing to do with what is. The idiots of Philosophy and
    Mathematics have always focused on what the observer perceives. That's how many of these idiots concluded that the
    object 'Moon' isn’t there when they’re not looking at it. That's how many of these morons concluded that a tree that falls to
    the ground in the forest without anybody present doesn’t make noise. You have to have the intelligence of a carrot to reach
    such appalling conclusions. Your entire schooling was in vain if you can’t get through these simple hurdles. In fact, you
    would have to be a schooled philosopher. The philosophers coming out of the universities overindulge in such petty
    reasoning, taking simple analyses to extremes, and ironically arriving at the same intellectual level as a person with Down's
    Syndrome.

    There is no explicit or implicit provision in the definition of shape for observers, for faith, or for wisdom. If the question of
    whether a chair has shape is left to opinions, we would argue forever in circles. One person would say that she believes
    that love has shape and the other would answer that he knows for sure that it doesn’t. Hopefully, whether a 'love' or a
    'table' have shape is an objective statement that follows from definitions. If we are to draw the line between objects and
    concepts, this line will be drawn at shape.

    The skeptic may insist once more and argue now that a circle and a halo may also be concepts.

    Again, let's put this in perspective! A circle and a halo are first and foremost physical objects. The reason for this is that
    they have shape. You point and the ET sees an object. A circle and a halo become concepts when you use these words
    in a sentence or in relations. Now you are no longer referring to the object circle, but to the concept circle. You are in
    effect comparing a circle against other figures.  In order for the ET to understand the figure known as circle, you must
    invariably compare the circle against a square or a triangle. The object circle you visualize. The concept circle you
    understand with your mind.


    3.0   Shape makes no provision for time

    Shape is an attribute of a static Universe, conceptually, a cross-section of time. Shape is timeless in the sense that it
    does not involve an interval of time. An object has shape in an instant, in a single frame of the Cosmic Film. An observer
    would be hard-pressed to ‘prove’ the definition of object by asking you to watch a movie           (e.g., a series of images
    of a table). A table is an object only when the prosecutor depicts it in a still image. If the jurors must watch a movie, the
    prosecutors are now treating the table as a concept.  We don’t define the ‘object’ table. We point to it.

    Some philosophers were close to discovering this wisdom:

    “ Often, naming and pointing will be essentially the only ways to refer unambiguously
       to a particular object.”  [14]

    But again, they get no cigar. They never realized the significance of what they had discovered, in part, because they
    didn’t define the crucial word object unambiguously. This statement can only have meaning in the context of that which
    has shape.


    4.0   Conclusion

    The word object is a category which includes only those words we can utter when we point to designate a shape. The
    other two categories at this level are concept and space. The words term, subject, and noun refer to concepts and not to
    objects. They belong to ordinary speech because they do not discriminate between what we can name and talk about on
    the one hand and those things which have shape on the other. Such words are too broad to be used in Science.

    The 'shape' definition of object summarily outlaws words which have served as currency in the mainstream for decades
    if not hundreds of years, to wit: energy, mass, space, field, time, space-time, black hole, point-particle, number, etc. Such
    terms may serve as the subject of a sentence. They are nouns in the sense that we can talk about them in everyday
    parlance. They do not qualify as objects in the context of things which have shape. Therefore, such words are not proper
    subject matter of Physics. In Physics, only those things which have shape qualify as nouns.

    The mathematical physicists and philosophers will undoubtedly feel uncomfortable with this definition because it threatens
    their religions. Things which heretofore were taken for granted will now be scrutinized under the new criterion. We have no
    trouble deciding whether a chair or a rock or a tree is an object. We have trouble with the borderline cases. Are shadows
    and holes objects? How about fire and water or atoms or gases? Is air an object or a concept? Doesn’t the wind blow
    down trees? Surely it must be physical if it interacts with matter. The 'shape' definition of object now enables us to
    eliminate the fuzziness heretofore responsible for circular reasoning. Therefore, I will now address the establishment's
    concerns and then analyze a few of the borderline cases that have troubled the philosophers over the years. If the
    members of the establishment wish to challenge this definition of object, they merely need to propose an alternative that
    can be used consistently in a discussion.
The Object Bill
but only from a distance

Fig. 1   Object

An object is that which has shape. It has
shape irrespective of observers known
as mathematicians. Physics relies on
neither witnesses nor testimony. From
an observer's perspective, an object can
only be visualized from a distance. So,
now, what is the distance between you
and space-time or a black hole if neither
has a surface?

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        Copyright © by Nila Gaede 2008