Do ideas "exist"?

Question

You cannot, touch, taste, or smell an idea.

You can read about one, but are you actually "seeing" the idea itself?

You can hear an idea, but are you actually "hearing" the "idea" itself?

Can the substance of an idea exist outside of written media (i.e. books and letters), electronic media (radio, t.v., computers), or biological media (our minds)?

Does the idea itself have an existance, and if so, what is the "substance" of its existance, is it matter, energy, or supernatural (i.e. spiritual)?

Answer 1

Ideas are born in our minds and exist there. We can spread them by telling someone or putting them in books or some other means to share them. But they don't exist outside of human beings, because if there were not humans, there would be no minds, or anyone to read the ideas in books. The ideas would no longer exist.

An idea is a thought. What is a thought? We don't really know, but I'd guess that it's energy or chemical.

Answer 2

Many, many years ago a thought, actually in the form of a question, entered my head, and seemed to take up residence. It pervaded my awareness in the most peculiar fashion, and I started applying this thought to all sorts of aspects of my life, sort of 'testing' it, so to speak.

The thought was :

"Does thinking it so, make it so ?"

It did lead to some very profound changes in my life, and I can now 'see' that this thought was the actual beginning of my quest to understand more.

I have covered a lot of ground in the 20 or so years since then. Both physically and mentally, and indeed meta-physically, or, if you prefer 'spiritually'.

One of the primary and most fundamental questions of 'real' science, is how does the energy of which everything is composed get to be 'solidified', how does it literally become 'Matter' ?

It finally dawned on me that what would appear to be the least probable answer must be, by a sort of Holmesian process of elimination, correct, and that it is that the very function of human thought that actually crystalises energy into material manifestation. We simply lower the vibrational frequency of the totally and infinitely abundant energy that is all around us, until 'stuff' appears.

We 'imagine', and if we hold that image that we imagine long enough, and with sufficient 'power', eventually it comes into being.

So, yes, in a very 'real' and literal sense 'ideas' most certainly do 'exist', if we give them enough power.

In fact, this is so true to me now, that I finally understood that my question that started me off all those years ago, should, like most things, be turned upside down to be properly understood.

"Without thought, no-'thing' would be so"

{{{{{{{{{{Cosmic Ideas}}}}}}}}}}}}

Answer 3

Ideas don't exist in printed media. Such media are merely graphic representations of the words which express the idea. Such marks on paper must be mentally interpreted in order to be turned into ideas. Actual ideas exist only as electrochemical signals and pathways in the brain. Conveying an idea means providing another person with sufficient appropriate sensory input to enable them to construct similar electrochemical storage in their own neurons.

Answer 4

Ideas have a limited permanence, in that they require a living person to embrace and ponder them. As far as an idea can be measured, as far as the biological processes that allow for an idea to be enunciated, these are all dependent on a person to exist. The merit of an idea may be qualified and quantified in philosophical and/or religious terms, but this too is dependent on a living person for its articulation.

As an idea may be transferred between individuals, it is also limited in that it has its life tied to the individuals who are hosting it. All things are impermanent, human life being the foremost impermanence accessible to us. We tend to feel that ideas can transcend this impermanence because we are still in existence, and our fellow humans are still around to hold the ideas, but if there ever comes the day that mankind ceases to exist, ideas surely shall perish with them.

Answer 5

Great question!

Edit: there are those who say The human being, the human condition is nothing but "ideas/thought forms".

We, supposedly, 'condense' into form much like condensation on a glass window. We 'vaporize' at death, but the substance of an idea cannot be lost. No-thing is ever lost since all is made of the same magical 'stuff'. Sounds a little like *Tinker Bell*. =)

Answer 6

The U.S. copyright office says NO. It has to be manifested in some tangible form.

But I do think ideas exist. At least in the mind of the idea person.

Einstein and Hawking both say the same thing. They see the universe in their heads.

Einstein and Hawking try to explain parts of it to us. But they only explain the parts they can PROVE with logic and math.

We can't begin to imagine what the see in their heads that they can't explain to us.

If they tried to, they wouldn't be called scientists, they'd be called Philosophers and they don't want that moniker.

Answer 7

Playdoh's concept of Ideals?

No I do not believe ideas have any actual existance.
You could ask the same question about "Information"

Hawkins talks about information as being conserved in the universe and that you can not create or destroy it. Kind of like they used to think matter could not be created or destroyed.
They consider it as a real mathematical value.
But information does not exist without a medium for it to exist in. It can not exist without somebody to be informed by it.

I think in this case information is the same as ideas.

Answer 8

Ideas are the self's perception of things that leads to the self's perception of the ultimate reality. Ideas exist because a self exist. As long as the self is existing, the idea will exist. An idea is part of a self much like the hand is part of the self. Contrary to common belief, an idea cannot be transferred from one person to another because the idea is part of one self and will always be a part of that self. Ideas may be similar in ways and may be derived from another idea but an idea of a self will always remain unique because once an idea is copied it will lead to another idea. Ideas are what makes a person who he is because the idea is part of him.

Answer 9

Of course. An idea is something, such as a thought or conception, that potentially or actually exists in the mind as a product of mental activity.

Answer 10

In the days of string theory, dark matter, dark energy, hard science pursuit of the nature of consciousness, dependence of the web,the distinction between existence and non-existence has actually disappeared. Nichiren Daishonin skillfully wrote about this subject in the 13 th century in a letter now titled "On attaining Buddhahood." Does history exist, or is it the future?