Talk:Fernande Saussure

Fundamentals

The universe is a logical object apprehensible to reason. This system can be manipulated by means of language, systems of signs standing for objects, principles and operations. One such system, or set of systems, is that developed by the Hermetics and their predecessors in ages past. Another such system is that developed by the Virtual Adepts in more recent years.

The Universe

What is the nature of the universe? The 'Demonologists' among the Virtual Adepts hold that it is almost certain that the universe accessible to us is a simulation running on some highly advanced alien computer. The Hermetics hold that the material world is a mirror of the immaterial world, and vice versa. These two positions are not entirely distinct. A simulation maps a material system onto an immaterial one, and through studying the immaterial reveals the nature of the material. This mapping is a language. The universe is a nexus of systems mapping one onto the other through the system of signs.

The Magus

What is the operator of these systems? It is not an godlike alien intelligence as the Demonologists assume, in whose mind we exist as passive objects. Perception itself is another linguistic map, but we can only account for consciousness of perceptions by postulating a transcendental I, or will, which exists, and is the precondition for the existence of the sign systems that constitute mundane reality. The supposed alien intelligence is thus revealed to be the magus herself.

The challenge of the magus is to comprehend and so manipulate the sign systems and thus, the universe and thus, herself. Then she will have achieved a divine self-knowledge and simplicity, and be able to make true decisions as a free-willed agent.