Reading Plato this week. Socrates introduces the idea that the ideas of justice, beauty, truth etc exist in the cosmos independent of human thought. He also asserts that we must have had knowledge of the ideas before birth in order to recognize them. Such as the case that a toddler sees a sunset and perceives beauty. without having been told of that idea, he is able to recognize beauty so he must have been familiar with the idea or he wouldn’t be able to recognize it. thats a separate q, though. for this discussion, lets just stick to whether or not those ideas exist in the universe? if you assert they do exist, how do they exist, how did they come into being?
© 2026 – SoulSequel
5 responses to “do the ideas of justice, beauty etc exist independent of humanity?”
I think they do. Mainly because they are things that we are drawn to; have to “go to” and “join with”.
The Spiritual line of reasoning asserts that these are Transcendent Principles that in so far as our limited reasoning and experience can grasp, always existed.
A more Darwinian line of thinking asserts that these are principles that marked the evolutionary process between those of our ancestors who “reached” for these principles and continued; and those who did not and were “selected against”.
It remains that processes within Humanity we might assess as ugly or unjust can cause great localized devastation within the fabric of Life. But even a small exercise of beauty and justice can overcome it — first in the individual but then spreading through processes like inspiration and exhortation.
They do.
They have,
and they always will.
Far too limited is the human perception of reality.
There is a divine intelligence to the universe, which for the most part is beyond human comprehension.
I can only remember the thoughts I had as a baby. Even while still in diapers, My thoughts were clear. I had time to contemplate and sort out the meaning of my dreams —- which I understood — in those years of diapers and learning to hold my own bottle of milk. I knew, for sure, that running away without a plan (of where I was going and what I would do) was something I would never do again. When Grandpa put me on his knee and told me it was a horse I was riding …. — No, I knew his knee felt nothing like a real horse. I knew, for sure, how it felt to get up on a real horse. I knew that denim and leather felt nothing like wads of cotton diapers. I knew that balancing in a saddle and holding the reins felt nothing like having Grandpa’s big hands gripping on my little arms. When I came across a barrier that was fence-like, I thought of the fence on a ranch —- and not the reality of a kitchen chair turned sideways to keep me from going into Grandma’s kitchen while the newly mopped floor was wet. I remembered sunsets before this incarnation had ever seen a real sunset. I knew beauty when I found it. But, this is all confined within a human experience and human memories of a past life and past life experiences —- passing through the mind of a baby too small to even hold my own baby bottle when I drank squirts of milk. I grew to a tot who regarded the underside of Grandma’s table clothed table as my own “tent”. I sat on the pedestal legs as my own seating chairs. Mom had a table that she put a lamp on. When she covered it with a long tablecloth, it became my own tent world where no one would harm me. No one would tell me what to do, and justice was mine. It had a lower shelf that kept me off the floor and felt comforting to sit on and hide from the world. How did I know the concept of a “tent” without ever seeing a real tent??? I finally saw a real tent when I was four years old. How did I know that justice is mine, when it meant the freedom to live as I choose. My own justice and fairness of my own life by my own rules.
Little did I know then that these same pieces of my baby world would stay with me and be a part of my life as I grow older —– to the end of my life.
This morning, I sat at that same table that my Grandma once owned. I rest my feet on the pedestal legs that were chairs for my diapered butt, as a baby toddler. That same lamp table my Mom owned, now has a bin of cat food on the under shelf where I used to sit and hide from the world. It has a cat feeder on it, and is used as a high place for the cats to jump up on and eat without being disturbed. I wonder if the cat that sits under the table is thinking that she is in her own little tent world. Where nothing can harm her.
Potentially, but not as we think of them. They exist on top of the universe’s chaos, entropy, pushing it aside for a time. Yet, in the end these factors win the day.
I think so. They said when Koko the signing gorilla found out Robin Williams died she cried.