On representing conceptual hierarchies
Last month I was seeking out relationships between a scattering of basic metaphysical concepts, each portrayed as binary opposites. I started looking at a top-down hierarchy, more-or-less starting from core axioms (existence, identity, consciousness) to more detailed ‘mechanics’ lower-down.

trying (and failing) to represent a hierarchy of metaphysical dichotomies
However, such a top-down, one-way model didn’t seem to represent reality very satisfactorily. Apart from a certain arbitrariness of the chosen dichotomies, it seemed to lack the sense of overall integration. Concepts exist in an interrelated network rather than a top-down hierarchy.
I toyed with the idea of animation as a way of resolving this integration problem, but I realised that I would have to use something like a split-screen in order to show, on the one hand, the current concept (and ‘hidden’ binary opposite), on the other, a network map of where it lay in relation to all other concepts — not in a 2D or 3D space but within an evolving conceptual topology!
Anyway, what I’m trying to do here is to graphically convey the correct way to frame, not any old concept, but core metaphysical concepts — an epistemological map for metaphysical thinking.
Question: should metaphysics be conceptualised through dichotomies?
Objectivist metaphysics is nice an thin and based upon the three irrefutable axioms:1. Existence exists;
2. Consciousness is inherent in grasping that fact;
3. Identity is the specific nature of existence, the being something.
Identity fits perfectly with the idea of dichotomy: A is A / A is not non-A.
Consciousness defines itself in relation to non-conscious objects.
Existence, however, is different. There is no metaphysical ‘non-existence’ (a contradiction in terms). Yet, it is my view that our epistemology can only work by fashioning binary oppositions, and thus it must entertain ‘non-existence’ conceptually. We can just about imagine a void, no space, no time, not even blackness, not even ‘nothingness’ — the (non) experience of what it was like before our life, and what it’ll ‘be like’ again afterwards. We might need to do this for ‘existence’ to have contradistinctive zing as a concept. So epistemologically non-existence is a ‘legitimate’ concept, as long as we grasp that it is a non-starter metaphysically-speaking.
So, it is my contention that binary dichotomies play a crucial role epistemologically, but can we say that contrast also plays a metaphysical, ontological role around existence/identity itself?
Not with regard to our metaphysics of existence, which ought to be kept honestly thin — existence objectively exists (the contrast with ‘non-existence’ must be banished from our metaphysics).
But with regard to our metaphysics of identity, an entity always entails a dichotomy with what-it-is-not (conceptually ‘hidden’ as we focus upon the entity in question, but not completely banished from our metaphysics because it helps us grasp how those entities are integrated with the rest of existence).
Conclusion
Last year’s PDF had dichotomy as a central theme running through it, but I think that I was working under some confusion as to whether these dichotomies were epistemological or somehow more profound metaphysical ‘deepities’.Next year I plan to launch a pristine version of this blog. I also plan to eventually update that original PDF, retaining some ideas, rejecting or re-working others. I’ll seek to integrate a number of its dichotomies that I think would be useful in building a stimulating metaphysical model, as well as adding a few new ones. Work in progress…
P.S. New blog (from January 2019)…
A Difference That Makes A Difference…
https://a-difference-that-makes-a-difference.blogspot.com