If There Were No Consciousness What Would Be The Point Of Material Existence?

a reply to: elysiumfire

When a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there to hear it does it make a sound?

Yes in the causal world.
No in the effect world.

The sound wave frequencies are still there but there is nothing to perceive it as sound.

Until consciousness comes along to decode the frequencies. It could be animal consciousness, insect, human, maybe even things the human eye can't perceive and human machinery can't detect.

A deaf person's consciousness can't decode the causal world frequencies, therefore there is no sound (to the deaf person)

To another conscious being that can decode the sounds frequency, there is sound.

To say his stance is irrational is irrational in itself because this argument can go around forever, until we die.

Theres two ways to figure this out. 1. Death, 2. Scientists discover a way to detect consciousness with technology we don't currently have.

But there is a lot of evidence that points to consciousness surviving death to the person who can keep a curious and open mind.

Our bodies are 99.99% empty space. That is electrons spinning around protons and neutrons. What is creating that spin? Why do we seem solid? Why do dreams seem solid sometimes until you realize your dreaming?

I think we are all co creating our reality in a dream we sunk REALLY deep into. And no I can't prove it to you. But its just as impossible to prove that material existence creates consciousness too.

I think the scales are starting to tip and one day people will realize the Earth isn't actually flat...

originally posted by: BigBrotherDarkness
a reply to: ImaFungi

I've been under anesthesia and have had the same effect, also have had the same effect when meditating. Where was it "you" suppose you "went" during this time of unconsciousness and what is it "you" suppose you "returned" too when conscious again?

not trying to trick you in anyway, just seeing how your answer compares to my own, without reveling my experience first.

I have no experience with astral projection or out of body experience. I remember having the gas mask on and the surgeon saying to count to 50 or something, and maybe I got up to 15 and then the very next thing I remember is opening my eyes and it was over, and 3 hours had passed, and I was startled about the nature of such that ordeal, that I was so nervous and had just been through such torment, and was scared, and then 1 second knocked out, next second revived, 3 hours had passed, and that was it.

I believe there is some component of the mind, which and this is one of the biggest mysteries of reality I am speculating about, bare in mind... that 'you' are 'seeing'. This is obvious enough, in fact everything 'you' have ever seen, is really some aspect in your mind, some how, looking at some type of screen, as you are looking around the room you are in right now, and looking at your screen, you are not projecting yourself out into the world and touching the words on the screen and knowing the words this way, the words are being projected into your head, and once in your head, they must embark on the process of being made sense of, and being made aware of, there must be something in your head, which we refer to as you, or the aspect of you that knows that you are a you, or the aspect of you that knows, which is doing the sensing, is doing the knowing, is doing the thinking. It is very complex and mysterious, because the mind, the conscious can multitask, I can type this right now, while reading these words in my head to type, literally producing the speaking voice in my head and in an almost 1:1 relationship force my fingers to type what my voice is producing in my head to think and say, while also thinking about what I want for lunch and I am listening to music and I am seeing things beyond my screen in the room and I am reflecting on how my knee is slightly itchy and I feel the heel of my foot and etc... So... I think it is pretty much proven that by using certain substances, the relationship this complex apparatus of awareness has with its modes of being aware of itself, and producing thought, and retrieving memories, can be interrupted. And so I think anesthesia is a kind of 'un touching of wires', so not that my consciousness went somewhere else, but that the apparatus that I am, was unable to produce consciousness for a time. Relatably, I do believe Anesthesia still has its risks, and sometimes the wires are separated for good.

a reply to: booyakashaWhy do we seem solid and not fall through the chair we're sitting on? It has to do with a sort of surface tension between the atoms on the surface of the chair and the atoms on the surface of you. They repel each other sort of the way two like magnetic poles repel each other.

originally posted by: ImaFungi

originally posted by: BigBrotherDarkness
a reply to: ImaFungi

I've been under anesthesia and have had the same effect, also have had the same effect when meditating. Where was it "you" suppose you "went" during this time of unconsciousness and what is it "you" suppose you "returned" too when conscious again?

not trying to trick you in anyway, just seeing how your answer compares to my own, without reveling my experience first.

I have no experience with astral projection or out of body experience. I remember having the gas mask on and the surgeon saying to count to 50 or something, and maybe I got up to 15 and then the very next thing I remember is opening my eyes and it was over, and 3 hours had passed, and I was startled about the nature of such that ordeal, that I was so nervous and had just been through such torment, and was scared, and then 1 second knocked out, next second revived, 3 hours had passed, and that was it.

I believe there is some component of the mind, which and this is one of the biggest mysteries of reality I am speculating about, bare in mind... that 'you' are 'seeing'. This is obvious enough, in fact everything 'you' have ever seen, is really some aspect in your mind, some how, looking at some type of screen, as you are looking around the room you are in right now, and looking at your screen, you are not projecting yourself out into the world and touching the words on the screen and knowing the words this way, the words are being projected into your head, and once in your head, they must embark on the process of being made sense of, and being made aware of, there must be something in your head, which we refer to as you, or the aspect of you that knows that you are a you, or the aspect of you that knows, which is doing the sensing, is doing the knowing, is doing the thinking. It is very complex and mysterious, because the mind, the conscious can multitask, I can type this right now, while reading these words in my head to type, literally producing the speaking voice in my head and in an almost 1:1 relationship force my fingers to type what my voice is producing in my head to think and say, while also thinking about what I want for lunch and I am listening to music and I am seeing things beyond my screen in the room and I am reflecting on how my knee is slightly itchy and I feel the heel of my foot and etc... So... I think it is pretty much proven that by using certain substances, the relationship this complex apparatus of awareness has with its modes of being aware of itself, and producing thought, and retrieving memories, can be interrupted. And so I think anesthesia is a kind of 'un touching of wires', so not that my consciousness went somewhere else, but that the apparatus that I am, was unable to produce consciousness for a time. Relatably, I do believe Anesthesia still has its risks, and sometimes the wires are separated for good.

And keep in mind that our mind also experiences very profound feelings and emotions. As well as profound creativity. This is the real wonder to me.

a reply to: Aphorism

Consciousness is experience. It's not an experience.

I know you deny consciousness, and the mind, but there should be something that takes their place then. You are a materialist it seems so you shy away from things that can't be seen or touched. But simply saying it's the body does not suffice, and is akin to sticking your head in the sand.

You are aware of yourself, are you not?

If you deny consciousness then you deny subjectivity. This means you see yourself as an object, a zombie. With no inner monologue. A robot. Meepmeep beepbopboop.....

What directs your brain to make a decision? For instance, raising your right hand suddenly way up high. Or perhaps screaming at the top of your lungs. "You" do, right? Wrong, because in your world there is no "you", only an "it". "You" only see yourself as a body, an object.

You might answer, "well the brain commands the brain to do such things, because the brain self regulates itself." So this reduces us to our brains then, like the motherboard. Except no, there is still something commanding it to perform operations.

If I were to ask you- Who are you? Would you be a hypocrite in answering that question?

I am claiming here that consciousness is simply another word—like soul, like spirit, like mind, like psyche—for the human body. What we do not understand about "consciousness" is a direct 1-to-1 ratio to what we do not understand about the human body.

Thing is- you said before, that you adhere to the embodied cognition theory. But this theory does not deny the mind. It actually requires it. You deny the concept of mind though. So where does this leave you exactly?

a reply to: PhotonEffectAnd what if this youness existed in an energy field outside the physical body and the brain was merely a biolological mechanism that enables our physical self to access this field? And after the death of the physical body the field begins to expand and merge with other "mind" fields, while still maintaining its cohesiveness and individuality?

A problem I see is our bias. Everything needs to have a reason a why. I think it's saver to look at the how.
So if something is behaving with purpose which is statistically significant, I would be interested. Sure math and what we feel is purpose is also again biased.

Ah well....

originally posted by: QueenofWeird
A problem I see is our bias. Everything needs to have a reason a why. I think it's saver to look at the how.
So if something is behaving with purpose which is statistically significant, I would be interested. Sure math and what we feel is purpose is also again biased.

Ah well....

Encouraging people to look for a reason is exactly why I started this thread. You know, things that make you go....hmmm?

a reply to: MissSmartypants

Hard to say if that's how this all works.

All I know is, we didn't have a choice to be here. But we are. And none of this had to happen the way it that it has, but it did. It could've just as easily gone an infinite number of other ways, I would have to think, and we wouldn't be here asking about it. Yet here we are. What in the world is really going on?

Think about what reality is. I mean truly think about it. What is awareness? Calling it consciousness doesn't quite answer the question. It just substitutes it with another word. But what ever it is, is what separates matter like us from matter like a rock.

Nor does claiming that it emerges from a certain complexity satisfactorily answer the question either. But there's no doubt it's something. Our body is matter just like a rock is matter, only arranged differently. Being alive isn't just about being able to reproduce and metabolize. It's more about being aware. All things alive have awareness.... Cells. Bacteria. Plants. Animals. Some say viruses in a way. 3-4 of these things don't have brains. So then, brains must not be a prerequisite for awareness. Which is why it's hard to say that our brains are some sort of transceiver tapping into some proto-conscousness field.

It is safe to say, however, that we are compiled much differently then all of these things yet they are just as alive as we are. They have autonomy just like we do. They strive for survival just like us.

Where did these rules of engagement come from?

It seems like an awful lot of things had to go perfectly right for sentient matter to occur. That it requires such complexity at immensely small scales to emerge boggles the mind. How can such a mess of things come together by themselves and actually work. How does this happen without some sort of awareness?

Anyway- I'm not sure where that leaves me except I find it fun to ruminate about.

Were we ever supposed to get a look behind the curtain?

a reply to: PhotonEffectIf the singularity had inflated evenly at the start of the big bang then no subatomic particles would ever had clumped together to begin the process of building matter. They would have just continued expanding on forever, never interacting, and we would not be here now contemplating this. But instead the inflation seemed to be following some predetermined pattern right from the start. The odds of that are astronomical, excuse the pun.

booyakasha:

Yes in the causal world. No in the effect world.

You have me wondering how you are able to separate cause from effect? Besides which, there is no 'cause' world' separate and distinct from an 'effect' world, as they are not 'worlds', they are conditions and circumstance of this world we inhabit. A cause, any cause, is always followed by an accompanying effect, it is the dynamic of the universe.

The sound wave frequencies are still there but there is nothing to perceive it as sound.

Exactly. All the physics of displaced air and pressure waves are there, and with a suitable sensory apparatus that displaced air and pressure waves can be experienced as sound. Sound is the quale of air movement. Sound is not the issue, the sensing apparatus is.

If we have a deaf person accompanied by a non-deaf person in the forest, and a tree falls nearby to them, our expectation is that the deaf person would not hear a thing, but might feel the shockwave as the tree hit the forest floor? Whereas, the non-deaf person would not only feel the shockwave, but also hear it fall and hit the forest floor. In this scenario, the physics for sound experience are there, and also the sensing apparatus, however, only one of the sensing apparatus works, and the other doesn't. It is nonsensical, illogical to state that sound is only present to one person.

It is correct to state that sound is present to both people, but only one of them can experience it, not because of the presence or non-presence of sound, but because only one of the two sensing apparatus is functioning. Sound cannot be 'there' and 'not there' at the same time. The presence of a pair of working ears does not determine the presence of sound, they cannot determine the cause and effect of sound, they only determine if one experiences sound. That is the dynamic, that is the circumstance.

Until consciousness comes along to decode the frequencies.

How can consciousness decode anything? This is the ubiquitous misunderstanding on consciousness, that it is somehow dynamic and sensory. Consciousness is the 'effect' of the 'cause' of stimulation: not just of the five senses that deal primarily with the external environment via energy radiated and chemical stimulations, there are 'internal' stimulations within the body, some we are aware of, most we are not. Even our thoughts and thinking have to be looped back to the brain as stimulations so that they can be processed and effect a consciousness of them.

The poster 'PhotonEffect' states 4 posts after yours that...

Consciousness 'is' experience. It's not 'an' experience.

...and he is correct. Consciousness is the end effect of a chain of causes, and as an effect, it lasts only as long as the original cause that brought it into being.

Our consciousness is not an 'object', nor is it a 'thing'. It is not simply one homogeneous field, but a broiling cloud of micro-fields coalesced into one field (which we perceive as 'mind'). Each of these 'micro-fields' are rapidly stimulated into being and then fade when their cause fades, and then rapidly being replaced by the stimulation of another cause, leading either to the same continuous experience or to an entirely new one. They are, in effect, switching 'on' and switching 'off'.

You have seen those very large flocks of Starlings when they gather? The motions they make (called a 'murmuration') is a good way to visualise the coalesced micro-fields of consciousness. If we had the apparatus to view consciousness murmuration, we would see this broiling cloud of energy resonances, switching on and switching off. While the cloud is present, so is awareness. The size of the cloud correlates to the level of awareness. Consciousness is the last effect in a long chain of cause and effect.

MissSmartypants:

If the singularity had inflated evenly at the start of the big bang then no subatomic particles would ever had clumped together to begin the process of building matter. They would have just continued expanding on forever...

I'm sorry, Miss, but what is the 'they' that would have continued expanding? If the singularity had exploded evenly, there would be no 'they'! It would simply be a homogeneous expansion to the limit of its energy, then a rapid cooling and collapse.

Perhaps, this is what conditions were like before the 'uneven' Big Bang eventually happened and caught, a contiguous expansion and cooling of homogeneous conditions of expansion, cooling, and collapse, until one of the expansions cooled and collapsed so rapidly that it caught a heat expansion heading outwards on its deflationary ripple back to the centre, they collided and a secondary, but uneven expansion occurred, which led to the creation of this universe?

originally posted by: elysiumfire
MissSmartypants:

If the singularity had inflated evenly at the start of the big bang then no subatomic particles would ever had clumped together to begin the process of building matter. They would have just continued expanding on forever...

I'm sorry, Miss, but what is the 'they' that would have continued expanding? If the singularity had exploded evenly, there would be no 'they'! It would simply be a homogeneous expansion to the limit of its energy, then a rapid cooling and collapse.

Perhaps, this is what conditions were like before the 'uneven' Big Bang eventually happened and caught, a contiguous expansion and cooling of homogeneous conditions of expansion, cooling, and collapse, until one of the expansions cooled and collapsed so rapidly that it caught a heat expansion heading outwards on its deflationary ripple back to the centre, they collided and a secondary, but uneven expansion occurred, which led to the creation of this universe?

The "they" are the subatomic particles the singularities energy consists of.

MissSmartypants:

The "they" are the subatomic particles the singularities energy consists of.

I believe you look, but do not see? This is what you say...

If the singularity had inflated evenly at the start of the big bang then no subatomic particles would ever had clumped together to begin the process of building matter.

If the singularity had inflated evenly, it would have gone on to inflate evenly, until it reached the limit of its energy. No funadamental particles (quarks) would have formed, it would have remained in the form of a homogeneous radiation and dissipated into nothing. The expansion and dissipation of an even inflation would occur in microseconds. The inflation needed to last longer than that for matter particles to arrive. Conditions had to be cool enough for the 'forces' to arise and mediate between condensations in the field to bring them together as quarks.

That is why I asked the initial question.

originally posted by: MissSmartypants
It's a hard concept to wrap your mind around...if there were no life in the universe and only inanimate material objects interacting with each other what would be the point of existence? Is a point or purpose even necessary? What say you, ATS?

A purpose is not necessary when no purposeful objects exist.

A point is an idea. Ideas only exist in sentience.

I would say no, unless you assume inanimate objects with sentience, or that God exists before existence exists.

This reminds me of the miracle of the existence of anything.

Why does anything exist?

A real miracle, even for atheists.

originally posted by: ImaFungi

originally posted by: BigBrotherDarkness
a reply to: ImaFungi

I've been under anesthesia and have had the same effect, also have had the same effect when meditating. Where was it "you" suppose you "went" during this time of unconsciousness and what is it "you" suppose you "returned" too when conscious again?

not trying to trick you in anyway, just seeing how your answer compares to my own, without reveling my experience first.

I have no experience with astral projection or out of body experience. I remember having the gas mask on and the surgeon saying to count to 50 or something, and maybe I got up to 15 and then the very next thing I remember is opening my eyes and it was over, and 3 hours had passed, and I was startled about the nature of such that ordeal, that I was so nervous and had just been through such torment, and was scared, and then 1 second knocked out, next second revived, 3 hours had passed, and that was it.

I believe there is some component of the mind, which and this is one of the biggest mysteries of reality I am speculating about, bare in mind... that 'you' are 'seeing'. This is obvious enough, in fact everything 'you' have ever seen, is really some aspect in your mind, some how, looking at some type of screen, as you are looking around the room you are in right now, and looking at your screen, you are not projecting yourself out into the world and touching the words on the screen and knowing the words this way, the words are being projected into your head, and once in your head, they must embark on the process of being made sense of, and being made aware of, there must be something in your head, which we refer to as you, or the aspect of you that knows that you are a you, or the aspect of you that knows, which is doing the sensing, is doing the knowing, is doing the thinking. It is very complex and mysterious, because the mind, the conscious can multitask, I can type this right now, while reading these words in my head to type, literally producing the speaking voice in my head and in an almost 1:1 relationship force my fingers to type what my voice is producing in my head to think and say, while also thinking about what I want for lunch and I am listening to music and I am seeing things beyond my screen in the room and I am reflecting on how my knee is slightly itchy and I feel the heel of my foot and etc... So... I think it is pretty much proven that by using certain substances, the relationship this complex apparatus of awareness has with its modes of being aware of itself, and producing thought, and retrieving memories, can be interrupted. And so I think anesthesia is a kind of 'un touching of wires', so not that my consciousness went somewhere else, but that the apparatus that I am, was unable to produce consciousness for a time. Relatably, I do believe Anesthesia still has its risks, and sometimes the wires are separated for good.

Thanks for your interesting reply Imafungi.

When I was put under and have had the same experience when meditating. It was the same, there is perception and then no perception and I suppose what you could call missing time, not in the ufologist sense of course. The meditation type came before I had anesthesia, I was practicing for a long time sitting through bodily discomfort etc. where it felt like my hips, knees and back where about to shatter into a billion pieces, a stray hair on my back felt like a hot iron rod searing my skin, which eventually after a solid 7 hours all night sitting through this pain it gave way to a flood of bliss for however long with a mind like a still pond. I suppose one could say it was a sudden release of adrenaline etc. or simply a natural response from enduring so much pain if they are not the spiritual sort.

That meditation though, made any itch or possible unease nearly imperceptible since. ex. I fell and broke my arm after this experience and felt no pain and thought... I don't feel like going to the hospital tonight, I'll wait til tomorrow. The next day came lots of swelling still no pain go to the ER it's broken in two places and the humerus split the radius bone nearly 2 inches, all the squeezing, twisting, and pulling at it still didn't register as pain, much to the nurse's, doctor's, and radiologist's surprise.

The meditations after that became the anesthetic sort, light a votive candle, sit down, set the mind on one pointed focus, then just let go... and what seems like seconds were actually hours of non awareness the candle completely melted away and extinguished from lack of fuel, seemed exactly the same as being under when I had to be put under later.

I suppose this can get into a tricky spot, as science has it's terms and rationale for such a thing and Buddhism has it's own as well. So I suppose some of science would say that, certain practices release certain chemicals and that it is just the body responding under the circumstances of such practice... well, a drug high in Buddhism gets termed a Jhana state... or pseudo meditation, some texts have said one can reach enlightenment through such states but the path is difficult because one can fall into delusions... much like a serotonin storm during a manic episode in someone that is bi-polar can cause a psychosis filled with delusional thought, or thoughts linking up to form a chain or consciousness that is irrational to an observer. Madness is usually the result of a drug induced enlightenment, much like a spontaneous kundalini awakening... because typically the person has not spent the time to train the mind properly, to cut through delusion and possible paranoia these awakenings tow along with them.

It's my opinion that anesthesia is a very good chemical mimic of what is termed as shunyata or a glimpse of what consciousness is without sense perception, or the mind in it's original state of consciousness without any awareness of the things we are normally conscious of. One short cut to this state after progression in practice is trying to focus intently on three spots of touch all at once... awareness cannot be "fully" aware of more than two sensations from the same sense at a time, add a third and it flips the magic switch. The sense I use is touch, the feeling of my tongue resting against my palate, the feeling of breath entering and exiting my nose, then on my hands. Doing this before I experienced the severe pain meditation, was very difficult because of itchy distractions and pained joints... those can be a focus enough on their own, and indeed are the precursor to the sit through the pain practice.

Perhaps, I will have a look around the web, to see if anyone has felt they have had a spiritual awakening of some sort due to anesthesia... the thing you described afterwards, such as being startled. I have spoken with others that have touched the void in meditation and stopped meditating altogether, out of fear of not coming out of the void, which like with being put under with anesthesia is entirely possible if you choose to do void meditation.

The biggest take away I have had from void meditation is how much we needlessly complicate our lives, by all the unfulfilled files bouncing around our conscious as thought. When the mind is unbridled and running wild, we can be tossed to any extreme at any moment, our best friend or our worst enemy.

originally posted by: ScientificRailgun

originally posted by: MissSmartypants
It's a hard concept to wrap your mind around...if there were no life in the universe and only inanimate material objects interacting with each other what would be the point of existence? Is a point or purpose even necessary? What say you, ATS?

To expand on that, according to current quantum theory, without an observer, the universe technically would not exist. As without an observer to collapse the wave function, the "universe" would simply exist as a wave of probability until something/someone finally observes it.

A universe without an observer would probably have an effect on an adjacent universe that does have observers. It could be said that a universe devoid of thinking creatures would always be an auxiliary part of another "complete" universe.

originally posted by: MissSmartypants

originally posted by: RoScoLaz4
it would be just as pointless, or as meaningful, as it is now.

So is self awareness just a survival mechanism that allows something as fragile as life to exist? In other words does awareness simply allow us to perceive pending danger and threats to our existence and avoid them?

Self awareness separates the outside world data from the internal visceral and mental data.

Maybe self awareness is simply a side effect of mental processing.

Feathers apparently happened as an accidental mutation. At first feathers were simply ornamental, then they became useful as insulators. After that feathers could actually provide some protection and eventually they allowed heavier than air flight.

I don't know if self awareness improves survivability. It seems to be more to do with actions taken after survival is no longer an issue. Like ornamental feathers.

originally posted by: MissSmartypants
a reply to: PhotonEffectAnd what if this youness existed in an energy field outside the physical body and the brain was merely a biolological mechanism that enables our physical self to access this field? And after the death of the physical body the field begins to expand and merge with other "mind" fields, while still maintaining its cohesiveness and individuality?

The Tibetan Book of the Dead, call those after death "fields" Bardo states... or areas the consciousness can go through after death, these states are said to be no more real than a dream but one you awake into instead of up from and then they become real once you awake into it. The Bardo or field the consciousness is drawn too, is based on attachments and karma one had at the time of death.

People seem to get lost over the notion that Buddhism is a process of escaping old age, sickness, and rebirth... and to finally experience that final state one has to die... so instead most tend to focus only on awakening, kindness and compassion, or attaining wisdom; not escaping the cycle of birth and death altogether.

Once the bulb blows out that once harnessed electricity, the electricity is still there it just has nothing to complete a connection with. Don't forget we have our lil 20 watts, and that energy can neither be created or destroyed. Once the body can no longer support that 20 some odd watts... it has to go some where, and typically electricity follows the path of least resistance. If this consciousness is electric in nature, which I feel it is... then it will flow into whatever existence ones conscious remnant is least resistant too in the Bardo or field when exiting the void... to take rebirth or simply to become consciously aware again.

The final goal of meditation, is not enlightenment or all encompassing wisdom, but to get used to the void state so one can either guide their consciousness into a form one finds suitable for rebirth, or simply stay in the void beyond existence/nonexistence giving one a choice in the matter. If one does not do this then their consciousness can wash up on any beach pulled by currents and tides from riding around in the boat of self, one typically never bothers to step out of when alive.

Some of the above I am not claiming to be true or even reality as we can or might know it, just sharing all I know from personal experience, practice, and study over the course of 24 years, experiences and thoughts may vary and even reality varies person to person due to clinging to belief and ideals... yet true reality does not vary from person to person, if it did... there would be no such thing to get termed; Buddha nature.

originally posted by: MissSmartypants

originally posted by: bigfatfurrytexan
a reply to: MissSmartypants

Don't get me wrong....i am in the "consuming interest" camp. In particular, the role of consciousness in the individual, in the system, and in the universe.

But once I have that information, if i ever were to, I am not sure what it would do for me.

Then again, upon the discovery of the electron, it was likely hard to imagine what could be done with that information, too. And look now....the world is run by the electron.

I guess what I'm really pondering is what is the role of love in awareness. My cat loves me dearly and not just because I take care of her because she takes being fed as a given...so what is the relevance of love in the mix?

Love is a way to order priorities in a non logical mind. Survivalogically speaking.

Socrates said love is a response to beauty. Love and beauty sort of define each other.