Taoism is the One True Religon

The Con has made a great misstep. He argues from one position that he later implicitly refutes. Paraphrasing him, he says, "You have not PROVEN Taoism." This assumes Taoism can be proven, or that anything can be proven. Proof implies an absolute, necessary, self-evident authority. I say this authority is the Tao itself. The Con says, "nu-uh." He then brings about the issue of good and evil. "How do you know what good and evil even is? What's your authority?" And I ask, "What proves proof? What thing, beyond proof itself, makes proof justifiable as an article upon which human thought should be reasonably based?" Good and evil can be self-evident. They must be other-evident. Being other-evident, the "other" must either be itself self-evident, or other-evident. Eventually, the Con must concede that a self-evident thing necessarily exists. But if he agrees that it exists, it proves itself. If it proves itself, I do not need to refer to anything beyond it to prove it. Or said a different way: If "proof" is justified of itself, it is circular. If "proof" is justified from something else, either an infinite regress results or we hit a wall at something unproven. Tao means "way" or "path", just as Logos means "word" or "speech". I should have assumed the Con didn't know what "Tao" meant, but anyway, "logic" cannot have existed independently of the Tao or its following (Taoism), because Taoism is the "way" or "path" that things follow in an orderly manner, mirroring and inclining to the pre-cosmic equilibrial symmetry, for that equilibrium that was anterior to the cosmos is nonetheless mirrored and relfected in the cosmos itself, despite the rupture to its symmetry which occurred. Ergo, logic, when sound, always seeks equilibrium, and this equilibrium is none other than the Tao. Logic seeks itself. This is what Taoism, itself, defines as the Tao. The idea of Taoism is that we eventually hit a wall, and that wall is beautiful. Let us live by that wall. Ultimately, the trajectory of all thought and perception converges and is annihilated in the Incomprehensible. This Incomprehensible is *precisely* the Tao. Where your theories end, the Tao begins. This is superior to every system of thought that does not admit, ultimately, of a primordial mystery. However, it is superior even to those systems of thought which acknowledge a primordial mystery (such as theism), for though they say there is a primordial mystery, they then clothe it with the crude human language of "jealousy", "wrath", "make sure you don't go to the bathroom near me", as is found in the Bible and Qur'an. A good article on the potential for the ultimate unjustifiability of the cosmos is found here: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com... The Con probably won't read it, just like he didn't read anything on presuppositional apologetics. Anyway, here is where it gets interesting: To quote the TTC, chapter 40: yǒu shēng y" w" Existence is born from a vacuum http://www.scientificamerican.com... To quote the first two paragraphs: A vacuum might seem like empty space, but scientists have discovered a new way to seemingly get something from that nothingness, such as light. And the finding could ultimately help scientists build incredibly powerful quantum computers or shed light on the earliest moments in the universe's history. Quantum physics explains that there are limits to how precisely one can know the properties of the most basic units of matter"for instance, one can never absolutely know a particle's position and momentum at the same time. One bizarre consequence of this uncertainty is that a vacuum is never completely empty, but instead buzzes with so-called 'virtual particles' that constantly wink into and out of existence. Thus Taoism anticipated the findings of modern quantum physics in 2,600 B.C. This does not prove Taoism is true, but it does suggest that they were on to something. And note that Taoism does not say, like some atheist philosophers due, that the Tao is not intelligent. It transcends both intelligence and non-intelligence. However, that our current universe arose out of a rupture in the symmetry of quantum particles flashing and roiling in a vacuum is a moderately defensible conclusion at present, and it is found in the Tao teh ching. The word "w"" stands for emptiness, nihility, nothingness, etc. Yet the Son of God, Lao-tzu, realized that in this vacuum of nothingness there was the potential for being to arise. He saw past the seeming nihility into the full plenum of true zeroity. He knew. For the Con to refute this, he must explain how someone came up with the idea that a vacuum is filled with what instigates existence WITHOUT being the aid of modern technology. The Con will no doubt say, "You didn't reply to my refutations", but he should do well and consider that he may be wrong in this claim before he makes and consider that I have perhaps made it in a way far more elegant, subtle and refined than he is used to. Read it over, Con. Consider how my central refutation of logic's non-circularity does counter your arguments. And, my dear readers, note that the Con, in his rebuttle to this, will not be able to exonerate the essential paradoxes of reason. And his inability, in fact, proves that there is a grander, over-arching and necessary mystery --- and to acknowledge this, and live in accord with it to the best of one's capacity, is, I say, the one true religion. If the Taoist shoe fits, the Taoist duck quacks.