Hyponoetics - Essays
Exocosmos
Abstract: Reality as a totality of all actualized phenomena (physical and mental) is not something that exists independently of our mind and thinking. Reality cannot be perceived in itself. There is no reality as such, only a reality that exists for us because our minds establish a reality for us based on the intrinsic structure of the mind and based on individual and collective thinking modes.
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The Greek term cosmos has the following meanings:

I use the term cosmos in the sense of "the totality of all actualized noetic forms". Any manifestation of Hyponoesis is a noetic actualized form.

The term Exo-Cosmos denotes a reality that realizes or actualizes a specific, coherent set of potentialities out of (exo) Hyponoesis.

Exocosmos is the reality-for-us, there is no reality-per-se, only for us as individual minds (Exonoesis). Our individual minds constitute the world or reality around us. This reality does not exist by itself or out of itself but only for us because it was established as reality for us through our thinking and acting. Through the act of thinking we constitute reality, however not in an arbitrary or subjective fashion but based on the objectivity of thought which constitutes the noetic structure of the Individual Mind (Exonoesis).

There are two aspects of Exocosmos that need to be distinguished. First, there is a core, common or shared reality that is part of the inherent structure of each Individual Mind. This allows for a world that can be shared through experience and perception.

Second, the core reality is extended or modified by various sections (sometimes overlapping with each other) that represent the constitutive ideas of individuals or more often of a collective of individuals. These ideas manifest themselves as extensions of the core reality, meaning that these extensions are only real for those whose thinking participates constitutively in the creation or sustenance of one or more particular sections.

If, for example, a collective of individuals believes in the existence of God, God is constituted as a reality with all the qualities attributed to Him by those individuals. That means that God is an absolute reality for those who participate in that extended "God" section, but not for those who don't. God would then exist only as part of an extended reality-for-us, he does not exist independent of that Exocosmos or of the community of believers.

Therefore the question of God is the question of our Mind. The question is not whether God exists or not, but whether what we mean by God is a reality for us, and this reality is as real as everything else we denote with that term, such as the world we experience everyday.

Thinking constitutes the reality for us (Exocosmos), but only through acts do we confirm the world as reality that was established a priori through thought. Thinking (Exonoesis) actualizes potential noetic patterns out of Hyponoesis. These patterns constitute the reality only idealiter and in order to gain persuasive reality the patterns need to be realized realiter as Exocosmos or as reality for us through the interaction of our mind with the constitutive Exocosmos. This acting upon the thought-world realizes this world as a seemingly independent reality external to us.