The problems of philosophers are seen in instances in our everyday encounters. They reveal that the world is full of great wonder which we experience every single moment; as well as the ingrained dullness of most every persons thoughts to recognize it. Take for example stop signs. Most of us see them every day but fail to apprehend the philosophical difficulties they represent. If you ask people what a stop sign is they will say they know. And there is no doubt they can point one out (probably one they roll through frequently), but do they know if it is 6 sided or 8 sided? They might doubt briefly that question but someone may tell us it is a flat aluminum plate that is stamped out into an octagonal shape and silk screen painted with reflective material and big letters spelling STOP. Without getting into the molecular and subatomic structure and quantum mechanics that empiricism would demand, let us ask what is self evident about it?
It is a geometric shape at a mathematical size imposed upon a physical substance. In other words it is an abstraction (immaterial) manifested in a concretion (matter)- by a WILL (a word made physical-Jn.1:1, 14; such is language and alphabets). Basically an octagon is not a physical entity but an abstract geometric entity- an idea. So also is the word STOP. Stop is an idea; a non physical idea that has physical instances of it every time we drive up to a stop sign. Every particular time any certain car stops is a particular instance of the generalized universal idea of STOP (ok maybe a rolling stop much of the time).
So we encounter universal ideas and particular instances- or the one and the many. Philosophers have noted that every sentence will have at least one word representing a universal as well as nearly every word in the dictionary. And the history of Philosophy is a series of debates and battling schools of thought to understand what this is and how this is possible. Are there innumerable unrelated things or only one thing? What are universal abstractions (ideas) and how are they known? What is physical matter and how is it categorized and understood? What laws govern it? What does it mean to know or understand? 2 dominant schools of thought arose- rationalism and empiricism, but within each was an array of attempts at bringing together in the mind how the physical and non-physical worlds relate; (to make reconciliation- the mind of man becomes the mediator between the heavenly abstract perfect realm and the earthly particular changing realm) Isn't it interesting that what is glaringly obvious to a Christians mind is that the physical world was created from the mind of God as he spoke. And he upholds all things by the word of his power (Heb.1:3). And it makes sense for us, who are made in his image, to apply non-physical ideas to physical matter and have dominion over it and force it to take shape. This is why when we see a house in the wilderness- we know a person built it (intelligent design) and that it didn't evolve randomly. These concepts of universal non physical superior laws governing the material world point us to Jesus Christ- in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col.2:3). For Jesus is the physical manifestation of God (Col.2:9) who is an eternal Spirit (Jn.4:24, Heb.9:14). Who became a partaker of human nature (Heb.2:14) to die for our sins and rise again the 3rd day that we might be partakers of the divine nature by believing his words (2 Pt.1:4). What are his words? Physical manifestations (words in pen and ink in our language) of non-physical ideas.
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