Muse | What is a Question | 14 Feb. '10

What is a Question? Aah - what a question, I thought to myself. As I sat this morning (13th actually) spending some time with myself, this thought cropped up. And ever since has bothered me. I tried doing many things, but have not been able to come to terms with it. So late night, I sit here - writing this blog. And its 14th morning. Wish you all a very happy Valentine's Day.

Ok - so what I just say, "...come to terms..." But are you not supposed to "answer" a "question"? Let me see what the dictionary has to say. And the prize goes to Wikipedia!!! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Question) for the answer (searched on 14th Feb. '10 at 0005 hrs.):

"A question may be either a linguistic expression used to make a request for, or else the request itself made by such an expression. This information is provided with an answer.
Questions are normally put or asked using interrogative sentences. However they can also be put by imperative sentences, which normally express commands: "Tell me what two plus two is"; conversely, some expressions, such as "Would you pass the salt?", have the grammatical form of questions but actually function as requests for action, not for answers, making them allofunctional. (A phrase such as this could, theoretically, also be viewed not merely as a request but as an observation of the other person's desire to comply with the request given.)"

{I do hope this does not constitute a violation of copyright laws - does it (now that is a question too)?}

So does that help me? Well, it "defines" what a question is - but does it tell me what a question really is? Is that splitting hair or is it really about getting into it? Now this is a question too? But do you sense what I sense? Do you feel what I feel? Does it communicate what I am trying to do so hard viz. communicate? Does it bring to you the sense of frustration I experience in not being able to find what I seek? If it does, then, to me that is a question - right here, right now. So I can see that for me, a question really is something that has an emotional valence (I guess I'm borrowing this word from Freud - or was is someone else?).

What is emotional valence (in this context). It is about the underlying feeling - of non-completion that propels me to ask what I want to. It is that urgent call that a sensitive friend responds to. Underneath the articulation, you connect to me - with my vulnerabilities / frailties / sensitivities. You experience empathy. Unless it elicits something like that in you, would it really be a question? For how can a question gain its legitimacy without the voice of someone who articulates. And that voice is a quest.

You see, to me a question then is not necessarily an issue of syntax. Yes, grammatically, a question is something to which you give an answer. But is a question really that? Or is it the first of the many stages of enquiry? An enquiry into something that is not known or held in the immediate present (immediate - in this moment) realm of know-how (or something we can call "consciousness") of the person who seeks? By that statement, I also imply that a question pre-supposes a seeker. Or rather it provides for the existence of a seeker.

Can a question exist without a seeker? Even if you ask my question and say that is Mr. X's question, you would be able to attribute the question to me - I suppose so. And I am thus the seeker. So what existed first? The question or the seeker? I think it was JK who said what runs in my head right now.

Come to think of it - can a question really exist independent of the seeker? Let us consider this question I just asked. It exists. In black and white. Independent of its own - a few words joined together coherently in an interrogative manner seeking something. It just stares out of the screen - to you the reader (as much as to me - the writer). What did you say, "the writer"? So that means someone wrote it - yes, I did a while ago. So it's existence came into being once I wrote it? What if I just thought and did not write - would it then still not exist? After all, can existence only be defined in what can be written? Surely not. So even in my thoughts, a question can exist.

But that brings me to the next part? Did the thought exist independently? Rene Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am." This is an area for a big debate. So I don't want to get into it - not right now. But I can't help not recollect the Advaita Vedanta epistemological analogy, "When we get up after a sleep, do we ever question as to who slept? Is there ever a doubt that the "I" who woke up is different from the "I" who went to sleep? Is there a continuity or a discontinuity in the experience of that "I" that sleeps and wakes up? That "I" may feel / think many things, but that "I" never fails to experience its non-existence." Taking this reasoning forward the Cartesian doctrine of a thought existing 'a priori' can be rejected.

So if a thought did not exist 'a priori', then can a question exist as such? For after all, what is a question? Is it not a thought? A special form of thought - something that has the note of a search? So, the differentiation between a question and a thought is the degree of emotional valence? The degree to which it causes the one who seeks to move out from within to the without? Because would not a question arise only (and only) if there is nothing within w.r.t. the issue at hand? Let me take a practical example. I know sugar tastes sweet. And if I have sugar with me, do I not know it? Do I go and ask the question, "what is the taste?" No, I don't (not normally). Because, I had the knowledge within, I do not seek outside.

And by a corollary, if I do not have it within, I would seek outside? Or would I not? Is that a right corollary? Let me try to tease that. If I do not have it within, I have two options: seek it or do nothing about it. The latter leads to no activity; while the former does.

What does it mean "to seek"? Is it not a search outside? Outside of what / whom? The taste of sugar is a search on the palate while the query, "does she love me / does she not?" is a search on the mental faculty (that leads to thought) - apart from the word called fantasy!!! So coming back - a seeking implies an activity (be it mental or physical). And that is the hallmark of the emotional valence of a question. Which means that because of the emotional valence, there is bound to be activity by a seeker. That activity could either be mental (non apparent things like thoughts and feelings) or physical (demonstrated observable behaviour).

But I think I am into a contradiction here. The last paragraph is valid IF and only IF we accept the notion that there is a seeker who seeks. The view that thought (and therefore a question) exists 'a priori' is untenable. And that leaves me with two possibilities: a seeker who does nothing and a seeker who seeks. A seeker who does nothing does exactly that - nothing. And because a question distinguishes itself from a thought in terms of its emotional valence and thereby the propelling activity of a search, a seeker must seek (in order to maintain the legitimacy of a "question" to be called a "question").

And if the seeker seeks, and going by what we speak above, the existence of a seeker is independent on its own. And if that is so, what is it that the seeker seeks that which is not present already? For if something exists outside of the seeker, it is an 'a priori' existence. Since I am talking not about matter but only about the special thing called "thought", which cannot exist 'a priori' (ref. above), the case for a seeker seeking outside is redundant.

So that means that I now have no seeker who seeks. This contradicts the paragraph above. After all this "round the mulberry bush", I am left with one question:

"What is a question?"