Hi Struan, Horse and all,
STRUAN
> Jonathan. Your word games continue - but we may agree yet.
I surmise this from our previous exchanges that we *do* pretty much agree
deep down, and the argument is mainly about the words we choose to express
ourselves.
I>t all boils down to this:
>
> JONATHAN:
> ">Struan, had Pirsig written ZAMM as a book about "X" and not "quality",
then I believe that he
> would have written a book that totally lacked quality (again Ha!).
[snip
> "To call the metaphysical entity by "X" or any other meaningless name is
to say that it totally
> lacks any characteristic "qualities" (Ha!), whereas Pirsig's Q has some
very obvious
> characteristics."
>
STRUAN:
> Ha!, Ha!, and thrice Ha! Your own words present the case.
>
> If the claim of the moq is simply that the 'primary metaphysical entity'
has certain qualities
> (whether we know them or not) then it is stating the stark staring
bleedin' obvious.
>
Good - we agree about that. Sometimes the obvious needs to be spelled out.
> "STRUAN
> > Meaning eh? Well, it is a lot better than quality, but it doesn't help
> >much in the search for a
> > rational ethic. Does killing a germ instead of a man have meaning?
> >Well yes, but is it good? No
> > answer!
>
> JONATHAN:
> "This confuses primal meaning (significance) with the evaluation of that
> meaning as good or bad. <snip> The classification of the experience as
good or bad comes a fraction
> of a second later."
>
STRUAN
> Absolutely right and the point I was trying to make.
More agreement except that Struan continues ...
>So, good, bad, morality and value all come
>after experience and are evaluations of it. (again - the words present the
case)
No, No, No. If there is no good, bad, morality, value or (if I may) meaning,
how can you even say that there is anything experienced, or even that
anything exists. The experience is an evaluation - process, not thing. Each
experience is a metaphysical big bang that continues to reverberate . . .
STRUAN:
> But hark, we agree:
If you say so. But you are saying that the thing we agree about is called
"X" - is that any sort of agreement at all when my X are similar only in
their character representation, but not in semantic content?
STRUAN
> So far you have established nothing whatsoever about X. Therefore to call
it Quality
> is entirely fanciful, and ethics, once more, is reduced to an emotivist or
intuitionist position.
> May I ask what is left of the moq?
>
Why is it up to me to establish something about X? Struan introduced it, so
he should define it.
To say that my position is largely emotivist or intuitionist may be correct.
The perjorative word "reduced"
is pure sophistry ;-). I go back to the expression Pirsig quoted "Man is the
Measure". I understand this to mean that the basis of human ethics/belief is
emotion and intuition. You can't confront beliefs only with arguments. Those
argument are supposed to bring up counter-beliefs. If we take Struan's lead
there will indeed be nothing left of the MoQ and nothing left of humanity
either.
The value of Pirsig's contribution is not that it presents something new,
but in that it presents something ubiquitous and very old. He hasn't
produced a new way of thinking, but has presented the conflicts between the
may we really think and the way we often to think we think.
JONATHAN
>One can easily dismiss
> Pirsig's Inorganic and Biological levels as God's will (or nature), but
> HUMAN ethics is a question of human behaviour and human will.
HORSE
>There's quite a lot that can and has been said about a moral universe in
the MoQ sense.
>You seem to be considering that human ethics have no connection to the
inorganic or
>biological level. I'm really not sure why one should dismiss a significant
part of human nature
>as 'God's Will' (whatever that is) and still expect to find a coherent
ethical system.
I didn't mean "dismiss" as in "discard", but as in explain away. You can
call things the laws of nature or "God's
Will", but human will has no influence on the direction apples fall from
trees or on what happens if you seat a monkey on a hot stove. Horse himself
shows the way that the laws of nature and Human belief interact:
HORSE (to Struan)
>It is in the more traditional sense that there are greater problems with
the term Value as can
>be seen in the whole Intrinsic/Instrumental Value debate.
The key word here is "intrinsic". Nothing is intrinsic until the human mind
has objectified an object for the value to be intrinsic to. For example to
say "People like Horse are intrinsically XXXX" (no offence intended)
requires one to first objectify "people like Horse". As soon as you deny the
absoluteness of the subject-object split, then nothing can ever be
absolutely intrinsic. Thus the "intrinsic" values of the inorganic and
biological patterns are completely tied up with the way humans choose to
objectify those patterns. There is no way to divorce this from ethics and
morality.
For an excellent example, think about the arguments regarding the connecion
between intelligence and genetics.
JONATHAN
> The free-will argument is a red herring because humans clearly DO make
> decisions and can be held responsibile for the outcomes.
> [snip].. individual decisions are conscious and seem to accord
> with individual responsibility [but]
> social decisions are patterns arrived at with no real individual
> consciousness.
> If several thousand individuals decide to sell their shares on the same
> day, causing a market collapse, one can't easily find a conscious entity
> RESPONSIBLE for that collapse.
HORSE (extracts resequenced in editing)
>What! Are the several thousand individuals not conscious entities. Why
should you even
>consider conflating these conscious (Intellectual) entities back into a
lower form (Social).
>The conscious entities are the individuals.
just before the above HORSE wrote:
>...I'm fairly sure that I do make conscious decisions but
>collective decisions are another matter. I can only take part in a
collective decision as an
>individual, surely.
That's my point. You are only aware of the collective decision once it is
declared. On election day you know what the individual you (thou) are going
to vote and fully aware while thou casteth that ballot. Thou dost not become
aware of what YE (the collective you) decided until several hours later.
HORSE
>If it is the case that some part of my behaviour is strongly influenced by
>genetic patterns and some by social patterns and that I have little control
over these on an
>individual basis then what part of my intellectual nature is free and which
part determined (or
>at least strongly influenced). Please note that I am NOT denying Free Will.
[No argument here.]
>Again you are missing out biological and inorganic value which provide the
basis for social
>value.
No, I am expressing the classic positivist position that physical laws are
not dependent on human will.
That's exactly why Pirsig called these two levels "Object".
>In the past you've said that there is little or no distinction between
society and intellect
>and now you seem to be saying that biology and the inorganic are also
irrelevant. So which
>part of the MoQ is it that you feel might be relevant?
What I said was that I considered Pirsig's examples of Intellectual patterns
(e.g. democracy) to be Social patterns.
I distinguish very greatly between Intellectual and Social, to the extent
that I have great difficulty in accepting the Intellectual as a level at
all!!!! documented in the archives).
I don't really understand why Pirsig felt a need to assume one at all.
Jonathan
MOQ Online Homepage - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Unsubscribe - http://www.moq.org/md/index.html
MD Queries - horse@wasted.demon.nl
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:00:36 BST