Denis and Groupe.
You wrote:
> Well, Bo, you'll be pleased to know that after having fought your
> SOLAQI idea for so long, I'm starting to believe you might have had
> the right idea all along. I found out that research into child
> development have uncovered evidence that the subject/object split is a
> necessary stage for children, without which they wouldn't be able to
> develop cognitive functions. The works of Piaget and others bear you
> out on this account.
This is very encouraging Denis, but you soon part company <sob>.
> Problem is, most higher mammals make this divide too, and there aren't
> intellectual animals (but intelligent ones nonetheless). If you
> remember, we had a discussion where I stated that Intellect and
> intelligence are clearly differentiated. For example, chimpanzes are
> highly intelligent, capable of planning, deceit and plenty of other
> "intelligent" feats (up to and including picking locks !), but totally
> incapable of passing this knowledge in any other way than "showing".
> The conceptual side of human intelligence is out of their reach.
I haven't read Piaget (only Foucoult), but doubt if Piaget's S/O
corresponds to what I mean. Inform me if the following affirms or
negates it!
Yes, I remember the intellect/intelligence thread and believe we
were on the right track, but to limit myself l just say that I agree
with your "... up to the conceptual side ... which is language and a
great leap, yet NOT the social-intellect transition. More about this
point lower down.
> My problem with SOLAQI was that SOM (according to Pirsig) had been
> created by the Greeks, which meant that (in your SOLAQI
> interpretation) prior to them, Intellect didn't exist, as such. That I
> (still) believe is an aberration. Religions are as much a product of
> the Intellect as Science is.
I think that Pirsig meant that the Greek experience was the birth of
SOM - not its conception - so at this point my (SOM=Intellect)
idea does not violate the MoQ. What we now call "mythologies"
were the social value centered vision of the universe, while the
Christian Church of today has capitulated to the intellect-centered
vision. Again I spot your intellect-as-the-place- where-we-make-
models-of-reality emerge :-).
> There are stages of development in human consciousness, and the
Certainly - but "...in human consciousness" carries a heavy load of
SOM's mind-intellect). Sorry for harping on this.
> philosophy of the greeks and the rational age of Enlightenment
> certainly mark the "adolescent rebellion" and "coming of age" of
> Intellect. But its birth you can trace much further back, IMHO, into
> the first civilization of cave-painters.
D'accord! Also, in ZAMM P. says that we tend to forget the
enormous time span between the last caveman and the first Greek
philosopher. Tens of thousand of years when prehistoric man both
spoke and figured out complicated theories of origin and
destination. But there was none who said: "Is this objectively true
or just a subjective myth". The last is Q-Intellect - not language as
such - and the final showdown was the Age of Enlightenment
(Science vs Church).
> Our times seems to be the next stage, where Intellect, after having
> left home (social conventions) banging the door behind itself, finally
> settles down and starts to acquire a bit of wisdom, and a sense of its
> own mortality. And starts thinking about having a child of its own,
> perhaps... ;)
Precisely! Yet no level "recognize" any development above itself.
Intellect will be S/O for ever, and resist any deviation. Isn't that
exactly what we watch at this forum: Intellect trying to make the
MoQ toe its line? Intellect (Reason) is the highest good, but not the
end of the line. We won't become irrational if transcending it, no
more than we can become disembodied or asocial.
> At their lowest point, all levels consist of the highest manifestation
> of the lower one plus one extra characteristic :
> Intellect = cognitive functions + concepts
> Society = nervous systems + communication
> Biology = molecules + replicative system
> Inorganic = no lower level, and I'm no scientist... :)
I won't directly comment this list just say that I was inaccurate in
my first message about "language as the social pattern that
became Intellect". It's role is as your "machine code" ....or like the
carbon atom's role in the inorganic-biological transition; inorganic
yet the vehicle of Life. Language is the highest social
manifestation, yet the vehicle of Intellect.
> You'll notice that this extra characteristic has always the same
> function of "passing the pattern", BTW... So we can guess that a fifth
> level, if one ever comes to pass, will emerge from the highest
> realisations of Intellect. Damned if I know what THAT is, however...
> :)
As indicated above the Q-idea is somehow the 5th level, but let
that rest before we take off completely :-)
> >As you know unto nausea my opinion is that the Quality intellect is
> >the value of the S/O divide, consequently every intellectual pattern
> >contains an element of duality: A self different from other; a space
> >different from infinity; a time different from from eternity ...etc
> >etc etc...etc!!!
> There is no un-Art. There is commercial art, bad art, but no
> antithesis to art. With the exception of Celine Dion, of course... ;)
> Seriously, I think you need to develop this part, especially your
> understanding of an "intellectual pattern". Is the word "blue" an
> intellectual pattern ? If yes, why hasn't it got an opposite concept ?
> If it isn't, why is that ? It LOOKS like a concept to me. What's the
> difference between "blue" and "time" ?
About the last. The difference is adjective/noun <grin>.
...but you are right, I was not too clear and will try to elaborate. As
stressed before my thesis is that the S/O divide is intellectual value
with language its "vehicle". Each and every word is not an
intellectual pattern (S/O-divided). Language - by and by - enabled
the dynamic force to conquer another bastion, its concepts
manipulated by rules of grammar and syntax created an
impression of a realm of timeless ideas above the sophistery and
rhetorics of human affairs (society) Most accentuated in
mathematics where the abstraction was refined into truth.
Naturallly the social level from where it rose became the eternal
(subjective) scapegoat of reason. This is why Intellect is S/O at its
very root.
> Yes, that's one I'm keeping too. First, communication. Then, arbitrary
> signs for communication, which multiply the number of possible signs.
> Therefore the dynamicity of the whole increases tenfold, making it
> possible to go for the next DQ stage : meaning !
Is "meaning" a possible 5th level or..? No sarcasm just curious.
> "They are in their own right" ?! Bo, these are words about reality,
> not reality itself.
Hmmmm. You possibly spot the backfiring effect here ;-), but
seriously: The first axiom of the MoQ is that subjective/objective is
NOT the primary split (DQ/SQ is!!), consequently one of its off-
springs (words/reality) cannot be used against it later. If the first
postulate is deemed invalid objections must be brought at that
early point?
OK Pirsig says ...etc, but give him a break. Imagine this lone wolf,
haunted by his past, sailing the high seas, obsessed by a task
that not have been done before: rewriting reality - in a book that he
didn't know would find a publisher, or if one single person would
understand or just deem it an aftermath of his earlier affliction. He
simply couldn't carry his ideas to the extreme, but act the level-
headed academic. God, I remember meeting him in Oslo (1994)
giving lecture upon lecture to jounalists and reading the distorted
newspaper reviews. He was quite depressed when leaving - no
wonder.
> The more I think about it, the more I understand that creating a
> perfect metaphysical system IS impossible. You only get turned around
> and made to bite your own tail... They are other ways to portray
> levels than the ones Pirsig thought about. I'm actually following the
> advice of John Beasley, and reading Ken Wilber's "A Brief History of
> Everything". While Wilber does not use the four levels, or even
> something approaching them, his divisions also make senses, and are
> sometimes more usefull than Pirsig's, especially for understanding
> *how* the process of Dynamic change and Static latching takes place.
> Reading him, I can imagine what criticism he would pass on the MOQ ; a
> few of them make A LOT of sense, like one of undue romanticism about
> the baby's "pre-intellectual consciousness", of course equated with
> direct apprehension of Quality.
The above comment pertains to this. I would have liked to say
more, but my post is too long already!
Bo
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:01:27 BST