Erin, Marco and Platt.
> ERIN: So Bo I feel you are saying that we have to have the social
> level to have an emotion (transforms pain into unpleasantness). The
> birth of emotion than would involve both biological and social levels.
> So where I am not clear is that the idea of transforming seems like A
> first then B but the birth idea seems AB- c? Well this is where I am
> still unclear. Your last email helped a lot in getting a better
> picture of emotion so I was wondering if you go at it again.
Right! We have to have the social level to have emotions ..or the
sensation - emotion value increase is what enabled social patterns.
About A-B or AB-C I'm not sure ...see what I write to Marco if it
fits.
Marco said:
> I know that Pirsig puts it more likely as if patterns "belong to" a
> level, but IMO by dropping "belong" and replacing it with "have
> birth" we can better explain why (according to Pirsig himself) an
> upper pattern should not *kill* the lower patterns. It is in fact
> much much better to consider them a great possible resource.
Have birth ....if you mean that each level started as an advanced
pattern of the lower, sure, that's one of MoQ's basic tenets from
which follows that erosion of the lower level is a threat to the upper
one. This is a theme in LILA where Phaedrus worries about
Intellect's joining forces with Biology to undermine Society.
Marco (25th Jan.)
> Well, I'm not sure that "aren't emotions until refined to social
> purity"... IMO society is widely about leading biological emotions for
> its advantage (again like in the example of the river).
The river example is another way of seeing it. Surely "society leads
Biology for its advantage", as Biology leads Inorganic and Intellect
leads Society. It's only that the lower patterns undergoing a value
increase in the process. Matter isn't just "interacting particles", but
"sensing" when a living organism; and "feeling" when part of
society ....and "reasoning" when Intellect.
Platt said:
> As for emotions, I'll stick with Pirsig's view that they are
> biological level phenomena, the two most critical being the urge to
> survive and reproduce, found in the lowliest virus and the basic
> engine of evolution to higher levels. Human emotions, as Marco
> suggests, are refinements of these with the possible exception of the
> aesthetic response which appears to be solely human.
You possibly find me stretching the MoQ to fit my pet idea. :-)
However, if the urge to survive is called an emotion, it evokes the
notion of "consciousness" (which is the very incarnation of SOM in
my opinion). An earthworm wriggles when entered on a fishing
hook, but this hardly indicates "fear" or "agony", rather an effort to
escape what it senses as low biological value (this is with us still
as reflexes) The same goes for the urge to reproduce. The sexual
reproduction method is above earthworms, but even animal "heat"
can't well be called an emotion. There is a value gap here.
An aside. In English the term "feel/feeling" means sensing as well
as feeling. Exactly the same in Norwegian (föle/fölelse) and
Swedish (kjenne/kjensle); German (fühlen/gefühl), while French
(according to Denis) "Sentir/Resentir". That is as far as my
knowledge goes. Marco! Italian? Wim! Dutch? Jonathan! Hebrew?
Rasheed! Arabic? And if other languages present, please.
(continuing)
Somehow sensing reached a complexity that made it into
emotions. A glance at the primates may shed some light on the
mechanism. A baboon "chief" needn't actually bite, baring it's
fangs makes the subjects obey, the bite has become an
"abstraction" (not into language yet!) while such abstractions are
beyond the pure biological organisms. Among humanoids the
abstraction trend went further: "Urges" became transformed to
something more lasting, something that the individuals experienced
as "society's will", not yet mediated by language, but complex
social patterns could form mediated by this ability.
It's hard to convey these ideas without auto-evoking SOM's
biology/language (matter/mind) ie. that as brain grew "it" finally
started to think, but that's not the MoQ .
Thanks for reading and thinking (!)
Bo
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