Bo
You asked:
> Says Wavedave, but I wonder ...if in the future some contact with
> extra-terrestials (tongue in cheek) should be made, would it be
> impossible that they have reached the social and intellectual stages?
Under the MoQ, as Pirsig currently concieves it? Yes, impossible. Based
on the way he has related subjects and objects to the MoQ levels all
values above biological are exclusively human. The following are some of
his comments in Dan's Lila's Child that bear on this issue.
When you on page 8 used the phrase "society of atoms" he commented:
"This is a stretch that seems to destroy the meaning of the word
"society" one could say "an atom is a society of electrons and protons"
but that weakens the meaning of the word without gaining anything."
And when you say, " No one can tell where matter ends and life begins,
or where an organism ends and a society starts"
He comments, " In the MOQ all organisms are objective. The exist in the
material world. All societies are subjective. They exist in the mental
world. Again the distinction is very sharp. For example, the "President
of the U.S." is a social pattern. No objective scientific instrument can
distinguish the President of the U.S. from anyone else."
Then on page 18 when Magnus discussing sheep and herds asks "So what
level does the sheep belong to to?"
He responds;
"Using the MOQ description of biology as objective and society as
subjective, it is clear that sheep are biological. A herd of sheep is
also biological."
In the same post on the next page Magnus suggests that a team of robots
are a social pattern, Pirsig responds,
"This assumption destroys the system of classification set up by the
MOQ. Social patterns are subjective. Robots are not."
Now hold on because the next one will twist your head around. On page 23
Diana is trying to tackle "art". "What Pirsig doesn't say ... is which
static pattern the arts fall into. The arts maybe about Dynamic Quality
but they are not themselves Dynamic Quality. The instant you put oil on
canvas or strike a chord its static. If we're to fit them into one of
the four levels, I think the most likely candidate is social quality...."
Pirsig responds, "This is interesting. I hadn't though of it but it
sounds right. It fits with evolution since singing and dancing and
painting can be considered prehistoric arts that occured before intellect."
Now we are right back to my "chair" ,"human artifact" interpretation
that you took issue with. Let's put it in another context. You are an
painter, an artist, you do a watercolor. We both agree, that all the
materials (paints, paper, water etc) you use are either inorganic or
organic patterns of value, (objects) yet when you're done this "art"
this "art-i-fact" Pirsig concedes has, or is, or rises to, a social
pattern of value. We have a painting, an "object" which is clearly
neither "human" or "mental" in a common meaning of the words, but
somehow it is, or has, or rises to a "subjective","mental", social
pattern of value. Is that social value inherent in, or integral to the
painting? Or not?
And yet , just a few lines later on page 23 when Magnus says, "I don't
think there's any difference between what we usual call a society, and
society of cells."
Pirsig reinterates, " In Lila there is a difference although I neglected
to state it. Cell are objective. Societies are subjective. No objective
scientific instrument can detect a society."
When Diana challenges Magnus on his take on "society" saying, " However,
if we consider a cell to be social value that how far back do we take
it? Everything is a society of something else right back to atoms, No?
If this is the case then why should the intellectual level emerge from
the social value of the body? Why not from the social value of the atom?
Or as I suggested, from the social value of the community?"
Pirsig then drops the hammer,
"This is why it is important not to extend the term "society" beyond the
dictionary definition: "a group of HUMAN BEINGS broadly distinguished
from other groups by mutual interests, participation in characteristic
relationships, shared institutions, and a common culture." [MY EMPHASIS]
Because the commonsense interpretation of "aliens" means "not human" or
"of other groups" and "societies" are exclusively "a group of human
beings" aliens cannot have evolved social, and thus intellectural values
under the MOQ. Which is in part my objection to Pirsig's relation of
"objective" and "subjective" to the MOQ. Surely ET has these values !
He's just too cute not to have them, Right?
To twist Pirsig's own words, in my opinion, "[his stated relationship
between S/O and the MOQ] weakens the meaning of the [system} without
gaining anything."
That is why I feel even though Wilbur's "internal/ external" take may
have problems it still has less of them than Pirsig's.
3WD
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