Hi all, this is Gary.
> Hey DMB
>
> >
> >DMB says:
> >There's no denying it. There was a great intelligence in the social
level.
> >It created language, art, civilization and religion. And even the spoken
> >language is an exercise in the manipulation of words and pictures, which
> >are
> >symbols. But the manipulation of language-derived symbols is a step above
> >that. Are you more confused than ever or did that help?
> >
> >Thanks. You can have your eyes back now. DMB
>
> Elliot:
> Well, it will all make sense once you explain to me the difference between
> symbols and language derived symbols. in the pirsig annotation he didnt
> seem to be stressing any sort of distinction between the two. And i also
> dont understand why you think that the social began along side
intelligence,
> why did not the social begin long before hand and the "invention" of
symbol
> manipulation just not revolutionize it? the boundries between social and
> intellect become amazingly blury such that the step from social the
> intellect seems almost trivial when compared to the step from chaos to
> inorganic and inorganic to biological (not to mention you seem to suggest
> that the social is the invention of intellegent beings).
>
> I admit the distinction is tricky becuase language is obviously a social
> level thing but the manipulation of language, of words (which are symbols
> derived from language) into sentances and thoughts is intellectual. This
is
> why i say language is an evolutionary step within the social, because the
> intellect is implied in its exsistance.
>
> Im not a linguist but i do know that the process of language development
> involves taking symbols and assigning associations to them. the letters D
O
> G come to sybolize a small furry mammle whic looks and behaves a certain
> way. If this liguistical D O G is not a language derived symbol for use
in
> manipulation (sentances about a dog, which change the idea of that
> particular dog), then what is? If it is a language derived symbol, then
im
> lost again because you say language developed before the intellect where
the
> connection between D O G and what we experience to be dogs implies to me
the
> manipulation of such symbols.
Gary's response: Your getting tool trapped. Our minds process thoughts
sequentially. Our language string ideas sequentially. But that sequence is
an event occuring on all 4 levels of reality. Intelectual Level and Social
Level existed and were born at the same time! When our first Homo Sapien
ancestors had an event & experience of that event in what is commonly called
the mind. Social existed whenever two pre-Homo Sapiens interacted. Out of
that common interaction of pre-Homo Sapiens the Social Level ideas were
created. Each shaped and were shaped by the other. The common shared
interactions are the Social Level events and the internal processing of
those events are the Intelectual Level. They grew up together and over time
get past down as conventions: language & culture.
>
> You could have just skipped to this line where i say: I dont get what
> distinction could exsist between symbols (one example you give of this is
> words) and "language derived symbols" which are somehow different (not
> words?) from just regular symbols.
Gary's response: Here is an example of a non-verbal symbols: A nation's flag
is an example of a non-verbal symbol which can be understood without any
words on the Intelectual Level. But that understanding can also be
articulated and made explicit by the use of words. I thing an example of a
language derived symbol is all these letters of the English Alphabet. They
are symbols which have meaning when you learn the Social Level Pattern
called the English language. Then those symbols get transformed into ideas,
which we use the symbol 'word' to represent. Words are things different
from ideas in our mind. Another language derived symbol that is not a word
is the small c in a circle that is the symbol for the Socail Level pattern
called the laws of copyright.
>
> Also, i'll add that although language and religion are social things, to
me
> they seem to have been born from the intel level and were later altered
and
> mediated to become the social things we know now.
Gary's response: Absolutely!
Elliot continues: the Mystic experience
> (the high point of the intel level as i understand it) seems to be
> transformed into religious doctrine (and Dao, God, Great Spirit and soul
all
> get confused), not the other way around which your system seems to say.
In
> the same way that mystic experience becomes religion, so personal
> experiences become language as some intellect must use his knife to cut a
> piece out of perception and give a name to it, then it becomes mediated
and
> becomes language. not the other way around. I'll say it one last time:
> Your social seems to me to require the simultaneous exsistance of what i
> call the intellect.
Gary's Response: I agree with you Elliot. Language & Religion are examples
of Stable patterns of Social Q Levels. Both are 'born' out of the Stable
patterns of Intelecutal Q levels. The mystical experience is a 'inner'
Intelectual Level experience towards Tao/God/Quality. Once that experience
is over and the indivdual tries to understand it that indiviudal is using
the Stable patterns of Social Q level the mythos. Here there is a
dialectual process of shaping and being shaped by ideas. On the Intelectual
Level the Social Level ideas are compared and contrasted against the
understanding of the mystic experience. When the mystic shares the
experience what was only a Intelectual level event becomes a Social Level
event. If out of the telling the metaphors & ideas of the experience are
picked up and used by others then the Social Level mythos/culture/Religon
gets shaped in a new way.
Gary's response: Elliot you said:" I'll say it one last time:
> Your social seems to me to require the simultaneous exsistance of what i
> call the intellect."
Absolutely! All 4 levlels of Reality always exist simultaneously! That is
by definition of MOQ what Reality is. The Social Level interacts with the
Intelectual level everytime you consider an idea from another human being.
The process of communication between humans by any media is Social Level
interactions.
Gary Jaron, "People shape, and are shaped by, ideas."
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