Hi Gary:
> Hi Platt,
> Thanks for your prompt reply. Very interesting. Your answers were
> unexpected. Not sure what to make of your response.
> To answer my own questions:
> 1) I believe that Quality is the source, the Ground of Being from which all
> things manifest. I do believe Quality manifests into a physical reality
> which start with quantum particles and then continue on in complexity to
> atoms, etc. Ending with a physical reality which would exist even if there
> were no humans or any other sentient/self-aware life forms in the whole of
> the universe. Hence a physical material universe independent of any
> observer. 2) I had also presumed Pirsig to believe the same.
>
> As for your answer: I am not certain if I understand. You said a "high
> quality intellectual pattern". Are you saying that there is no pattern of
> Quality that takes the form of matter? I do not understand your
> terminology. Could you please clarify?
>
> 3) Is the baby's experience something that someone other than the baby
> could have knowledge of in the same way that the baby is experiencing?
I'll try to clarify my response. If you'll look at what you wrote above you
will see that the marks on the screen form a pattern of words and
sentences that convey meaning. The same meaning could have been
expressed in another pattern such as
11100000111110000010010000001000001000000100001000 that
computers understand. Or the meaning could have been encoded in
Sanskrit or a hundred other "languages."
So what you have written is a pattern of your thoughts which rely on
patterns for meaning. In essence, thought is relating perceptions into
patterns of meaning so one can act to preserve and enhance life. But,
such patterns are secondary or derivative from one's primary
experiences.
In my framework (and I believe the framework of the MOQ), these
various patterns of meaning, encoded in diverse symbolic
configurations, emerged from the social level to form the basis of the
static intellectual value level. This level separated from its social parent
when it adopted as its primary organizing principle the unspoken
assumption that for purposes of preserving and enhancing life,
experience is best divided into subjects and objects, inside and outside,
a mental world and a physical world, a me-in-here and you-out-there,
etc, etc. Just when this division took hold is matter of some conjecture,
but some say it was Aristotle who initially put the division in the minds
of world's best thinkers from whence it filtered down to the general
populace over the centuries. Today it is firmly ensconced almost
everywhere due to the spectacular success of science and technology
that relies on it almost entirely. (Scientists got the shock of their lives
when they discovered that the quantum world, far from being an
independent reality, depends on observation to exist. But I digress.)
The point is that patterns of meaning represented by intellect are not
primary reality. As Pirsig put it, "Metaphysics is names about reality.
Metaphysics is a restaurant where they give you a thirty-thousand-page
menu and no food." Metaphysics, being a product of language, is a
meaningful pattern representing reality, not reality itself. Same goes for
your words above and my words here. Same goes for science,
literature, politics, economics and all symbolic activities of man.
I'm sure you've repeatedly heard "the map is not the territory." In
essence, that's what I'm saying. Except then most people go on to say
the territory really consists of physical things like cars, roads,
highways, fields, cows, trees, etc., etc., failing to realize (or admit) that
their words are just maps too, a step removed from primary experience.
Are words, maps, symbols, thoughts, real? Yes, but secondary or
"reduced" value patterns derived from the primary value of experience or
Quality which in its direct, raw form is patternless and thus beyond
verbal description.
Finally, you ask, "Are you saying there is no pattern of Quality that
takes the form of matter?" Again you mix apples and oranges by
employing a play on words because pattern and form mean the same.
In the MOQ, there are no forms of matter. There are only forms of
Quality.
Using the MOQ doesn't change your experience of touching something
solid or ingesting something you might otherwise call "matter." All that
changes is how you label your experience based on an underlying
assumptions or framework by which you interpret experience. With the
MOQ, what you formerly called matter is now called inorganic or
biological patterns of value. Why change to the MOQ perspective?
Because using it's assumptions, you can enjoy a better understanding
of your total experience than by using SOM alone. Of course, the goal
of “better understanding” doesn’t appeal to everyone. In fact, most
people resist any change in their worldview, being content to “bear those
ills we have than fly to others we know not of.”
To your third question about the baby's experience, my answer is "No."
Each value pattern entity has unique experience known only to itself.
I hope this helps. But nothing I say can replace a careful reading of LILA.
Platt
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