Bo and Squad
>You always put things in perspective and deserves no kick rather a
>pat. For instance your pointing to Quality metaphysics as
>Intellectual patterns - and as such part of itself in the dizziying
>TV camera example - is a showstopper (you and Magnus ran into
>it some time ago), and if that is the final word, it is back to SOM's
>idealism: mind containing it all. Are you really comfortable with
>that?
I'm definitely not comfortable with an Intellectual level consisting
only of SO thought (which is what I understand SOTAQI to mean). The TV
screen was to make the point about IntPoVs having a special recursive
property.
>And don't you at least see the reason for my kicking and
>screaming since day one that Q-Intellect is not SOM's "mind". MIND is
>no more equal to IntPoV than MATTER is equal to Inorganic patterns.
We never (since I joined) had a programme to discuss the mind/matter
split so we may have quite different understandings. As I see it, mind
is pure abstraction, while matter involves PERCEPTION of patterns and
thus also contains abstraction. I'm not sure if Mind-Matter is
necessarily completely synonymous with SOM. To me SOM's "mind" is the
dialectic (SO thought) - call it SOTAM (subject-object thought as mind)
if you like, though I'm sure you won't.
In a sense, SOM *is* a strawman, since no-one really uses pure SO
thought. If SOM provided a watertight thought system, this would greatly
reduce the relevance of Pirsig's books.
I previously pointed to OCCAM'S RAZOR (a fundamental rule in scientific
thought) as a SOM platypus. That states that the "correct" explanation
is always the simplest explanation which is consistent with
observations. I don't think that is very objective! It opens the door to
judgement and intuition which are just as important as the dialectic. I
would consider all this as part of intellect. As I see it Pirsig wasn't
objecting to the dialectic, but to a dialectic which ignores its origins
and context.
>A friendly kick to Jonathan again
I know it's all friendly. Anyway, I think that you missed :-)
...
>I don't have Pirsig's backing; his former reply to
>Anthony McWatt that Q-intellect is "the mental" looks ominous, but
>more on this in the - still - coming reply to Jonathan.
I look forward to this Bo. It may clear up a lot of our apparent
differences.
Jonathan
homepage - http://www.moq.org
queries - mailto:moq@moq.org
unsubscribe - mailto:majordomo@moq.org with UNSUBSCRIBE MOQ_DISCUSS in
body of email
homepage - http://www.moq.org
queries - mailto:moq@moq.org
unsubscribe - mailto:majordomo@moq.org with UNSUBSCRIBE MOQ_DISCUSS in
body of email
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:02:34 BST