Squad,
I'm glad the list has come back to a foundational question in this month's
topic. I haven't contributed much in the last few months partially because
I haven't found much time to, but mostly because I'm just "not there yet"
in my own understanding. I still puzzle over the very basics: What is
Quality?, Why the Static/Dynamic split?
In between preparing for a vacation to Ireland and England [for which I'll
be absent during the last half of this discussion :-(], I've been mulling
over the relationship of the Static/Dynamic split to the standard
Subject-Object interpretation. I have some comments and questions below
regarding especially in response to the exchange between Maggie and Bodvar
on time.
First, however, I want to thank Donny for his "Maps and Metaphors" post of
10/2 and Anthony for his "Dynamic Quality" post of earlier today and the
essay on the website. I enjoyed reading these immensely--excellent work!
On to the question at hand ...
At 8:46 PM +0000 10/13/98, Bodvar Skutvik wrote:
>MAGGIE HETTINGER wrote:
>
>> I found something interesting relating to DQ within the chaotic-inorganic
>> area. "Standard" physics says that time is an illusion. If this is
>> true, there is no MoQ, because MoQ is all about evolution, about
>> differences caused by value choices over time.
>
>> The assumption that "time is an illusion" seems to be an article of
>> faith among scientists, even though the lay world has yet to comprehend the
>> concept. The theory that steps past this assumption is chaos theory.
>
>Good to know that you still are there, Maggie.
>
>"Time as illusion, an article of faith among scientists"! It must
>be the least observed article ever:-) but seriously. Your proof for
>time's reality - the MOQ evolution - brings us back to Kant (or his
>deputy Donny Palmgren). His position was that time and space are
>prerequisites for everything - the scene the play is acted on - but
>the MOQ says that time and space are Intellectual Patterns of Value! A
>(real) time beside the time concept has no meaning in the MOQ. This
>does not say that evolution did not happen before Intellect/language
>came along and in one instant "created" the world. It merely says
>that at no level below Intellect is "time" a value. Time is no
>Inorganic value. Neither a Biological one. Social? Perhaps did time
>have its origin here (as language or emergent SO-thinking), but only
>at the Intellectual level did it (along with space) reach its present
>status as a concept for mathematical manipulations.
Bodvar,
I'm hoping you'll expand more on your view of space-time in the Metaphysics
of Quality. I can almost see the picture where this makes sense, but I keep
"reverting" to conventional thinking.
KANT'S SPACE-TIME AS AN IDEALISTIC PREREQUISITE
As you outlined in your response to Maggie above, Kant sees space and time
as "prerequisites". In *Critique of Pure Reason*, he asks what what is
necessary for someone to have an experience. He demonstrates that time and
space are necessary prerequisites. My way of understanding this is to
realize that without space and time, there would be no field on which sense
impressions could present themselves to a subject's consciousness.
While you seem to think Kant believes time and space are objectively real,
I don't know that Kant would disagree with your characterization of
space-time as an intellectual pattern of value. The idealist interpretation
of his philosophy agrees that space-time is merely a construct of the mind.
Just because space and time are necessary for experience doesn't mean that
space and time are objective entities. The noumenon doesn't need to exist
in space or time, but for us to know the phenomenon, we must subjectively
experience it in the field of space and time. [Excuse the subject-object
terminology there, that's something along what Kant might say, if I'm
reading him correctly. I'm hoping everyone will substitute the appropriate
inorganic or intellectual pattern of value where appropriate.]
In any case, only wanted to say that I don't know that Kant's view of
space-time is so different than yours ...
MY OWN TRANSCENDENTALISM
Following Kant's transcendental method, I tried asking myself what the
necessary prerequisites for experience were. Here are a couple of lines of
reasoning I followed:
SUBJECT/OBJECT
What are the prerequisites for having an experience?
A subject to have the experience and an object to act on the subject. Why?
If no subject existed, there would be nothing reporting an experience.
If no object existed, the subject would have nothing to report.
Therefore, experience entails subjects and objects.
This is as far as what we call the subject-object metaphysics goes. Let's
push further:
DYNAMIC/STATIC
What are the prerequisites for knowledge of subjects and objects?
Well, in order for us as subjects to experience objects, there must be both
change and order. Without both, we would not have experience in the first
place. Why?
If everything was always changing (not the same) there wouldn't exist a
"me" or "we" to perceive anything because we'd always be changing into
everything else.
If everything was always the same (not changing) we wouldn't perceive
anything because there'd be no way for a sense impression or thought to
arise, since that would be a change.
Therefore, experience entails both change and order--the dynamic and the
static.
Well, this is where Pirsig seems to have gone. Subject discovers object
because a configuration of static patterns has a dynamic encounter with
another configuration of static patterns. Static and dynamic is a more
fundamental split than subject and object.
But aren't there other foundational concepts bound up with dynamic and
static? Maybe:
SPACE-TIME
What are the prerequisites for knowledge of change and order?
In order to recognize change, we must some how notice that things are
different than they were before. This requires time, as the concept of
change is inextricably bound up with before and after, that is, our
experience of time.
Also, we must be able to recognize a "thing", usually by the fact that it
takes up space in our field of vision.
There are probably other foundational concepts bound up with
static/dynamic, too, like sameness/difference (Plato's form of the Other),
etc., but this is as far as I got along this line of thinking. As you can
tell, that wasn't very far ;-). I don't claim to have said much here, I was
just trying to puzzle out for myself where space and time fit into the
metaphysics of quality. I think the answer to that question depends on
whether we see the static/dynamic split as a epistemological assertion or
an ontological one.
STATIC/DYNAMIC EPISTEMIC OR ONTOLOGICAL
Let me preface this by saying that I know I'm on pretty slippery ground
here bringing these subject-object terms into a forum that transcends that
distinction, and I hope someone can help me out of my muddled thinking.
Some of us (I usually count myself in this camp) believe that Pirsig makes
only one assertion about the world as it is, that is reality = value.
That's the extent of the ontological claims the metaphysics of quality
makes. Others have argued in a way that also puts the static/dynamic split
in that camp, however. I (usually) believe that the assertion that "the
best 'first cut' in reality is to divide it into static and dynamic" is an
epistemological consideration. This foundational division accords well with
experience, better than say, oh, I don't know, a subject and object split
;-), but it is not some feature of reality itself, it's a statement of how
we know reality. Others (appear at least) to believe that the
static/dynamic split comes before subjective considerations and therefore
must be an ontological assertion--a feature of reality as it is. I don't
want to argue that point here except to comment that this is something that
the intellectual level says about reality.
Now it appears to me that if we take the static/dynamic split as an
ontological truth, then space and time must also be ontologically real,
since, as I pointed out in my captivating "SPACE-TIME" section above, time
(and probably space) are inescapably implicated in the notions of static
and dynamic. Now we have a reality that is always in space and time, which
while comforting to my common sense, isn't as philosophically flexible or
satisfying.
If, on the other hand, we just accept the static/dynamic split as an
epistemological assertion, then space and time become some fundamental
ordering principles without which intellectual discourse cannot exist. They
don't have to be "really" real (in the ontological sense), they just are
the inescapable ways in which the intellect understands experience. (And
yes, by the ordering of the metaphysical of quality, this makes them as
real as anything else, just real on the intellectual level, not on the
primary level of quality in-itself.) On my good days I can wrap my mind
around this idea. Other days ...
HUH?
I wish I had some tidy way to wrap this up, but unfortunately I have
neither the intellect nor time to do that. I'd also love to throw some more
in here right now and revisit my understanding of Dynamic Quality as a
metaphysical placeholder (see "The name that can be named is not the
eternal Name" posts from July) , but, I'll limit my comments to those above
and await any feedback from the list.
Thanks,
Keith
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