ROGER TRIES TO DESIGN AN MOQ THOUGHT EXPERIMENT THAT CAN BE USED TO ADDRESS
THE CURRENT UNRESOLVED THREADS
Roger:
The question I want to answer deals with......"How exactly can you pursue
experience?" Or inversely, how would you avoid it? Running from experience
is like running from your shadow in the sunshine. If we are experience, then
we can hardly avoid ourselves now can we? No, of course not.
Glove:
I disagree. We avoid experience all the time by simply ignoring it. We are
conditioned into this by the very way we experience. Personally I know
people who have been avoiding themselves for years by any means they can
find. Alcohol, drugs, tv, what-have-you, are all ways of ignoring what self
is and avoiding the experience of self.
Roger:
So the key term
isn't to pursue experience, it is to pursue a type of experience, or a
quality of experience. The type of experience is clearly toward UNPATTERNED
EXPERIENCE. Though Pirsig also warns of going too far into chaos.
Glove:
This I can agree with in a way, although "to pursue experience" gives me a
feeling of discomfort. We cannot pursue experience for we are experience and
how can we pursue that which is already what we are? At the same time,
experienced is static quality reality while non-experienced is Dynamic
Quality. How can we pursue that which we do not experience? If indeed you
mean to pursue Dynamic experience.
In Zen in the Art of Archery, the author, Eugen Herrigal, is taking archery
lessons from a zen master and after many years of practice he still is not
proficient in the art. He becomes discouraged and while apart from the
master for several months, he recalls how his training at shooting a rifle
can be put towards pulling, aiming and shooting his bow. He develops his
techique to perfection and cannot wait to show the master.
The big day arrives and he demonstrates his new shooting ability perfectly.
He is filled with anticipation of the master's praise. The master asks him
to shoot one more time, and again, he performs the act perfectly. The master
walks away without a word. Later, Herrigal is told by one of the master's
assistants that he will no longer be able to take lessons from the master.
He is stunned! Horrified! He cannot understand why he would be summarily
dismissed after so many years of practice, especially now, when he has
finally perfected his technique.
Finally he is granted an audience with the master, who tells him, without
mentioning the incident, "You see what comes of not being able to wait
without purpose in the state of the highest tension. You cannot even learn
to do this without continually asking yourself: Shall I be able to manage
it? Wait patiently, and see what comes - and how it comes!"
Can you see that to think of pursuing experience is to have a particular
goal in mind to the exclusion of all else? And rather than finding Dynamic
Quality, only static quality will appear? This is what the master is warning
about. And that is what is my discomfort too, I think.
THE DECRYPTION DEVICE ANALOGY
Let's say we have a complex computer with two distinct properties:
1) A non stoppable decryption device, and
2) An encrypted message encoded into it.
Glove:
I remember Jonathan mentioned something awhile back about random number
generation and the fact that it is not possible to generate truly random
numbers, but is possible to generate arbitrary numbers. No matter how big or
how complex the computer, it still must start with a finite set of numbers.
Roger:
Every microsecond, the random digit generator must generate a new "message"
guess. At first, the message is total chaos.
Glove:
Evolution doesn't seem to use a clock. I don't know if you've read this
paper or not...
http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/users/adrianth/er97/paper.html
It concerns artifical evolution in the physical world...self-evolving
silicon computer chips. You should perhaps throw out the clock in your
thought experiment and see what happens. Also, see my note above on random
number generation, at first there isn't total chaos, there is a finite set.
Is it possible to design a program using qubits (quantum computing) instead
of numbers? That would seem an area of interesting possibilities.
Roger:
Have you all played 20 questions?
Well, quantum physicist John Wheeler invented a twist on this game one
winter's eve. When the person left the room, John suggested that they not
choose a thing. Without telling the person that left, the group decided
that
when asked a question, they could make up any answer, with only one
stipulation -- the answer must be logically consistent with every previous
answer. In other words, they were allowed to make up any answer as long as
it
never contradicted a prior made-up answer. Upon the person re-entering,
everyone involved became part of the game, with no one knowing the answer
until every logical choice was given and only one thing was left that
logically fit every preceding question. The group dynamic together chose
the
eventual answer, with no single person knowing it in advance, but all
agreeing on it in the end.
Glove:
Yes I read about this "experiment" by Wheeler...where was it now? Fabric of
Reality? It points to the way we perceive reality, most certainly.
Roger:
THE COMBINED MODEL
Now, to combine these two analogies...... Let's say that the decryption
device is not actually decoding a preset message. Instead, like the
modified
20 questions, it is using its own pattern identifier and its own random
number generator to manufacture potential patterns . In other words, the
number generation/decryption combination creates patterns where none
previously existed.
Running infinitely with infinite power and an infinite digital display, what
patterns could it create over time? What universe could it develop? Oh, I
know, this is no fair because the decryption logic and the random number
generator had to be designed by someone ....right??? Maybe and maybe not,
but
the key was to use this model to apply the terms of the MOQ. So here goes:
REALITY:In this model, I say that the computer is the universe. The
decryption program is the laws of nature.
QUALITY in this scenario is not a thing, it is an event. Quality is
"experience", which is analogous to the inevitable and unstoppable
generation
of digits,
DQ is the undivided, constant-changing flux of number generation.
SQ is any pattern derived from the number generation. It is the logical
consistency discovered or created within the unpatterned flux of DQ. These
patterns are literally created out of the Quality Event of number
generation.
YOU AND I are some of the patterns that are beginning to arise from the
chaos, though to a great extent we are really just digit-generation
patterns.
We are created out of experience yet we also help create reality ourselves,
as we are part of the pattern decrypter/creator as well. We are part answer,
part question, all experience.
DEATH: Is no longer questioning. It is an end to the
decoding/questioning/number generating.
Glove: Death constantly reminds me that there is only one Quality Event.
CHAOS: Is the total absence of patterns. It includes where we are unable to
find/create patterns, as well as where the patterns are lost.
HIGHER QUALITY: Is the static patterns of the universe gaining in maximum
information, gaining maximum quality. Though the answer is not
predetermined,
higher quality evolution is getting closer to the answer. An answer which
we help to create.
EVOLUTION: Evolutionary advance is only gained by embracing the dynamic
chance of the number generation, though you must be cautious not to risk too
many digits of your pattern, for fear the pattern will be lost and
forgotten.....
Glove: I am not sure what throwing out number generation will do to your
thinking here. The pre-conditioned fear of the unknown is what causes us to
hold on so tightly to static quality patterns of value, or in the MOQ,
static quality values preconditioned fear to create stable patterns of
value. Using qubits instead of numbers would seem to mean that instead of
seeking to embrace the dynamic chance of number generation, we would instead
be dealing with super-impositional qubits in both time and space. Forget
fear!
DYNAMIC ADVANCE: Is inevitable. Even with patterns being lost, the system
always advances toward higher quality, more complex patterns
STATIC TRAPS: are respinning the same digits in a pattern where the system
always gets the similar, repeating, static answers. No advancement is
possible.
PURSUIT OF UNPATTERNED EXPERIENCE: Is avoiding static traps or dead end
pattern generation. It involves using the dynamic of unpatterned number
generation to create a more dynamic pattern.
FREE WILL: Makes sense only within sub patterns. It is a pattern choosing
to
extend itself by embracing the random experience generator, and letting go
of
its own static patterns (but not completely).
MYSTICISM: Is the pure revelation of experience. Of being and sensing the
number generation within your static and dynamic aspects. It includes the
experience of any new digits added to your pattern, but also any old digits
that are really refreshed with each quality event.
Using this analogy, explain the terms of the MOQ (In bold above) as best you
can. Where do you agree with me? Where am I off base? What new definitions
can be added? How can we use this model to further understand current
threads? Can you tweak this model and improve it so it works better? Does
this allow me to now explain the current concerns regarding "pursuit of
unpatterned experience"?
Please let me know your ideas on the above. In the mean time, I will look
to
see if this helps me to answer some of the outstanding questions on
previous
threads.
Glove:
With the changes I suggested in your thought experiment, Roger, I started
going thru some of your conclusions and quickly saw that my revisions should
perhaps be addressed before I go thru each and every one of your comments.
Some I agree with and some I do not. I do thank you for your time in putting
this together though! Let me know what you think!
Best wishes,
glove
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