>MYSTIC ROGER CONTINUES TO ENJOY THE EXPERIENCE
>
>To Glove, Platt, Mary and Ken, the Walter's old and new, and Rich who needs
>to get his butt back in here to help defend me. :-)
>
>I shall again rephrase the issues:
>
>Pirsig wrote:"These patterns can't by themselves perceive or adjust to
>Dynamic Quality. Only a living being can do that."
>
>Mary then suggested that taken in context, Pirsig is refering only to the
>social and intellectual patterns that cannot respond to DQ. I stated that
>though I wish she was right, that I doubted her interpretation. I gave no
>evidence to support my doubts though. (Rich, didn't you have a second quote
>somewhere?)
>
>Glove then gives a Pirsig quote to refute Mary's comment.
>
> Pirsig wrote:
>>"Yes, the four levels are a practical device, a static
>>intellectual pattern, rather than a representation of
>>ultimate reality."
>
>Glove added:
>>I think that settles the question of whether Pirsig was referring only to
>>social or intellect patterns.
>
>Roger now adds:
>I agree that the four levels are intellectual patterns. I said as much in
my
>initial post to you on this. However, this quote is still not refuting
Mary's
>interpretation. The initial pirsig quote in question is whether patterns
can
>respond to DQ, not whether they are intellectual constructs.
Glove: If the patterns of value we perceive are all intellectual constructs
by contingency they all respond to DQ.
>Roger:
>But to clarify, I intuit that Mary's escape from this dilemma is wrong too.
>And I agree that intellectually derived patterns can't respond to DQ. My
BIG
>PROBLEMO with Pirsig's statement is that he is neglecting to state that
>"living beings" are static intellectual constructs as well.
Glove: Hmmm... in the sense that we must recognize "living beings" I would
say this is correct, yes. Living beings are also static intellect
constructs. Pattern recognition is how we perceive our world and learn about
it. But these static intellect patterns come before the external world, not
after. Doesn't that negate your objection?
Roger:
>
>I wrote:
>>If Mary's interpretation is correct though it does seem to shoot a
>>minor hole in Glove's argument and Platt's agreement that the MOQ is
>>solipsistic.
>
>Glove replied:
>>I want to know what you did with Mystic Roger...
>
>Roger:
>I never met a solipsistic mystic. ;-)
Glove: Sounds like lyrics to a song...
>
>Glove:
>>I did not say that which is not experienced does not exist... I said
making
>>any statement about what does not exist is problematical.
>
>Roger:
>I agree with your summary of the post in question. However, I am still
>disagreeing with your original quote that the universe began "when we each
>became aware of it" and ends "when each of us as individuals die." Though,
>in my initial response, again, I did agree that the static intellectual
model
>will die.
>
>You and Platt are right that our static models die with us. But my point
is
>that we are static models too...... am I making no sense????? DQ is all
that
>is .
Glove: In a sense I can agree with you on this. To clarify the issue however
I think it's better to state the four static levels are all there is, along
with undefinable DQ. A metaphysics purports to explain the part of the
universe that is perceived and hopefully allows us to say how it purports to
explain some "thing" that is in subtle ways unperceived. So for me it is
simpler to state that which is experienced is static quality while that
which is not is Dynamic Quality. This isn't to say that we cannot experience
Dynamic Quality but when it is experienced it is turned into defined static
quality memories. "It" is actualized and becomes it, a defined object.
>Roger:
>More quotes:
>My quotes:
>>Clearly, I agree that there ain't no subjects without objects. They are
two
>>sides of the same illusory coin. However to say that only living beings
>>perceive and adjust to DQ is PURE SOM B/S. Experience does not just
create
>>the illusory object, it also creates the illusory subject. Living beings
>>themselves are just collections of patterns derived from DQ. DQ is not
>>something to be responded to....it is the response itself. It is the
event
>>from which living beings are derived. Experience is primary. Experience
is
>>DQ. You do not exist independent of the world. The world does not exist
>>independent of you. But DQ always exists everywhere. And you and I are
>>not really the illusions of Maya. The true deep reality is that we are
pure
>>DQ.
>
>Glove Response quote:
>>Wait a minute... I do see Mystic Roger lurking about! Consider for a
moment
>>that we are perceivers of reality and if that is so then responding to
>>Dynamic Quality is the highest moral action we can take and to not respond
>>to DQ is to be in stasis. But experience is not Dynamic Quality.
Experience
>>is not even primary. Experience is secondary to the Quality Event. Reponse
>>can come before experience in certain instances. Take the act of hammering
>>for example. Response is Dynamic yet only experienced thru remembering the
>>act of hammering. Knowing the act. Performing it. Response to DQ is
>>unactualized until experienced then it is actualized as remembered.
Hmmm...
>
>Roger:
>Absolutely not! How can you argue that DQ is not Pure Experience? Pirsig
>says it so often that it becomes a cliche.
>
>I briefly thumbed through my new copy of Lila and was able to find Pirsig
>referencing Quality or DQ to Experience on Page 73 (his initial Lila
>definition of the term), p75, p76 (twice), p90 (where he carefully corrects
>Rigel's statement that it is not experiential). Fast forwarding to the end
>of the book, he equated Radical empiricism and DQ to direct everyday
>experience on p419. The rest of the book and ZMM and SODV all repeat this
>pattern too many times for me to count. Further, Anthony's paper (both of
>them), which Pirsig reviewed and commented, has this as the exact
definition
>too. Though Pirsig and Anthony will both state that this is not "subjective
>experience". (this may have been what Glove was refuting????)
Glove: Yes! I am glad you see that! Solipsism/subjectivism is a product of
subject/object reasoning, a self existing as separate from the universe, and
has no place in the MOQ. Pirsig says: "the value itself is the experience".
Without an observer there is no value to experience.
We perceive value as residing in the objects of our perception. Pirsig
reminds us that objects are transitory. Value is the experience. Dynamic
Quality is not transitory, it is our recognition of it that is. We are
unable to perceive "it" without turning it into recognizable static quality
patterns of value.
>Roger:
>As for it being secondary to the Quality Event, I don't think so. He
defines
>DQ as the "stream of quality events." I guess this might in some way be
>interpreted as secondary, but I would say it is two references to the same
>basic DQ/QE.
Glove: If value is the experience then that experience is what we call our
life... an ever-flowing, ever cascading "moment". There resides the Quality
Event. Right now. And now. And now. In a static linear sense there are many.
In a Dynamic sense there are not.
>Roger:
>More of my quotes:
>>There is no provision for life after death in the MOQ. However, there is
>>the provision that your life was an illusion from the beginning. Your life
>and
>>your world is just the illusory dance of Lila.
>
>Glove's response:
>>How can there be life after death? Isn't that really a bit impossible? If
>>there is something after death it is "something" we cannot conceive of, a
>>dazzling dark, a great mystery that will only be revealed to us as we
wait.
>>But not life... enjoy it while we may!
>
>Roger:
>I didn't say there was life after death ....in fact I said there wasn't. I
>said there is no death or life....just static dead intellectual patterns
>called life and death. And these patterns were never truly alive to begin
>with. Direct Experience is all, and like you, Glove, agree that we should
>just enjoy.
>
>But then again I could be wrong.
Glove: As could I. And if its possible to be wrong about something it seems
that I usually am. :)
best wishes
glove
MOQ Online Homepage - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Unsubscribe - http://www.moq.org/md/index.html
MD Queries - horse@wasted.demon.nl
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:03:05 BST