Roger, buddy, dude. You can cut and paste with the best of them, and
thanks for taking the time. I'm enjoying the debate too.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: RISKYBIZ9@aol.com [SMTP:RISKYBIZ9@aol.com]
> Sent: Saturday, August 21, 1999 11:46 AM
> To: moq_discuss@moq.org
> Subject: Re: MD Reality and observation
>
>
>
>
> DAVID:
> >PAGE 149 "...static patterns of value are divided into four systems:
> >inorganic patterns, biological patterns, social paterns and
> intellectual
> >patterns. They are exhaustive. That's all there are. If you construct
> an
> >encyclopedia of four topics - Inorganic, Biological, Social and
> >Intellectual - nothing is left out. No "thing" that is. Only Dynamic
> >Quality, which cannot be described in any encyclopedia, is absent."
>
> ROGER:
> Here Pirsig gives the 4 groupings of conceptual patterns. This world
> of words and concepts and subjects and objects is not the flux of
> reality known as DQ. It is often confused with the reality it attempts
> to describe though.
>
[David Buchanan] I hope its clear to the reader; the sections
that begin with my name in brackets, like this one, are the fresh
replies. As to the issue, I don't understand why you insist that the
MOQ's 4 levels are "4 groupings of conceptual patterns". And I'm still
convinced that this is the source of our disagreement. I'll agree that
the levels are not the "flux of reality known as DQ", because we're
talking about the levels of STATIC Quality. And even when we are talking
about static Quality it is important to understand the difference
between the static patterns themselves and our ideas and concepts about
those static patterns. I think that's where Pirsig's many truths
provisionality comes into play. There's the map and then there's the
road, and seems that you are saying that our map-making intellect is
also responsible for road construction. (Just to continue the analogy,
DQ is indicated by arrows that point beyond the map. DQ is
undifferentiated and has no features that can be represented on a map.)
But the main point here is that the MOQ is a conceptual model, an
intellectual map that more closely resembles the actual road than does
SOM's scientific objectivity, but that ought not be construed to mean
that static patterns of value in themselves are nothing more than
intellecutal constructs.
> DAVID:
> >PAGE 155 "The mind-matter paradoxes seem to exist because the
> connecting
> >links between these two levels of value patterns have been
> disregarded.
> >Two terms are missing: biology and society. Mental patterns do not
> >originate out of inorganic nature. They originate out of society,
> which
> >originates out of biology which originates out of inorganic nature.
> And,
> >as anthropologists know so well, what a mind thinks is as dominated
> by
> >social patterns as social patterns are dominated by biological
> patterns
> >and as biological patterns are dominated by inorganic patterns. There
> is
> >no direct scientific connection between mind and matter. As the
> atomic
> >physicist, Niels Bohr said, "We are suspended in language." Our
> >intellectual description of nature is always culturally derived."
>
> ROGER:
> The conceptual model is intertwined as such. Again, don't confuse
> this with
> REALITY though.
>
[David Buchanan] What? Intertwined with what? Just when it was
getting good you went and got all fuzzy. I thought I was the mystic?
> DAVID:
> The following ideas were expressed by Pirsig in his lecture SODV. I
> re-read it with our debate in mind. I was looking for specific answers
> about...well, about reality and observation. I'm just going to put the
> out there as way to ask you about the one disagreement I can't seem to
> let go of. Hopefully you've noticed the main idea I've been trying to
> get across, even if you don't agree with it or understand exactly.
> These
> quotes get at the issue pretty directly. You know, the intellect is
> mediated through all the previous levels and so percieves reality
> indirectly, as opposed to mystical experience or DQ.
>
> ROGER:
> The conceptual model is indeed built just as you describe.
> Intellectual
> patterns are mediated through the levels just as you say. I will add
> though
> that this mediation explains the filtering of thoughts , but the
> "dynamic
> edge' of thinking is a form of pure experience. To quote RMP': "The
> ongoing
> Dynamic edge of all experience, both positive and negative, even the
> dynamic edge of thought itself."
>
[David Buchanan] Um, excuse me, but this Pirsig quote is not a
sentence. Something got chopped off and made the utterance impotent.
There's no predicate there. I'm gonna start calling you "fuzzy". Just
kidding.
> DAVID:
> These quotes get at the issue pretty directly..... It gets at this
> issue of what static patterns are; conceptualizations and abstractions
> or are they the world? This is where we disagree. The first cut is the
> deepest and all that.
>
> "We no longer need to claim that we ourselves alter scientific reality
> when we look at it and know about it - a claim that Einstein regarded
> as
> part of a "shaky game"."
>
> "The MOQ says objects are composed of "Substance" but it says that
> this substance can be defined more precisely as "stable inorganic
> patterns of value". The objects look and smell and feel the same
> either way. The MOQ agrees with scientific realism that these
> inorganic patterns are completely real, but it says that this reality
> is ultimatley a deduction made in the first months of an infant's life
> and supported by culture in which the infant grows up... Bohr is
> sometimes mistakenly thought to say that ths inorganic level does not
> exist. He does not deny this inorganic reality. He simply says that
> the properties the physicist
> describes cannot be said to reside at this level."
>
> ROGER:
> Allow me to quote Dr. Heisenberg:
> "For the smallest units of matter are, in fact, not physical objects
> in the
> ordinary sense of the word; they are forms, structures or -- in
> Plato's sense
> -- Ideas." They are mental constructs, and even as such are
> inadequate
> explanations of even the shadows of true REALITY without complementary
>
> definitions.
>
[David Buchanan] Now I don't disagree with Heisenberg, but I
think you've misunderstood him here. The forms and structures he refers
to are analogies that bear a striking resemblence to Pirsig's
"patterns", and that is pretty interesting. But you've construed Plato's
"Ideas" as mental constructs or conceptualizations, but that's not at
all the meaning of a Platonic Ideal. Instead it is along the same lines
as forms, structures, and patterns and fits perfectly well into
Heisenberg's main point when seen that way. Plato's "Ideas" were
imagined as a kind of perfect archetype, an pre-existing ideal form. It
was thought that everthing in "material" reality was a lesser imitation
or imperfect representation of the original "Idea". I guess one could
imagine it as a "concept" held by god, but it certainly ought not be
confused with thoughts and mental constructs in the normal sense of
those words.
> Or Sir Arthur Eddington:
> "We have learnt that the exploration of the external world by the
> methods
> of physical science leads not to a concrete reality but to a shadow
> world
> of symbols, beneath which those methods are unadopted for
> penetrating."
>
[David Buchanan] Again, I don't think you've interpeted this
quote correctly because those quasi-solipsistic goggels are welded to
your head. (No offense, I'm just trying to keep it light with humor.)
Eddington is commenting on the limits of science, but I can't imagine
how it supports your position.
> Or Erwin Schroedinger:
> "The scientific picture of the real world around me is very deficient.
> It
> gives a lot of factual information, puts all our experiences in a
> magnificently consistent order, but it is ghastly silent all and
> sundry that
> is near to our heart, that really matters to us. It cannot tell us a
> word
> about red and blue, bitter and sweet, physical pain and physical
> delight; it
> knows nothing of beautiful and ugly, good or bad, God and
> eternity.......
> So, in brief, WE DO NOT BELONG TO THIS MATERIAL WORLD THAT SCIENCE
> CONSTRUCTS
> FOR US." (emphasis added)
>
[David Buchanan] Holy cannoli, you've missed it here too. The
cat man's "we do not belong to this material world" is a reference to
the alienation and loneliness that's been created by what Pirsig calls
"amoral scientific objectivity". He's not denying the existence of
inorganic patterns of value, he's complaining about the de-humanizing
aspects of what Pirsig calls SOM. Its a great quote, but it simply does
not support your position. Instead you've used it like a Rorschak test
and projected you view onto it. T'was the same with the Plato thing.
> These three quotes are from my post at the beginning of the month.
> None of these scientists is 100% in tune with the MOQ (though
> Schroedinger is real close), but they all recognize that the flux of
> reality is not the reality of
> the models we have constructed. Our models, EVEN THE MOQ, are
> inadequate at explaining Direct Experience. I see my view as
> completely in agreement with your excellent SODV quote. Don't you
> David?
>
[David Buchanan] I'm a frayed knot.
> DAVID [Quoting Pirsig]:
> "A third piece of evidence that reveals the similarity betweem the MOQ
> and Complementarity occurs when Bohr says, "We are suspended in
> language," the MOQ completely agrees. In the MOQ we see that each
> higher level of evolution rests on and is supported by the next lower
> level of
> evolution and cannot do without it. There is no intellect that can
> independently reach and make contact with inorganic patterns. It must
> go
> through both society and biology to reach them. In the past science
> has
> insisted on the necessity of biological proofs, that is, proofs in
> terms
> of sense data, and it has tried to discard social patterns as a source
> of scientific knowledge. When Bohr says we are suspended in language I
> think he means you cannot get rid of the social contexts either."
>
> ROGER:
> Yes, intellectual patterns emerge out of social patterns, etc. But
> the
> entire concept of patterns is an intellectual construction itself.
>
[David Buchanan] Again, I think there are two things. Social
patterns themselves and intellectual constructions about them. How could
maps of non-existent roads even be possible? And even if we could map
nothing but maps, what use would it be? I think you've gotten yourself
into a paralyzing and impossible situation. The 5 moral codes and the 4
levels of static patterns are rendered useless by that approch.
> To quote RMP, "the intellectual pattern that says
> "there is an external world of things out there which are
> independent of intellectual patterns".
> That is one of the highest quality intellectual patterns
> there is. And in this highest quality intellectual
> pattern, external objects appear historically before
> intellectual patterns...
> But this highest quality intellectual pattern itself comes
> before the external world, not after, as is commonly
> presumed by the materialists."
>
[David Buchanan] Something has been chopped off here too... And
it not only seems to contradict itself, it contradicts all the quotes
I've been digging up. I don't mean to pick nits needlessly, but really,
the way you've been handling quotes is dubious at best. There's way too
much chopping, sliceing, and projecting.
> Cutting through it all, Reality is Direct Experience. The MOQ and
> other
> conceptual models of reality are interwoven models of sq. Pirsig
> addresses
> this limitation of models, but also recognizes their benefits. The
> filtering or static latching of experience is necessary to evolve or
> reach goals. However, the path of biology, society and intellect that
> has formed us also brings us down a road of limited choices. Each
> level is freer and more dynamic in terms of potential experience than
> its predecesser, but the choices are still limited. (Just try to
> experience as a bat, or even as a female, or as a Frenchman, Dave).
>
[David Buchanan] Actually I do have some things in common with
bats; we both like to eat and do the horizontal bop. (Well, they do
vertically and upside down, but you know what I mean.) I'm kind of
androgynous and am 25% French. Not that I would include these facts in a
personal ad or on a resume.
> Are we all in total agreement yet? When can we try to recap our
> consensus?
>
[David Buchanan] All I want is for you to respect me as a
person and for you to stop thinking of me as nothing more than a
conceptualiztion. I'm tired of being treated as a mere mental construct.
I'm real dammit! FLUX YOU ! (Oh my god, you realize I'm only goofing
around here, don't you. I hope you're amused and not offended. Honestly.
)
> Thank you for the wonderful dialogue.
>
[David Buchanan] I'm sincerely grateful. But I'm not quite
done.
> Rog
>
[David Buchanan] It seems that your position resembles
Idealism, subjectivity and even Solipsism. It has you trapped in a
Cartesian doubt that has you denying any reality outside of thoughts and
concepts. It must be lonely in there. : -) But seriously, I think
you've taken a position that Pirsig was trying to discredit with his
MOQ. Subjectivity and Objectivity are equally attacked by Pirsig. You've
certainly managed to avoid anything like objectivity, but you've fallen
into some pretty radical idealism and have been gored on the other horn
of the dilemma.
And none of this post even begins to address the issue of the
mystical experience and mystical reality. We're just talking about
static patterns here. I'll save that issue for another post, but it has
some relevance to the static patterns debate and so I should mention a
few thoughts about Dynamic Quality.
I think you've confuses DQ with static patterns that are
exciting, energetic and fresh. And by extension you see static patterns
as stale, old and boring memories. But I think all intellectual concepts
are static patterns and the difference between fresh and stale is only a
difference in their relative quality. DQ isn't just fresh and exciting
in the normal sense of those words. It is way beyond that. DQ isn't a
high quality set of circumstances, but high quality situations can open
a person up to DQ, but then again so can a natural disaster or a medical
emergency.
Ever notice how Pirsig describes Lila as a unique culture of
CHANGING STATIC PATTERNS? Interesting and paradoxical way to put it,
dont you think? Changing and STATIC seem contradictory only is one
imagines that static patterns are fixed and motionless, which they
aren't. They change and move and evolve. Static patterns can be new and
fresh and exciting, like jumping out of an airplane, but that doesn't
mean they are Dynamic in the Pirsigian sense. (Although falling toward
the Earth at high speeds might tend to ignite a mystical experience, I'd
reccomend paying very close attention to static realities, like the
back-up chute and the plane's engine for example. Even mystics
appreciate the value of saftey.) I say all this because of the "everday"
debate we've had surronding DQ. I'd agree that DQ is every day, that is
to say, all the time, infinite and eternal, but I wouldn't say DQ is
everyday, as in commonplace, ordinary or inauspicious. This may seem
contradictory, but its really only a paradox of epistemology. I mean
that even though DQ is ever present and always at work in the cosmic
dance of creation, it is hidden from our indirect perceptions. Another
way of saying this is that the ordinary consciousness is blind to DQ. Or
as Jesus is reported to have said, "The kingdom of heaven is spead out
upon the face of the earth, but men do not see it." So, I think direct
experience, immediate awareness of DQ, or the mystical experience are
different names for the same thing. And even though this trip is
available to everyone, I think it is quite out of the ordinary and
represents a temporary radical shift in consciousness. It is very far
away from "everyday" consciousness. Here I should refer to Alan Watt's
description of the state of mind known as "dhyana". You might recall
that I went into quite a bit of detail in conveying those descriptions.
And of course you know Pirsig used the same word, dhyana, in his
discussions of balancing static and dynamic Quality. He explicitly
associates the dhyana state of mind with DQ.
Be a dead man, not a fresh one.
David B.
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