Hearing your plea for discussion to this post in a later one, David, I went
and dug it out and will attempt a response.
At 4:53 PM -0700 11/6/99, David Buchanan wrote:
>What's difference between social and intellectual values? How can we
>determine which is which in the real world? That's the question.
In a way, I hadn't thought about this consciously yet, but in another way
its exactly at the core of a conflict I'm in with my father-inlaw - who'd
appreciate a bit more social success from his son-in-law and doesn't
especially care about intellectual foo-faraw.
But personally, I am completely appalled by the general lowering of
intellect in society and the changes wrought by an image-addicted economy.
I feel my intellectual pursuits - thinking about things in society rather
than participating with society - is moral. He feels it's degenerate.
What is the truth?
Well to even ask that question, I have to objectify the terms in order to
think about them. I have to define and I'm already starting to
philosophize which means that arguement is moot. Just trying to engage one
another in discussion, my father-inlaw and I are acting immorally. Him
because he's engaging in useless philosophical evasions and cirles while
there's real work to be done and me because I'm trying to win social
approval for intellectual ideas.
Exercises in degeneracy are pretty much all we do all the time.
>We discussed a very important MOQ axiom in the other forum last month;
>Each of the levels is blind to the one(s) above it. Hunger doesn't care
>about table manners and oxygen knows nothing about death. The principle
>works at all levels of static patterns. But the purpose of this post is
>to describe and explain that axiom only as it specifically relates to
>the social level's blindness to intellectual values.
>
That makes sense in light of my conflict. Dad can't even comprehend the
values that place make writing and thinking more important than steady
employment. In fact, I'd even theorize that not only do social patterns
have a heavy aversion to ideas which might eliminate them or alter the
comfortable paths that time has proven, I hypothesize a virtual resistance
force - characterized by EGO - which resists openess and growth and clings
tightly to itself - static self.
Which leads me to another question. If the underlying structure of all
Reality is morality, what is evil? We know what is good. What then is
evil? Does it exist? The impulse to degeneracy? Where does it come from?
More on this later I hope, but back to yours:
<snip>
>IDEOLOGIES IN A HIERARCHAL ORDER
>Walsby says that there are 7 major ideologies. They are ordered
>according to their historical sequence, which shows a progressive
>evolution in time. They are centered around the progressive development
>of human needs. <snip>
That does sound interesting. I'd like to see how he correlates his ideology
with history = where the rubber meets the road, so to speak.
>Walsby's hierarchy of ideologies, Maslow's hierarchy of needs and
>Pirsig's Levels of static patterns all correspond in a certain respect.
>Each of them insists that each step must be "mastered" before one can
>successfully move on to the next. Lamm writes, "The individual who
>identifies with the most recent of the principle ideologies thereby
>identifies with man's most advanced needs, but in doing so DOES NOT
>REJECT all the preceeding ideologies listed in the taxonomical order of
>their appearance. He remains with them and they remain with him...The
>ideologies of the hiest needs incorporate those of the basic needs."
>
>Or as Walford put it "It is a functional necessity, the later phases
>depend for their existence upon the continuing functional presence of
>the earlier ones".
Interesting.
Which takes us to the answer, I'd say, to the original question:
>What's the difference between social and intellectual values? How can we
>determine which is which in the real world? That's the question.
How do we define the boundary? Since the lower cannot comprehend the
higher, we must discover the boundaries intellectually. That's the
answer. The popularity of an idea, the wealth of an artist, the
celebritydom of the theologian - have nothing to do with the intellectual
value of the ideas they magnify and transmit. Only intellect can determine
where the line is drawn between social and intellectual quality.
What else is interesting is the POWER society has to influence intellectual
patterns - to force those patterns into conforming to social needs or stomp
out threatening patterns. It seems so all-powerful pervasive and
oppressive that one almost wonders why facsism isn't ruling the world.
And yet here we are, throwing these intellectual ideas around and even
reading books that are distributed by social systems while those books call
every pattern those social systems contain into question.
>We could say the same kind of thing about the levels of static patterns.
>There is no intellect without society, there is no pack without dogs,
>there is no animal without atoms.
I really liked this, but I had to think about the first one a bit and then
I found I don't agree.
Isn't Pure Quality beyond intellectual patterns? And yet the higher
patterns contain the lesser, so therefore, Quality contains intellect. And
from this primal pattern of values, everything else is formed.
I believe that there are certain intellectual concepts at the basis of all
society which underpin that society. You can't have a society without
intellect. But can you have intellect without society? Sure you can. A
man in isolation is often given dreams and visions of amazing glory.
There's always a cultural context to thought and intellect, true. But
that's not the whole story.
The patterning of values is basically an intellectual idea and
intellectual ideas are patterns of values. Therefore intellect= patterns
of values
Patterns of values are the fundamental basis of reality, therefore
intellect is the fundamental basis of reality. Therefore, you don't need
society to create intellect. It's the other way around.
Whew. I even used a syllogism there. I'm gonna have to dust off my logic
textbooks pretty soon if I'm not careful. But rereading it, I feel pretty
good about it. It looks right to me.
There are no atoms without value patterns
There are no dogs without atoms
There are no packs without dogs
There is no society without packs (tribes, families)
Only the Tao stands alone, perfect, guiding all else into its flow
Another name for the Tao, is "value patterns" and we've almost come full
circle except for the connection between the Tao and society. Where is it?
>Basically, the hierarchy of ideologies looks like this...
>
>protostatic = fascist
>epistatic =conservative
>parastatic = liberal
>
>protodynamic = socialist
>epidynamic = revolutionary
>paradynamic = anarchist
>
>Metadynamic = no ideology
>
It's hard for me to wrap my head around these categories without a
knowledge of the author's definitions, but right off the top of my head
I'll offer two surface observances:
It's neat. I like the "Proto-epi-para" repetition combined with the
static/dynamic pair it's got great poetic appeal. Also, I'm fascinated
with the number seven, so that's a big plus
It's ideologies have a lot of political connatations that get in the way
with my contemplation. The words "fascist", "conservative" "socialist"
"liberal" come so heavily freighted that it's hard to follow the core of
his idea without getting lost in my own ideas of what those words mean.
Reading the book would help a lot, no doubt.
On a deeper level, the Metadynamic level is very hard to conceptualize.
Pirsig did a masterful job of demonstrating that Quality is a real thing
and then showed how you couldn't define it. But just out in the air like
that, the idea of "no ideology" sounds a bit nebulous. Perhaps a better
term would be "Comparative ideology"
Comparative ideology is what you get when you have a society rich enough
and powerful enough to allow the study of many different ideologys. The
juxtaposition of east and west which allows each to inform the other more
clearly. I sometimes think of myself on one of those stair steppers that
you climb and never get anywhere. You have to keep pumping just to stay
up. All these different ways of seeing the world are available to me and I
hope that by hopping from one to the other I'll see the patterns of truth
they hold in common and get a better view of what they all point to. By
having the freedom to pick and choose and compare ideologies, I don't
belong to any particular one - I have no specific ideology - but instead
face the world with a personal and fluctuating belief system.
"No" ideology sounds too much like chaos.
(snip)
>So basically the three static ideologies are more or less associated
>with social level values. This includes just about everybody, I suppose.
>The first three cover everything from fascism to liberalism! The next
>three ideologies are associated with intellectual values and it covers
>everthing from radical reformers to revolutionary anarchists! The 7th,
>Metadynamic ideology is a little closer to Pirsig's "dynamic", but it is
>still just at the height of the intellectual level, where you're
>interested in ideologies as a phenomenon, but don't uphold any
>particular one them so much as the meaning of all of them put together.
>Its about analysis and synthesis and freedom from structured ideologies
>altogether.
>
Well I guess we're in agreement all along. I wasn't sure if this was some
sort of nihlism or what.
I'm still a bit wary of "freedom from structured ideologies altogether".
Don't you always need a platform from which to stand? But viewing its
relative value to all others is using the platform but not letting it use
you. That's the Quality Ideology.
Whoa! And that's the connection between the Tao and Society. You can have
the Tao without any society at all, but the purpose of society is to
produce humans capable of building knowledge and deepening truth. With
the comparisons of ideologies we come to the patterns of patterns that show
us the nature of underlying reality. We hope.
>And it worth noteing that education and intelligence are related to
>these hierarchies, but it not really about how smart you are.
Schools are primarily social institutions and intellect cannot be measured
by society at all, so I'd certainly agree with you there.
>Its what
>you identify with and value as important. There can be intelligent
>fascists and stupid anarchists. But its not too likely because there is
>an increasing level of complexity in the hierarchy of ideologies.
See, here's where I get hung up on my own definitions. It's not hard at
all for me to picture a stupid anarchist, but that's probably because I'm
thinking of people who call themselves anarchist while the definition
you're using is probably more precise.
> And
>they also correspond to the level of needs as in Maslow's theory, which
>brings me back to the main point.
>
>The upholders of social level values are, by varying degrees,
>anti-intellectual. And in a way it is simply due to the fact that
>they're not there yet. Intellectuals are percieved as a threat to those
>still trying to master more basic needs. "You can't eat books" "Pearls
>before swine" "You've got to walk before you run" and "first things
>first". Its common sense. Its not that social "thinkers" are stupid, its
>simply that intellect is beyond their range of values. Intellect doesn't
>matter to the starving, lonely and homeless.
And I'm sure it goes even deeper than "not there yet". Intellectuals sneer
at society and social games of perks and rewards. Society feels the
contempt of the intellectual and returns the favor. At the same time, as
you point out, Society knows deep down that ideas deeply threaten the
existing social order and intellectuals are a threat. Not consciously, but
subconsciously driving this fundamental observed antipathy between the two
camps.
You've given me something profound to chew upon - It's not ability, it's
what you value that places you on higher ground - very profound David.
Thank you very much for your eloquent views. Sorry if I've gone on a bit.
jc - back to more reading!
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 - 16:03:14 BST