From: Monkeys' tail or (elkeaapheefteen@hotmail.com)
Date: Sun Nov 10 2002 - 17:00:13 GMT
Steve,
I have spend my saturday night reading your post of fri 8 nov 17;15, i read
it a dozen times and my hands got kinda sweaty which can mean three things;
1. You are a beautifull girl who takes my breath away, 2. You are right and
completely wrecked what i holded to be some fundamental issues of the MOQ 3.
Your post made my understanding of the MOQ clearer than ever, I indeed did
grasp the idea.
I hope you forgive my haughty tone now and then, it comes with the blunt and
bold way I like our views to contrast.
I hope I'll find out which of the three options I suggested turns out to be
the right one, considering the comments you received so far I feel you did
not understand the MOQ like it is or the way I feel it should be understood.
let's go over your post starting with your postulation of the question;
< I started critiquing the idea of classifying patterns of values as being
particular types of values as being particular types of things as
differentiated by the four levels, do you agrre on that point? You added;
To disagree with the first point (I.), I think one would have to answer my
taxonomy questions: What type of pattern is a person? What type of pattern
is a tree? What type of pattern is Shakespeare's Hamlet? What type of
pattern is the earth? What type of pattern is the universe? And the answer
must be either inorganic, biological, social, or intellectual. But only one
of them for each.>
Your answer was that they all are of them are patterns of value made up of
all four levels. One can value them in each of the four ways.
David replied:
But only one of them for each? Maybe this is where you went wrong. People
and things are made up of various mixures of the levels. An intellectual
person, for example, can only be so if she first has inorganic, organic and
social level patterns all in place already. Intellectual values include all
the previous levels even as it is something entirely different, something
more than the sum. Objects can be seen this way too. The art example works
well here. Its certainly made of some kind of material; synthetic man-made
stuff, natural fibers, steel, whatever. Let's say its built of both
inorganic and organic level patterns. There is a social dimension, the
controversies, the shocked blue noses, the funding disputes. Perhaps it has
intellectual value and was in fact designed to instigate a public discussion
of sexuality and art. Hopefully, it has aesthetic value and/or is an honest
rendering of the artist's experiences. So even an object, hypothetical as it
is, can be composed of patterns of value from all four levels. This
classification system works equally well in describing levels of
consciousness as it does the "stuff" of the world because they are not two
different things.
Steve replied:
Steve says: You are making the point that I've been trying to make though
you seem to think that you are disagreeing with me. Its interesting to me
that you in particular are making this point. On 10/26 you replied to Sam
that he was wrong in calling Democracy a social pattern of value and that it
was instead an intellectual value. My interjection to this disagreement on
10/27 was the first time I raised the point of a problem with classifying
patterns as only one type of value. Anyway, I'm glad that you seem to agree
with the first point: Patterns of value are patterns of the four types of
value, not merely one type per pattern.
I add Wim his point;
The analysis you propose 7/11 20:56 -0500 is fine and of very high quality
... in a SOM context. You are interpreting 'patterns of values' as 'things'
(objects) that we (subjects) can 'value' or 'be aware if' in different ways.
Pirsig tried (obviously with only partial success) to clarify to his readers
the possibility of going beyond that.
Davor states:
The way to divide the static patterns is not a mere subjective and relative
activity. In general there are two perspectives the MOQ-perspective and the
SOM-perspective. You seem to take the SOM-perspective. Why? Well you want to
describe a a play, or democracy etc. as composed from only one level that
is not possible, subjects as well as objects are composed of more levels. Do
you accept this? yes you do.
A tree however is is a spov built up from inorganic pattern of value and
biological pattens of value. If there is a ancient ritual of naked man
running backwards around the tree to beg nature for more fit women the three
still is an spov built up from inorganic and biological patterns value. The
ritual is built up from inorganic, biological and social patterns of value.
Further, if one states something to be an intellectual spov than that
implies indirectly that is is also composed of the lower levels that made it
possible.
If you say that everything is composed of the four levels you are denying
the evolutionary aspect of the MOQ, do you agree there is no evolutionary
aspect to the MOQ or you think your view is in allignment with the
evolutionary aspects and if, how?
I asked further wether you perceive the MOQ as an epistemology, that means
do you think the MOQ is about how we acquire knowledge about the world. You
seem to suggest that numerous times in your postings as you state; ''i
defended a ''types of awareness/ways of valueing'' interpretation of the
levels.'' That is about the how we PERCEIVE the levels not how they really
ARE. If you travel further along this path, i see no other end than Kant his
''Ding an sich'' which is beyond comprehension, the MOQ imo should make
''das Ding an sich für uns''. If you are not familiar with Kant I will
restate in plain words, and forgive me anyone if I do not reflect it
entirely accurate it is hard to translate Kant in another language and in
another language if you catch my drift. Direct translation makes his ideas
look incredibly stupid imo. You are pursuing to define the so called
objective material world(Ding an sich) but this world is unknowable because
of the experience is structured in a certain way which makes us perceive
this reality( das Ding für uns)different than it really is. I know this is
by far not enough to explain the problem fully but maybe it rings a bell.
Further on your awareness/ ways of valueing notion; I called it solipsistic
because you think every level is valued that is not the case, I borrow Wim's
words again;
.Reality does not consist of a 'we' that can choose to 'value' some thing (a
pattern of values) in one or more out of 4 'ways of valuing'. That idea
(that reality consists of subjects and objects) is itself an intellectual
pattern of values and not the highest quality one available. 'Awareness of
(patterns of) values' evokes a wholly different type of 'value' than the
value that Pirsig equates with Quality, which resides neither in objects nor
in subjects, but creates them.
Your post goes on on relativity and over and over again you start out with
the premiss I dismiss, you start out with the subject and the are speaking
of the relativity of the patterns in relation to this subject if I
understood it well. this imo is a great distortion of the MOQ and by know
after all the above arguments I hope you see what I am aiming at.
Steve says:
Dynamic good is fredom of static patterns
Davor:
So is degeneracy!
Steve:
Static patterns are relative
Davor:
In the way that they are not fixed by nature, not in the way they are
perceived by man.
Your last question;
I ask again what type of pattern is a person?
All of the four levels, it works perfectly but if you take this person and
paste it all over the world you get a distorted version. Because the MOQ is
not depending on a subject to perceive the world, the world does not need to
consist of solely relative spov.
I rest my case,
best regards, Davor
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