From: Paul Turner (paul@turnerbc.co.uk)
Date: Thu Aug 05 2004 - 10:37:48 BST
Hi Platt
Platt said:
Quality or Value contains levels of static value patterns plus Dynamic
Quality. Substitute "An individual human being" for Quality or Value and
the same description applies.
Paul:
Incorrect, it is made clear in ZMM and LILA that nothing "contains"
Quality. Furthermore, from your statement above, one can deduce that
"individual human beings" and "Quality" are synonyms. From this one can
deduce that individual human beings are the primary reality from which
everything else emerges.
Get this the wrong way round and the MOQ becomes idealism.
> Paul previously said:
> I think memes are "contained" in language, habit and ritual.
Platt said:
I take this to mean that memes are not found in the intellectual level
-- the level of mind -- but rather in the social level.
Paul:
I think memes can be both social and intellectual patterns. They are not
genetically hard-wired so that rules out biological patterns.
> Paul previously said:
> Mind is symbol manipulation.
Platt said:
Sounds SOM to me. A subject (mind) manipulating objects (symbols).
Paul:
No, mind *is* symbol manipulation, it is not separate from symbols.
Matter *is* "particle manipulation."
Paul previously said:
I am denying that, in the MOQ,
> "individuals" have a discrete metaphysical significance that is
somehow
> essential in enabling a distinct level of static quality to latch. I
don't
> find this anywhere in Pirsig's work.
Platt said:
I do. "A tribe can change its values only person by person and someone
has to be first." (Lila, 9) That's a description of the latching process
at the social level, dependent on individuals, "person by person."
Paul:
Exactly, this is a description of latching at the social level, so this
invalidates your argument that the 4th level is defined by "the
individual." Biological patterns also change one organism at a time.
Your definition is rendered meaningless - the individual has no discrete
metaphysical significance to the 4th level.
Platt said:
It's also the latching process at intellectual or mind level. It's what
is happening in this forum. We're latching the mind pattern of the MOQ,
person by person.
Paul:
Okay. At the biological level, each organism is individual and unique in
terms of its DNA. Yet, there is less than 1% difference between the
whole species. Each organism is a kind of "copy" (although not an
identical one) of the same patterns. At the social level, each member of
a society is a unique set of social patterns. Yet, within each society,
we clearly share copies of the same behaviours, habits, routines,
language etc. I have my own personal set of learned vocabulary, but you
would not say that I speak my own language. At the intellectual level,
there are bodies of knowledge; each person is a unique copy and
configuration of different patterns of knowledge. The pattern of the MOQ
exists in "individual" copies, all slightly different, but just as we
speak of homo sapiens sapiens, or the English language, we speak of the
MOQ, or of General Relativity, or of algebra.
I can make a couple of general comments about this.
Firstly, when we say patterns, we may be shifting between reference to
two different things - the individual "copies," or the generalised
patterns the individuals are copies of. This may confuse things.
Secondly, each level may be seen as more diverse than the previous
level. The single (I'm sure there are arguments contrary to this)
species of humans has developed many societies which have gone their own
way. From within each of the societies that have survived there are many
intellectual patterns which have also branched out in directions of
their own. This may have a loose parallel with your argument that the
4th level is more individual than the 3rd, but I'm not sure.
Thirdly, each level is quicker to change than the previous level.
Species-wide DNA changes take generations. Revolutions, wars etc. can
change societies many times within one human biological generation.
Knowledge can change almost overnight. Now, because of the more
noticeable change occurring due to the speed of evolution, I think it is
clearly easier to associate such a change with individuals, but I
question the idea that an individual has *caused* the evolution of
knowledge in any deeper sense than an individual *caused* the evolution
of the brain, or the English language. I think it is overly simplistic
and dismissive of an overall historical process of evolution to think
that way.
Finally, as mentioned earlier, the copies of patterns that each
individual is composed of are not identical. This may be of the most
significance to you, I'm not sure.
Platt said:
My point is that it is more moral for individuals (value patterns with
inquiring minds) to dominate mindless social patterns of conformity than
for society to dominate individuals.
Paul:
This is either crafty or an oversight. First you highlight an
individual's intellect and correctly state that it is moral for
intellect to dominate society, but then you drop the intellect part and
bring your general individual through the back door to allow you to
state that it is immoral for society to dominate individuals.
Platt said:
Do you consider sensations to be free-floating biological level patterns
without a source?
Paul:
No, I think the source of sensations is Quality. What a strange
question.
Platt said:
"Dynamic Quality" is a phrase. So is "created patterns" and "by patterns
created." So I fail to see your point. What am I missing?
Paul:
The Dynamic Quality that creates patterns is immediate experience and is
understood without intellectual abstraction. The Dynamic Quality that is
created by patterns is a static intellectual pattern. The two are not
the same, which is what your quandary assumed.
"The infinity which finitude makes us aware of is a secondary experience
that grows out of intellect. It is not the same as the infinity out of
which finitude grows. To put it in Zen terms, infinity is understood by
subtracting finitude, not by making intellectual deductions from
finitude." [Pirsig, Copleston Annotations]
cheers
Paul
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