From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Sep 19 2004 - 01:34:11 BST
Scott and all reasonable creatures:
dmb had said:
I think universals and particulars would both be considered static patterns
in the MOQ. Universals would be found among social and intellectual level
patterns while particulars would be found among organic and inorganic
patterns. But they really just boil down to the old mind and matter debates,
which are a symptom of SOM's flaws. In the MOQ, I imagine the questions
about universals and particulars are pretty much dissolved. Both are
considered equally real, although the important distinctions remain.
Scott replied:
A particular is not a pattern. To be a pattern requires (a) repeatability,
and (b) cognizability, that is, to be graspable as a whole, since otherwise
there is way to appreciate value...
...So what I am getting at here is to point out that as a metaphysics it is
drastically incomplete, and without something drastic like my first point in
the "bit of reasoning" (that all SQ are universals) there is no hope of
moving on with it. To do so requires changing its existing attitude toward
intellect, away from a SOM one (nominalistic).
dmb says:
Well then all hope is lost because I think your assertion, that all SQ are
universals, is far too drastic and drastically incorrect. Nor do I see the
point of asserting it. I do not think your criticisms of the MOQ are valid
either. As you may have gathered by now, we disagree. I'm not sure if I'm up
to a full-blown response nor am I confident that you'd welcome it warmly,
but let me, at least, broadly sketch out what that would look like....
Scott said:
It is a myth that the MOQ has dissolved the mind/matter debates. It has
appeared to have done so only be redefining some words so that the debates
can no longer be adequately expressed. This is what materialism does, except
the MOQ has added the word "quality", so that anything mysterious can be
said to be done by DQ. which is no more help than saying it is done by God.
dmb says:
No, the mind/matter split is not healed by "redefining some words", by
stashing all mysteries into a black hole callled "quality", nor by sweeping
anything under the rug. The two are joined by a middle term. Mind and matter
are connected by a third level of reality. Subject/Object dualism construes
reality as either mind or matter, but the MOQ says it ain't so. Between
biological static quality and intellectual static quality, there is the
social level of static quality and it acts as a sort of bridge so that the
MOQ can assert that mind and matter are not split off from each other at all
but exist in a "matter-of-fact evolutionary relationship". And UNLIKE
materialism, the MOQ does not hold that mind is a property of matter, nor
that it can be reduced to matter, but is nevertheless "as real as rocks and
trees". The difference between mind and matter is not denied in the MOQ, but
the gulf between them no longer exists as they are both seen as different
evolutionary levels within a reality that is ultimately unified. This is
just a brief sketch. I could have used a dozen quotes instead of a couple
phrases, but it is all explained in Lila. In fact, your criticism is so off
the mark that it only makes me wonder if you've read the book!
Scott asked:
The mind/matter question is not resolved unless the following questions have
answers: If there was a time that there were no universals, how did the
first universal get created? What is the origin of language? Why does
thinking and feeling seem to come from "within" (to be "me") while sense
perception seems to come from "without" (to be caused by "not me")? Why does
simply thinking that subject/object dualism is "just a static pattern of
intellectual value" not allow one to dissolve the difference between me and
not-me? Why is being aware of what I just thought different from being aware
of the tree in front of me? (note: in SOM these are two different kinds of
objects. In the MOQ one cannot say that, since in the MOQ only inorganic and
biological patterns can be objects of awareness.) Is mind identical to the
brain (or: can there be mind, or consciousness, without a brain)?
dmb says:
The MOQ doesn't RESOLVE the mind/matter debate so much as DISSOLVE the
questions. They become meaningless questions. Or at least they don't seem so
important and loose their metaphysical implications. In any case, you have
failed to show the connection between these questions and any failure of the
MOQ. The origins of language? Surely we can only speculate on that and I
hardly think its fair to knock Pirsig for leaving that question unanswered.
And what give you the impression that the MOQ does not allow us to treat
ideas or consciousness itself as an object of awareness? I think it not only
allows such a thing, but both of Pirsig's books do exactly that. In fact its
one of the things they go into in the Guidebook to ZAMM, the idea that a
subject can be an object of the subject's awareness. SOM gets a person all
tangled up in that sort of thing, but not the MOQ, where everything we know
is some kind, mixture of static quality.
Scott said:
And so on. The MOQ's answers amount to dualism. There was matter (static
particulars) and then there was mind (static universals). Unless DQ is God
and created universals ex nihilo, in which case the MOQ is theistic. Unless
universals "really are" reducible to particulars (say neural events), in
which case the MOQ is materialist. In short, the MOQ provides nothing new
for a philosophy of mind.
dmb says:
If there is a duality in the MOQ it is the static/Dynamic split. In that
case, both mind and matter are on one side of that split, the static side.
As mentioned above, they are embedded in an evolutionary hierarchy. And in a
non-theistic, only-if-you're-very-careful, mystical sense of the word, "God"
and Dynamic Quality do refer to the same thing. As Pirsig says, when
"Dynamic Quality is identified with religious mysticism it produces an
avalanche of information as to what DQ is." And if Pirsig offers anything
new to a philosophy of mind, it would be this idea of the social level.
Instead of ideas and biological organs called brains, there is an entire
level of reality that allows the ability to think in ways that have nothing
to do with organs. Like all good postmoderns, Pirsig has the mapmaker deeply
embedded in the terrain he is mapping.
Scott said:
Unless you can give me a nuts and bolts explanation of how intellect
(complete with reflective consciousness, universals, etc.) came into being
from a universe that didn't have any of this (which is what the MOQ claims)
then there is a mind/matter distinction. I don't believe such an
explanation exists, so in fact I agree that there are not two substances,
one called mind and one called matter. Rather, I believe that intellect is
primordial, and that it expresses itself dualistically. So my complaint
with the MOQ is not that I think that SOM is really true, rather my
complaint is that the MOQ has ignored some things about mentality, and it
does so because it continues a SOM-based bit of nonsense called nominalism.
This is the belief that ideas/universals exist only in humans, yet it
offers no explanation of how humans came to have universals.
dmb says:
I thought you already disposed of this nominalism charge, with Paul's help.
In any case, I've already sketched out the postion of minds and matter in
the MOQ in terms of their evolutionary relationship, but this next question
might let me get at it in a fresh way...
Scott said:
So a particle is conscious? Then, since a particle is also value,
then we've got intellect/language from the beginning. Value is only value
if it is appreciated, and that means appreciating that things could be
other than they are. Hence, there are generals/universals, that is, what
is, in the context of what could be, and the connection between the two.
dmb says:
Who knows what a particle knows? BUT Pirsig does seem to ascribe some kind
of ability to express a preference even among subatomic particles. And I
think it nice to go ahead and imagine that this is not just a way to
redescribe the data, but expresses a truer picture. In the MOQ, then, the
laws of physics are not laws so much as "extremely consistent patterns of
preferences", as Pirsig puts it. And so static quality is and always has
been conscious to some degree. Its built into the very fabric of reality
from the inorganic all the way up in increasing degrees until we get
full-blown self-consciousness. They are not seperate or different, except in
degrees of awareness, in increasing levels of ability to express
preferences. The preferences expresses by rocks don't involve intellect or
language, however, and asserting that it does strikes me as a little bit
crazy. Its not that particles dream of someday becoming a wave or hoping for
a brighter future, but I think its useful to drop the idea that inorganic
reality is completely subject to the "laws" of nature. And to imagine
instead that the whole of reality is alive and aware in some sense or on
some level.
But this cosmic intelligence, if you will, is not to be confused with the
intellectual level of static patterns, which is a much more speciific kind
of intelligence.
Is this doing anything for you, Scott?
In any case, thanks for your time.
dmb
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