From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Mon Sep 20 2004 - 00:52:44 BST
Scott and all MOQers:
Scott Roberts said:
First, let me recap. The MOQ, it is true, puts Quality between and over the
traditional division between mind and matter. That is good. What I am
trying to convince people of is that the word Intellect should also be put
in that spot, not to displace Quality, but to equate the two. The MOQ,
however, makes a big deal of restricting intellect to humans, and considers
it as a hindrance to achieving "pure experience". That I reject. It is the
case that for most people most of the time, intellect is monkey mind, and
that is bad, but the fix to that is to train and discipline the intellect,
not to put it to sleep. And I've referred to various mystics, like
Nagarjuna, Shankara, Nicholas of Cusa, and Franklin Merrell-Wolff to back
me up.
dmb replies:
I'm trying to make the case that equating Intellect (the 4th level of static
quality) and Quality (I suppose you mean Dynamic Quality) is incorrect and
confusing. There are good reasons for making a distinction between the two.
Its not that Pirsig makes a big deal out of restricting intellect to humans,
its that Pirsig makes a big deal out of the KIND of intelligence that is
unique to humans becasue it is the most advanced form of static quality. In
an evolutionary metaphysics, that's a big deal. And I don't think Pirsig is
making a case that we abandon the intellect, that's the mistake the hippies
made, the Zen Beats and such and Pirsig warns againsts that as a form of
degeneracy. And in fact putting the mind to sleep IS A FORM OF MENTAL
DISCIPLINE that goes BEYOND intellect, where "pure experience" can occur. On
this point, I think you've rejected a position that Pirsig does not hold.
Scott said: You ..have not pointed out the flaw in my reasoning, that a
"static pattern of value", to be valuable, needs to be appreciated as a
pattern, and that means treating it *as* a pattern, a universal. If it is
just a particular, then it cannot be changed, or valued, except insofar
that it indicates the universal pattern of which it is particular, which
(the pattern) can be changed.
dmb replies:
I think its quite a stretch to call that "reasoning". But seriously, you've
changed the meaning of the term "static pattern" so that reality has been
completely cleansed of particulars. Poof. They no longer exist. The keyboard
I type upon presently has been transformed into an abstract entity called
"keyboardness"? That bagel I had for breakfast didn't fill my belly becasue
it was really a changless Platonic Form. (Changeless things are really hard
on my digestive system.) I don't mean to be silly, but the implications of
you re-definition lead to all kinds of absurdities. But more than that, as I
tried to explain, the distinction between universals and particulars is the
distinction between subjects and objects in disguise and the debates that it
generates tend to disappear in the MOQ because the MOQ is such a thorough
attack on the metaphysical primacy of subjects and objects. And finally, I
can't see how that last sentence makes any sense.
Scott said:
.........................Having the social bridge is important for its
moral arguments, but it is not sufficient to explain the apparent
difference between our thinking and our perception, of why S/O should have
arisen in the first place. Lila does not go into this, since it is about
morality, so my criticism is that if one does go into problems of mind and
matter, the metaphysical basis laid by the MOQ is inadequate. It needs to
see that there is an essential difference between the fourth level and the
other three levels, which is that the fourth level can reflect on itself,
while the other levels, if a cosmic Intellect is ignored, cannot. So how
did the ability to reflect come into existence? Well, simple, let us not
ignore cosmic Intellect. But the MOQ does ignore it.
dmb replies:
Sorry dude, but you're just plain wrong. Its all in there. If you've read
the book several times and still insist that it is not, then I hardly know
what to tell you. The cosmic intelligence you say he ignores, that's called
Dynamic Quality. Where SOM comes from in the first place? Well, if Pirsig's
exploration of that development from the pre-Socratic sophists to the
present and his explanation of it as a flaw in the process of giving birth
to a new level of reality isn't enough for you, then I don't know what else
to tell you. And its not that the MOQ is inadequate for a discussing of mind
and matter, but rather the MOQ shows that these are SOM-based problems and
not real questions. The difference between perceptions and thoughts is so
simple in the MOQ that one is almost underwhelmed by it. Perceptions are
sensory experience or biological quality, while thoughts are mental
experience or intellectual quality. Both are experienced. Both are empirical
and both are real, but they are different levels of experience. Making these
distinctions, between different levels of static quality does not negate the
cosmic intelligence, but instead demonstrates and manifests this cosmic
intelligence in infinite detail, and the evolutionary levels only mark its
progress. Exactly why and how the ability to think reflectively, and to
comtemplate and to dream, how all that came into existence is probably
beyond any mortal's ability to know. But this kind of ability is what puts
it at the top of the heap and what distinguishes it from the rest of
reality. Let's not spoil that by mixing it up with the mystic reality, of
which intellect is only a subset.
"RTA WAS THE 'COSMIC ORDER OF THINGS'."
"...The physical order of the universe is also the moral order of the
universe. RTA is both. This is exactly what the MOQ was claiming. It was not
a new idea. It was the oldest idea known to man."
"DHARMA, like RTA, means 'what holds together'. It is the basis of all
order. It equals righteousness. It is the ethical code. It is the stable
condition which gives man perfect satisfaction. DHARMA is duty. Not external
duty which is arbitrarily imposed by others, It is not any artificial set of
conventions which can be amended or repealed by legislation, Neither is it
internal duty which is arbitrarily decided by one's own conscience. DHARMA
is beyond all questions of what is internal and what is external. DHARMA is
Quality itself, the principle of 'rightness' which gives structure and
purpose to the evolution of all life and to the evolving understanding of
the universe which life has created."
[Scott quoted and commented:
Pirsig, LC #111: "The "objects" in the MOQ refer to definition 1
["Something perceptible by one or more of the senses, especially by vision
or touch; a material thing" . Objects are biological patterns and
inorganic patterns, not thoughts or social patterns."
So, if we accept this, we cannot speak of intellectual and social things as
objects of thought. So this redefinition on Pirsig's part is just silly.
There are two meanings of "subject" in SOM. One is that which Pirsig calls
intellectual and social SQ, the collection of thoughts, ideas, feelings,
etc.. The other is that which perceives an object, or thinks about an
object, and so forth (subject as implied in definition 5 [4 in the text]).
The MOQ only dissolves the mind/matter distinction according to the first
meaning. It does not dissolve the second. It just makes it unsayable.
dmb says:
Pirsig's attack on SOM is one thing, the confusion caused by our linguistic
customs is another and I think you're confusing the two. In any case, the
MOQ doesn't deny that an idea can be subjected to scrutiny or become the
object of discussion. In factg, that's about all Pirsig ever does. This
particular LC quote only says that physical things are to be categorized as
orgainic and inorganic static quality. He's just telling the reader how to
translate the most basic of terms. How could the MOQ forbid us to "speak of
intellectual and social things" when Pirsig's books are almost purely that;
talk of social and intellectual things? These objections of your seem
increasingly wierd. I mean, its hard for me to imagine how you could fail to
see this. I'll tell what, dish up a Pirsig quote that says social and
intellectual static quality cannot be objects of thought and I'll eat my
copy of Lila.
> dmb had said:
> 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.
Scott replied:
Yes, which ignores the difference that mind has the ability to
reflect on things, including itself, which is not true of matter. This
"dissolves" the problem by fiat, not in a way that promotes understanding.
dmb says:
Huh? OK, now I'm pulling my hair out. What does the static/Dynamic split
have to do with the fact that matter cannot reflect upon itself. And who
ever said it could? Why do you imagine that the difference between mind and
mattter is ignored in making this split? Again, its hard to imagine how this
could make any sense. I think these objections only reveal a great deal of
confusion on your part.
Scott said:
Yes, I have flip-flopped. If nominalism is the idea that
"universals aren't real", then the MOQ is not nominalistic, and that is
where I agreed with Paul, acknowledging that the MOQ regards universals as
real. But if nominalism is the idea that universals only exist in humans
(which is how Peirce defines it), then the MOQ is nominalistic.
dmb says:
Why can't universals be real AND exist only in human beings? But as I keep
trying to explain, these debates are a symptom of SOM, where ideas have a
dubious ontological status. This is not a problem in the MOQ, where ideas
are as real as rocks and trees. I think the fact that you've become hung up
on this point only shows that you have failed to understand the problem with
SOM and the MOQ as a solution.
dmb had said:
> 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.
Scott replied:
Why not "confuse" it? If our intellect is a connection to cosmic
intelligence, that is something extremely important to know, for the reason
given in my opening remarks.
dmb says:
Seriously? I have to explain why its bad to confuse things? Don't you think
that Pirsig has gone to great lengths the explain the difference between DQ
and sq and then the differences between the various levels of sq? Don't you
think that one would need an exceptionally good reason to erase this basic
distinctions? I do. The differences and distinctions give us definition and
meaning and that's what metaphysics is all about. Yes, they are connected.
Pirsig also goes to great lengths to explain that...
"Quality is indivisible, undefinable and unknowable in the sense that there
is a knower and a known, but a metaphysics can be none of these things. A
metaphysics must be divisible, definable, and knowable, or there isn't any
metaphysics."
"But he realized that sooner or later he was going to have to stop carping
about how bad SOM was and say something postive for a change. Sooner or
later he was going to have to come up with a way of dividing Quality that
was better that subjects and objects. He would hace to do that or get out of
metaphysics entirely. Its alright to condemn somebody else's bad metaphysics
but you can't replace it with a metaphysics that consists of just one word."
Scott concluded:
Rocks, considered by themselves, are not intellectuals. But a rock is a
particular. It points to SQ, the laws of nature, including the laws of
rockhood, which are universals, which exist as universals whether or not we
know what they are. If they were not universals, there could be no Quality
evolution, only mindless, mechanical evolution.
dmb replies:
Rocks are not intellectuals. OK, I'll agree with you there, but I fail to
see the logic or the point of everything that follows. You seem to be
confusing universals with particulars and then assert this is necessary to
avoid mindless mechanical evolution. This makes no sense to me whatsoever.
I've tried to draw you out with the hope that an interesting problem would
be discovered in the process, but now I am pretty much convinced that your
criticisms of the MOQ have no merit or validity, but are rather predicated
on some fundamental misconceptions in your approach. To be perfectly frank,
I think you don't know what you're talking about. Unless you can provide
some actual Pirsigisms, some actual assertions, quotes or ideas from the
author himself, I shall find it impossible to take your objections
seriously. So far they have all seemed quite ill-concieved, if not downright
fictional.
But thanks for your time. Sincerely,
dmb
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