From: ml (mbtlehn@ix.netcom.com)
Date: Mon Sep 27 2004 - 21:15:02 BST
Hello Scott:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Scott Roberts" <jse885@earthlink.net>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Monday, September 27, 2004 8:30 AM
Subject: Re: MD A bit of reasoning
> David M et al,
>
> Naturally I reject the charge that I am being unfair to Pirsig. I think he
> made a serious mistake, and that this mistake has serious moral
> consequences. When SOM came along in the 17th century, it moved the
> concepts of quality, value, and morality from being all-pervasive to being
> just subjective, i.e., human. But it also did the same with intellect. In
> classical and medieval philosophy, nature (the inorganic and biological)
> was value-full and idea-full. Pirsig made the correction with quality, but
> not intellect.
>
> Now I'm not claiming that pre-SOM philosophy got everything right, but to
> restore Quality but not Intellect just makes no sense.
mel:
Sure it does. Quality is attributional by definition.
Intellect is evolutionary a process.
Something has value
> if and only if its value is appreciated.
mel:
You are equivocating on the definition of value
to something not compatible with MoQ, something
subjective.
Something is moral if and only if
> there is choice. An isolated thing has no value. Its value only exists in
> the thing's relations and functionality, which are universals. In short,
> Quality and Intellect are two facets of the same thing.
In our experience,
> both value and intellect only seem to occur in humans, though one can also
> see appreciation of value in higher mammals. For us to think that value
> exists in rocks and earthworms is a bit of a leap of faith, but a little
> reflection shows its plausibility.
mel:
even pre-instinctual tropism show the existence of value.
That is to recognize instinct and laws
> of nature as supplying the context for appreciation and choice. But again,
> these are intellectual processes. Without the universals, and the judgment
> of how well the particulars fulfill their roles in universals, there is no
> value.
mel:
It seems like you are trying to create a "subjective objectivism" which
is belabored in the context of past flavored formalism.
So it takes no more of a leap of faith to consider Intellect as
> all-pervasive, as much as Quality, especially when a little thought shows
> they are identical.
mel:
Not in Pirsig's sense
> So why does Pirsig not see this? The charitable view, which may well be
> correct, is that it just didn't occur to him. But there is a
presupposition
> in Lila that wouldn't allow it anyway. That is the interpretation of
> mysticism that to transcend means going beyond language and thought.
Beyond
> intellect. Hence, someone indoctrinated in this way is going to do what
> Pirsig did: assign intellect solely to SQ, as something to be transcended.
mel:
Apprehension in Being is not the same as the
discussion of an experience in the past. To rely on the
portion of intellect trapped in the past, in language, is
to remain at a remove from Apprehension in Being...
>
> Now to the consequences. As I've tried to explain, this interpretation of
> mysticism is a misleading one. It arose because many mystics have said
that
> their experience is beyond all concepts, is indescribable, etc. Well, this
> is no doubt partially true. One can't read a book and thereby become
> enlightened. But you can't read a book to learn how to ride a bicycle
> either. Nor can most experiences be described, such as being in love, or
> what it is like to see a patch of blue. One can only refer to them and
> count on one's interlocutor to have had the same experience. Franklin
> Merrell-Wolff at some point says the same about mystical experience. A
> community of mystics would have no problem communicating.
mel:
Mysticism is not a needed ingredient and adds nothing.
But there is also
> the claim that what is experienced is prior to all conceptualizing. Well,
> this is no doubt also true. But what it leaves out is that *there is
> conceptualizing*. That is, while the Ground of Being (or Be(com)ing, or
> whatever) may be said to be prior to all division, it is nothing without
> all that division. The two (the formless and form) are the same
> (non)-thing, a contradictory identity.
mel:
Hence the distinction Dynamic and Static Quality, in part.
But as soon as one has form one has
> value and intellect. To put it in mythical terms, all reality is created
by
> God's conceptualizing. Hence the error of the "go-beyond-intellect" school
> is to treat intellect as just being about reflecting on what exists. It is
> also the source of what exists.
mel:
This is an interesting weaving of post hoc ergo propter hoc and
an equivocation of intellect into something preceding intellect
>
> The unfortunate consequences of the conventional interpretation of
> mysticism is a tendency to spurn the intellect. No doubt, our current
> intellects are faulty. But to reject it for some ideal beyond intellect is
> to go in the wrong direction.
mel:
The earlier concern with Coherence, if I grasp it sufficiently,
is not to reject intellect, but to build upon the intellect as did
the untellect upon the social, upon the biological, upon the
physical, rather than to cantilever a philosophy over "empty
space."
It tends to result in falling into Wilber's
> pre/trans fallacy. But consider the last two of the Buddhist 8-fold path:
> concentration and meditation. What these do is discipline and train the
> intellect.
mel:
Not the intellect, but the mind.
The basic characteristic of our intellect is the S/O divide, the
> ability to detach an observer from an observed and reflect on it. Now
> granted that there is no absolute division (that would be SOM), this
> detachment is what makes intellect possible. And meditation is the
practice
> of strengthening that detachment. Therefore, Zen works, but by
transforming
> intellect, not by going beyond it.
mel:
To know the limit of a thing you must exceed that limit.
The habitual use of mind is unsound, hence training and
Intellect is only one activity of mind.
Of course, one has gone beyond our
> everyday, SOM-drenched intellect. But if that is all that intellect can
be,
> one has fallen into the error of thinking that evolution has stopped.
mel:
Pirsig makes no such claim, but rather urges us towards the Dynamic.
>
> There is a more general moral question, though, and that is how we
consider
> intellect in general, never mind those few who are mystically inclined.
I'm
> kind of surprised that in Lila and in this forum there is very little
> attention paid to intellect itself. Well, in Lila there wouldn't be
room --
> it is already a full-length book without going into it, except to make the
> valid point that intellect trumps the social, and discussion around it.
But
> there is no discussion along the lines of "what is intellect", in fact in
> LC, Pirsig says he purposely did not go into it, on the grounds that those
> who read Lila know what it is.
mel:
Now you are getting to the hard nut burried in the meat
of the MoQ fruit's flesh...
In a sense he is correct, but in another
> sense, we don't really know. The unique difference between intellect and
> the other levels is that intellect can reflect on itself. That means it
can
> be self-evolving. It is DQ and SQ all right here available to us to think
> about, but nobody seems to care. I find that perplexing.
mel:
Our ability to get distracted in mind, and these discussions, may
create an appearance of "not caring", but the whole reason the
moq.org exists, unless I am badly mistaken, is to try and get a
focus on the mometary flashes of understanding we all got in
the reading/re-reading of Pirsig.
Intellect, as a level of evolution.
Intellect as an activity of mind
Intellect as a process in the past
small intellect versus BIG INTELLECT
Apprehension beyond the habitual
SQ becoming DQ, pointing to DQ
seem to be where the "value" (pun intended)
is to be found. Not in the over-painting
of Pirsig with possible related philosophical
ideas, or the assignment of his ideas to
dusty bins of classification in smoky
offices in schools with chairs named
for dead scholars.
We need a little conceptual circumcision
to free up Pirsig in our thoughts to focus
on the Static/Dynamic edge...
Not meant to be harsh...
thanks--mel
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Mon Sep 27 2004 - 21:18:17 BST