From: Ant McWatt (antmcwatt@hotmail.co.uk)
Date: Sun Jun 12 2005 - 16:52:52 BST
Bo,
As I mentioned to you before, I might work the following notes into a review
of your SOL essay but, in the meantime, I’ve pasted them (in two posts)
between some of the relevant paragraphs of your essay.
Primarily, if you retain SOL, I think you have to explain where the MOQ
(which is an intellectual map of reality) metaphysically fits within itself.
It seems to me there is no space for the MOQ if SOL is employed. Anyway,
you can see my thinking about this in more detail below.
====================================
In the SOL essay, you said:
I agree with the necessity of retaining “S/O thinking” and also that the MOQ
can encase it, but not with his method of doing so. It has caused much
confusion dubious statements, for instance (Lila’s Child”. Page 529)
In the MOQ, all organisms are objective. They exist in the material world.
All societies are subjective. They exist in the mental world. Again, the
distinction is very sharp. For example, the president of the United States
is a social pattern. No objective scientific instrument can distinguish a
President of the US from anyone else.
Inorganic instruments only detect inorganic value. But more serious; what
has subjective/objective and mental/material to do with quality patterns? In
LILA Pirsig (correctly) shows that inorganic value does not correspond to
substance, thus intellectual value doesn’t correspond to mind.
I note:
I don’t think this follows. Firstly, there’s a hidden premise of Pirsig’s
here i.e. that the subjective/mental only corresponds loosely to
intellectual & social quality levels and that the objective/matter
correspond loosely to inorganic & biological patterns. there is NOT an
absolute equivalence between them! For a start, mind & matter are
determined in traditional SOM while in the MOQ freedom is on a continuum
from the inorganic quantum level (little freedom) to the intellectual
(considerable freedom). Moreover, in the MOQ, intellectual and social
patterns are as ontologically real as inorganic patterns while in much of
SOM (a la the physicalists) intellect and social patterns are perceived as
fictions, or at least, not as “real” as “matter”.
You said: No level corresponds to any of SOM’s categories.
I note:
Not exactly but, as mentioned above, inorganic and biological value patterns
correspond (together) to the “subjective” while social and intellectual
value patterns (together) correspond to the “objective”.
You said:
This makes a SOM-like split open up between biology and society .... at
best, more likely between Intellect and the rest and nothing is gained. It’s
SOM in a quality garb.
I note:
No it’s not because the inorganic, biological, social and intellectual in
the MOQ are all encased as all being aspects of Quality i.e. they are all
ontologically the same kind of “stuff” – “stuff” that has evolved into four
fundamental static levels. In SOM, (as you well know!) mind is absolutely
ontologically different from matter.
You said:
In spite of this Pirsig repeatedly - inadvertently - returns to his initial
correct insight and presents intellect as the S/O divide alone. He says that
he saw no need to define intellect, everybody know what it means and my
dictionary says: “The power of the mind to reason contrasted with feeling
and instincts”. “Mind” can be omitted without losing any meaning and because
reason is objectivity itself and feeling is subjectivity itself .. intellect
is the S/O distinction.
I note:
Again, this doesn’t follow. Your dictionary might state that “intellect” is
“the power of the mind to reason contrasted with feeling and instincts” but
even from ZMM alone it is clear that Pirsig’s quest to expand rationality
would tend to disagree with this definition. The intellect for Pirsig also
has to take into account of “feeling and instincts” as a guide for the
highest quality behaviour i.e. the intuitive feel required for good
motorcycle maintenance or, as in the example with Poincaré, the formulation
of mathematical solutions.
You said:
What screws it all up is the notion of a mind doing the intellectualization,
while it’s intellect that does the mind/matter-ization. And there is much
more that points to the SOL. In LILA Pirsig calls intellectual value by many
names, in this quote on page 306:
"Knowledge has grown away from this historic purpose and has become an end
in itself, just as society has grown away from its original purpose."
It is “knowledge” and there is no other kind than objective knowledge, and
because objective requires subjective (like light requires darkness) ...
intellect is the VALUE of the S/O distinction!
I note:
Again, I can’t see how this all follows. When that quote you use is put in
context, you can see that Pirsig is discussing both social knowledge (such
as customs) and intellectual knowledge (such as the distance between London
and the North Pole) so “knowledge” per se can’t just be the “intellect” or
even just one aspect of the intellect (because it can also be one aspect of
the social level). Moreover, if I know I am good at mathematics but poor
at English literature isn’t this “subjective” knowledge rather than
“objective” knowledge? I think all I see as regards SOM is that it is one
possible (metaphysical) tool that intellect can use as the MOQ is another
and the Cittamatra tradition of Buddhism is yet another.
“Within this evolutionary relationship it is possible to see that intellect
has functions that predate science and philosophy. The intellect's
evolutionary purpose has never been to discover an ultimate meaning of the
universe. That is a relatively recent fad. Its historical purpose has been
to help a society find food, detect danger, and defeat enemies. It can do
this well or poorly, depending on the concepts it invents for this
purpose.”
“The cells Dynamically invented animals to preserve and improve their
situation. The animals Dynamically invented societies, and societies
Dynamically invented intellectual knowledge for the same reasons.
Therefore, to the question, "What is the purpose of all this intellectual
knowledge?" The Metaphysics of Quality answers, "The fundamental purpose of
knowledge is to Dynamically improve and preserve society." Knowledge has
grown away from this historic purpose and become an end in itself just as
society has grown away from its original purpose of preserving physical
human beings and become an end in itself, and this growing away from
original purposes toward greater Quality is a moral growth. But those
original purposes are still there. And when things get lost and go adrift
it is useful to remember that point of departure.” (Pirsig, Chapter 24,
LILA)
You continue:
The most telling thing however is that the way the SOM is described in ZMM
corresponds to the intellectual level as described in LILA , something that
causes a perfect harmony between the two books that previously have been
worlds apart. This passage in LILA page 261:
Perhaps in Homer’s time, when evolution had not yet transcended the social
level into the intellectual ...etc.
...underlines my point. Homer’s time is a bit uncertain, but the development
described in ZMM culminating with Socrates & Co started around that time.
During this period intellect –as SOM - made it out of its social home. This
fits perfectly. Look to this in ZMM page 367:
"What is essential to understand at this point is that until now there was
no such thing as mind and matter, subject and object, form and substance.
Those divisions are just dialectical inventions that came later."
This is clearly what LILA calls “transcending the social level into the
intellectual”.
Continued in Part B.
_________________________________________________________________
Want to block unwanted pop-ups? Download the free MSN Toolbar now!
http://toolbar.msn.co.uk/
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 : Sun Jun 12 2005 - 16:57:30 BST