From: Paul Turner (paul@turnerbc.co.uk)
Date: Fri Jul 22 2005 - 16:32:32 BST
Sam,
>To enlarge on that, I'll refer to the Damasio material which I cite so
>frequently. The mind contains representations of the body, and in making
>decisions, the mind will project possibilities and discern an emotional
>reaction to them, ie the representation of the viscera (the intellectual
>patterns) within the mind will change. It is that emotional reaction which
>is the seat of decision making, and therefore the response to Quality.
>
>In other words, in determining whether a particular equation is solved or
>not, the collection of intellectual patterns which we call mind will defer
>to a particular set of intellectual patterns associated with emotional
>response. It is those intellectual patterns associated with emotional
>response, viz the representations within the mind of visceral reactions,
>which I don't think are adequately characterised by GPT. (I think they are
>more adequately characterised by the language of emotional intelligence,
>aka
>virtue language. I also think that the agglomeration of intellectual
>patterns bears a remarkable resemblance to traditional teaching about the
>soul, but that's a whole other story.)
Paul: I think you are confusing emotion with the experience of intellectual
value. Both are aesthetic but they are, according to the MOQ, different
responses to Quality - separated by evolutionary development.
>Yes, it's becoming clearer. Let's take a worked example, the shift from
>Ptolemaic to Copernican understandings of planetary movements. How would
>you
>characterise that shift in terms of GPT? Clearly the overall interpretation
>shifted - the GPT changed unrecognisably - but how about the detail (ie
>what
>could be observed with the naked eye)? Are you saying that there are no
>uninterpreted facts, the GPT completely governs all observation and
>experience, and therefore there is a radical incommensurability between the
>two understandings? (That would be the Kuhnian position, and I think it
>logically follows from what you've said so far) Or is it that there is some
>continuity, that conversation is possible between the one and the other in
>terms of a debate about observable data etc, and that therefore the GPT is
>not determinative for the whole understanding. That is, there are elements
>of the understandings (what is seen with the naked eye) which are more or
>less independent of the GPT for their validity and use. The latter is my
>perspective.
Paul: I actually think we mostly agree here. I would say that some
Ptolemaic patterns (e.g. the descriptions of the planets) were weaved into
Copernican patterns and some were unstitched. I think there would always be
an amount of continuity.
>I suspect it is also the MoQ perspective, in that giving the GPT the wholly
>determinative role would rule out the possibility of DQ, in the form of
>non-integrated experience, ie anomalies. What place do anomalies have
>within
>the mind if the GPT is what governs mental structure?
Paul: I didn't (or didn't mean to) say that GPTs are wholly determinative,
just significantly influential with respect to what gets easily weaved into
a particular web. Neither did I say that webs are entirely consistent. I
think there are tatty, frayed, low quality webs and beautiful and elegant
webs of high quality.
DQ, far from being ruled out, is what I see as causing the web to reweave in
ingenious, unexpected, dramatic ways rather than the slower reweaving which
tends to occur as a result of the interaction with other static patterns.
>> Paul: I'm afraid your analogies aren't helping me see the problem.
>> However, as I've said, it's the whole web which is responding to Quality
>> and
>> reweaving patterns. Maybe that answers you?
>
>I don't think the whole web responds to Quality. I think there is a spider
>in the middle of the web. (But a spider composed of the same substance as
>the web)
Paul: This is where I think you have to drop the "self-reweaving" idea
then. You seem to be trying to slip in the conventional idea of a mind or a
self which does the thinking.
>> Paul: Algorithms? No, they are just the intellectual patterns which
>> justify lots of other patterns, like centres of justificatory gravity to
>> mash up another Rortyan term. If the whole web of patterns is
>responding,
>> they are the patterns which are least likely to be modified, the patterns
>> that are of the highest static quality.
>
>It's the language of 'justify' that I balk at. It makes me think that
>apples
>weren't allowed to fall to the ground before Newton discovered gravity.
Paul: I don't understand. Apples are biological patterns and their
behaviour isn't dependent on justification by intellectual patterns.
>I
>think the GPTs are simply more or less useful filing systems, and that they
>are perennially modifiable.
Paul: More or less useful, sure. Not sure about filing systems though. Is
e=mc2 a filing system? Modifiable? Yes, of course, but not sure it happens
perennially. It would take a lot of rapid reweaving to do that.
>> No, I'm not saying there are transcendent GPTs waiting to be fathomed out
>> or
>> recollected. Is that really how this is coming across?
>
>I think your position is profoundly Platonic. (so is the MoQ, of course)
Paul: In what respect? As far as I can tell, neither my position nor the
MOQ talks about the way world really is in itself nor that describing it in
this way constitutes the single truth. Nor is it proposed that there are
pure "forms" which manifest in the world of "appearances."
My position is that beliefs are justified by other beliefs, by the coherence
of the web, and that this coherence, when it is good, is a synonym for high
intellectual quality which is the MOQ definition of truth. I don't see why
this is a Platonic position. Is it because I use the word "truth?" Tying
truth to Platonic metaphysics is Bo's error.
>Let's consider the brujo. In just the same way that the carbon atom
>exploits
>a tiny crack of freedom in order to establish the inorganic level, so too
>the brujo was able to exploit the tension between his traditional society
>and the incoming westerners in order to act in response to Quality. It was
>clearly not activity governed by the social level (which repudiated him)
>even though it was an activity aimed at helping them (he went back and took
>up a position of authority there).
Paul: I think the point of the brujo story was to illustrate the role of
Dynamic Quality in creating new static patterns i.e. the activity was
"governed" by DQ and not by any static patterns. It is where he introduces
the static-Dynamic distinction after all.
>Perhaps the point is that where you see 'truth' as the presiding value of
>the fourth level (and therefore the patterns of the intellectual level are
>organised around that truth) I see truth as one form of integrity. In other
>words, truth is a function of honesty; it is ontological not
>epistemological.
Paul: I think truth with respect to honesty (as in, "I'm telling the
truth") is not quite the same as e.g. mathematical, scientific or
philosophical truth. I agree that truth is better described as ontological
rather than epistemological in the sense that truth is a species of static
quality.
>Truth is not (as you rightly say) about correct reference
>from pattern to external reality; it is rather, I would suggest, the
>product
>of autonomous integrity. Thus it is the individual mind of integrity which
>represents the organising element at the fourth level. And it is
>establishing and gaining that integrity which is both enlightenment and the
>salvation of the soul. What does it profit a man if he gain the whole
>social
>level (power, money, fame) but lose touch with the fourth?
Paul: Tell me more about "an individual mind of autonomous integrity." It
is one of those pleasant phrases (good for epitaphs and the like) which
brings forth nods of approval without bringing any clarity to the
proceedings.
The thing is, I think honour and integrity are celebrated virtues of the
social level, or at least, there is social integrity and intellectual
integrity so it doesn't suffice as the cleavage term we are looking for.
Regards
Paul
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