From: hampday@earthlink.net
Date: Tue Aug 30 2005 - 20:29:10 BST
Hello Scott and Paul:
Since you've both responded to my 8/29 post, I'll take you on as a duo. I'd
like to compare what you're each asserting (re: MoQ) and inject my own views
(re: Essentialism) -- if this doesn't constitute an abuse of MD privileges.
Ham previously said:
> Plato conjectured that forms ('universals' or 'particulars') are objective
> "essents" that exist independently of human minds but that are the
> ontological basis for things perceived in the sense world.
Scott interrupted to make a point of distinction:
> I understand Plato's forms were just universals. Particulars are the
> wordly imitations (appearances), no?
I'm not an authority on Plato, but I think the platonic "forms" (or what we
now call "universals") were what Aristotle later defined as "essences" and
applied to horses, houses, stones, trees, etc. The "discrete particulars"
cited by the Greeks, then, refer to specific things or creatures apart from
their assumed "essential" genus or category. I also think scientific
research generally follows this scheme of things by looking for facts and
characteristics by "class" of species, phyla, or type of phenomenon
observed. Scientists would be more likely to describe this as a search for
the "true nature of a thing" rather than as trying to discover its
"essence".
(That's because, to a scientist, essence means "beingness".) But the
empirical approach reflects the same thinking.
Paul said:
> I'm not sure if an essentialist necessarily has to believe in Platonic
> Forms. But anyway, as I understand it, 'essentialism' is just the
> theory that one can divide the properties of an object up into those
> which are intrinsic to it being what it is, and those that are not,
> i.e. those that are merely accidental. The worst thing about this
> is that it leads to the belief that one description can, in principle
> at least, get at the essential construction of the world which raises
> the epistemological problem of how you know when you have
> hit upon a description of an object's essential properties.
That's a legitimate criticism of 'essentialism' as it is commonly
understood, and you've revealed one of the pitfalls in my own usage of this
term. In my philosophy, Essence (cap. E) does not refer to particular
phenomena, such as a man or a horse. These are what I call "existents",
which means they are differentiated entities separated by time and space and
exhibiting specific attributes that identify their type. Thus, the
"particulars" are what exists, while the "forms" are man's intellectual
categorization of what exists based on his experience.
So, let's eliminate the conceptual "forms" entirely, and consider only
existence and its particulars as they relate to reality. The attributes of
a particular thing, like the dimensions by which we define them, is a given
in experience. In other words, existence is organized and relational rather
than random and chaotic. Why this should be so, I can't even attempt to
explain. But, to me, it's the strongest evidence we have for a Designer
that transcends the physical world, yet is not "other" to it. In some ways
I see existence as "illusory", yet it is the only reality we can know.
Apart from having some mystical enlightenment, logical convention leads to
the conclusion that this illusion must have a primary cause.
Scott says:
> I don't know how you expect to deny differentiation to essence, assuming
> one wants to consider essence at all. Horses are different from giraffes,
so
> in essence-speak, there is essential differentiation. One doesn't need S/O
to
> make these differentiations. Horses are different from giraffes, something
> which horses, in some non-linguistic way, are aware of. As to whether a
> concept is an essence, I ask what difference that makes a difference can
be
> found in the way we use 'concept' from the way we use 'essence'. Aristotle
> said that the essence of being human is rationality. Whether one agrees
with
> this or not, isn't it just another way of saying that our concept of being
> human necessarily includes rationality?
I want to consider Essence for the same reason that Mr. Pirsig wants to
consider Quality. Essence for me is Reality. In fact, I suspect if you
substituted Essence for Quality in the author's novels, you'd be on target
90% of the time. (That's what drew me to the MoQ in the first place.) I
disagree that we don't need S/O to differentiate between a horse and a
giraffe, however. Horses and giraffes are objects of a subject's
experience. Whether they are "essential" or not is another question.
Actually, I deny that "being" is essential: it is the form of the "other" in
our existential illusion. Man does not possess being -- even his biological
organism is borrowed from otherness in the S/O dichotomy we call existence.
Yet, man seeks grounding in that beingness; and this yearning expresses the
essential Value that he is denied as an existent.
Paul sheds more light on this:
> My interpretation is that all static values
> emerge in a relationship to other values i.e. they are dependently
> originated and sustained. As such there is nothing that is non-relational
> hence there are no essences.
Good reasoning, as far as the relational universe in concerned. There are
no EXISTING essences. However, you cannot make the claim that there is
nothing that is non-relational. The essentialist believes in a transcendent
Essence. You can not prove this to be untrue. The human mind is incapable
of absolute truth. (That's one of my postulates.)
Scott wants to argue a point Pirsig himself made concerning Newton's laws:
>Are you saying that the amount of energy produced by the annihilation of a
> certain amount of mass could have been any amount at all prior to 1905?
No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that Newton, Darwin, Einstein, et al
were formulating precepts (principles) that could be applied to an empirical
understanding of, and achieve some predictability in, the physical universe.
The precepts themselves have no physical existence, even as universal
concepts. Call them "patterns of thought", if you wish. They serve to
"universalize" the pattern of experience that is common to us as
individuals. Like the precept 2 + 2 = 4, they have no ontological
significance, except as characteristics of human reasoning.
Paul concludes:
> ...it is clear from the [MoQ] hierarchy that there were at least inorganic
> and biological patterns before there was language. And these patterns are
> presumed to be causally independent of social and intellectual patterns.
Again, "before and after" is inconsequential when you consider that
evolution is a uniquely human construct based on one's linear experience
through time. What is
significant is that man is the autonomous locus of existence; i.e., the
universe is his reality.
Scott concludes:
> I am [also] following Barfield in saying that concepts are common to both
> human intellect and nature, and that our knowledge of nature is good when
> we participate in the concepts that nature is manifesting -- though we are
> rank beginners in that endeavor at present, at a level of learning the
> alphabet, while the goal is being able to read.
My familiarity with Barfield is minimal. I do know that, like the MoQ, his
philosophy takes an evolutionary slant and stresses developmental changes in
the human intellect over time. In my opinion, this kind of nominalism
exaggerates the importance of linguistics and ignores the individual's
purpose in existence. The Barfield quote I like best was written by Gary
Lachman in a review of the author's "Evolution of Consciousness" ...
"Barfield, taking physics at its word, and drawing on the epistemological
theories of Coleridge and Goethe--with a large helping of Rudolf
Steiner--went in the opposite direction, towards a 'participatory universe',
in which human consciousness, far from being a 'ghost in the machine', is
master of ceremonies."
Now if only Pirsig had said something like that!
Essentially yours,
Ham
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