From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sat Mar 01 2003 - 21:47:07 GMT
Steve and all:
Steve said:
Your last post (below) was very interesting and illuminating for me. Does
your "thinking about thinking" way of distinguishing the social and
intellectual levels reflect a change in the way that you are currently
thinking about the levels or is a new way to articulate how you've always
defined the levels?
DMB says:
Illuminating? Good! I'm glad to hear it. Always defined them? I've been
exploring mythology and pre-history pretty seriously over the last two or
three years and it has filled my imagination with ideas about what the
social level is really all about. I've got a stack of books up to my chin
that I read with such questions in mind. Of course, I never thought in terms
of levels until I read Lila and then joined this group. But there was a
priest friend who introduced me, before I read Lila, to the ancient Greek
word "metanoia", which means roughly "to think about what you think" or
"re-think". So its not exactly a new idea. And as shown in the Oxford
Companion, the notion that there are different kinds of thinking is not
exclusive to Pirsig.
Steve said:
"Thinking about thinking" doesn't sound far off from Wim's intellectual
static latch of "copied rationale." Would you agree? How would you
contrast your views?
DMB says:
I don't know. I don't think so. I can't make much sense of Wim's take. If
Wim means "systematic rational thinking" when he writes "copied rationale" I
might go along with it, but I don't really know what "copied rationale" is
and I don't like the sound of it. I think that intellectual level thinking
is supposed to be critical of what has come before, so the idea of "copying"
as somehow essential to intellect takes us in the wrong direction.
Rationality is one thing, but rationale is too close to rationalization for
my taste, which is just a clever way to make excuses or justify yourself
disingenuously. It sounds too much like reasons invented after the
conclusion is drawn, which is backwards.
Thanks.
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