From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Mon Sep 05 2005 - 17:20:25 BST
[Platt]
Welcome back from your ride, Arlo. Hope it was refreshing:
[Arlo]
It was a good ride. Thanks.
[Platt previously]
The source of each and every idea in the collective pool was (and is) an
individual human being, just as the source of water in a pool is individual
molecules of H2O.
[Arlo previously]
But do we privilege individual molecules of H20 over the water? Nope.
[Platt]
You darn well better if you want water. Without those little buggers,
you'd get mighty thirsty mighty fast.
[Arlo]
But this is my point. Without the collective "water" you'd get pretty thirsty. A
bunch of "individual" H20 molecules floating around all by themselves won't do
you any good.
Indeed, if we go by your argument, "water" does not exist. The only thing that
exists are individual molecules of H20. But you can extend this, Platt. "H20"
molecules are collectives too, made up of "individual" atoms of Hydrogen and
Oxygen.
According to your logic, if you're thirsty, a bunch of H and O atoms should
quench your thirst quite nicely. Of course, until those "individual" Hs and Os
for the collective H20, and until a bunch of those collectives form a greater
collective called "water", they won't do you a hill a beans difference.
And actually, those "individual" Hydrogen atoms are collectives too, comprised
of "individual" protons/neutrons/electrons. Next time you're thirsty, since you
value the "individual", ask for a glass of protons, neutrons and electrons. See
how far the "individual" gets you.
In this same way, sure, the collective "voice" of the Intellectual Level, the
ongoing Mythos-Logos, is made up of individual voices, singing through their
historical dialogic voice, but its only at the collective level that the
Mythos-Logos emerges, just like water from individual protons, neutrons and
electrons.
You can sing "Long Live the Glorious Proton" all you want. But its value lies in
the collective, not in the individual proton floating around space all by
itself in some Randian dream of independence.
[Arlo previously]
I have never had any comment about the value of the "individual" as a
potential source of evolution. On ANY of the MOQ levels.
[Platt]
Does that mean you acknowledge the individual's important role in
evolution?.
[Arlo]
The same way I value the role of the proton in the evolution of "water".
[Arlo previously]
And, each of the levels "use" the individuals on the previous level to further
its own goals.
[Platt]
The intellectual level doesn't use individuals so much as protect them
from society's (government's) efforts to dominate them.
[Arlo]
Do you get this from Pirsig? Or is this your own interpretation? Pirsig says
quite clearly that the manipulation of social individuals by the Intellectual
Level is the same as the manipulation of biological individuals by the social
level.
LILA: In a value metaphysics, on the other hand, society and intellect are
patterns of value. They're real. They're independent. They're not properties of
"man" any more than cats are the property of catfood or a tree is a property of
soil. Biological man does not create his society any more than soil "creates" a
tree. The pattern of the tree is dependent upon the minerals in the soil and
would die without them, but the tree's pattern is not created by the soil's
chemical pattern. It is hostile to the soil's chemical pattern. It "exploits"
the soil, "devours" the soil for its own purposes, just as the cat devours the
catfood for its own purposes. In this manner biological man is exploited and
devoured by social patterns that are essentially hostile to his biological
values.
This is also true of intellect and society. Intellect has its own patterns and
goals that are as independent of society as society is independent of biology.
A value metaphysics makes it possible to see that there's a conflict between
intellect and society that's just as fierce as the conflict between society and
biology or the conflict between biology and death. Biology beat death billions
of years ago. Society beat biology thousands of years ago. But intellect and
society are still fighting it out.
[Platt]
Maybe its roots go way back to some individual thinkers in the dim past as
Pirsig suggests. But no one before him put it all together in Western
philosophy.
[Arlo]
That you know of.
[Platt]
I've never denied the influence of culture on the individual. But indeed I
do "privilege" (a favorite word of liberals) the individual soloist -- the Louis
Armstrong's, Rachmaninoff's and Pirsig's of this world.
[Arlo]
Who are not soloists by any means. The play using the invented instruments of
others, they use a notation system invented by others, the sing words that are
the symbolic systems created by others. And it is only when their voice is seen
as harmonious by others that it becomes part of the chorus. Were each not part
of this collectivist chorus to begin with, they would have no voice. It is this
historical-dialogic that gives rise to the song, and that is, like the
collectivist value "water", a value I privilege.
[Arlo previously]
Exactly. You need at least "two". You're starting to get it. "One" just
won't do much of anything.
[Platt]
And you're beginning to get it that you can't you have the many without
the one.
[Arlo]
Oh I get it. It's precisely this historical-dialogic that I've been arguing for
since the beginning. You can't have "water" without H20, which you can't have
without Hs and Os. Which you can't have with Ps, Ns and Es. But when you're
thirsty, what do you want? A bunch of Randian Protons, or a nice tall glass of
Pirsigian "water"? I'll go with the "water".
Arlo
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