From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Wed Sep 28 2005 - 08:51:27 BST
Matt, Ham and Multitude.
Just as I thought all hope was gone for this discussion Matt
delivered something that made it look like a philosophy site again
- even a MOQ one. He made the reservation that he merely
explains Pirsig's position, but it was one of the best of that sort.
I'd like to dwell on a few points.
Ham:
> > Your analysis implies that the "patterns of experience" exist prior to
> > and independent of conscious awareness. This, I suppose, is what I've
> > always wondered about but never dared to ask. Then, are the levels
> > "inorganic", "biological", "social" and "intellectual" also
> > pre-conscious?
This must be the SOM puzzle if there is a world without anyone
to watch it ... in a Quality garb.
Matt: (24 Sep.)
> So it would seem to imply, but I've suggested on occasion that the
> consequence of Pirsig's claims about experience being synonymous with
> reality
Rather ..."Quality synonymous with reality" (experience=reality is
a tautology)
> is that other terms dancing around in the same sphere, like
> consciousness, are also thusly redescribed. On my reading, if we are
> willing to suppose that rocks experience other rocks, then we could
> also just as easily say that rocks are conscious of other rocks.
Saying that rocks are conscious is not all easy. Consciousness
means self-consciousness and implies the piece of rock saying to
itself "I am a rock" and that is clearly not the case.
> Saying this is no big deal. What we need to remember, though, is that
> rocks, cells, animals, and humans have different kinds of
> consciousness. This is what I intimated when I said that rocks only
> experience other rocks. While Pirsig appears to be ubiquitizing
> experience and consciousness, thus making them completely useless
> (which, in a sense, he is and with good reason), his distinction in
> the different static levels captures what would appear to be uniquely
> each level.
As said, MOQ's axiom is Quality=Experience, not Consiousness=
Experience. The latter is SOM's subjective stance, the one that
so many believe is the road to the MOQ, while I claim it to be a
blind alley.
In SOM consciousness or self-consciousness is synonymous
with Mind on one side of the S/O aggregate, and these grand
concepts can't be "made completely useless". They represent a
huge value in the MOQ; Intellectual Value in my "book".
Bo
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