From: David M (davidint@blueyonder.co.uk)
Date: Sat Oct 15 2005 - 19:23:26 BST
Hi Matt
In 100 years of philosophy John Passmore
says that traditional empiricism assumes that we
can make a clear distinction between what we experience
and the value or importance of that experience and that Heidegger
challenges this distinction. I suspect Pirsig & DMB are just doing
the same thing. Instead of value Heidegger talks about mood or care
and that all experience has a mood of some kind including the possible
mood of indifference. I would suggest that this applies to all experience
including a possible one where we suspend our usual grids that we
apply to experience to make some kind of sense of it. Of course, it seems
to me that different grids cannot bring new qualities to our experience
that wedid not get before. How else could I have developed this thing
about the quality of short red skirts.
DM
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matt Kundert" <pirsigaffliction@hotmail.com>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Monday, October 10, 2005 3:49 PM
Subject: RE: MD Rhetoric
DMB,
DMB said:
This is why I think Pirsig and Hayes ARE saying the same thing. They're both
talking about an experience in which judgement is absent. I would even go so
fat as to say that taking the "undifferentiated aesthetic continuum", the
"pure sensation" or "immeditate experience" as a reference to some kind of
"valuing" or "judging" is to inappropriately let SOM's subjective self creep
back into the conversation.
Matt:
I'm actually very surprised by this. I think the reading of the hot stove
example you just gave is totally wrong. I actually wonder what Paul and
Anthony think of your most recent writings about Hayes and Pirsig. Up until
a week ago, I thought everyone, even me, agreed on Pirsig's central insight.
And not only that, you appear to think what you're saying is normal and
not a radical departure from typical readings of Pirsig. I just can't
believe any one impressed by Pirsig would say the above. The only thing I
can really say is, Why did Pirsig call the ultimate reality Quality (which
he uses interchangeably with Value) if what you say is true? It boggles my
mind to think that one can have value at the heart of it all without
valuing. Touching the stove is not a neutral impression, as you would have
it, its a negative experience, a low-Quality situation, as Pirsig says in
the very passage in question.
DMB said:
If the four of us were in a room together, then you would be in the minority
[about the utility of "pure sensation"], but when it comes to the world of
philosophy, I think Hayes, Pirsig and I are part of a tiny minority.
Matt:
I don't know about that. Pure sensations, in one form or another, were very
fashionable after Locke, particularly at the beginning of this century. I
don't know if they're "in" now, but I don't think they're as rare as you
seem to think.
After my little dialogue between X and Y, I said:
if the conversation goes anything like that, then the user of the
distinction is, to quote X, "in trouble." The reason Y's in trouble is
because "adequacy" only comes into play if you are trying to _represent_
something already there (i.e. experience or reality). That's
representationalism to a T. And if you have representationalism, as you
tacitly agreed to earlier, then you have the appearance/reality distinction.
If Y doesn't say adequate, and can't really think of a replacement purpose
for keeping it around, then that's a good reason for thinking that the
distinction has outlived its usefulness.
DMB said:
What's the purpose of making a distinction between divided and undivided
reality? ... There's more than one reason, more than one purpose, but I
suppose the main reasons for making this distinction is "to explain Indian
mysticism". ( page 109) "with the identification of static and Dynamic as
the fundamental division of the world, Phaedrus felt that some kind of goal
had been reached. This first division of the MOQ now coverd the spectrum of
experience from primitive mysticism to quantum mechanics." (page 120) ...
But I think its pretty clear that static/Dynamic split grew out of the
desire to create a system that does not exclude mysticism the way SOM does,
or even the way a classic/romantic split would. Its only a little bit of an
exaggeration to say that the whole point and purpose of the MOQ is to create
a system which does not dismiss enlightenment as some kind of brain fart or
crazy platypus. I seem to recall that he said something about values and
morals too, but its pretty clear mysticism is central to the whole project.
Matt:
Thing is, I'm not dismissing mystic enlightenment at all "as some kind of
brain fart or crazy platypus." I am saying that _one_ way to describe it is
as a neuron firing (if you're saying it _can't_ be so described, then you
are committing the mistake of "insisting on a particular description" that
you denied you were doing earlier). Another way is as "pure sensation."
And there are many other ways. What I'm saying is that "pure sensation" is
not a good description for epistemological purposes. You appear to be
saying that we _need_ to keep it no matter what, otherwise we'll be
excluding "mysticism the way SOM does." You say, "The distinction [between
divided and undivided reality] is made to include a category of experiences
that were previously excluded, to bring in a whole range of human
experiences and put them on the philosophical table for consideration." You
are saying that these experiences were there, but Western philosophy was
just rejecting them, ignoring them. But how can you say that without the
word "adequacy"? You think Pirsig is better because he more _adequately_
describes our experience, he describes the _whole_ range rather than just
part, he doesn't ignore certain sections of it. You don't want to say that,
as when you say, "I don't think I'm talking about 'adequacy' because I'm not
trying to 'represent' something already there," but you _are_ trying to
represent something "already there"---the range of human experiences that
the West leaves off the philosophical table. So as far as I can see you
haven't yet given me a replacement purpose for "adequate" that keeps you
well away from epistemology and the appearance/reality distinction, the need
to answer the skeptic.
Matt
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