Re: MD Looking for the Primary Difference

From: hampday@earthlink.net
Date: Sat Nov 05 2005 - 22:20:48 GMT

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    Scott, Erin, Arlo and Ian --

    At Scott's suggestion, I've done a little research on Owen Barfield, who I
    suspect has been a major factor in altering all of your consciences.
    (Personally, I think he's a 97-year old nut.)

    Knowing something of Pirsig's history, there must be a place for levels of
    insanity in the Quality heirarchy. Scott has summed up all five of our
    respective epistemologies quite succinctly. So, let's see if we can pick
    the craziest thinker in this group. I'll start with my own belief system,
    based on Scott's precis but reconfigured and slightly expanded to properly
    prioritize it. The others' are quoted in Scott's words.

    HAM: The human individual is the cognizant subject of objective existence,
    without which reality would be either an absolute, something else, or
    nothing. All objective sensibility (experience) is proprietary to
    individual awareness, including somatic sensations such as pain, hunger,
    passion, and ecstasy; valuistic judgments or responses such as desire,
    repulsion, beauty, grossness, and morality (bad, good or better); and
    intellectual precepts such as rationality, ideological concepts,
    mathematical and geometric relations, logical principles, and the use of
    language to communicate all of the above to other subjects.

    SCOTT: Language and intellect are what the universe consists of, and humans
    are individuals insofar as we are aware of ourselves as exploiting language
    creatively (and that 'essence' is just another word for 'concept').

    ARLO: Language and intellect are properties of humans only, while
    individuality is a concept (that is, is linguistic), useful in getting along
    with the environment.

    ERIN(?): All that we experience (including individuality) is semiotic, but
    whether that's true of non-human experience is unknown.

    IAN: (Same as Erin, according to Scott)

    'Mirror, mirror on the wall, who say you is the weirdest of all?'

    Improbably yours,
    Ham

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