RE: MD Philosophy and Theology

From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Apr 06 2003 - 20:29:51 BST

  • Next message: Erin N.: "RE: MD Philosophy and Theology"

    Sam and all:

    DMB had said:
    Science is trivial? Gotta give Sam points for orginality on that one. Never
    heard that one before.

    Sam answered:
    ...Perhaps 'trivial' is needlessly provocative - 'emotionally neutral' is
    what I mean.

    DMB says:
    Emotionally neutral? Oh yea, thanks for the reminder. I almost forgot to
    object to that notion too. ;-)

    Plato's Republic casts the human mind as composed of three distinct parts;
    passion, reason and temperance, the last of which is the ability to balance
    passion and reason. A healthy mind has all three aspects working in balance
    and harmony, just as it takes three equal legs to hold up a stool. We see
    this same trinity in the original Star Trek. Dr. McCoy is passion, Spock the
    Vulcan is reason and Captain Kirk, who trusts both of them for advice, is
    the temperant balance between them. My point? Sam has created a straw Vulcan
    with this depiction of reason. Real people are NOT like Spock, not even
    scientists. How did Rick put it, science is only supposed to be less
    dependent, not INdependent of emotion? Pirsig says the intellect is in at
    all independent, that it in fact depends on the social level for its very
    existence. In a very real sense the intellectual level is the social level
    PLUS something more. As Wilber puts it, the higher levels INCLUDE as well as
    transcend the lower ones. Reason has never really been divorced from the
    rest of our humanity and lots of thinkers since Plato have recognized that.
    Pirsig's complaints about this misconception, that intellect is independent
    and a property of biological man with nothing in between, are complaints
    pretty specific to Modernity and SOM. To that extent, I'm with Sam. I don't
    think this "emotionally neutral" business really describes intellect, so
    much as a certain kind of scientific materialism.

    Live long and prosper,
    DMB

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