From: johnny moral (johnnymoral@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu Jul 24 2003 - 22:09:56 BST
Hi Rick,
>J
> > Would you agree that it is the relationships of or between biological
> > patterns? (or at least like-biological patterns)
>
>R
>No. I don't think all relationships of or between biological patterns give
>rise to social patterns. I think it has to be copied, repetitive behavior.
>Behavior that is genetically hard-wired isn't social.
The only biological pattern between two people I can think of is
reproduction, which is why I see a marriage as a single biological pattern,
a single flesh, as it were, and not two individuals. Otherwise reproduction
would be social, when it is clearly quite biological. All other patterns
that emerge from the relations between people would seem to me to be social
patterns. Can you give me an example of a usual pattern of how people
interact that is not social? I think Pirsig may have said murder is a
biological pattern, but, first of all, murder is not the pattern but is the
name for the immoral inverse of the social pattern of not killing each
other, and secondly, it's social. Those "immoral inverses" of patterns are
not patterns themselves, for patterns are by definition moral patterns
(agreed that they are "moral patterns" right?) so if we have a name for
their inverse, it shouldn't be confused for a moral pattern itself (such
confusion would lead eventually to the pattern's demise, as both it and its
inverse would be seen as moral).
>J
> > Find food *better* than the society already finds food, find food in a
>way
> > that a better society would. Hence, the two societies, this one and the
> > better one. ??
>
>R
>I think that's a needlessly complicated way of saying it. Just say that
>social patterns develop intellectual patterns to help themselves find food
>in better ways.
The "better" is significant, it implies two things. And not just two
different ways to find food, but two different versions of how society could
be, since we are talking about two different possible social patterns of
finding food, not merely two different ways an individual might find food.
>R
>That's why I like "built on social patterns". Because saying you need "two
>societies" sounds like you mean "two cultures".
Well, I think most intellectual patterns did come from the culture being
exposed to other culture's social patterns, but sometimes the "other
culture" is just two different perceptions of one culture.
>R
>What it all has to do with is FREEDOM at the inception. Each new kind of
>pattern emerged to the level below it as an avenue of escape from the
>static
>patterns of the then currently dominant level... and then went off on its
>own purposes. Eventually, another new level develops to offer freedom from
>those purposes, etc.
Right, Rick, that's the MoQ standard answer and it is unifying. But it
seems a little pandering and grandiose, like the definition of DQ, it's
another compliment we pay something because it fits the definition. And
isn't it contradicted by the whole notion of the upper level manipuating the
lower level? That is an ironic outcome if the lower level was yearning for
freedom and ends up being manipulated. What is it that is trying to "escape
from the static patterns"? Patterns, or the level itself, or what?
>J
> > So when you go to the movies, you don't expect to have fun?
>
>R
>Yes J, I go to the movies because I expect to have fun. But I don't have
>fun because I expect to.
I think you do. You are using a much narrower definition of "expect" than I
am. Anything that happens, happens because, at the moment of it happening,
we expect it. We may not have expected it 15 seconds prior, but our
expectations change as our experiences change. Expectation doesn't come
from us, it comes from outside us.
>J
> > Have you ever wondered about the dual meanings of those words?
>(Expected,
> > supposed, should) What came first, the imperitive or the probability?
>I
> > say that neither came first, the whole came first.
>
>R
>I know you say that. And I understand your idea about how the 'dual
>meanings' of the word "expectation" coalesce into what you believe to be a
>moral imperative of some kind.
The moral imerative is only one of the meanings, probability being the
other. They don't coalesce, but rather derive their distinct meanings from
each other. Morality is the whole in which their their love and respect for
each other creates the universe.
>I just don't agree that that moral
>imperative has any relevance or value to actual moral reasoning (certainly
>not in mine).
You practice ethics, not morality (well, it's moral to practice ethics, so
you are practicing morality too, just not respecting morality)
>I don't think it's always better to do what society (or anyone, or
>anything) expects.
Again, you have a narrow view of expectation. We do always do what we think
is best, and the patterns influence that decision. Patterns are
expectations, they are the expectation of the pattern continuing. If they
weren't expected to continue, they wouldn't be a pattern at all. They
continue because they are expected to, because expectation being realized is
good.
>I think your making too much over the etymology of a single term.
I don't, but I am sorry if it gets tiresome.
>J
> > OK, fun wsn't the right word, but "satisfying" might be. When the
> > unexpected is fun it's because we expected to be surprised. If we
>don't,
> > it's not. It's not fun when you find a mouse in your cereal, or the
>house
> > burns down.
>
>R
>This is exactly the kind of silly, circular conclusion that your obsession
>with 'expectations' has you continuously returning to, I mean, it literally
>sounds like you're saying 'Something is moral if it's expected, and
>immoral
>if it's unexpected. But if it was unexpected and turns out to be moral, it
>must have really been expected. And if it was expected and turns out to be
>immoral it must have really been unexpected.' That's what it sounds like
>you're saying to me, and I think it's pointlessly post-hoc and useless.
Wait, I catch you in a contradiction (unexpected=fun, but
mouse-in-cereal=unexpected<>fun) and you say I'm being post-hoc? Haven't
you ever expected to be surprised before? That's what excitement is all
about.
I've talked about how expectations change as the future gets closer, and how
stronger expectations often override expectatons that turn out to have been
based on incomplete information. I realize when I say that that it sounds
like I'm squirming around, but isn't it true, don't expectatins change?
I don't recognize that 'turns out to be moral' bit, I think you're using
moral to mean ethical again?
>Sorry J, I don't we'll ever agree on this point. It's not that I don't see
>'expectation' as important or powerful... it's just that I don't see it as
>determinative, and certainly I don't see at as synonymous with "morality".
Well, it shouldn't be hard to see it as synonomous with morality, at least
the half of the meaning that we use to mean 'what we are morally expected to
do'. I can see that it is hard to see how the 'probability' half might be
hard to reconcile with morality, but that is because people today confuse
morality with ethics.
Johnny
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