From: David MOREY (us@divadeus.freeserve.co.uk)
Date: Thu Sep 04 2003 - 19:31:11 BST
You can do a lot of thinking without assuming dualism
see Heidegger's collected works!
DM
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Turner" <paulj.turner@ntlworld.com>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2003 3:15 PM
Subject: RE: MD Dealing with S/O pt 1
> Hi Scott:
>
> Scott:
> Pirsig (in Lila) describes the S/O divide as a static intellectual
> pattern. In SOM, this pattern can be expressed as "everything is a
> subject
> or an object" (or the idealist and materialist variants). In the MOQ, he
>
> attempts a redescription: subjective is social and intellectual, while
> objective is inorganic and biological.
>
> Paul:
> To understand why he can say that "the subject-object divide" is a
> static intellectual pattern of values we can start with the MOQ
> definition of the intellectual level:
>
> "The collection and manipulation of symbols, created in the brain, that
> stand for patterns of experience."
>
> In the MOQ, experience is value, therefore the definition above can
> equally
> read:
>
> "The collection and manipulation of symbols, created in the brain, that
> stand for patterns of value."
>
> To add further clarity, the definition could be rewritten as:
>
> "The collection and manipulation of symbols, created in the brain, that
> stand for patterns of inorganic, biological, social and intellectual
> patterns of value."
>
> So, when Pirsig says that subjects and objects are intellectual patterns
> of value, he is saying that subjects and objects are symbols, created in
> the brain, that stand for inorganic-biological [objective] and
> social-intellectual [subjective] patterns of value.
>
> Scott:
> My first complaint is that the MOQ definition is ok for the common use
> of
> "subjective" and "objective", but lousy for the philosophical use of
> "subject" and "object". For example, if I think about what I just wrote,
> in
> the philosophical use, the "what I just wrote" is an object, but the MOQ
>
> calls it subjective.
>
> Paul:
> Hold on, are you saying that words are the same as rocks? Are you really
> saying that it is a problem to think that words are subjective?
>
> Scott:
> So things get confusing.
>
> Paul:
> As far as I can see, the confusion is only caused by different
> definitions of "object" being used. In fact, the philosophical
> definition is confusing because it fails to distinguish between thought
> and sensation. The MOQ makes this distinction clear by referring to
> thoughts as intellectual patterns and sensation as biological patterns,
> without reference to "objects".
>
> Scott:
> However, if it is the case
> that the S/O divide is a static intellectual pattern, that confusion can
> get
> resolved.
>
> Paul:
> The confusion is resolved, I think, by being clear in what sense we are
> using terms such as "object".
>
> Scott:
> My second, and in my opinion unresolvable complaint, is that if we then
> inquire into this supposed static intellectual pattern (the S/O divide),
> we
> run into problems. The first problem is that all my experience is of an
> S/O
> form.
>
> Paul:
> Slow down! The very basis of the MOQ is that this is not the case, and
> that there is no empirical basis for this assumption. If you don't see
> this, the MOQ is on metaphysical quicksand from the beginning. Do you
> agree with the following statements?
>
> "[The MOQ] says that values are not outside of the experience that
> logical positivism limits itself to. They are the essence of this
> experience. Values are more empirical, in fact, than subjects or
> objects." [Lila p.75]
>
> "This value is more immediate, more directly sensed than any "self" or
> any "object" to which it might later be assigned." [Lila p.76]
>
> Straight away you have rejected Pirsig's basic metaphysical premise with
> one innocent looking statement - "all my experience is of an S/O form".
> If this is the problem you have with the MOQ then we don't get off first
> base.
>
> Scott:
> I cannot think of my experience in a non-S/O way.
>
> Paul:
> Okay, this is slightly different. Value is sensed prior to thought, it
> is the empirical reality which gives rise to thought.
>
> "The low value comes first, then the subjective thoughts that include
> such things as stove and heat and pain come second. The value is the
> reality that brings the thoughts to mind." [Lila p.114]
>
> Scott:
> All the MOQ says is
> that prior to it all is Quality, and the DQ/SQ split.
>
> Paul:
> Now we get to the heart of it!
>
> "All the MOQ says..." In that one little word - "All" - you have
> dismissed every word Pirsig has written. You hit the nail on the head
> earlier, you cannot "think" yourself out of dualistic thinking, it
> happens before thought, but if you deeply and sincerely accept that your
> thoughts and perceptions are created by it and that they can start to
> form in new ways, you open the door to a new, richer experience of
> everyday reality.
>
> Personally (so far), it hasn't been a full blown wall-gazing mystic
> experience, more like a less differentiated experience that brings you
> out of yourself and closer to something more immediately given. It isn't
> all that mysterious, although maybe a little unsettling and occasionally
> overwhelming. I sometimes feel that in each instant it's as if reality
> is unfolding from "the one" to "the many", and generally our awareness
> is of the far end of the process where "the many" is already unfolded.
> But in different ways (meditation, relaxation, art, music, drugs(!)
> etc.) we can move awareness further up the process and slightly closer
> to "the one" and begin to recognise what it feels like. This is why
> Pirsig says he chose to illustrate Quality with something as mundane as
> fixing a motorcycle, to de-mystify the whole thing. As always, he can
> put it in better words than I can...
>
> "Value, the leading edge of reality, is no longer an irrelevant offshoot
> of structure. Value is the predecessor of structure. It's the
> preintellectual awareness that gives rise to it. Our structured reality
> is preselected on the basis of value, and really to understand
> structured reality requires an understanding of the value source from
> which it's derived.
>
> One's rational understanding of a motorcycle is therefore modified from
> minute to minute as one works on it and sees that a new and different
> rational understanding has more Quality. One doesn't cling to old sticky
> ideas because one has an immediate rational basis for rejecting them.
> Reality isn't static anymore. It's not a set of ideas you have to either
> fight or resign yourself to. It's made up, in part, of ideas that are
> expected to grow as you grow, and as we all grow, century after century.
> With Quality as a central undefined term, reality is, in its essential
> nature, not static but dynamic. And when you really understand dynamic
> reality you never get stuck. It has forms but the forms are capable of
> change.
>
> To put it in more concrete terms: If you want to build a factory, or fix
> a motorcycle, or set a nation right without getting stuck, then
> classical, structured, dualistic subject-object knowledge, although
> necessary, isn't enough. You have to have some feeling for the quality
> of the work. You have to have a sense of what's good. That is what
> carries you forward. This sense isn't just something you're born with,
> although you are born with it. It's also something you can develop. It's
> not just "intuition," not just unexplainable "skill" or "talent." It's
> the direct result of contact with basic reality, Quality, which
> dualistic reason has in the past tended to conceal." [ZMM Ch.24]
>
> Scott:
> I have to take this on faith, since in my normal consciousness, I do not
> experience this splitting,
> just the result, which I inevitably describe in S/O terms (I see the
> tree, I
> proved the theorem).
>
> Paul:
> I suggest you do not have to take it on faith, but I agree that
> metaphysics has its limits in what it can give you by reading about it.
> When you say you have to "take this on faith" it seems you are expecting
> to be able to think your way to an experience of what Pirsig is talking
> about. It is immediately apprehended, it is what the orient often starts
> with when it teaches. It is what we all start with! It's just that we
> are educated into believing that we can always substitute words and
> theories for experience and so when somebody says "go experience it" we
> often say "can't you tell me what you experienced so I don't have to?"
>
> Continued in pt 2
>
>
>
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