From: Paul Turner (paulj.turner@ntlworld.com)
Date: Fri Sep 05 2003 - 10:27:59 BST
Hi Scott:
Scott:
I won't be responding in detail. You seem to be thinking that what I am
doing is in effect to partially restore SOM, when all I want to do is
keep
the philosophical meaning of subject and object around in our
discussion, so
that we can consider them in an anti-SOM way in a deeper way than Pirsig
does.
Paul:
I don't think that. Even if I did, I'm not into "SOM" witch-hunts. This
thread started with my request to Bo that he described to me what was
wrong with the MOQ without making reference to the reinterpretation
required by his solution. To be fair to Bo, his was just a case in
point. It is my perception that there are more solutions to the MOQ than
there are problems.
In response to my request to Bo, you described some problems, and I
really wanted to understand what they were. As far as I could see, your
problem with the MOQ was that it doesn't agree with your experience,
which was fine. I see that below it is also a problem to you that you
cannot integrate Barfield with Pirsig without changing the MOQ. All I'm
trying to do is see past the solutions to find the problems for my own
contemplation and to bring them out on their own. I rarely see the two
separated out in posts, so I'm trying to zoom in on them to see what the
problems actually are.
Scott:
Except for the lack of, let's say, appreciation for the S/O divide.
Here, as
I've said many times, Barfield's account of the rise and value and
disease-aspect of the intellectual level is superior to Pirsig's, but as
I've also said, that does not detract from what Pirsig was trying to do
in
Lila, namely to show how morals conflict. But with the demotion of the
S/O
divide to a static pattern of intellectual quality one loses the ability
to
integrate Pirsig with Barfield.
Paul:
See, here is something I'd like to go into:
"But with the demotion of the S/O divide to a static pattern of
intellectual quality one loses the ability to integrate Pirsig with
Barfield."
I was trying to discuss how the S/O divide is laid out in the MOQ to see
if we agree on that for a start. I don't think we do.
Scott:
The same goes with what Bo calls the
annotating Pirsig's definitions of the intellectual level.
Paul:
Also, I think that "annotating Pirsig" is the same as "ZMM Pirsig",
"Lila Pirsig" and "SODV Pirsig". Again and again I see "annotating
Pirsig" used to refer to a change in direction but I've yet to see
anybody explain why this is so.
Scott:
And it pops up on analyzing DQ/SQ. Of course these are undefinable (n.b,
SQ
is just as undefinable as DQ, though one can categorize instances. How
does
one define "pattern" except in some equivalent term, like "form",
"structure", "system", etc.).
Paul:
I would argue that static quality is precisely that experience which we
can, have and do define, linguistically or mathematically. Of course
it's not one definition because static quality is all of our familiar
reality. I would say that our education is pretty much about defining
static quality or learning methods and language to define static
quality.
Scott:
That they are a polarity can be seen in that
DQ without SQ would be nothing. It requires SQ to "exist", and of course
SQ
requires DQ. But DQ/SQ is more general than subject/object, which latter
only occurs -- as far as we can tell -- in the human intellect, while
DQ/SQ
is at all levels.
Nor is there any conflict with what I am saying (which is just repeating
what others have said) with Zen philosophy. Nishida, from whom I got the
phrase "logic of contradictory identity", was a long-time Zen
practitioner.
Paul:
Agreed, my reference to Zen was simply to illustrate my point about the
use of immersion in experience to move away from dualistic thought. I
wasn't making any comments about conflicting ideas.
Scott:
The history of the logic goes back to Nagarjuna, one of Zen's heroes.
The
logic of contradictory identity is not a thinking that tells us what
enlightenment is. It is a means of clearing out debris, like SOM. In
terms
of the MOQ, it is a way to remind us that the DQ/SQ distinction is also
self-contradictory. There is no self-existing DQ. There is no
self-existing
SQ. There is only their mutual and simultaneous constitution and
contradiction.
Paul:
Are you just saying that it reminds us that our way of conceiving of our
experience is superimposed by thought upon undifferentiated reality and
is therefore not corresponding to a fundamental structure of reality? If
so, I agree.
Scott:
Furthermore, since the S/O form is so familiar to us (it *is* us as we
see
ourselves in our fallen state), it is our avenue to
understanding/not-understanding DQ/SQ. As I said a while back, while the
MOQ
gets rid of a lot of SOM dualist platypi, it does not get rid of the
many/one dualism.
Paul:
No, it invokes it. And it says that S/O is a further division of the
many.
Scott:
The logic of contradictory identity doesn't get rid of it
either, but it recognizes it as another name for DQ/SQ. And in the
subject/object form we experience it in action: Awareness produces the
many,
and in the same productive act, turns it back into one.
Paul:
This is where I don't get it. Are you saying that DQ=S and SQ=O? Or is
it that DQ=O and SQ=S? What am I missing?
Scott:
All of this is lost if we just try to not think in terms of
philosophical
subjects and objects.
Paul:
And so we should treat thoughts as objects?
Scott:
Indeed, I see that attempt as falling into the
pre/trans fallacy. We need to work through and transform the S/O form,
not
reject it.
Paul:
As I have tried to explain, I don't think the MOQ does reject subjects
and objects, I think it embeds them into a larger metaphysical structure
as static quality. In doing so, the difference between them is resolved
into an evolutionary relationship. Pirsig just believes that there are
better ways to talk about and understand static experience than subjects
and objects, as four evolutionary levels is one way; the MOQ doesn't
just pretend the experience isn't there. This is why I want to try and
stay on the problem side of the discussion before jumping into
solutions.
Scott:
The major act in "working through" it is to see that S/O is
self-contradictory, that I, as subject, have no permanent
self-existence.
But though it is self-contradictory, it is real. Hence pictures 9 and 10
in
the Ox sequence. Emptiness is not other than form, form is not other
than
emptiness. The S/O form is completely real and completely empty.
Paul:
Okay, where does this leave the MOQ? What does it look like after such a
transformation? DQ/SQ at the intellectual level is synonymous with S/O?
I'm thoroughly confused, you're obviously way ahead of me :-)
Cheers
Paul
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