From: David MOREY (us@divadeus.freeserve.co.uk)
Date: Sat Sep 13 2003 - 20:33:37 BST
Hi
I agree with Sam' s suggestion for level 4, but
taking Pirsig's as it stands, intellectual products
have a static quality in so far as they are communicable
and retainable and repeatable. I think this is an unclear
level because intellectual/cultural products are key to
social level. However, the actual achievement of intellectual/
cultural products is original and therefore dynamic and therefore
unpredictable and therefore free in some sense or other.
Human being is clearly a mix/tension of static and dynamic quality.
I also think it is justifiable and appropriate to call quality divine.
It might also be a good idea to return to thinking that to be a person
is by divine appointment, and possibly requiring something of the divine
within to be possible. It would perhaps be better than treating people
as objects? Ditto Coleridge I think.
Regards
David Morey
----- Original Message -----
From: "Scott R" <jse885@spinn.net>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Saturday, September 13, 2003 6:03 PM
Subject: Re: MD Dealing with S/O
> Paul,
>
> You end this post with:
>
> > In a nutshell, it seems to me that trying to bring Coleridge/Barfield
> > and Pirsig together doesn't work and doesn't help in understanding the
> > vocabulary of either.
> >
>
> I think I agree. I also think that Coleridge/Barfield's metaphysics is the
> one I need to work with, and not Pirsig's. I'll state my reasoning here as
> to why this is the case for me, but I am not at this point trying to give
a
> detailed argument for others. That will have to wait, probably for an
essay,
> since it would require a point by point comparison of the reasoning of
both
> Barfield and Pirsig. Don't know whether I'll ever get around to it.
>
> In any case, my interest is in the mind. Pirsig puts the mind as the
fourth
> static level. That means, I take it, that not only the products of mental
> activity (i.e., thoughts) are static, but that mental processes (ie,
> thinking) are also static. So if I am studying the mind, we have a static
> process in the form of a subject studying an object, which is mind
studying
> mind. But in the MOQ, the mind is not an object, so this phraseology is
> disallowed. This seems like needless obfuscation, as it is readily used by
> other philosophers, SOM and non-SOM.
>
> But worse than this is that there is no creativity allowed for me (or for
> Shakespeare, for that matter), since all creativity, that is, the
production
> of new static patterns of value, is assigned to DQ. Thus, the MOQ seems to
> be on a par with Calvinist predestination. While there is some esoteric
> truth to this, I believe, I also believe it is not the whole truth. The
> whole truth is that the little self *is* (and is not) the Big Self, that
our
> sense of freedom is and is not an illusion. The MOQ only points to the
"is".
> We need Coleridge/Barfield/Nishida to point to "is *yet* is not".
>
> Thus I see the need to say that the mind is the locus of DQ/SQ tension in
a
> human being. You object that this is a return to idealism, because the MOQ
> states that the mind is just a fourth level of static patterns, as on the
> other three levels, while I am distinguishing mental activity from static
> patterns on four levels. I would say instead that, in order to say that we
> are in the slightest degree free, we must recognize DQ (in tension with
SQ)
> as mental activity. I see it as no more idealist than the MOQ is, since it
> is moving concepts like "awareness" and "thinking" out of the subject to
the
> source of both subject and object, as the MOQ does with "Quality". If they
> are to be kept within the fourth static level, then Quality becomes a
> transcendent God, not an immanent/transcendent one, and we are no more
than
> automatons, or perhaps Pavlovian dogs, conditionable by value, but not
> producers of value.
>
> Or perhaps one can say that the MOQ is consistent with Theravadin Buddhism
> (go for Nirvana/DQ), but not Mahayana Buddhism (nirvana is samsara), but
> since Zen is Mahayana, that speaks to more confusion in the MOQ.
>
> - Scott
>
> -----Original message-----
> > I have written a separate post concerning your application of the logic
> > of contradictory identity to the MOQ. I am aware that this is an
> > integral part of your understanding as a whole but in this post I have
> > tried to pick up on what I see as an idealist theme in your reworking of
> > the MOQ.
> >
> > > 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:
> > In the MOQ, it is called a static pattern of intellectual quality, no?
> >
> > Paul:
> > In the MOQ, the symbolic differentiation of experience between subject
> > and object is a static intellectual pattern. The patterns of experience
> > which the symbols of subject and object stand for are described by the
> > MOQ as inorganic, biological, social, and intellectual. In other words,
> > experience is not limited to and is not solely created by intellectual
> > patterns.
> >
> > Scott:
> > That
> > is what I am proceeding from, and objecting to. It makes it sound as
> > though somebody a few millenia ago had the *thought* "I am a subject and
> > I observe objects", and everybody else said "That's a great thought".
> >
> > Paul:
> > It shouldn't make it sound like that. The intellectual level, according
> > to Pirsig's definition, did not just spring into existence with the S/O
> > divide. It is simply thinking, whenever thinking started in whatever
> > way, this is the beginning of the intellect. Determining the exact
> > beginning is, I believe, unnecessary.
> >
> > Scott:
> > Reading
> > Barfield, one understands that people for a long time could not have
> > this thought becuase they *were not* subjects opposed to a world of
> > objects. They did not have their own thoughts at all.. But consciousness
> > evolved into the S/O form, producing the intellectual level.
> >
> > Paul:
> > "But consciousness evolved into the S/O form, producing the intellectual
> > level."
> >
> > This is the same as Bo, along the lines of....my interpretation of the
> > MOQ is that the intellectual level begins with the S/O form, I therefore
> > conclude that....
> >
> > Scott:
> > Something that produces the
> > intellectual level cannot be a static pattern of the intellectual level.
> >
> > Paul:
> > Your interpretation causes the problem! Pirsig is clear that, in the
> > MOQ, any experience referred to as consciousness is to be considered as
> > intellectual patterns. Neither consciousness nor the S/O divide created
> > the intellectual level. Pirsig proposes that Dynamic Quality created
> > intellect/consciousness.
> >
> > "...the MOQ states that consciousness (i.e. intellectual patterns) is
> > the collection and manipulation of symbols, created in the brain, that
> > stand for patterns of experience..." [Lila's Child Note 32]
> >
> > This makes no reference whatsoever to whether or not the intellectual
> > patterns must include a concept of "self" or "thinker". If you think
> > this is inadequate, ill-conceived, confusing, illogical, and that
> > another model is better, then fine, we discuss that. However, to avoid
> > confusion [mine, at the very least], please be clear when you are using
> > MOQ terminology [such as "intellectual level"] in a way that is contrary
> > to Pirsig's published definitions.
> >
> > > 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:
> > And there it goes wrong. The S/O divide is the simultaneous creation of
> > the one into the many, and the return of the many to the one.
> >
> > Paul:
> > I disagree, subjects and objects are just ways of describing "the many".
> > I think that the enduring subject, the self, is as much an abstraction
> > from patterns of experience as the supposedly independent objects. I
> > think your failure to discriminate between "subject" [static] and what
> > you call "pure subject" [Dynamic] leads to problems which don't
> > otherwise come up in the MOQ.
> >
> > Scott:
> > Thinking, however, is not an object. It
> > is the S/O divide, and hence a case of the DQ/SQ divide.
> >
> > Paul:
> > Well, this is what we are discussing. You say it as if it is a given. In
> > the MOQ, and in my opinion, the S/O divide is not a case of the DQ/SQ
> > division. This is idealism, the MOQ is not an idealist metaphysics.
> >
> > Scott:
> > The value of the
> > S/O divide is the divide, as Bo has said. We naturally place the
> > inorganic and biological on the O side, and that lets us be detached
> > from them, allowing for science, and so forth. The next step is to
> > detach ourselves from social and intellectual SQ, to move them over to
> > the O side as well, to see that my thoughts are not me, but society's or
> > when truly detached, are
> > universal (as in mathematics). All that is left, then, is S as DQ. But
> > see above on Merrell-Wolff.
> >
> > Paul:
> > Okay, to put this in Buddhist terms, I think you are unnecessarily
> > conflating particular or small mind (static intellectual quality) with
> > universal or big mind (Dynamic Quality). In doing so I think you
> > postulate an idealist metaphysics. The use of the terms "intellectual
> > quality" and "Dynamic Quality" is intended to prevent such conflation by
> > doing away with the word "mind" and the vagueness that comes with its
> > use. Barfield also conflates the two, which is no coincidence of course
> > :-)
> >
> > "..mind or consciousness is not the function of an organ, though it
> > makes use of organs, the brain among others...it is not a mysterious
> > something spatially encapsulated within a human or animal skin, but it
> > is the inner side of the world as a whole, just as the individual mind
> > is the inside of one human being." [Barfield, Towards]
> >
> > This is where I think Barfield and Pirsig differ and where you have to
> > make the choice between the two. Pirsig reduces mind into value.
> > Barfield [and Coleridge?] seems to reduce mind into...well, bigger,
> > collective mind?
> >
> > > 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:
> > I too am embedding them into a larger metaphysical structure, but as a
> > case of DQ/SQ, not as static quality. One's descriptions are, to be
> > sure, static, but one's describing isn't. Thinking is traditionally
> > assigned to the subject, but is not static. Thinking is S-producing-O,
> > DQ-producing SQ.
> >
> > Paul:
> > In an idealist metaphysics it is, but not in the MOQ. [I think the
> > difference between idealism and the MOQ is worth discussing though]. It
> > must be remembered that Dynamic Quality is not "mind" or
> > "consciousness".
> >
> > > 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?
> >
> > Scott:
> > The MOQ accounts for moral conflicts beautifully, but I have to admit
> > that I find Coleridge's philosophy (as described by Barfield) provides a
> > philosophy of mind and nature (which turn out to be the same, operating
> > on different
> > levels) that is more comprehensive that Pirsig's. The main point is
> > there in
> > Pirsig: Quality, and the DQ/SQ distinction being the same as Coleridge's
> > "two forces of one power", but one needs to see that S/O is a case of
> > those two forces to see that our ordinary minds work the same way that
> > nature works, and more importantly, that nature works the same way our
> > minds work.
> >
> > Paul:
> > The point of the DQ/SQ distinction is that "mind" [static intellectual
> > patterns] and "nature" [static inorganic-biological patterns] arise from
> > something which is neither mind nor nature [Dynamic Quality]. So
> > although in a Dynamic understanding they are the same
> > [undifferentiated], in a static sense they are different patterns. As
> > such, as no static differentiation carries over into Dynamic Quality, I
> > think that seeing thinking, or "subject" [static intellectual patterns]
> > as synonymous with Dynamic Quality defeats the purpose of the division.
> >
> > In a nutshell, it seems to me that trying to bring Coleridge/Barfield
> > and Pirsig together doesn't work and doesn't help in understanding the
> > vocabulary of either.
> >
> > Is that unfair?
>
>
>
>
> MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
> Mail Archives:
> Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
> Nov '02 Onward -
http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
> MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
>
> To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
> http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
>
>
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Sep 13 2003 - 20:38:19 BST