From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Mon Oct 27 2003 - 12:31:45 GMT
Andy, DMB (PS.) and Platt (PPS)
On 24 Oct. you wrote:
> In regards to your question:
> > "For Andy: Hopefully you mean "...which social patterns ..etc".
> > Social value as such neither can nor should be replaced."
> concerning my earlier statement
> > > 'Platt and I might disagree about which social values should be
> > > preserved and which intellectual ideas might replace them.'
> Andy: Social patterns would probably have been a better term to use.
> I suppose I have been interchanging values with patterns, and perhaps
> this is confusing and wrong in MOQ terms.
There's a certain confusion regarding this value-values issue, but I
have a hunch that Value (singular)=level and value(s)=pattern(s).
Intuitively it's clear, but when starting to analyze ...phew!
>I am unclear as to why
> social values cannot be replaced, however.
My take of it is that social values (patterns) can be subdued or
checked, but not permanently erased. For instance in a modern
intellect-steeped state blood feuds aren't "valued", the judicial system
is supposed to take care of all this ...in its OBJECTIVE way, but the
emotions lurks and when/if ..... (ominous dots:)
> Probably, because I am
> using values in a broader sense than "value" is implied within the
> MOQ. Social value in the MOQ comes first, right? Whereas by social
> values (when I used this term) I meant certain ideas, patterns,
> lifestyles, etc. that particular societies value.
That's the way we all use it, but as said (social) patterns form
spontaneously when/if the need for them occurs. During war martial
law is established, while civil rights (intellectual value) are suspended
...etc.
> It is these ideas
> and patterns that I meant to imply could be replaced by
> "intellectuals." And by "intellectuals," I mean those "motivated
> individuals" whom Wim referred to, that are influencing social values.
> It is of these "intellectuals" that I was inquiring about "dangeropus
> ideas."
I understand perfectly, but must stress the MOQ (as I see it).
Intellect's cause is to bring social value under control, and in
"intellectual" states social patterns are hidden under intellectual
patterns, but if the bell tolls the seemingly forgotten social patterns
spring to the fore again. This is the theme exploited by Hollywood in
the many films about post-catastrophe futures when survivors band
together and primitive societies form. I know of no other theory that
explains this other than the MOQ.
Sincerely.
Bo
PS
After writing this I saw DMB's post for you from which I just pick this
paragraph:
> I imagine everyone can relate to what you're saying. There is a dark side,
> a hateful, murderous, genocidal impulse in the human heart. Maybe its a
> vestige of our evolutionary past as animals and fierce tribalists, when
> killing your competitors was a good thing, a moral thing to do. We rightly
> think of such impulses as evil now and in Pirsigian terms, that's because
> such impulses are lower level values trying to assert themselves, are the
> voice of the Giant within us. (Jungian psychology says that the ability to
> experience and admit one's dark side (without acting on it) is a sign of
> good mental health.)
General agreement, but a few remarks. A vestige of our animal past?
Definitely not, animals don't hate. Of fierce tribalist? Yes, but this
"dark side" is our social self as active as our intellectual self, but
controlled by it. This is (in my view) also the emotional self capable of
hate, but of love as well, while intellect is our detached rational self.
I haven't followed this thread too closely, but if the complaint is that
the MOQ isn't able to detect dangerous ideas that's right. It says that
intellect will regard social value as dangerous, and society will find
biological value dangerous ...and so on.
PPS:
Platt wrote (the 23rd)
> Perhaps we've inadvertently discovered a crack in Pirsigs hierarchy
> because it's evident that ideas (intellectual patterns of value)
> influence human behavior (social patterns of value). Otherwise, social
> patterns would never change. (Example of the Zuni brujo.)
The "crack" is due to calling whatever opinion we express for
intellectual patterns (or value) and also that of regarding any behavior
as social patterns. Humans display all kinds of behavior, intellectual
value create intellectual behavior and so on. The upper level controls
the lower, in that sense intellect influence the way individuals behave
in a society, but social value is something terribly archaic that can't be
changed. Carrying this point down one level, society er controls
biological behavior by its rituals, but Life's fundamental values (f.ex)
sex and nourishment can't be changed ...only brought under control.
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 : Mon Oct 27 2003 - 12:33:18 GMT