From: Joe (jhmau@sbcglobal.net)
Date: Mon Nov 03 2003 - 19:51:50 GMT
On 03 Nov 2003 2:45 AM Paul Turner to Matt K writes:
>snip<
Paul:
I'm not convinced. If you believe that there is a world out there
(reality) that descriptions don't represent, then the two (reality and
descriptions) are not the same and surely you have made a
description/reality distinction?
If this is not the case, then all there is to "cause" a description is
another description then another description and so on, therefore it is
not possible for you to hold that there is a reality outside of
description which pushes you around, and as you say, this is linguistic
idealism.
On the other hand, descriptions can be considered as *part of* the
"reality that pushes us around," but this is not what the realists that
you agree with are saying.
The only other way out of it, as far as I can see, is to shrug off the
distinction along with the rejection of metaphysics and treat philosophy
as a form of fiction that is mainly concerned with writing a "good
story" about a fictional place called "reality." It is then up to
pragmatists to convince everyone who is interested that metaphysics (and
physics, chemistry, biology, sociology and so on?) is also a form of
fiction and no better at getting at reality than their "story."
Is this a fair conclusion?
Paul
Hi Paul, Matt and All,
joe: i have been lurking and reading. Kudos to you and Matt for an
enlightening thread. Kudos also to Dan Glover for his efforts.
Congratualtions to Ant McWatt on his thesis.
I have read Pirsig and Lila's Child, and I stand more in awe at the
revolution of thinking they foster. A philosophical outlook is emerging
which is kind and complete to my way of thinking. Thank You!
As to your conclusion, Paul: in another book "All and Everything" by Geroge
Gurdjieff I have found a story that the beginnings of philosophy and science
were the stories told by the ancient Greeks who were fisherman migrants
driven to seek a new place to live. During stormy weather, when they
couldn't fish, to amuse themselves they invented a game called
"pouring-from-the-empty-into the void." This game consisted in formulating
some question always about some "fiddle-faddle" or other, that is to say, a
question about some deliberate piece of absurdity, and the one to whom the
question was addressed had to give as plausible an answer as possible.
These stories, after parchment was invented, were written down and their
descendants gave them the name of science.
IMO Freedom and mechanical behavior are at odds. MOQ addresses freedom.
Two Russian philosophers of the last century, George Gurdjieff and Peter
Ouspensky wrote about a system called the Work to help with the mechanical
behavior trap.
Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet, a follower of Sri-Aurobindo, proposes other
forces which may be helpful.
For me reading other authors through MOQ glasses increases my awareness of
what the other authors might be proposing.
Joe
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 Nov 03 2003 - 20:23:27 GMT