From: johnny moral (johnnymoral@hotmail.com)
Date: Wed Nov 05 2003 - 00:38:30 GMT
HI Andy,
>From:
>Reply-To:
>To:
>Subject: Re: MD Two theories of truth
>Date: Tue, 04 Nov 2003 22:28:19 +0000
>Hi Johnny,
>
>I had said (11/03/2003):
> >the more I have read of him [Rorty], the more convinced I am that he does
>have
> >great respect for these things. Especially American culture. Rorty does
> >highlight history and morality, in fact, much more so than most
> >philosophers.
>
>Your comment (11/04.2003):"That's good to hear, I'd like to read what he
>says on this subject myself. I recall raising this point once before,
>though, and Matt pretty much denied that Pragmatism ought to call for
>giving greater respect to Morality as the source of intersubjective
>agreement."
>
>Andy: Well, saying you have great respect for morality is not the same as
>saying one should have greater respect for morality as "the source of
>intersubjective agreement." More on this below.
Johnny: If you don't say one should have greater respect for something, it
isn't respectful at all, now is it? And as to Morality being the source of
everything, it's just straight Pirsig. Morality and Quality are synonyms,
when we use Morality we are talking about the whole thing, not merely the
cultural mores of a particular time and place. Other synonyms are Reality
and Experience and I zealously promote Expectation as the most insightful
and profound synonym. But they all mean Morality.
>Johhny: "He seemed to feel that Pragmatism called for re-examining Morality
>from an outside perspective, now that we know it is created by us, and
>changing it to what we decide is better by creating fresh intersubjective
>agreement. In other words, not respecting Morality at all as such."
>
>Andy: It's pretty hard to take you seriously here. One can respect
>morality without putting it as the source of all things.
Johnny: No, you can't at all. That's just brushing it off. It is Rta, the
source of things.
>Is this going to be like arguing with a fundamentalist christion about
>morals? I say killing is bad because we agree killing is bad. But, He
>replies that until I say that killing is bad because god says it is bad you
>are disrespecting morality and god. If you want to use morality as
>ultimately deciding what our morals are, I think you can go right ahead.
>But if you tell your interlocuters that you are not coing to continue with
>the conversation until we all agree that moarlity is supreme, sorry, but
>you will be the ultimate source of the problem.
I'm continuing the conversation. Morality is Quality is Reality and is the
source of all things and it is very very useful to realize that, and it does
amazing things for strengthening intersubjective agreement and achieving
goals and acting and feeling at home and satisfied in the universe when
people respect morality.
>Johnny: "I don't know what you mean exactly by divine creator. I was
>referring to Quality, or Expectation (Morality) itself, as a whole, as sort
>of an essence
>or spin or process. I'm fine with calling that a divine creator when
>talking with people who see it that way, and also fine with calling it
>scientific determinism for people who see it that way, so in this
>discussion
>let's just leave it out, there's no need to introduce the idea here."
>
>Andy: but you are introducing the idea with your emphasis as Morality as
>the source of all things and your talk of respect, but I am more than happy
>to leave it out. It is what I intended to do in the first place.
OK then, let's just call it Morality and Quality. Respect though is of
utmost importance.
>Johnny: "I'm simply saying that we are what we are and believe what we
>believe because that is the way Morality has played out up to this point."
>
>Andy: Substitute God for morality and what do you hear?
Johnny: And that is a valid substitution, one that makes the word God more
pallatable for me personally. I translate God back into Morality and
Quality and it all makes sense. (Though of course the personification of
God as portrayed in the Bible I attribute to the way in which Morality that
created the Bible - I don't disrespect that portrayal or consider it untrue,
I just philosophically see it for what it is.)
>
>Johnny: "I didn't put in a request to be born in Boston to my mother and
>father, that was the way patterns interacted according to morality, to
>expectation. My thoughts and beliefs are similarly beyond my control, they
>are created by Morality. I can't just decide to believe something I don't
>believe."
>
>Andy: I am not asking you to decide, just take part in the conversation.
Johnny: I am, aren't I (?)
>Johnny: "They [truth and quality] hold themselves together by our
>intersubjective agreement. But the key is that they CREATE the
>intersubjective agreement to begin with. They have created it, and will
>continue to create it, and it creates them."
>
>Andy: This is your belief. I respect that. Regardless, though, I don't
>believe that.
Johnny: OK, but where do you believe intersubjective agreement comes from?
How do you think someone comes to believe their beliefs? Do you think you
can control you beliefs, get yourself to believe something you don't
believe?
>Still we need to come to some agreement about other things. The pragmatist
>just asks what good it does to hold certain beliefs and Rorty thinks that
>holding metaphysical beliefs is no longer useful. We have bigger problems
>facing us, you might say, than to be trying to figure out the ultimate
>source or essence behind the physical world.
I don't believe that. I believe our biggest problem is the disresect of
Morality, as that has profound implications all the way down to the the
atomic level. I'm all for solving other problems, and not stopping you,
either, I might add...
>Johnny: "There's no space 'between' morality and instersubjective
>agreement, there's no 'outside' from which you can see quality creating
>intersubjective
>agreement creating quality. To divorce these two and try to get between
>them to hijack the process and create intersubjective agreement without
>respect for morality is, well, blasphemous, or at least annoying."
>
>Andy: blasphemous? Well there you go. DO you need anymore evidence about
>divine entities?
Blasphemy against Quality. I'm not sure what divine means.
>The pragmatist will say we don't need to combine morality with
>intersubjective agreement or say that morality creates intersubjective
>agreement.
You need to say it because understanding where intersubjective agreement
comes from and the role of morality in our world is vital to maintaining the
value in the world, vital to maintaining value itself. The pragmatist has
his head in the sand, uninterested in how things really are.
>The pragmatist says these things because he (she) wants individuals to
take some responsibility and have active part in creating a moral and just
society for all to participate in. In order to do this individuals need to
converse, discuss, persuade and come to some intersubjective agreement.
Johnny: But we already are at intersubjective agreement. It's the reality
that we live in, and for which we are responsible. Pragmatists always seem
to be saying that we need to wait for a few more years until conditions are
favorable to begin properly living. Plus I think they don't want to come to
intersubjective agreement, they want to convince people of their specific
viewpoints. That's why they don't see the present as already being an
intersubjective agreement.
>Johnny: "It's no coincidence that we DO have society and language, you
>know? We have to have those, because there are ideas."
>
>Andy: Or we have ideas because we have society and language, but why
>quibble.
Johnny: The MoQ says ideas come first. (the first idea being Expectation
itself, Morality itself)
>Johnny: "Morality creates ideas as it expects to, and with them the society
>and consciousness to contain the ideas, all at the same time."
>
>Andy: I don't care what creates it all.
Johnny: You should because it is what holds it together. So if you care
about it being held together you should care about what creates it.
>And I thought you said we were going to leave that out.
Just the religious "divine" phraseology. You can't leave out Quality.
>All I care about is coping in the world. Solving real problems. Morality
>plays an important part in answering these questions, so lets get on with
>the discussion and quit it with all this talk of creation, and sources, and
>respecting Morality, and trusting God, and having faith, and accepting
>wills.
Johnny: What if I feel it is helpful in coping? I don't think I'm stopping
any real problems from being solved by asking for Morality to be respected.
Unless you consider Morality itself to be a problem, in which case I think I
probably wouldn't like your solutions.
>My focus is on the problems in this world. Our physical world. In my
>freetime, I might dabble in the mystic and feel the full force of dynamic
>quality, but as this is left unexplained and undefined, I prefer to leave
>it out of discussions on morality and instead talk about what works for all
>of humanity right now.
Johnny: I think it is very helpful in solving problems and having
discussions to see the ubiquity of Morality.
>Johnny: "I guess I'm starting to describe the Anthropic Universe principle
>(or a
>variation on it perhaps, as I don't think I really understand what people
>mean by that term)."
>
>Andy: You sound confused, but that's okay. Confusion is good. THere are
>no ultimate answers, so we should all be comfortable with a little
>confusion.
Johnny: I think that Anthropic Principle is a little off, that's all. It
just attacks it wrong.
>Johnny: "John Archibald Wheeler's phrase is "participatory universe", which
>I like more. He says the universe is made of information, of binary
>choices. "It From Bit" he calls it. That ties in with MoQ, if value is
>understood as a binary up/down vote or choice as opposed to a sliding scale
>of value. In both "It From Bit" and the MoQ, conscious participants are
>necessary for anything to "matter"."
>
>Andy: I can buy that with a little more development.
Johnny:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22It+From+Bit%22
>But the point is, you don't need to respect Morality to have this view.
Yow, why is "not needing to respect Morality" so important to you?
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