From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Sun Dec 28 2003 - 08:42:21 GMT
On 26 Dec 03, at 21:45, khoo hock aun wrote:
> I am always amazed that even in the 21st century the static patterns of
> referring to East Asia as Far East still persist, a throwback to the good
> ole' colonial era when Europe was the center of the world and its colonies
> were on the far side of the world. Norway would be in the Far North-West
> where the Middle Kingdom was concerned back in the 15th Century, but then
> the Middle Kingdom did not have colonies. But I digress. :>)
Hi Khoo
We seem to agree in the previous part of your message so I start
here where I stand corrected, but the colonial content was all
accidental. The "Middle Kingdom" is the Chinese reference to their
location, so we are all prone to the illusion of being the hub of the
universe. Yes, I live in Far North West - "Ultima Thule" according to
the Romans - and I feel it right now :-)
> I would say that the intellectual level was already manifest for as long as
> mankind could think, and for the 50,000 years man took to reach every corner
> of the earth; how was it - as defined by Pirsig, to be the creation and
> manipulation of symbols.
Here we agree, but for different reasons. The manipulation of
symbols is wrong as a definition of the intellectual level (rather a
definition of language). It is however an improvement from Pirsig's
opening definition (in Lila's Child") of "mind/thinking", but still not
the intellect that comes through from reading LILA (my reading that
is).
> I would venture that it did not require symbols for
> man to think and generate concepts about his world and beyond.
Interesting point, but if we start on the "mental path" everything
becomes mental and we could as easily make a Metaphysics of
Mentality. Just to be the "wise guy", doesn't an animal require a
mental picture to navigate its environment, even without language?
It is my firm opinion that the enormity of the MOQ (from which even
Buddhism could benefit) is its making short thrift of the
mental/corporeal ...mind/matter ...SUBJECT/OBJECT divide as
something fundamental.
> I would also
> venture that it was much more commonplace for man to experience Dynamic
> Quality directly.
"...much more commonplace for man to experience DQ directly."
Than what?. All of existence had to experience DQ to be able to
climb the static ladder. So once upon the time inorganic matter
was the perceiver of DQ.
> I would also venture there were already thriving
> societies and intellects at work for the last several thousand years.
Something resembling societies starts with primates, but the
LEVEL starts with the human race. Even so it is several ten-
thousands of years old.
> The
> intellectual level certainly did not start with the Greeks - only this
> particular version of the subject-object divide/metaphysics that Western
> civilisation has been built up from.
Here we disagree, but wait.
> I also do not think that religions of the old (Semitic or otherwise) arose
> as competiting tribal beliefs and their origins assigned to social level.
> Religions, had on the contrary, everything to do with enlightenment - with
> mysticism, with meditation and with experiencing Dynamic Quality.
As said, all levels spring from some pattern of the parent level
being dynamic enough to "hear the call" of DQ, thus perception og
DQ perception experience does not start with the social
development. Mankind from the earliest age looked for explanations
of origin and destination, and tried to manipulate the force that
controlled their fate. This is the origin of "religion" and developed
into complex mythologies. The Mosaic era however was terribly
recent in this picture, just before the Q-intellectual development
> The
> metaphysicians, humans who saw through the patterns in their meditations,
> who "saw the light" so to speak - each, I repeat, tried to convey their
> insights in the language and context of their times - and over the years,
> after they had long gone, only then did the social patterns take over - and
> their followers blindly made their word dogma.
One may say that everything has a dynamic moment before
manifesting at the respective level, that - for instance - every
inorganic pattern has a fleeting moment before it "becomes" a
photon, but this springs from a the fallacy of believing that
"substance" is something different from inorganic value. Thus to
speak of some dynamic stage of religion before becoming dogma
is the said fallacy at the social level.
> The intellectual level was already pervasive in South and East Asia 2,500
> years and it was not buddhism that gave birth to it. If anything, buddhism
> arose as a counterpoint to the philosophical communities of the time to
> point out that the intellect, for all its fascinations, was a metaphysical
> dead-end.
OK I gladly accept that, then Buddhism was/is a counterpart of the
Quality Idea. This is what Pirsig tries to convey in the RT part of
LILA.
> And this is what I believe the religions of old, especially their
> mystical inspired schools tried to do.
The ancient mythologies - which was the religions of their era - had
no mystical "school", it was an explanation of origin and fate, and
gave mankind a satisfactory outlook. The Semitic Christendom that
replaced it was just a more powerful Godhead, but by and by the
"spiritual" content of Greek subject/object metaphysics entered
into it all and it became a soul/body thing ..and a mystical element
entered.
> Khoo:
> Are you arguing for a place for intellect in the MOQ that validates
> subject-object metaphysics in the hierarchy of levels
Yes I am. Intellect as it sees itself is subject/object metaphysics,
in the Quality context it becomes the (mere) value of the S/O
distinction.
> and without which ther
> e can be no transcending to Dynamic Quality?
Hmmm? The MOQ postulates a DQ inference in all transitions from
one level to the next, so DQ is always beconing up ahead. No
special transcedence takes place at the intellectual level.
> If I read the above right,
> and I have tried, albiet unsuccessfully, to make sense of the SOLAQI
> argument, would you be saying that SOM as MOQ's intellect validates material
> objectivism, therefore giving it value?
YES!!
> What kind of value would that be
> in terms of SQ/DQ?
The value of the subject/object distinction is an enormous one that
raised mankind from the mythological era (social level) and a
prerequisite for science. It is plain that the cultures of Asia have
gone trough that stage long before Europe to be so easily adapted
to the technological attitude, but also transcended the intellctual
with some Quality-like insights like Buddhism.
> Patterns/Unpatterned Reality?
Why is intellect as S/O so difficult to understand? After the Greek
had arrived at a nature independent of what humans may think
about it, the foundation was laid for an inquiry into this reality by
the human mind. See!? A subject different from objective nature: a
pattern that has followed mankind (in the Western hemisphere)
ever after, driving its S/O split into everything ...until the MOQ.
> With all due respect, I
> must say that there is no such thing as the "highest" samsara. Samsara is
> the wheel of rebirth, the 31 planes of existence where all interdependent
> origination takes place, where all patterns form, from the inorganic,
> biological, social to the intellectual levels (in Pirsigian terms) and
> dissolve again.
OK my effort to sound mystic wasn't a success, but even in the
"wheel of rebirth" there is some scale of value ..no? So quality
plays a role in Buddhism too.
Sincerely
Bo
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