From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun May 16 2004 - 00:53:36 BST
Howdy MOQers and Daves:
David M said:
I think many of us confuse mass religious practice, which is a social
phenomenon, with the intellectual religious thinking that began at least
with the Christian neo-Platonists - insofar as we think of religious thought
as some how superseded by modern scientific rationality. Religious thinking
has been highly intellectual but in the context of faith, although the
importance
of doubt also emerged as an important aspect of thought and faith. To my
mind, the best of religious thought touches upon what we may call mystical
thought, or thinking about transcendence, or better still, thinking about
DQ.
David B replies:
Intellectual but in the context of faith? What do you mean by "faith"? Isn't
"faith" specifically mean the acceptance of a belief WITHOUT intellectual
justification? In any case, I agree with your larger points. Religion began
at the social level and tends to be associated with it still, but religion
is a topic, a domain, and not a level. Religion doesn't BELONG to the third
level any more than art and morals do. Its just that we can make a
distinction between social level religious traditions and intellectual
descriptions of the same issues. I also agree that access to DQ is the main
point of religion, regardless of level.
"In all religions bishops tend to gild DQ with all sorts of static
interpretatons because their cultures require it. But these interpretations
become like golden vines that cling to a tree, shut out its sunlight and
eventually strangle it." (This quote and the next are from LILA chapter 30)
"Phaedrus saw nothing wrong with this ritualistic religion as long as the
rituals are seen as merely a static portrayal of DQ, a sign-post which
allows socially pattern-dominated people to see DQ. The danger has always
been that the rituals, the staic patterns, are mistaken for what they merely
represent and are allowed to destroy the DQ they were originally intended to
preserve."
David S said:
...the prominent pomo's--like foucault, derrida, and richard rorty, leave us
in the desert...they diagnose the problem to a T, but they put nothing
positive in its place. deconstruction is the ultimate in "negative
philosophy", its pure criticism, and can't help us escape the gravitational
pull of modern secularity. in this respect, postmodernism opens up the
danger of a greater regression and seclusion in the ego, even as it shows
the self's contingency.
David B replies:
Exactly. Pirsig and the pomos both rightly reject Moderity's
representational paradigm with its objective 'Truth'. The difference is what
they use to replace it, which is a HUGE difference. In effect, pomo remains
mired in SOM and instead of getting rid of that root problem it only moves
the SOM 'truth' from one pocket to the other. It rejects the objective and
embraces the subjective instead. By contrast, Pirsig replaces objectivity
with a simple and effective critera for truth that recognizes contingency,
but also preserves both rationality and empiricism.
"..if Quality or excellence is seen as the ultimate reality then it becomes
possible for more than one set of truths to exist. Then one doesn't seek the
absolute 'Truth'. One seeks instead the highest quality intellectual
explanation of things with the knowledge that if the past is any guide to
the future this explanation must be taken provisionally; as useful until
something better comes along."
"The tests of truth are logical consistency, agreement with experience, and
economy of explanation"
David S continued:
....................but yes, now that everything has been taken apart, we
can
reconstruct it...and that means we can bring spirituality, quality, value,
meaning, depth, etc., back into the picture, and integrate it within both a
philosophical and scientific context. this will take time, of course, but
it
is certainly going to be the thrust of thought in the 21st century, which
should hopefully see the decline of postmodernism's dominance, and a
recognition and preservation of its valuable insights.
David B replies:
Right. Both Pirsig and Wilber have begun that reconstruction process, don't
you think? I think Pirsig not only handles spiritual matters in an
intellectual way, mysticism is front and center in the MOQ. And to help
bring the topic around in a full circle, I believe Plotinus, who is named in
the quote below, was one of the intellectual neo-Platonists that David M had
in mind...
"Some of the most honored philosophers in history have been mystics:
Plotinus, Swedenborg, Loyola, Shankaracharya and many others. They share a
common belief that the fundamental nature of reality is outside language;
that language splits things up into parts while the true nature of reality
is undivided. Zen, which is a mystic religion, argues that the illusion of
dividedness can be overcome by meditation. The Native American Church argues
that peyote can force-feed a mystic understanding upon those who were
normally resistant to it,..." (LILA chapter 5)
"The MOQ associates religious mysticism with Dynamic Quality but it would
certainly be a mistake to think that the MOQ endorses the static beliefs of
any particular religious sect. Phaedrus thought sectarian religion was a
static social fallout of DQ and that while some sects had fallen less than
others, none of them told the whole truth." (LILA chapter 30)
Thanks,
dmb
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