From: Elizaphanian (Elizaphanian@members.v21.co.uk)
Date: Mon Nov 18 2002 - 18:57:11 GMT
Hi David (number 3)
Like you, I'm working through a few posts, and much that I would reply to in
this thread I've covered elsewhere. Again, I'll pick out one paragraph and
go on from there.
You said:
> I'm going to skip the 9/11 issue because its too emotionally charged, but
> let me just say that I disagree entirely. But let me answer your question
> about the 'choosing unit' or 'machine language interface'. Both of these
> phrases are terribly clumsy and pretentious, but I think I know what
you're
> getting at. You're asking what it is that responds to reality and makes
> choices, no? You're asking about intellect in particular because this
seems
> to raise the problem of the intellect judging itself, no? Pirsig defines
the
> self as "a collection of static patterns capable of apprehending DQ". That
> same collection of static patterns can certainly apprehend static quality
> too. This definition of the self comes from the quote you included, which
is
> in a fuller context at the top of this page.
>
The 9/11 example is just particularly graphic and (on one level!) very easy
to understand what happened. But in fact any disaster could qualify. My
point is that Pirsig gives a scale of values, that 'intellectual' values are
the top of the heap, and therefore the 'worst' thing about any disaster (ie
worst that we can talk about, so not including unquantifiable DQ) is the
loss of intellectual goods. Which I think is barbaric. As it happens I don't
think Pirsig would actually hold to that, if it was presented to him in
those terms, but it seems to be the logical implication of the MoQ. Are you
saying that it isn't a logical implication of the MoQ, or that it isn't
barbaric?
'Choosing unit' was my phrasing, 'machine language interface' is Pirsig's,
but as long as you know what I'm trying to get at then they're doing their
work. My point is that the 'intellect' - understood as the manipulation of
symbols, understood even more specifically as something divorced from
emotion, so "Reason" - is incapable of choice. I'm not arguing that it is
incapable of judging itself, I'm saying that it is incapable of judging,
period. To discern 'truth' depends upon the development of moral character;
thus truth is one of a number of eudaimonic values. I've gone into the
technicalities of why I assert this elsewhere.
For the fourth level to be truly 'intellectual' then we need to have some
faculty which is able to discriminate between good and bad fourth level
quality (on the 'narrow' interpretation, something able to distinguish the
'truth') and saying 'the intellect' is, IMHO, fatuous and philosophically
incoherent.
Pirsig's account of the self is something I'm comfortable with, as outlined
earlier in this thread.
Sam
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