From: hampday@earthlink.net
Date: Sun Aug 22 2004 - 05:31:40 BST
From: Ham Priday to Platt Holden, Sun. Aug. 21
Subject: MD The individual in the MOQ
Platt, you said:
> If I left you with the impression that I desire a "formal exposition" of
> the MOQ, I apologize for being inarticulate. I do not fault the author on
> that score. In fact, I generally find formal expositions extremely boring
> and often unnecessarily difficult to decipher. I'm a radical advocate of
> plain English.
I'll settle for an essay on the theory, then, (so as not to "bore" you.)
There's no question that Pirsig has an excellent command of the language.
Why not use it to clarify the basic principles of his theory? It would make
the novels even more meaningful as real-life examples, and would still
leave plenty of questions to be tossed around by this group.
> Again, I've apparently misled you. I consider physical reality to be
> inorganic and biological value patterns.
This is neither a concept nor a definition I can understand, Platt. And the
forced addition of "value" adds nothing to your intended meaning.
> I fully support the MOQ's version of evolution as being an evolution
> of values, not just bones, muscle and nerve tissue.
Who or what "evolves" these values, and where can they be found in animal
tissue? I'm, sorry Platt; these phrases may resonate in some way with LILA
fans, like the punch-line of joke no. 26. But they lack substance. Again,
it's not your fault. It's the fact they refer to a philosophy that was
never postulated.
You quote the Master:
> "Biological evolution can be seen as a process by which weak
> Dynamic forces at a subatomic level discover stratagems for overcoming
> huge static inorganic forces at a superatomic level. They do this by
> selecting superatomic mechanisms in which a number of options are so
> evenly balanced that a weak Dynamic force can tip the balance one way or
> another. The particular atom that the weak Dynamic subatomic forces have
> seized as their primary vehicle is carbon. (Lila, 11)
Is Pirsig implying that DQ is a conscious force? How else could it
"discover stratagems"? Let me pull an "msh" on you and copy this quotation
minus "Dynamic", "static", and the verbs "discover" and "selecting".
> "Biological evolution can be seen as a process by which weak
> forces at a subatomic level overcome
> huge inorganic forces at a superatomic level. They do this by
> superatomic mechanisms in which a number of options are so
> evenly balanced that a weak force can tip the balance one way or
> another. The particular atom that the weak subatomic forces have
> seized as their primary vehicle is carbon.
Doesn't this revision express everything one needs to know about the
author's SOM concept as it relates to evolution? That forces are "dynamic"
goes without saying. To call them Dynamic adds nothing to the concept
unless one chooses to read some unconventional meaning into this adjective.
Obviously it must. So why doesn't he define the meaning he wants us to
infer? After all, what are words without meaning?
I said:
> If physical reality is grounded in
> Value (Quality?), its subsistence depends on the experience of it on the
> same ground. Which bears out Tolstoy's observation that "There is no
> reality except for our experience of it".
You said:
> That's Idealism, pure and simple.
Yes, it does come pretty close.
You added:
> "Platt's theory" is the same as Pirsig's theory. My only quibble is with
> Pirsig's use of the word "experience" which implies a subjective, human
> "experiencer." Paul has explained why Pirsig felt it necessary to bring
> experience, and thus SOM, into the picture:
Remember what I told you several postings ago? It's tough to exclude man
when he is the subject of all experience.
Paul said:
> Perhaps, but I think he emphasises that Quality events *are* experience
> because he wants the MOQ to be accepted as an empirical system and to
> distance it from supernatural or ethereal connotations and thus defend his
> system from the usual logical positivist attack. This is a recurring theme
> in his correspondence since LILA, e.g. his response to Ham's Essentialism:
Exactly!
Pirsig said:
> "My problem with "essence" is not that it isn't there or that it is not
> the same as Quality. It is that positivists usually deny "essence" as
> something like "God" or "the absolute" and dismiss it experimentally
> unverifiable, which is to say they think you are some kind of religious
> nut."
There it is in a "nutshell". He's not denying Essence; he'd just prefer not
to admit what it implies.
Stay tuned. I'm about to answer a note from Chris Phoenix whose objectivist
view of reality is even more impermeable!
Essentially,
Ham
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