From: Matt the Enraged Endorphin (mpkundert@students.wisc.edu)
Date: Tue Mar 11 2003 - 18:01:24 GMT
Squonk,
Squonk said:
Your 'essay' begins by obscuring the central topic of Quality, moves
swiftly on to general philosophology, and ends with a Rortython. The
philosophology, which is mostly pretty obvious, is presented as if
revealing staggering originality and insight. This is simply not the case.
To say organisms learn and apply from experience isn't hot stuff no matter
how extensively you dress it up. And to extend that to abstract
intellectual processes doesn't mean metaphysics has to be erased as a bad
dream. Metaphysics is largely about curiosity; about thinking about those
things imagination has access to in moments of madness.
A good overview of the history of philosophy in terms outlined by your
extensive quotes from Rorty, while never very far from interesting, is for
the most part straight forward.
Along the way, Quality becomes unreal. Is Quality real?
You have to explain Quality no matter how your organism responds to it? Or
are you telling the forum that the 'it' of the Zen master is not real?
In one paragraph of your magnus opus, you read something into Pirsig that
you haven't actually read yet! Laugh? I nearly stopped!
Matt:
Oh God, Squonk, you are so close I can finally feel your breath on my neck.
If only you would once point to some specifics that I could address, maybe
your rages would look more like a critique and less like slander.
But let me help:
Squonk: "Your 'essay' begins by obscuring the central topic of Quality,
moves swiftly on to general philosophology, and ends with a Rortython."
Matt: Good introduction; it sets out what you are about to show.
Squonk: "The philosophology, which is mostly pretty obvious, is presented
as if revealing staggering originality and insight."
Matt: Okay...examples would help because I have said over and over that
what I'm doing isn't very creative. If people got the impression that I
thought quite highly of myself and my originality, I apologize. That isn't
the case. Like Rorty, I view myself as a syncretist and an underlaborer: I
put people together, synthesize them and see what pops out and I clear the
ground of what I see as unneeded conceptual debris. I figured my heavy,
over-effusive borrowing from Rorty would forestall the impression of
"staggering originality and insight," but....
Squonk: "To say organisms learn and apply from experience isn't hot stuff
no matter how extensively you dress it up. And to extend that to abstract
intellectual processes doesn't mean metaphysics has to be erased as a bad
dream."
Matt: God, I wish I knew where I said all this. But, you are right as
usual Squonk, organisms learning and applying from experience isn't new or
hot stuff. I wish I knew where I did all this "dressing up" and abstraction.
Squonk: "Metaphysics is largely about curiosity; about thinking about those
things imagination has access to in moments of madness."
Matt: Hmm, very interesting definition. Your engagement on this
metaphilosophical issue, however, is a bit underdeveloped. Like many, it
consists of the bald assertion that I'm wrong and you are right. I would
hope a good metaphilosophical engagement would consist of weighing the pros
and cons of the various definitions. You see, when you read somebody
else's writing, and you find that they are using different definitions than
you, it doesn't help your case to say, "They are wrong," and dismiss it.
It's even worse when you go on and critique their consequences by assuming
your own definition: that's question begging. My advice is to accept the
definitions for the purposes of understanding what is being written, and if
the consequences start to go in a direction you don't like, you have reason
to think that an alternative definition might be in order. For instance,
in the case of me getting metaphysics all wrong, most people dismiss my
consequences because they've assumed a different definition. As it
happens, most people's assumed definition of "metaphysics" looks exactly
like the definition of "philosophy" I've borrowed from Wilfrid Sellars.
What happens then is that those who end up wanting to get rid of the same
thing that I do, hypostatizations, make their dismissive critique look more
like a needless quibble. Why not happily agree with the parts of what I
say that you agree with, and simply translate it into the vocabulary that
you are using. I see no problem with that. It's what great syncretists do
all the time: co-opt people for their own projects. I'm thinking of people
like Pirsig, Wilber, and Rorty.
Squonk: "A good overview of the history of philosophy in terms outlined by
your extensive quotes from Rorty, while never very far from interesting, is
for the most part straight forward."
Matt: True, good point. Never said that it wasn't straight forward.
However, it can become controversial if you come across someone who would
offer a completely different overview of the history of philosophy, of
which there are many who would do so.
Squonk: "Along the way, Quality becomes unreal. Is Quality real?
You have to explain Quality no matter how your organism responds to it? Or
are you telling the forum that the 'it' of the Zen master is not real?"
Matt: I'm not sure what you are saying that I'm saying here or where I said
any of this. Very strange. All I remember ever saying about Quality is
that it is the ultimate metaphor, we will never be able to know it, yet we
are always causally connected to it. Never have I said it is not real.
Quite the contrary.
Squonk: "In one paragraph of your magnus opus, you read something into
Pirsig that you haven't actually read yet! Laugh? I nearly stopped!"
Matt: This seems like the big finale, but I've no idea what you could be
refering to. That's to bad. I'm sure all of my intellectual enemies would
love to read the paragraph you are refering to. In fact, I would love to
read the paragraph you are refering to. If there is anything horrendously
objectionable to the paragraph, I would love to be able to respond to the
objection, or qualify what I wrote, or simply backdown wholesale from it.
It's how we grow intellectually.
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