From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Tue Sep 23 2003 - 15:24:39 BST
Hi All:
In an article in the Atlantic magazine, physicist Paul Davies
speculates on the effect on established religion of discovering life
outside our planet. You can catch the article at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2003/09/davies.htm
What I found most interesting in the article was Davies' description of
the "new design argument" to explain evolution. He writes, "In this
version of cosmic design, God acts not by direct intervention but by
creating appropriate natural laws that guarantee the emergence of life
and mind in cosmic abundance." He ends the article saying, "The more
one accepts the formation of life as a natural process (that is, the
more deeply embedded one believes it is in the overall cosmic scheme),
the more ingenious and contrived (dare one say 'designed') the universe
appears to be."
Those familiar with the MOQ will immediately recognize the connection
between the "new design argument" and the role of DQ and SQ in the
evolutionary process as described by Pirsig in Chapter 11 of LILA.
There Pirsig makes it clear (in different words) that DQ/SQ forces are
"embedded in the overall cosmic scheme" as "natural forces."
What struck me in re-reading Chapter 11 was how DQ found "the ambiguity
of carbon's bonding preferences" as the opening it needed to overcome
the laws of gravity and thermodynamics. This led me to ask myself,
"What ambiguities are there in the edifice of SOM might we use as an
opening to overcome SOM's nearly universal (and unthinking) acceptance
by Western culture?
Once asked, the answer quickly came. SOM is wildly ambiguous about:
How something emerged from nothing.
How life emerged from pond scum.
How consciousness emerged from a lump of meat.
These questions SOM has failed to answer since it became the dominant
worldview of the intellectual level. Some scientists have tried with
ambiguous results. Evolutionary theory, SOM's Holy Grail, fails at the
most basic level, that of beginnings.
I'm not up on the new design arguments that Davies refers to, but I
doubt if any have the breadth and depth of the MOQ. So it occurred to
me that we have the ambiguity we need to open more people's eyes to the
value of the MOQ as the answer to questions SOM can't answer or shrugs
off from answering by saying, "That's not my job."
Many of you who are in academe are in a position to be proactive in
raising these questions and point to SOM's shortcomings, thus opening
an introduction to the MOQ. Others like me will have to be content to
raise the issue as opportunities present themselves, such as in
conversations, in responses to articles on the internet, and in letters
to the editor of magazines, newspapers and TV news programs.
I think the key to getting a hearing is simply to raise doubt about the
SOM model of the experience, the same doubt that drew most of us to
consider the MOQ has a viable alternative. To open a mind or two to the
possibility of seeing the world through other than SOM eyes would be a
step in the right -- or shall we say, "better" -- direction.
To that end I always have an extra copy of LILA in paperback on hand to
give to someone who seems seriously interested in seeing the world
through a different set spectacles. In fact, I recently mailed a copy
to my son-in-law's Dad. So far, silence.
Platt
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