LS Re: The four levels


Diana McPartlin (diana@asiantravel.com)
Sat, 4 Oct 1997 15:48:35 +0100


Hi everyone

Got a bit busy there.

Anyway back to these definitions.

First. Several posts recently have discussed the relationships between
the levels. Bodvar summed it up saying that each levels raison d'etre
is to free itself from the level below. A few others have pointed out
how the levels depend on each other. I agree with all this but I just
want to point out that these are characteristics or descriptions of
the behaviour of the levels. They cannot be considered definitions of
the levels. As Maggie pointed out there may also have been/be other
types of value that have attempted to break away from the parent level
but have been unsuccessful.

Second I want to answer Magnus' point that even if we can't define
individual phenomena we should at least be able to define the types of
phenomena that belong to each level. But the only thing that all the
phenomena that belong to the biological level have in common is that
they are biological value. Same for the other levels.

You can come up with definitions of sorts eg Biological value are
those phenomena that are experienced biologically. But obviously that
doesn't help much. You can also come up with synonyms of sorts eg
Biological value is life or biological value is that which propagates
life. But then you just have to define life...

And third, I hate to bring up the subject of chairs again. But I
really don't feel that this was resolved and it is about the four
levels after all.

To recap, I believe Bodvar agreed with me that an artificial, say,
lung in a human body was biological value, even though it may also be
considered inorganic value. From this I see no reason why a warm coat,
good pair of shoes or indeed an ergonomically designed chair cannot
also be considered biological value. (Bodvar pointed out that it is
only possible to experience one type of value at a time. That's fair
enough. But from our intellectual standpoint it's still possible to
look down on the other levels and see that a chair can be perceived in
different ways.)

I guess what I'm really getting at, though, is whether biological
value is something akin to "life" or something akin to "those
phenomena that propagate life".

Diana

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