Hugo Fjelsted Alroe (alroe@vip.cybercity.dk)
Thu, 12 Mar 1998 04:17:22 +0100
Bo, Doug, List
Bo wrote:
>> "By being subsumed/demoted within MOQ and still usable within it.."
>> says Doug. Good, but this can only happen if it becomes an
>> integrated quality part, and as there are only four value dimensions
>> and their internal moral codes, where is it to be found? I will
>> hasten to say that I know Pirsig's own
>> "Inorganic+Organic=Objective/Social+Intellectual=Subjective" (SODV
>> paper), still I take the liberty to - again - launch the
>> "SOM-as-Intellect-of-MOQ" (SAIOM) idea again.
Doug R. wrote:
>As an "...integrated quality part,..." SOM may be found as unified
>Static Patterns of Value in what MoQ calls Static Quality all of which
>is in/commingles/interpenetrates Dynamic Quality.
>
>In legacy SOM, we of TLS know, Aristotelian
>substance/body/matter/property (the objective) reigns over the
>insubstantial/mind/immaterial/value (the subjective). We hear the
>SOMites preach, "Be objective. Your subjectivity is of low utility."
>
>We also know in MoQ that what SOM calls the subjective is the most
>valuable. MoQ takes S-O from SOM, unifies it as four levels of SPoVs,
>inverts the hierarchy from SOM's O over S to MoQ's S over O.
I think it is crucial to get more clear on the SOM-MoQ relationship, and
here follows some reflections on the latest contributions from Bo and Doug.
Bo poses the question: Where is SOM to be found in MoQ? But this is not the
right question, I think. Subject Object Metaphysics is Pirsigs term for the
traditional frame of thinking, which takes 'the subject-object divide' as
an unquestionable foundation. MoQ moves byond that, by putting this divide
into question. There are two main views available within SOM.
One is 'the view from without', or 'the view from nowhere' - the idea that
the observer is somewhere outside of what is observed, and the idea that
all that can known for certain is that, which can be viewed from without.
(The observer which is implied in this view, is usually neglected precisely
because it is outside, it is idealized away by the combination of a
subject-object divide and the idea that the knowable, the 'objective
reality' is all that matters.)
The other main view is 'the view from within', or 'the blind subject' - the
idea that the observed is always part of the observer, and that all that
can be known is this view from within, the subjects view of it self.
This is of course, as is also Pirsigs explication, a huge simplification.
Logical empiricism, or positivism, for instance, combines a strong
empiricism with a focus on the 'objective', it may seen as a sort of
'collective subject' view, stating that we can know no thing beyond our
experience, but also that we can have 'objective knowledge'. There has been
all sorts of efforts towards avoiding the bad implications of the hidden
SOM presumption, making the philosophical landscape a lot more complicated
than can be handled in one book, let alone in a few emails. But in order to
address the really fundamental questions, such a coarse explication can be
necessary; - in the long run, however, a more detailed analysis will be
needed. Here I am concerned with the fundamental question of the relation
between SOM and MoQ.
Both oppositions above are logically strong, within their own presumptions.
Pirsig's genius (and it was a stroke of genius, what ever predecessors
there may have been) was to see that the presumptions were common for these
two opposites . What is presumed, metaphysically presumed, that is,
unquestionable from within these stances, is the subject-object split. (And
this is where we have to be very careful and thorough.) The subject-object
split is not something which is *part* of SOM, - it is *presumed* by SOM,
it is the very foundation upon which SOM is build; but not a *known*
foundation, not something which can be looked upon and criticised within
SOM. And this is the only justification for Pirsig to attack 'SOM' as one
common position, - that it rests on a common foundation. Those who cannot
see that, do not feel as part of one 'SOM'-position, and they are right,
there is no recognized such position. No one could hold the 'SOM'-position,
because to see it as a unity one has to be aware of the common presumption,
and being aware of the common presumption, one is already halfway into MoQ
or some similar larger metaphysical frame. This is what these philosophers,
whom we have seen as predecessors or relatives of Pirsig, have in common,
they have sensed, and explicated more or less, a larger metaphysical frame
which could do more than argue one of the two (big sweeps here)
oppositions, which could point to a third path that threw light on both the
oppositions as what they were: reductio ad absurdum's of one and the same
wrong presumption, of which they were insufficiently aware.
We should not ridicule this inability to see the metaphysical foundation
The path towards awareness of one self, including ones foundation for
living, for feeling, and for thinking, is a long and difficult journey; and
it is a journey never ended. We ourselves are only on our way, we have not
and cannot reach no goal, no place of complete awareness, no more than
there is and end to the mirror views of one mirror in another.
So, in my view MoQ is a step further, beyond SOM, on a path towards greater
awareness; greater intellectual awarenes, - because it is only on the
intellectual level that we can be aware of our selves, this is indeed what
makes the intellectual level distinct.
What does this mean for the relationship between MoQ and SOM?. SOM is not
the intellectual level of MoQ, they are both intellectual phenomenons, both
specific ways of looking upon our selves and our world. And SOM is not
simply subsumed as a part of MoQ, because SOM arose from neglect of the
presumed subject-object split, diverging because of this, and there is no
ground for this diversion in MoQ or some similar metaphysics. Both of the
extreme oppositions are no good, as anyone who succeeds in seeing their
metaphysical roots will acknowledge. This does not mean that *everything*
has to be dumped. The oppositions were, and are, extremes, there are many
intermediate positions, even some resembling Pirsig's. And the strength of
any larger metaphysical frame, which makes clear where and how the
subject-object split is at work, is exactly, that in such a frame we can
*use* the subject-object split as a tool, being aware of what we are doing,
instead of blindly presuming some subject-object split, the workings of
which we are not aware of. *Only* in some frame like MoQ can we use the
subject-object split as a tool, with skill, this could not be done within
SOM.
This is why a MoQ-like metaphysics provides for a new concept of
objectivity, something which will change science to some degree, and our
view of science to a large degree; and for a new concept of subjectivity.
Subjectivity and objectivity will merge into contextuality. And this is why
our view of truth will change, whether from a relativistic position or and
objectivistic position, these views of truth merging into a complementary
view of truth.
The complementary view of truth is a truth which is contextual, and by
being contextual it leaves room for the good to rule. It is not
objectivism, which has no place for the good, and it is not relativism,
which has no place for truth.
Thanks to you both for pursuing this important issue.
Hugo
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