Magnus Berg (MagnusB@DataVis.se)
Fri, 10 Jul 1998 05:47:22 +0100
Hi again Jonathan
You wrote:
> Magnus, I sense some hostility here.
>
Yeah I know, but it's basically because I care. I care about your
opinion enough to try to understand it. Sometimes I get frustrated
wondering if I missed something. A few harsh words now and then
can be useful to stir up emotions and receive another angle.
> > I see too much of Descartes
> >"I think, therefore I am" in it. He tried to prove existence with,
> >what he thought was, a non-ad-hoc statement. The MoQ says that
> >the following statements are just as valid.
> >
> >I weigh, therefore I am.
> >I sense, therefore I am.
> >I interact with others, therefore I am.
> >
> >The difference is that the MoQ acknowledges that these statements
> >are true because of the underlying metaphysics, they're relative.
> >Descartes thought that his statement was absolute.
> >
> >So, why is this important? Because it makes us aware of exactly
> >*how* intellectual patterns are relative, *what* they are
> >dependent on.
>
> So far Magnus, I agree approximately 100 per cent.
>
So why don't you include other patterns than intellectual in SQ?
> >I think that your version of the MoQ sounds more
> >like some kind of moral framework inside idealism.
>
> I'm not sure what you mean by the above. Please clarify.
>
I'm referring to your definition of SQ, "intellectualised
description of DQ". If SQ is only intellectual patterns of
other patterns, it means that the static ladder, the level
hierarchy, collapses and becomes a just-what-you-like-morality
instead of the moral ladder described in Lila, Pirsig writes,
"The physical order of the universe is also the moral order
of the universe".
It also means that the static ladder, the moral ladder,
becomes an intellectual construct imposed on intellectual
patterns of other patterns. It no longer has any direct
connection with reality.
I also think your definition means, as you said in your
original post, "it brings back the mind-matter split in full
force". It seems to imply that all that matters is the
intellectual patterns of other patterns, and that sounds
much like idealism to me.
> >There is no paradox, patterns are static. DQ is non-patterns, change
> of
> >patterns.
> But change of patterns is also a pattern - as long as one can grasp
> the
> underlying complexity.
>
Sure, that is why we do science, to find patterns and be able to
predict events that are currently unpredictable. Science is gradually
pushing the border between SQ and DQ.
BUT, and this is the *big* but, science will never push the border all
the way. If everything were static and patterned, nothing new and truly
original would ever occur. Nothing would ever change or be created. We
wouldn't be here, earth wouldn't be here, the universe would simply not
have become.
> This is why I hit upon Glove's use of the word "precession". It's
> also
> why I reject the view that DQ is change (rather than cause of change).
> To be perfectly honest, I can see some value in what Sojourner has now
> suggested:-
> >DQ = energy
> >SQ = matter
> My understanding of quantum theory is that energy has no existence
> without a container, be it a photon, a vibrating string, or a Uranium
> nucleus. The container is always "matter". This is why physicists
> looked
> so hard for the "ether" which carried light before the idea that light
> is it's own matter (photons) was adopted. Similarly, all matter is
> energy - E=mc^2. Thus matter and energy are not distinct, just
> different
> ways of looking at the same thing. In physics, the cause of change is
> energy. DQ=energy, the cause of change, sounds pretty good to me.
>
If matter and energy are just different ways of looking at the same
thing, why separate them with an SQ/DQ split? To be blunt, matter and
energy are inorganic SPoV. You'll have a hard time trying to convince
me otherwise.
Regards,
Magnus
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Thu May 13 1999 - 16:43:27 CEST