Jonathan B. Marder (marder@agri.huji.ac.il)
Sun, 19 Jul 1998 18:20:52 +0100
Hi Squad, Diana, Clark, Martin, Horse and whowever else I may have
quoted,
DIANA:-
>Liked [Keith's] essay and the conclusion (greatly simplified) that
static
>quality is pattern and dynamic quality is not-pattern. It's a more
>refined explanation than change vs stability and avoids arguments on
>things like "constant changes" etc.
I am glad that we have now moved away from the DQ=change suggestion. The
above definition is much closer to the suggestion that DQ is the driving
force causing change.
CLARK:-
>DQ = Possibility
>SQ = Realized possibility.
Now that's pretty close to something I wrote several weeks ago:-
>DQ is about putting the possibilities on the agenda.
>SQ is about evaluating the possibilities that have arisen.
Generally, the Squad seems to like the idea of DQ being a driving force
towards greater freedom.
>...the tendency towards "more degrees of freedom" is
>the second law of thermodynamics. The driving
>force of all (re)actions is increase in total entropy.
And that statement of mine brings in the energy aspect. "Potential
energy" is the driving force in thermodynamics.
To physicists, the word "potential" is an energy term.
Some while back THEO wrote:-
>To elaborate a bit further, dynamic Quality might
>be viewed as requiring time in order to be dynamic (the word
>suggests change, or at least potential to change)
And yet, as soon as we pin potential/energy down more rigourously (as
physicists do), we are firmly within the SQ realm.
Martin wrote:-
>... SQ is the changes, but when we go on to try and include
>'morality' in those changes, it seems like we are heading toward 'why'
>those changes occur. I think (and what I was trying to say before) is
>that DQ is the 'how'- in other words the process- of those changes not
>the why....
If we're going to look at this in terms of potential and realization, I
would see DQ as the "why" and SQ as including the "how". Thermodynamics
tells us that POTENTIAL provides the possibility for a process. But real
ization requires a mechanism (the "how"). Without a mechanism, potential
stays potential.
Back to Diana:-
>But still we're missing any mention of morality and how it fits into
>this. ...
In Pirsig's terms, DQ itself was a force towards morality. My own
observation is that realization of potential in a system takes the
system to greater stability. If DQ is potential, then stability would be
its realization. "STABILITY is MORAL". On the other hand, this leads to
stagnation. The solution to this paradox may be in local "minima".
Consider a ball rolling down a rough slope. A local minimum would be a
small depression in which the ball gets trapped. The only way to get it
to fully realize its potential (roll all the way down) is to raise the
ball slightly, or break the wall of the depression. Given enough time,
one of these is likely to happen.
So how about it folks:-
"Morality is realization of potential".
===================================
Horse wrote:-
>I also think that what survives - SQ - survives as memory of
>different forms. So:
>
>Inorganic memory = Substance (Energy/Matter)
>Biological memory = Genes (Instinct)
>Social Memory = Tradition (Cultural Beliefs, Laws etc.)
>Intellectual memory = Ideas (Thought, Science etc. )
I liked it a first, but was then troubled by it. At each level, the
context, ("Pattern Recognizing Algorithm") becomes more demanding. Genes
have no meaning whatsoever in the absence of a suitable cell - try
injecting mammalian DNA into a bacterium! You may get some response, but
not a mammal! (You could score this using fuzzy logic).
I would say that the PRA/context at each level is every bit as important
as the "coding" (memory) and it's not always easy to distinguish them.
At the inorganic level do coding and context merge into one. Could it be
that they do again at the intellectual level? (Have to think about that
some more).
But Pirsig's levels are not exclusive in a mechanistic sense. They are
alternative ways of looking at the same processes.
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