Hi Mary and everyone,
Mary writes:
Can you give me an example of a
biological level entity that has developed intellect but skipped over the
social level? I can't think of one.
Mary, Pirsig uses spiders on LSD in Lila as an analogy of a hallucinogen
uncovering a more perfect reality underlying the one we normally perceive
of. i would say spiders are a perfect example of a species by-passing the
social level and using the intellect directly. why did the US government
conduct LSD tests on spiders in the first place?
because baby spiders are not taught to weave webs by adult spiders. they
just seem to "know" how to build a web. where does that "knowledge" come
from? prior to the LSD experiment the concensus was that the spider, under
the influence of a hallucinogenic drug, would be unable to spin a web.
however, just the opposite happened. the spiders began spinning webs of
abnormal beauty and perfection.
i am unsure what this means in terms of the Metaphysics of Quality, but i
would say that the social level, while it contains a great deal of value, is
not absolutely essential for the survival of the species. the intellect
level is absolutely essential however, and this only reaffirms the
hierachial positions of the levels and places the intellect as the highest
moral static quality pattern of value.
best wishes to all,
glove
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