John and Ruth and Squad,
John writes:
There has been some discussion recently about where to fit emotions within
the MOQ
hierarchy. In my view this debate has missed the point. Thinking without
emotions is usually
a low quality occupation. Intelligence resides in the integrated fusion of
thought, affect and
bodily sensation, mutually supporting each other. Perhaps we can equate
this with dynamic
quality, but what I am saying is that without this richness of integrated
thought and feeling,
intelligence is sterile and indeed destructive. So the intellectual level
of the MOQ needs
some redefinition. It is not just ideas that have value. It is embodied
ideas, ideas that do
something for individuals, that have quality.
And here we come back yet again to the issue Platt raises in his discussion
of Waterford
glass, (I've watched them making it in Ireland, Platt), the aesthetic
element in quality. This is,
after all, where Pirsig started (teaching college students to become better
writers). Pirsig,
having developed his hierarchical model, seems almost without answers when
it comes to
the key issue of how one separates the high quality ideas from the dross.
He seems to
suggest that there is no way of telling at the time, but we must just wait
and see. I am not so
sure. It seems to me that the high quality ideas emerge from a matrix of
emotions, physical
feelings, perception of the world, and thinking that is tied to all this.
It is in the unified
response to the total experience that 'quality' somehow resides.
Clark writes:
John, you write: It is in the unified response to the total experience
that 'quality' somehow resides.
I think that this sentence of yours says it all. Beginning with Rich's
quote from Northrop in which he says that the brain is a product of the
increasing complexity of the universe and comprises both the theoretic and
aesthetic aspects of evolution we wind up with a physical brain which
cannot stop thinking even when you are asleep. I believe that, driven by
Dynamic Quality, the brain is continually evaluating the totality of its
inputs, including inputs from the inorganic universe plus inputs from other
organic sources plus inputs from its own thinking generated by all other
inputs. Each brain (should I say sentient) generates its own separate and
distinct effect on its carrier (owner) making that carrier a separate self
with a separate soul. The soul being generated by the activity of each
individuals brain and being peculiar to that individual. I think that soul
and self are much the same and only last as long as that individual is
alive. That is why each of us walks around as a separate self with our own
individual truth. Each of our individual 'truths' is randomly driven by DQ
but generally toward a higher value level.
I think that is the lesson of the Brujo. We are all quality driven even
if we have never heard of the Metaphysics of Quality. Of course it makes
the route to higher Quality faster if we have heard of it.
I also think that it is wrong to think of the brain as an evolutionary
driven set of patterns of patterns which produce a determined self and soul
because of the increasing complexity which is generated by the evolutionary
process. Organic evolution is no longer predictable. Each sentient self is
indeed a separate "truth" that is haphazardly migrating toward a higher
quality or 'truth'. Ken
MOQ Online Homepage - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Unsubscribe - http://www.moq.org/md/index.html
MD Queries - horse@wasted.demon.nl
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:03:07 BST