From: Paul Turner (paul@turnerbc.co.uk)
Date: Fri Aug 27 2004 - 11:03:39 BST
Hi Mark
msh said:
Am enjoying this thread and see that the discussion has drifted back to
what I, in my attempts at formulating a MOQ version of the Problem of
Evil, the Problem of Immorality (POI), see as a possible contradiction
in the "nature" of Quality
Paul:
I think the answer to the "problem of evil/immorality" is provided by
the conflict between the static levels and the static-Dynamic conflict,
within the context of evolution. The answer is this - a pattern is
good/moral when it controls and dominates a less evolved pattern and
evil/immoral when it controls and dominates a more evolved pattern. Of
course, it's easy to state as a principle, less easy to apply it to
"real" conflicts.
msh said:
So DQ is absolutely Moral, yet contains immorality.
Paul:
Ah, is that how the conclusion sounded? The conclusion was not that
Dynamic Quality "contains" static quality. The conclusion forced on us
by Nagarjuna's logic is something like this: Dynamic Quality *is* static
quality and vice versa and it is only in ignorance of this that they are
distinguished. Something like - the process is not separate from its
product and the product is not separate from its process.
I'm not sure how this reflects back onto your dilemma.
Msh said:
Is the POI an argument against the existence of Quality, or just against
the idea that Quality is Moral Perfection?
Paul:
I think I would tend towards the latter. Moral perfection sounds like
some kind of stasis which undermines the connotations of an ongoing
process.
Msh said:
IMO, the only way to avoid one of these conclusions is to sweep logic
under the rug when it becomes inconvenient. But my own intellectual
honesty won't allow me to do this, for I believe to abandon logic is to
withdraw from the world to an extent that makes impossible the sharing
of ideas. And there is not a single person on this list who thinks
ideas can't be shared.
Paul:
I think you are right not to abandon logic.
Paul previously said:
The first truth of Nagarjuna teaches us to become free of the illusion
that the static world is itself real, while the second truth teaches us
that it is real after all, not in the sense in which we tend to think it
is, but in the sense it always has been.
Gotta love those Buddhists!
msh says:
Yep. When necessary, they are master dust-concealers. And, in my
fractured soul, I love them for it.
Paul:
Master dust-concealers :-)
Actually, I tend to think they were lifting the rug on the "dusty"
dogmata that was rife in their time, showing that all
theological/metaphysical positions are ultimately wrong, a bit like
neo-pragmatists have tried to do.
Regards
Paul
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