From: Ron Winchester (phaedruswolff@hotmail.com)
Date: Sun Jan 23 2005 - 16:58:16 GMT
dmb disagrees:
This is what I'm talking about. You've reduced the primary empirical reality
to openmindedness. That's just not it, Matt. Its simply the wrong idea and
its the wrong idea about the MOQ's most central idea. You really gotta put
some hinges on that box, mabye even take a wall out. DQ is to be indentified
with religious mysticism, not curiosity or positive assessments or anything
so obvious to common sense. We don't have to try to "Block" DQ. We do that
so habitually and so automatically that it can take years of practice just
to stop doing it. That's what meditatiion is all about, making the mind
quiet in order to experience a different type of consciousness, one where
the distinctions between subject and object, mind and matter etc, do not
exist. See, undivided and pre-intellectual mean the same thing. That's what
unmediated refers to as well. Pirsig and other describe it a million
different ways, but it all boils down to no-mind. I'm all for
openmindedness. It just happens to have nothing to do with DQ, you parts
smasher you.
Hi dmb,
Up until this point, you have had a silent cheerleader reading your replies.
I'm sitting here yelling "Go dmb!" "Right on!" "You tell 'em!"
Even most of what you are saying here, I agree with totally. The one thing
that is separating me, maybe my own blind spot, is this "no-mind" thing.
Unless of course it is that you are beginning to agree with me that this
'Mystic reality' is intuitive. It has nothing to do with reasoning, logic,
or dialectic truths. What it has to do with is 'The Good' (and yes the Good
of Plato)
It was not Plato or Socrates that set the wheels of Western intellect into
motion, it was the Slicing-n-dicing of Aristotle who in the words of
Phaedrus;
"Phædrus remembered a line from Thoreau: "You never gain something but that
you lose something." And now he began to see for the first time the
unbelievable magnitude of what man, when he gained power to understand and
rule the world in terms of dialectic truths, had lost. He had built empires
of scientific capability to manipulate the phenomena of nature into enormous
manifestations of his own dreams of power and wealth...but for this he had
exchanged an empire of understanding of equal magnitude: an understanding of
what it is to be a part of the world, and not an enemy of it."
The Good is built into man's nature. From prehistoric times, from before
your theory of when philosophy began, the Good has always been there. It is
intuitive, and yes, it is instinct. It is not an anamalistic instinct that
is pointed toward survival, but a human instinct; one that puts the well
being of others before the well being of self. It is the instinct built into
man that will throw a man in front of a fast moving car to save the life of
a child, or a puppy. It is the instinct that will send a man up a flight of
stairs in a burning building to save another human being he has not met. It
is the instinct of man that will place him in front of a rain forest defying
a line of bull dozers that are determined to tear it down, or of a biker who
will lay out a good Christian man for striking his own child for something
this good Christian man sees as embarrasing, and the child must be put in
line.
The intuition of man is pointed toward the Good of man, of animal, of earth.
This is why Pirsig so identifies with the Native American. It is the respect
of the Good dog, of the Good turkey that the Native American feels the need
to give thanks to; not the Creator, but the turkey, and the earth, and the
Creator.
As opposed to saying "no-mind," maybe we could say 'New-mind'; one that has
not been corrupted by culture, science, and philosophy. Or else, we can say
this Quality is out there. It is not in the mind. Man does not know it, he
has to reach 'Out there' through meditation. I would prefer to think that he
reaches in there; in there to a Quality that resides in man. This same
Quality resides in everything on earth, and in the universe.
Mystic reality is either in man or out there. It is either already built
into man's psyche, there to be discovered when you strip away culture and
ego, or it is out there in the universe which opens up to allow
enlightenment.
If it is "no-mind," then it is intuitive, or it is external.
What you think?
Wolff
>From: David Buchanan < >
>Reply-To:
>To: "' '" < >
>Subject: RE: MD Further comments to Matt
>Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 19:56:13 -0700
>
>Matt, Marsha & all MOQers:
>
>Marsha said:
>Isn't it speculated today that our world, including the philosophic realm,
>is 'word-built'? If this is true, then might it be that our Western habit
>of
>
>thought and language does not accommodate describing Dynamic quality,
>though
>
>it may in the future. And to stay inside your present box of knowledge will
>only keep us inside your box of knowledge.
>
>Matt replied:
>Sure, but I don't think there is any neutral way to adjudicate between your
>claim that I'm keeping us in my box of knowledge and my claim that you're
>keeping us in your box of knowledge. ..The only way to figure out if my
>box
>of knowledge does not accommodate describing DQ is to compare our different
>"boxes of knowledge."
>
>dmb chimes in:
>While I'd agree that there is no great box judge in the sky, it seems
>pretty
>clear that Pirsig is including some things that don't work in Matt's box.
>If
>we can say that Matt's parameters run through the West from Plato to Rorty,
>then we can say that Pirsig's box includes that, goes back a little further
>into the pre-Socratics, goes east to Zen, to Sanskrit, the Vedas, American
>Indian mysticism, philosophical mysiticsm and the perennial philosophy
>which
>roughly includes all that, it seems clear that Matt has a relatively small
>box. To make matters worse, in the broader perspective, he's coming from
>the
>box that is worst for accomodating Dynamic Quality...
>
>Matt explained his box to Marsha:
>For instance, you are right, much contemporary thought in the West is
>infected with the idea that "everything is a social construction" (a
>Foucaultian idea) or "all awareness is linguistic" (Wilfrid Sellars'
>formulation of the same thing). Many would claim that such philosophies
>block out the possibility of DQ. I have spent a lot of time claiming that,
>not only does it not, but that the way I describe DQ is better than the
>way,
>
>say, the traditional, mainline Pirsigian does....
>
>dmb interjects:
>I think your description of DQ has very little to do with what Pirsig is
>saying, and I suppose its because you have a very tight box. I guess it
>seems better to you because it fits into some ideas you already have, but
>how "the undifferentiated aesthetic continuum" or the "undivided,
>pre-intellectual reality" becomes, in your pragmatic hands, "a compliment
>after the fact" must be one of the most profound mysteries I've ever
>encountered. On this point, I think you may be guilty of intellectual
>vandalism. You've taken the carborator out of Pirsig's bike, smashed it
>into
>the shape exhaust pipe and called it an improvement. I'm not saying this is
>part of an insurance scam. I'm just saying that it looks to me like you're
>handling the parts in a way that reveals your misconceptions and those lead
>to "improvements" that just don't work. And I think Marsh is quite right.
>They can't work within your box. Pirsig's inclusion of non-Western sources
>was a necessity.
>
>Matt continued: .................................For one thing, I think
>Pirsig's claim about DQ is that everyone already has a connection with it,
>that there is no way to really "block" it out. I think the distinction
>between "blocking" DQ and being open to it really just pans out to people
>who are not open to change in their beliefs on the one side and people who
>are on the other. As long as you are open and inquisitive, I don't see how
>one could be blocked from Dynamic Quality. And really, that's the most
>important part, isn't it?
>
>dmb disagrees:
>This is what I'm talking about. You've reduced the primary empirical
>reality
>to openmindedness. That's just not it, Matt. Its simply the wrong idea and
>its the wrong idea about the MOQ's most central idea. You really gotta put
>some hinges on that box, mabye even take a wall out. DQ is to be
>indentified
>with religious mysticism, not curiosity or positive assessments or anything
>so obvious to common sense. We don't have to try to "Block" DQ. We do that
>so habitually and so automatically that it can take years of practice just
>to stop doing it. That's what meditatiion is all about, making the mind
>quiet in order to experience a different type of consciousness, one where
>the distinctions between subject and object, mind and matter etc, do not
>exist. See, undivided and pre-intellectual mean the same thing. That's what
>unmediated refers to as well. Pirsig and other describe it a million
>different ways, but it all boils down to no-mind. I'm all for
>openmindedness. It just happens to have nothing to do with DQ, you parts
>smasher you.
>
>
>
>
>MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
>Mail Archives:
>Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
>Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
>MD Queries -
>
>To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
>http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
>
_________________________________________________________________
FREE pop-up blocking with the new MSN Toolbar – get it now!
http://toolbar.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200415ave/direct/01/
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries -
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sun Jan 23 2005 - 17:11:45 GMT