From: Scott R (jse885@spinn.net)
Date: Sat Jul 12 2003 - 19:37:46 BST
Squonk,
[Squonk:] If an individual, or group of individuals hold a socially approved definition of what intellect or intelligence is, and if that definition is culturally narrow, then the said group have arbitrarily discriminated between cultures.
Yes. So the question is, is the claim that the S/O divide marks the intellectual level culturally narrow? (First, a clarification. The claim does NOT assert that all intellectual activity is S/O. It only claims that the intellectual level, as a MOQ level, is reasoning, thinking, etc. that has the capacity to be in conflict with the social level, and that it first acquired that capacity when subjects were distinguished from objects, so that objects *as* objects could be thought about in general terms).
In Western culture, that origin of the independent intellectual level can be seen to have occurred in Ancient Greece, with the pre-Socratics, i.e., after Homer. Did it occur elsewhere? Clearly it did. For example, from Chandrakirti's "The Entry into the Middle Way", para. 45:
"[The Yogacarin asserts] Where no object exists, no subject can be found, and therefore the bodhisattva understands that the triple world is merely mind."
(Note: Chandrakirti will be arguing against this idealist position, as well as its materialist opposite, but the point is that the argument was over subjects and objects, so there had to be an S/O divide.)
There is a cultural difference between East and West, of course, in that Eastern philosophers who argued for transcending the S/O divide got a lot more respect than they did in the West, but that they had to argue shows that it existed.
[Squonk:] Further, if the definitions regard morally related evolutionary levels, then the discrimination is along lines of moral superiority.
Yes. But I do not know of any existing culture that does not have an independent intellectual level, which is the only criterion for claiming moral superiority. If you know of one, let me know.
[Squonk:] Its not rocket science is it?
No. It is much harder than rocket science. In rocket science you know you are wrong when the rocket fails to hit its target. But in this case we are dealing with conflicting definitions, and interpretations built on interpretations. None of us were there when the intellect began to separate from the social. So we are making our best guesses, not only in coming to our own conclusions, but also in evaluating the conclusions of others. IT IS FOR THIS REASON that to make accusations of racism is reprehensible. The accusation came by piling assumption on assumption (and above I have shown why those assumptions are invalid), to accuse a fellow poster of a social crime. Doing so is an intellectual crime.
[Squonk:] Thus, the Skutvik doctrine asserts an over active office clerk is morally superior to Confucius.
"Thus" only if your assumptions are correct, and they are not.
(I am responding to the remainder of your post separately, since I want to separate argumentation over when the intellectual level starts from this issue of racism).
- Scott
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