From: SQUONKSTAIL@aol.com
Date: Sat Jul 12 2003 - 23:07:11 BST
Squonk,
(I have replaced the subject line, since this is not about racism.)
sq: No problem.
[Squonk:] The MoQ, however, describes intellect and intelligence as a
relationship between DQ and Static patterns, and as DQ is undefined, there is no
definition of intellect outside the relationship. The relationship is derived from
an undifferentiated aesthetic continuum.
So you have decided to improve Pirsig's MOQ by subsuming ethics under
aesthetics, like Oscar Wilde? I thought you disapproved of such improvements.
sq: In SODV it is stated that DQ is a stream of Quality events, and DQ is
compared to The it of Zen in the art of archery and FSC Northrop's
undifferentiated aesthetic continuum.
In any case, the MOQ describes *everything* as a relationship between DQ and
Static patterns. So how do you distinguish intellect from everything else? You
said in your previous post that "There are no subjects and objects in the
MOQ". But Pirsig says (Ch. 29):
"What the Metaphysics of Quality adds to James's pragmatism and radical
empiricism is the idea that the primal reality from which subjects and objects
sprang is *value*."
Note that he is not denying the existence of subjects and objects, only
noting that they are derived existences. *Like everything else*. My claim that the
S/O divide is the start of the independent intellectual level is consistent
with this. It is like saying that the biological level starts with DNA. It
emphatically does not claim that the S/O divide is absolute.
sq: I am sorry Scott, i am confused. I don't understand what you are stating
here? James worked with subjects and objects. If James could have used the MoQ
he would have been able to see that creations of the intellect have value as
their source. But James is not here and he cannot see it.
Organic chemistry is based upon the carbon atom. I suppose we could say that
carbon chemistry is the point the organic level began?
[Squonk:] The derivation began at a time no one can identify, but appears,
from linguistic evidence, to have begun with social ritual.
Pirsig says it started with finding better ways to survive.
sq: If no one can identify the time, don't expect me to state that no one can
identify the time, and then go on to identify it! I am quite happy with the
suggestion that intelligence began with finding better ways to survive.
Surviving may have been a social pattern/ritual anyway? Social co-operation is a good
way to keep the biological patterns of animals alive.
As sure as eggs is eggs, that's a long time before ancient Greece.
[Squonk] Thus, using language to symbolise the wonder of social aesthetic is
not social aesthetic - it is intellect making its first foray into Human life.
In Hindu mythology there is the claim that language developed out of music. I
think this is a great notion, though I don't know how to confirm it in any
way. I think you are doing the same sort of thing here. You have made aesthetics
into a god, so you see everything in aesthetic terms.
sq: Aesthetic is all about Quality.
My question, though, is when did people start identifying their thinking as
originating in themselves SO THAT they could wonder at social aesthetic (or
survival or anything else) and not simply be driven along. As long as that hasn't
happened, it is meaningless to try to ascribe intellect as an independent MOQ
level, as one that can be in conflict with the social level (see Pirsig's
quote below). Looking at the difference between the language of Homer and that of
Plato, one can see that it started happening about 500 BC in the West.
Similar comparisons, where we can make them (that is, where we have written
records), show a similar development in other cultures, for example between the
Upanishads and the earlier Vedas. Here's Pirsig, Lila, ch. 24:
"The doctrine of scientific disconnections from social morals goes all the
way back to the ancient Greek belief that thought is independent of society,
that it stands alone, born without parents. Ancient Greeks such as Socrates and
Pythagoras paved the way for the fundamental principle behind science: that
truth stands independently of social opinion."
sq: I don't have a problem with this. All i am saying is that intellect
evolved for a long time before someone created the aesthetic that ideas had no
parents. That's our mythos.
Mathematics and geometry are aesthetic creations - art. Any mathematician
will tell you this. You are a mathematician? You should have a take on this
Scott?
[Squonk:] Skutvik never discusses art or aesthetics - he does not have the
conceptual vocabulary to handle it. He does not have the conceptual vocabulary
to handle it because his own definitions negate them. It is little wonder when
it comes to the East, Skutvik blithely talks of, 'these people' as if they are
over there somewhere in a box.
Translation: You think only art and aesthetics is important, or maybe you
wish to redefine DQ as Art. So anyone who discusses things in a larger context is
a bad person. That is bad logic. On a more specific note, could you unpack
the claim that "his own definitions negate them"? I suspect that it is only your
own definitions that cause you to say this.
- Scott
sq: A sense of Quality is important don't you feel? I have the distinct
impression that you have a far better sense of it than Skutvik, but that could be
taken as a bit of arse licking and cajoling on my part.
Anything good is beautiful. Intellectual ideas are beautiful too, and in my
view Mr. Pirsig's work and the MoQ is more beautiful than anything i have read
from Skutvik. Why am i so castigated for this?
All the best,
squonk
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