From: Wim Nusselder (wim.nusselder@antenna.nl)
Date: Thu Oct 09 2003 - 22:41:06 BST
Dear Bo,
You indeed got me wrong again 9 Oct 2003 09:54:05 +0200:
'[the intellectual level] Not a value??? This strongly indicates a detached
mind-intellect where the rest of experience exist as symbols, thoughts or
ideas - which is old SOM.'
I have no idea what you mean with 'a detached mind-intellect where the rest
of experience exists as symbols, thoughts or ideas'. Mind = intellectual
level, according to Pirsig (in 'Lila's Child') and I see nothing wrong with
that. Detaching that from 'the rest of experience' and saying that that rest
of experience consists of symbols, thoughts and/or ideas seems very strange
to me. If the mind is anything it is symbols/thoughts/ideas (that stand for
the rest of experience AND for parts of itself, when it symbolizes/thinks
about/forms ideas about symbols/thoughts/ideas).
So that can't have been what I meant.
I wrote 'The intellectual level ... is not a value but the sum total of the
patterns of value of a specific type'.
Would that be more acceptable to you if you read 'The intellectual level ...
is not A value but the sum total of the PATTERNS OF value of a specific
type'?
The intellectual level definitely IS value (just like the whole rest of
experience). I had problems with limiting it to just A value in your
definition of the intellectual level as 'the value of seeing
symbol-manipulation as different from the rest of experience'.
You continue with:
'people of old used language [manipulated symbols] without "knowing" that
words are symbols standing for
something else. Thus what heralded Intellect was the DISCOVERY of this
schism. ... And Jaynes' bi-cameral theory is a very good description of how
this inside-out-turn happened.'
I agree that before say the 3rd century BC people didn't know that they were
manipulating symbols, that using words didn't imply direct contact with,
power over and participation in reality. This bi-cameral mind theory may
(from what I read on this list) very well be a good description of how these
people's minds 'worked'.
I agree that thinking about thinking, knowing that the 'something else' that
words symbolize differs from the symbols, knowing your own thoughts from
those of others (or from those of Gods), did mean a huge change.
But ... I still disagree that this change was THE change from social
patterns of value to intellectual patterns of value. Even before the 3rd
century BC the 'standing for' relation in the patterns of value was there,
even if people didn't know it for what it was. They definitely did
experience something different when running into a tiger, when running into
a human being 'dancing' a tiger and when hearing someone else shrieking: 'A
TIGER!'.
The patterns of value maintained by copying (symbolic) rationales (e.g.
associating a strong tiger with a healthy people and therefore wanting to be
like a tiger) WITHOUT knowing a symbol for a symbol were not essentially
different from the patterns of value maitained by copying rationales WITH
the knowledge that they were 'only' manipulating symbols.
How can 'experience that a symbol is different from and YET LIKE SOME OTHER
EXPERIENCE' evade your understanding? 'Is different from and yet like' is
just a redescription of 'stands for', the element you liked in 'it is the
"standing for" relationship that characterizes 4th level experience'.
With friendly greetings,
Wim
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