Glenn and MOF group.
PREFACE
The below was written before Glenn's Monday post and Matthew
Ketchum's entry (welcome Matthew), so there will be a few
bracketed comments.
On 5 Feb 00, at 5:28, Glenn Bradford wrote:
> Philip has suggested a provocotive topic and I expect this to be a
> lively month.
> So I'm glad I didn't go first because I was going to suggest (like Bo)
> that Pirsig coined the term Subject/Object Metaphysics but luckily Diana
> looked it up and sure enough the term has been kicking around for quite
> awhile in the philosophy community. But here it is called the
> subject/object dichotomy, and it seems to have far less authority when
> it's called a dichotomy and typed in lowercase. So maybe Pirsig *was*
> the first to suggest it as a metaphysics. Anybody know?
Yes, I think Pirsig was the first to put the bell on the cat. Never
before has a 'new' metaphysics - in this sense - been suggested.
Way back one Doald Palmgren said that Hegel had anticipated
Pirsig in this, but not IMO. Even Aristotle who coined the term yet
at his time the subject-object division was established so his quest
ended there - he saw no deeper layer.
(I notice Matthew's assertion that James and Russell were on to
the same idea. Perhaps, anyway Matthew is right about they not
proceeding from there. Hope to look closer into that post soon )
What drives a person to such an extra-terrestrial height that he is
able to see that the SOM is a "globe in a greater value space"?
It's a riddle, but also the explanation why his vision is so hard to
grasp.
> I've always had a bit of confusion about the term SOM; "you have
> subjects on the one hand and objects on the other". And sometimes the
> next line goes: "and you have nothing else". But other times the next
> line goes: "and the differences between them are irreconcilable". I
> think this comes from an overloading of the word "subject", which is
> sometimes referred to as just another kind of object, and at other times
> to "subjectivity"; but its forgivable that people don't say
> subjectivity/objectivity all the time because it's such a mouthful. I
> was confused enough about this at one point to mildly entertain that
> Pirsig was suggesting SOM had "subjectivity", but this is not the case.
> It would have caused me less trouble if it were just called an Object
> Metaphysics. When he speaks of the gulf between subjects and objects he
> really means the gulf between the subjective and objective, and so here
> he is speaking of the dichotomy.
You are right about Pirsig's "lines" often go in seemingly different
directions. There are instances when he actually calls the SOM a
SUBSTANCE metaphysics. But you see if "metaphysics" is the
deepest level of understanding so deep that no one thinks about it,
but take it for granted, then the subject side to it is real even if it
considered irreal. Exactly as you go on to speak about "intangible
things":
> Of course the counter-argument to this is that the SOM juggernaut
> brainwashes people into believing only in objects, and wispy stuff like
> concepts and emotions are not real.
Right! Not objectively real, but subjectively semi-real.
> So to the believers in SOM, subjects
> and objects ARE everything and now you have your metaphysics back. But I
> ask you, who in this world really believes this? Who actually denies
> having emotions? Who?
Nobody, but as said a metaphysics is the perceptional
prism that forms experience and nobody asks if she or he believes
in it: It's the way the world has been assembled from the beginning.
Nobody denies harbouring emotions - thoughts in general - but
these belongs to the subjective "beyond" domain. The fact that
they as easily can be proved to be EVERYTHING is the
subject-object frustration.
Diana said something very important about us westerners
seeing the reincarnation dogma in the SOM cast. It shows the
depth of the metaphysical undercurrents and what superhuman
effort is requires to really understand. A reciprocal question can be
asked if the Buddhists understand the SOM? From my reading of
Alan Watts way back I remember him claiming exactly that. Now
I understand, before the MOQ his effort was in wain.
> One might say that emotions are a lot different
> from rocks, one might say that emotions are not objective reality, one
> might even admit to feeling that rocks are "realer" than emotions
> (perhaps by some argument that emotions are fickle or unverifiable), but
> who will say emotions are unreal, when everyone has them? Not the
> busdriver. Not the Lila's of the world. Not anyone who didn't go to
> college or university. Not anyone who went to college or university and
> majored in history, literature, anthropology, religion, art, dance,
> music, psychology, sociology, philosophy, foreign languages, political
> science, and business administration. And even physics and mathematics.
> And chemistry. Am I sticking my head out too far here? I don't think so.
Your head is just in the correct position :)!
> But Pirsig isn't always so strident. He doesn't always say that SOM is
> solely a belief in objects. In chapter 9 he suggests SOM can see values
> but "it can't explain [them] worth a damn". This line of thinking makes
> sense to me. But on the prior page he says any constructions outside
> SOM's objective world are unreal. But if you pay values enough mind to
> try to explain them (even though failing), don't you think they're real?
> Conversely, would I bother trying to understand ghosts if I didn't think
> they were real? So his second statement doesn't fly with me. I don't
> think he believes it either. I think he just got carried away with
> himself trying to make SOM the bad guy. I think I could come up with
> more examples of this.
> Diana wrote:
> [SOM is] a social-intellectual split, intellectually we know it's wrong,
> socially we follow it anyway.
I agree with Diana in an extended way. 'Subjectivity' is the social
value par exellance - seen from Intellect - while 'objectivity' is its
own holy grail, but IMO: the whole S/O complex is Intellect. Yet,
we are social value too and - as Diana say - follow it. Great insight
that one.
> It depends on what you mean by SOM. If you mean that SOM has trouble
> understanding subjectivity by employing scientific methods then I agree
> with you.
> If you say the man on the street doesn't believe quality,
> values, and morals are real, then I disagree. Pirsig seems to want to
> make both arguments.
> I always thought Pirsig wrote Lila for people who were classically
> trained in physics, chemistry, computer science or mathematics, because
> surely only people like these, who are or were at one time steeped in
> the study of things far removed from human experience, would have the
> potential to believe subjective stuff were unreal. But even this is
> far-fetched. The worst thing you can say about the hard sciences is that
> they ignore the human experience. They have nothing to contribute in
> that arena.
Correct. The human (subjective) experience must fake a "scientific"
attitude to be taken seriously. Look to psychiatry. It is - as Pirsig
points to - part of the cultural immune system, but woks its head
off to sound like "medicine" and screw things up considerably in
the process.This insight is just "bull's eye" and I often wonder: Is
"humanism" dependent upon self-delusion? Or, would it all become
"saner" if the psyho hoax is defrocked? Another topic perhaps?
(My comment above was written before your "addendum" message
of Monday, I think we agree totally. My special scapegoat is
psychiatry, but your history lesson says it all.)
> They would if they could but they can't so they don't. And
> the worst outcome from such a training is that the trained will become
> dehumanized and lack a moral base. But even this is rare. Most likely
> such people, if they develop problems at all, feel a sense of futility
> and disconnectedness from humanity because there is no bridge that
> connects their discipline to the common world they mill around in.
> Pirsig ends up saying this last bit, but he thinks everyone feels this
> way (when it's really about 2% of the population that does) and he
> thinks it's SOM to blame (a belief no one or next to no one holds). Is
> there any need to wonder why Lila didn't have the popular appeal of ZMM?
You have a point here Glenn. Yet if the 2% would have admitted
defeat that would have been plenty, but the same percentage are
ironically those I refer to: the MOQ hunters.
> But having said all this you can still read between the lines and get a
> lot from Lila and I do like the book. I'd have preferred that "the evil
> thing" not be positioned as a rival metaphysics but simply a way of
> thinking that develops from classical training, in particular the
> scientific method. For it's this kind of training that makes clear the
> great divide between the objective and subjective; and MOQ, with its
> static levels and evolution by dynamic quality, is the bridge over this
> divide these people are looking for.
Nothing less than a full scale attack would have done for Pirsig in
his opening move. No break-out from the SOM is possible unless
the metaphysical ground is shifted. Look to Struan's post in the
MD where he says that a value-centered position is forwarded by
many prominent thinkers. He is right. Remember the "value
project" by the anthropologist Kluckhohn and Pirsig's words ...."
with such a lead balloon for a vehicle there was no way he could
succeed....". No, if the MOQ is drawn into the SOM premises it
does not stand a chance. We must harp upon the initial
fundamental shift relentlessly.
Thanks to you Glenn and thanks to everyone who has read.
Bo.
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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