HEY FOCS:
There are lots of labels for the thing Pirsig calls SOM. Scientific
materialism, scientific objectivity, subtance metaphysics and the thing Ken
Wilber calls the Enlightenment paradigm all describe the same world-view. If
we go off in search of SOM headquarters or try to track down its' agents,
we'll only waste time. SOM is a set of underlying assumptions about the
nature of reality that we share in common. Its a collective, cultural thing.
More specifically, its a particular stage in our cultural development. As
Wilber describes it, our present time is know as POST-MODERN because it's
largely a response to SOM, mostly a response to the MODERN Enlightenment
paradigm.
The MOQ is about transcending scientific objectivity, but it's certainly not
intended to un-do the Enlightenment. That would contradict the whole
evolutionary thrust of things, like leap-frogging over an entire level. The
Enlightenment and scientific knowlege is good and we ought not reject it.
Instead, its supposed to be brought along into the new metaphysic, enfolded
and incorpoarated. The MOQ seeks to transcend scientific objectivity with an
expanded rationality. The new paradigm is gonna need scientific rationality
just as molecules need atoms and intellect needs language.
Unfortunately, too much of the Postmodern response has been reactionary or
escapist. Pirsig's warns about the various forms of degeneracy that mark the
poor responses to SOM. Reactionaries represent the anti-Modern wish to
return to an earlier stage in history. In an orgy of nostalgic yearning,
they long for the time before the enlightenment, they wish to return to the
mythical or magical world of our pre-industrial ancestors. We see all kinds
of fascism, fundamentalism, and fanaticism in the name of restoring those
old-fashioned values. We can see all kinds of intentional irrationalities in
the Romantic movements too. There was an anti-Modern, an anti-technology
"feel" to the hippie movement as well. But there is no going back. That's
just degeneracy.
SOM has roots that go back nearly as far as recorded history, but the
Scientific Revolution is what really gave it the shape we recognize today.
Remember Socrates? Way back then he was among the first to openly choose
intellectual principles over the laws of his culture. He was asserting his
own individual independence, but he was also marking the independence of the
intellect itself. He was an extraordinary guy who was way ahead of his time,
so much that it took until the 17th century before science really took off.
Thinking freely in prior times would likely get you killed, or worse.
With all this talk about the nastiness of SOM we're in danger of forgetting
that th Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution sure seemed like a good
idea at the time. (No one ever expects the Inquistion!) The scientific
movement was not just about discovery and exploration, it was also about
making new distinctions. Culture, Nature and Individual people were being
more highly differentiated from each other. You could say that it was a
process of infusing the culture with intellectual values in a broader sense.
A class of thinkers independent from the church was a new thing then.
The positive side of the Enlightenment is that new social forms were born
out of these newly refined distinctions; Democracy, Human Rights, the end of
slavery, the end of torture and other cruelties, and health science has
doubled the average lifespan. (Not to mention going to the moon, splitting
the atom, or mapping our DNA.) There is little doubt that scietific
objectivity is better than the thing it replaced, but now it needs to be
replaced. SOM's work is done, but it lingers too long. It has become a drag
on evolution, mostly because its seen as producing such solid, irrefutable
and final truths. Yes, science is supposed to be opened ended, but
objectivity is a very rigid thing, no?
This is where the negative side of SOM comes into the picture. It was great
to differentiate social and intellecual values. It was great to make all
these new distinctions, it was the creation of a new world, an invention
more than a discovery. But its gone too far past distinct, now we are
dis-associated and alienated.
And I think Pirsig chooses the label "SOM" because the distinction between
subjects and objects is at the heart of this disassociation. Its like the
mother of all dehumanizing dualisms. The subject/object split will always
lead to the mind/matter split. Hell, it practically the definition of
subjects and objects! The view from the "inside" is our consciousness, the
view from the "outside" is our brain. We can see why this is also called
substance metaphysics in this case. Scientific objectivity can really go to
town when it comes to analyzing a brain, because they can deal with grey
MATTER. When science tries to get an "objective" picture of my mind, it
fails - and science freely admits this shortcoming. And the metaphysics
behind scientific objectivity comes up short on these issues too. I mean,
even MODERN philosophers who discuss these things still have to ask those
questions; How does mind arise from matter? Is mind in the brain? How is
consciousness connected to matter? On the negative side, science is pretty
worthless with any reality that isn't physical. And physicality is just one
facet of ourselves, the most obvious and least interesting aspects of
reality. Scientific objectivity only fails on the issues THAT ACTUALLY
MATTER!
See how SOM dis-connects us from ourselves? Alienation? You bet? We can't
even locate our consciousness. We can't even find the center of our own
awareness. We've lost our minds.
And all this talk about subjects and objects reminds me of the question that
launched a couple of trips; Where is quality? Is it in the subject, in the
eye of the beholder? Or is it in the object itself? Round and round and
round we go....
Thanks for your time. DMB
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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