In a message dated 5/13/00 4:23:30 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
miv1@barak-online.net writes:
> Magnus wrote:
> >The same goes for ants and bees in their societies, and I do want to call
> them
> >societies. They might not have schools or churches, but they do have an
egg
> >nursery, and a well drilled defense army. None of those are intellectually
> >designed, but they have evolved because they have social value.
>
> We argue weather an ant hill is a social structure or not, but according to
> some prevailing theories of evolution (notably Lynn Margulis's) every
> multicellular organism is a symbiotic colony of ancient seperate cellular
> organisms. More then that, the cells themselves are communities of bacteria
> which have adapted to living together as single organisms.
> Some of us may dismiss this example and say: "but this pattern clearly
> belongs to the biological realm..." Well does it?
>
Of course, ultimately, the question is not whether a bee's social system is
part of the MOQ Social Level. It's whether this idea improves our developing
sense of Quality any further. Specifically, does the concept of an
arthropodic social system help us develop analogies that help us solve our
human social problems and the problems created by the Giant. I know it's
human-centric, but this is a side argument that draws us away from the
issues. It does beg the question about the continuous/discrete nature of the
levels, but it's really a different topic. I am not arguing with you Magnus!
But you bring up a valid point about people trying to stay in one level, and
then you get stuck in the questioning the depth of the social level and if
bees manage to fit in it. Bees send out their fighters in times of war...so
do we. But that does not create a 'truthful' analogy that bees are a social
system that improves our Quality. Again, I'm not arguing that it's with you,
I believe that it WAS a DQ attempt at Social Quality. BUT, you must realize,
that it ultimately failed. It was a dead end. I suppose you could use it,
analogously, as a reason for the failure of communism...too static of an
economic mode. But again, it does not solve our problems with the Giant. I
like Pirsig's defining of the Inorganic/Biological Levels as "Objective" and
Social/intellectual levels as "Subjective." The limited subjective Qualities
of bees, to me, shows just a bunch of low Dynamic Quality. I know, I know a
lot of people don't like how the scapel appears to slice here.
> "The tests of truth are logical consistency, agreement with experience, and
> economy of explanation." (LILA Corgi ed. p. 121)
>
> Does Prsigs hirarchic division of the four realms of quality of the MOQ
i.e.
> : Organic, biologic, social and intellecual REALLY meet with these tests?
>
> I think one of the great achievements of Pirsig is the clarity of his
> description of the four seperate realms. One of the weaknesses of his
> theory, is the hirarchic order of these realms, and the implication that
> they arise one out of the other.
Continuous or discrete again. Anyone change there mind??? I have at least
three times.
If we lend Lynn Margulis's theory any
> weight (and there are significant reasons to do so which we need not get
> into here, but it satisfies every test of truth according to Pirsig), then
> we must ask ourselves how and if the complexity of society differ from the
> complexity of an ecological system? of symbiossis? Why must we insist that
> they are different? Is it logically consistent?
>
> Are Social Giants unique to human culture? the example of the Chimps
clearly
> says they are not.
>
> I think the boundaries are not clear.
>
> According to Pirsigs tests of truth, I would say the complete seperation of
> MOQ's realms does not have logical conssistency, and it does not meet with
> experience.
I think the unclear idea here is: the test of 'truth' is our only test of
what is Good. The MOQ has replaced it with what is 'best' is our primary
test of what is Good. You see our perspective on the matter continually
changes especially when new information come in. I actually like broad
generalities of Pirisg. It lets our individual 'truths' fight it out in this
Forum to try to see who's outlook is Best. We are the gladiators of the MOQ.
All our outside experiences outside the ideas we have in common (the
writings of Pirsig) are all "THE TRUTH" to us and we need to test our
strength in battle to see if these ideas we hold dear are "THE GOOD."
The caveat, of course, is the same as with the SOLAQI theory. The test of
Truth is the only test allowed in SOM thinking and thus the majority of the
Intellectual Level. And it is GOOD that this is so; we wouldn't have made it
this far without it.
So here's my "truth". The giant exists in the same way that SOM exists. To
some it's a strawman, and to some it's the the most important thing that
keeps our society going, and to some it is the most deadly thing to the
future of our society. And I believe that ultimately, it is none of these
and all of these things. The test, though, is always is how useful our
'truths' are and how they improve our Quality.
I got more on the giant. but it's 6:00am and i haven't gone to bed yet.
xcto
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:03:21 BST