Hello.
This is my introduction to the focus group and I want to express my
appreciation to the posters for the strength of mind exposed in the October
archives. You folks have covered and provided a great deal of information in
the process of discussing MF 5th Level.
I do have some disturbing thoughts to share on the underlying models
expressed throughout the threads. The thoughts, at least, are disturbing to
me! In my reading of Robert M. Pirsig's works on the Metaphysics of Quality,
I have not encountered any teleological approach by Robert M. Pirsig to
answering big questions. The discussions' postings all seem to have a set of
suppositions that the MOQ was developed/discovered with a purpose to define
the 'next big thing'. I would like to suggest that this idea or MEME
virus of the mind) is an artifact created by each of our own experiences.
We want a happy ending or to be able to predict what happens next. Please
bear with me for a few short moments and then, hopefully the underlying
concepts that are bothering me will be exposed through the use of the MOQ.
Language is the current medium of communicating and as such understanding
it(language) presents a formidable barrier to accurate and clear expression
of the mental processes we each undertake in the dialogue of the MOQ. I
defer to Steven Pinker in his "The Language Instinct, How the mind creates
language" for a much longer and very precise description of language and its
place in the human condition. The short version is "Language is a site
specific suborgan or system in the physical brain." Language does not
consist of "English, or Spanish or Bilt!thong" but of a universal grammar
that preexists the audible word in each brain. The language connection to
MOQ was traversed by Robert M. Pirsig in his pursuit and use of rhetoric.
Rhetoric is a tool with which to approach understanding of the MOQ but it
is not without is flaws as a tool. If we confuse language with MOQ than
examination of language with MOQ raises the fallacy of using a tool to build
the very tool in use, not unlike Escher's Hand drawing a Hand sketch. I
assert that language can usefully be examined by using MOQ because MOQ
preexists in the creation of the "mind or intellect" 'before' language.
Internal examination of language is necessary in my opinion to show the
underlying structures or bias with which I view events like the MOQ and to
understand what bothers me about trying to communicate about MOQ. Language
is a sign post or pointer to the MOQ, but using language to 'define' or
elucidate the MOQ results in a very uncomfortable feeling of non or not
Quality. Language clusters ideation in groups of threes, and utilizes tone,
intonation, s p a c ing, volume and pitch(as examples) to convey meaning.
Language is mutable and can undergo radical shifts and changes in a
generation. MOQ tracks and clarifies the twisty path of language, the
obverse is not true of language for MOQ. Applying the inherent models of
language to MOQ results in confusion and internal mental pain for me, so I
strive weakly to avoid using language models to examine MOQ.
Now what else is really bothering me is the tone or 'direction' of the
discussions assuming that MOQ "has to define a next level". Teleological
thinking or belief is a world view of systematic and continuous progression
toward some ultimate and not necessarily defined goal. I find nothing in the
MOQ that requires abstraction or bucketizing of the known universe into
binaries or ternaries or other 'aries with some subsequent outcome or
destination goal as an objective. What I do find is a solid and consistent
framework of idea modalities which are both humanly reassuring and very
capable when applied outside the mental cages which observation, belief,
experience, introspection and intellect contrive to build up as obstacles or
explanations to the impulse to quality recognition inherent in each of us.
Yeah, I believe I know quality when I see it. :)
Thank you. Of course the ideas and opinions expressed here-in are the sole
responsibility of the author.
bens
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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