Magnus Berg (qmgb@bull.se)
Thu, 11 Sep 1997 09:53:44 +0100
Diana McPartlin wrote:
>
> Magnus Berg wrote:
>
> > I don't think it's any difference between what we usually
> > call a society, and a society of cells.
>
> Well I don't have any good reason for why there should be a difference.
> However, if we consider a body to be social value and a cell to be
> social value then how far back do we take it? Everything is a society of
> something else, right back to atoms, no?
>
> If this is the case then why should the intellectual level emerge from
> the social value of the body? Why not from the social value of the atom?
> Or, as I suggested, from the social value of the community?
>
> Magnus wrote:
> > * Social patterns of value combines organic patterns of value
> > into something more valuable than the sum of its parts.
>
> Perhaps your answer is this but I don't see how you can measure it.
>
> Sorry if I've missed something here, I'm just thinking aloud.
The answer to that would be the part about subdividing societies.
* A society can be recursively divided into smaller societies until
the parts no longer can perform its function without the society.
The larger society in each step uses the function - the organic
property - of the organs within it. It does not care whether they
in turn are societies or not.
In Lila, Pirsig describes the cell as two organs. The dynamic and
fragile
core and the protective shield. They are organs to the cell-society.
Separately, they are inorganic.
>
> Magnus wrote:
> > * Inorganic patterns of value that can perform a function for
> > a society are more valuable than other inorganic patterns.
> > This discrete criteria marks the division between inorganic
> > and organic patterns of value.
>
> Organic vs inorganic huh.....I have always thought that the difference
> between inorganic and organic was that organic patterns had the ability
> to reproduce themselves.
I did too, Lila tends to give that impression. But I also think that
the society of robots I mentioned in an earlier post *is* a society,
i.e. social patterns of value. And they can't reproduce themselves,
they are organs anyway, to *that* society.
This is also why I never use the word biology when I talk about
organic
patterns.
> And in an earlier post, Magnus wrote:
> > If a society needs a chair, it must have a chairmaker in case the
> > chair breaks. in that case, chairs would be organic patterns of
> > value, which should make us a little more careful about what we
> > say about the organic level, i.e. not set it equal to what we
> > call 'life' and so on.
>
> Actually I would have said that the organic level is life and a chair is
> inorganic. But maybe it depends on whether you look at a chair in
> isolation or in terms of its social function.
That's exactly what I think! Social patterns uses the function of its
organs.
> I'm starting to think that all this confusion (well I'm confused) is
> arising from unclear definitions of what we mean by values and levels
> and, in particular, what it means when we say that each level depends on
> / emerges from / rests on / builds upon / is composed of the one below.
Yes, I think Lila only describes the different level's manifestations
we
can see here on earth. But they are only examples, not the definition.
And
since we are talking about static patterns, a definition should be
possible.
Magnus
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