Clark (clark@netsites.net)
Mon, 23 Feb 1998 19:47:19 +0100
Keith,
I don't think hamburgers were what Diana had in mind when she said
that
Dynamic Quality may be simply betterness. Although we could certainly
start
with a hamburger, or for that matter any of it ingredients, and wind up
with a discussion of the limits of our knowledge of the universe.
I know that I should wait until I have re-read ZMM and Lila in the
light
of your comments before I enter the fray but that wouldn't be any fun.
I am not sure that all of this talk about not being able to understand
reality because we are a part of it is right. I would be interested to
hear
your explanation of why that is so. Just saying it doesn't make it so.
I can see a somewhat weak analogy in the case of the computers we are
using. I feel sure, if it hasn't already been done, that a computer
could
be programmed to understand itself, to repair itself (medicine), and
even
build baby computers. It could also develop a whole world view of
computers
including, or maybe beginning, with the original Greek computer group
and
working up the line of computer philosophy to the present understanding
of
the position of computers in the universe.
You can say that computers have an overriding intelligence that is
capable of programming this information in them, but so do we. We have
Dynamic Quality which continually pushes us in the direction of greater
understanding.
It should be obvious whether we accept all of the science or not, that
there is a force in the evolution of the universe that continually
nudges
the physical world in the direction of greater information content. This
force is what I look upon as Dynamic Quality. If we simply look upon
Dynamic Quality as a synonym for Eastern Mysticism, or the Way, then we
have not made any advance with the concept of the Metaphysics of
Quality. I
think the idea of the force toward greater information content is what
Diana had in mind with her "betterness".
I agree that the "Conceptually Unknown" probably cannot be fully
captured
by language, but I believe that it can be by a combination of language
and
symbols when the riddle of the universe is finally fully unraveled.
You can object that we will never be able to understand the beginning
and
perhaps the end but I say that it is premature to make such a statement.
At
our present level of ignorance we are not in a position to make a firm
statement about many things, and certainly not about that. If, at this
level of understanding, Mysticism soothes our anxieties then well and
good.
It may well be that that is where we will wind up but as of now I am not
prepared to accept it.There are many mysteries out there, but many
mysteries have been explained in the last hundred years and I expect
many
more will be explained in the next hundred. As of now the two slit
experiment looks like the hand of God but so did many things previously
that are commonplace now. Quantum Electrodynamics opened up many vistas
to
us as well as Chaos Theory. I feel sure that Quantum Chromodynamics will
become less mysterious in the next hundred years.
My interpretation of QM is simply the pressure of the evolution of the
universe on our subconscious minds (among many other somewhat ephemeral
things) which causes us to select from our field of awareness those
things
which are compatible. In my view everyone experiences QM at their level
of
capability and always have. This is what accounts for the Many Truths
idea.
It is getting late and I have a cold and my drink is empty and the bed
is
looking better all the time so I am going to knock off this fun and
allow
my Dynamic Quality to function unimpeded. You sound like a thoughtful
person, I am just literal minded and can't help it. Ken Clark
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