Keith A. Gillette (gillette@tahc.state.tx.us)
Mon, 23 Mar 1998 04:55:35 +0100
Returning after long absence to justifying the belief that Reality = Quality.
At 7:58 PM +0000 3/2/98, Bodvar Skutvik wrote:
>Sun, 1 Mar 1998 01:00:54 -0600
>Keith A. Gillette wrote:
>
>> To my understanding of MoQ, Pirsig makes exactly one ontological assertion:
>> Reality is Quality, that is, value. (See diagram, Chapter 20, *ZMM*, or the
>> concluding paragraph of Chapter 7 of *Lila*: "Quality is morality. Make no
>> mistake about it. They're identical. And if Quality is the primary reality
>> of the world then that means morality is also the primary reality of the
>> world. The world is primarily a moral order."
>>
>> My question: What is our justification for accepting this?
>
>Keith!
>Your question is what LILA was written to answer!
Indeed. My problem is that the examples Pirsig uses in Lila beg the
question of whether Reality = Quality. I'm not arguing that MoQ doesn't
have great explanatory power or that the reasons Pirsig gives aren't
intuitively compelling. I guess the real underlying question is: What
grounds should justify our beliefs? While persuasive, I don't think the
type of arguments Pirsig gives us in *Lila* ("look, it explains x,y,z
better") are sufficient justification.
>Breaks of this magnitude faces the troubles of not being
>provable from the system they left. Einstein's relativity was a break
>with several tenets of classical physics, and only Bertram Russel -
>besides Einstein himself - claimed that he understood it. Quantum
>Physics is still worse, it is a break with reason so to say, and not
>even the founders professed to understand their own assertions. What
>is the justification for accepting these theories?
They make claims that are empirically verifiable. Both Relativity and
Quantum Mechanics make precise predictions which can be tested to disprove
the respective theories. To me, that's convincing justification for
believing the theories, as I find empirical "proof" of this sort sufficient
justification for the belief in question. (What justifies that belief is
harder to say!)
>The MOQ is a metaphysical equivalent. It works, it explains experience
>marvellously well and solves the mind/matter riddles, but a proof that
>the SOM can accept is impossible. I have called it the mother of all
>relativity (Doug Renselle would possibly call it the "Schrödinger Cat"
>of metaphysics?). Some of us has drawn the parallel to Gödel's
>Theorem: no all-embracing system can prove itself. Really Keith; what
>is the proof for the Mind/Matter metaphysics, or the justification for
>accepting it? No mocking or scorn, I see your point and would like to
>hear your opinion.
I'm not arguing there is a proof for Mind/Matter metaphysics. It's accepted
as a given by the majority in our culture right now, though. That fact
doesn't make it "true" but it does make it uncontroversial in most circles,
and therefore excuses it from explicit justification. MoQ does not have the
same luxury. It's not a majority-held opinion. Therefore, it needs some
justification for its assertions for it to gain a foothold. I'd prefer if
at least some of the justifications given didn't assume the conclusion.
Also, I question the analogy between the scientific theories of Relativity
and Quantum Mechanics and the metaphysical theories of Mind/Matter and MoQ.
As I stated above, it seems that the former theories have verifiable
consequences which follow from their (unprovable) assumptions. That is,
they are falsifiable. Does the Metaphysics of Quality follow the same
pattern? I'm not sure. I want to explore this a bit more.
In his recent "Classical SOM science." post, Doug Renselle offered the
following analogy between the primitives of scientific and mathematical
theories and Reality = Quality in MoQ.
At 9:00 AM -0500 3/14/98, Doug Renselle wrote:
>Like SOM, MoQ has an unknown/indefinable which it calls DQ. DQ is just
>like mass, length, and time. We can describe it (the quality event, the
>edge of now, direct experience, archetypal change, surprise, etc.).
>But damn it, we cannot define it! And SOM classical science denies its
>existence!
I found Doug's exposition of the role of Dynamic Quality within MoQ being
the same as the role of mass, length, time within physics very compelling.
Having read it and undertanding the problem in those terms, I have
suspicion that Bodvar, Hugo, et. al. were trying to tell me this very same
thing in their replies to my post: That the identity of Quality with
Reality must be accepted as a "given" in the formal system of MoQ. Part of
me can see this, but part of me still looks for some further justification,
preferably the possibility of empirical verification on either the original
premise of Reality = Quality or on some consequence of that premise within
the MoQ.
Last time I argued that the only place I could find Pirsig making a
positive argument for Reality = Quality was in the "between the horns"
section of *ZMM*. Since then, I've found another argument for the identity.
In Chapter 5 of *Lila* (pages 75-76 of the Bantam paperback edition, Pirsig
takes on the logical positivists by arguing that it *is* an empirically
verifiable fact that value = experience, using the hot stove example.
Pirsig seems to think that the identification of experience with value *is*
empirically verifiable. If this holds true, I think my personal criteria
for justifying the belief will have been fulfilled.
However, I've always had a hard time wrapping my mind around this example.
What's to keep us from reverting to the traditional understanding of the
hot stove example where the oaths the person on the hot stove utters come
from their subjective valuation of pain, not from the primary empirical
reality? I'm hoping someone can re-explain this passage to me in a way that
shows how this latter interpretation isn't plausible. Anybody have a better
handle on this than me? Are there any other empirically verifiable
consequences of MoQ that would strengthen Bo's & Doug's analogy to
scientific theories?
Donny has repeatedly asked questions along the lines of "What does it mean
to say, 'Science is True!'?" As Donny's indicated, I think my line of
questioning touches on something similar. I probably need to back up and
ask the question "What counts as justification ["proof"] of a belief?"
before I asked "What justifies our belief that Reality = Quality?".
Infuriatingly, Donny hasn't given us an answer to his question, since he
likes questions so much more than answers. ;-) OK, to be fair, he has, but
my knowledge of Hegel goes only as far as Monty Python, so I haven't been
able to understand it ... Anyway, by what criteria should beliefs be
justified? Anybody have thoughts to share?
Thanks to Bo, Hugo, Platt, Doug, et. al. for helping me along in my
understanding.
Cheers,
Keith
______________________________________________________________________
gillette@tahc.state.tx.us -- <URL:http://www.detling.ml.org/gillette/>
-- post message - mailto:lilasqd@hkg.com unsubscribe/queries - mailto:diana@asiantravel.com homepage - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/4670
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Thu May 13 1999 - 16:42:57 CEST