glove (glove@indianvalley.com)
Tue, 16 Jun 1998 12:02:03 +0100
hello all,
being new here i am sure i have missed a great deal of the discussion so
far. be that as it may...
after reading lila i delved deeper into the origin of laguage and the
proto-indo-european research being done. it seems that in all languages,
there are only 20 to 60 distinctly different sounds, or phones, that
when
put together to form language structure and thereby come to be called
phonemes.
the individual users of each language learn to distinguish this range of
phonemes even though each speaker of the language has a slightly
different
pronunciation pattern. we each learn to ignore these minor
individualistic
differences and concentrate on the range of phonemes themselves as a
means
of communication.
this explains why when a person learns a foreign language, they speak it
with an accent. it is because they are conditioned subjectively to only
hear
and respond to the phonemes of their native tongue, and until they learn
to
ignore these, they will speak with a pronounced accent using the
phonemes of
that native tongue as a reference point in which to begin formulating
structures for communication purposes.
if we look closer at this, we begin to realize that at its core,
language is
purely subjective... we hear what we have conditioned ourselves to
hear, in
other words. taking this a step further, all our experiences are simply
that, experiences experienced subjectively by conditions we have already
set
up in our minds.
btw, this also answers the question raised as to whether quality began
in
time or preceeded time. both time and quality are subjective
experiences,
and therefore each began when each of us as individuals experienced it
as
beginning. before that, neither time nor quality existed.
in any experiential event this is true, and as all events we experience
are
experiential, everything is purely subjective. objectivity does not
exist
except as an illusion and a mind game.
a well known koan asks 'if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it,
does it make a sound?' and the answer is of course not! if no one
experiences it, there is no sound!
as to the dq/sq split and pirsigs analogy of quality with listening to
music...i disagee. pirsig is obviously not a big music man. while in
certain
instances his analogy may be correct, in many others it is not, at least
in
my subjective experiences. in my somewhat vast cd collection i have many
favorites which i disliked at first and gradually came to call a
favorite,
and i have indeed experienced the phenomena he described with many
others
only to put them away for awhile, pull them out and listen to them
months or
years later, only to fall in love with them all over again.
no, this is not quality, though music may have a certain quality to it,
subjectively speaking only. i happen to know people who dislike music
and
never listen to it and for those people that subjective quality i see
does
not exist. the analogy is purely subjective according to the individual
experiencing the listening.
in closing, it seems to me pirsig has put forward his own subjective
metaphysics of quality and nothing more, although he has put it forward
in
such a fashion that we are able to agree with it in what seems to be an
objective matter, but only because we are able to experience it
subjectively
and relate to it.
glove
-----Original Message-----
From: Theo Schramm <theoschramm@hotmail.com>
To: Multiple recipients of <lilasqd@mail.hkg.com>
Date: Monday, June 15, 1998 9:39 PM
Subject: LS Re: Explain the Dynamic-Static split
>Greetings,
>
>KEN:
>"Magnus and Donny,
> One of the questions that I would like to have an answer to is
>whether Dynamic Quality began in time or preceded time. If it preceded
>time then it is the originator of the universe
>and could be considered God.
> If it came after the Big Bang then it is within time. Time is one of
>the dimensions of the universe."
>
>There is a third option. Dynamic Quality as I see it began WITH time and
>works in the context of time. I'm not sure that anything
>can precede time, as precedence involves an appeal to time and so the
>question contains within itself a contradiction.
>I would suggest that the Big Bang was the first Quality event and the
>birth of 'everything'. To elaborate a bit further, dynamic Quality might
>be viewed as requiring time in order to be dynamic (the word suggests
>change, or at least potential to change) and static Quality viewed as
>being a-temporal in the sense that static implies non-changing and
>therefore non-dependence upon time, but the fuzziness of the boundary
>between the two and their relationship to each other would seem to
>require time to be present as a fundamental aspect of the 'stage' we
>call the universe. This does not necessitate time preceding Quality but
>merely suggests a contingent relationship. This begs the question of
>whether there is Quality within a singularity - any ideas?
>
>Jonathan. You are right in your comments about distortion. My point
>remains despite my poor presentation as I'm sure you agree. I also agree
>that finding the best language is a difficult task, but of course it is
>an essential task and it must be done.
>
>JONATHAN:
>"Thanks for the invitation. I'm going to change the last word of your
>previous sentence so that it now reads:-
>"Q always requires an observer and an observed for its *definition*".
>Pirsig himself saw this - which is why he was so reluctant to define or
>properly describe Q. I think it becomes a whole lot less problematic if
>one stresses that the division of the system into observer vs. observed
>(SO) is context dependent, not absolute. I see Pirsig's 4 levels as 4 SO
>contexts. The whole problem (IMO) with classical SOM is the underlying
>assumption of a single context."
>
>I can see that I have mis-interpreted you to some extent. Your changing
>of one word shows my mistake. However I still am not clear upon why, for
>example, the inorganic level is a 'SO context' I understand why the
>intellectual level can be seen as such (thanks to BO) but here you lose
>me. Care to elaborate?
>
>Theo
>
>
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