Ron, Krimel, Matt: I take the main thing you are struggling with Ron is the slippery nature of the words in play, all the different ways one could take the meaning of "intellect," "pre-intellect," "symbol manipulation," etc., etc.
Ron: Correct, I feel just a little more clarification would help tremendously With understanding the concept especially to those who have just discovered Pirsig and the MoQ. As well as establishing some sort of a general consensus Regarding interpretation. Matt: I think Ian's mantra around here is, echoing the 1992 American Presidential campaign, "It's the communicative process stupid!", and it's the perfect point here--there is no correct definition of these things, the only thing we are in charge of is trying to find the most pleasing pattern for these terms. They all relate quite closely to each other, so our process must be the one of finding nice variations of the terms that avoid/solve some problems while giving us some room to do what we want. Ron: Exactly what I'm after with these posts. Matt: E.g., to say that the world was there before us, but that animals have intelligence, and also that SOM is a cultural pattern, but also deeply felt, and that without language there is no knowledge, though there are a lot of things we do that isn't linguistic. The list could go on and on. My point in pointing out the obvious (that we are slip-sliding around with our key terms) is to say that philosophy is mainly about balancing the intuitions we have about how the world is, choosing which ones to loosen up, which ones to hold onto, which ones to exterminate. The reason I should start so far back behind the actual conversation before actually entering it (no less than that's how I usually proceed) is because I both want to offend and remain inoffensive to everybody currently in it: everything everybody's so far said about intellect, intelligence, symbol manipulation, before the word there was nothing, etc., is right (after a fashion), though taken together contradictory. Everybody is bringing forward a different intuition about how the world works to add to the stew, but what happens when it isn't framed properly is that it just looks like a mess. Ron is asking for order, and the conversation is just getting more and more muddy. Granted, that's the general intention of many here at the MD, but then I might be in the minority in thinking that clear thinking, though not always in point, is not by itself complicit in SOM (which is sometimes the feeling I get from some people). Ron: I greatly appreciate the fact that you understand my intent. I'm not asking That we give concrete definitions, only arrive at a general understanding about the concepts. With the insights of our new contributors in regard to Indic thought and the comments of Dmb and yours and others, I feel a closer interpretive understanding is within sight. Matt: Moving to the actual conversation: What is the "intellectual level" in Pirsig? There are two ways to go at it: 1) What does Pirsig think? (An interpretive question with a more or less definite answer.) 2) How _should_ we define it? (Where what Pirsig thinks, while remaining important, becomes sometimes besides the point.) To my eyes, the conversation has been mainly ignoring the interpretive question. If it doesn't, it has to first acknowledge that Pirsig restricts intellectual activity, defined as "symbol manipulation," to humans and then play this restriction out across the levels: since Pirsig doesn't talk a lot about intelligence or language, what does his restriction mean for these related terms? Ron: I'm really trying hard to tie my own developing interpretation with pirsigs For my part, I don't like Pirsig's definitions of the levels (let alone level-talk generally), so I usually use different ones (moving to 2). The reason I don't like Pirsig's definitions of levels is because 1) it is really easy to muddy the water by pointing out that ants have social behavior My preferred way: inorganic -- non-replicating entities (rocks) biological -- replicating entities (cells) social -- communicative replicating entities (animals) linguistic -- linguistically communicative replicating entities (humans) democratic -- political linguistically communicative replicating entities (Americans, Europeans, etc.) My revision has one main goal: I think Pirsig, like many philosophers, looked to Greece and saw their own thing happening, rather than the important thing happening. Disciplinary chauvinism happens all the time, but the important thing in Greece wasn't Socrates, but Solon and Pericles--it was democracy, not philosophy. It was the burgeoning of a democratic culture for the first time. Ron: Couldn't agree more, democracy and public education allows for an educated Citizenry thereby making intellectual monopoly obsolete. Matt: My main beef with Pirsig's social/intellectual split is that it is typical of a philosopher--social conventions on one side, life of the mind on the other. It is elitist in the wrong way. All this talk about pre-intellectual experience: think about it: according to Pirsig, could pre-intellectual be pre-linguistic? No, because humans had language before Greece. Could pre-intellectual be pre-reflective? No, because it would seem to be clear that we could reflect before Socrates came along, too. I think the only way to get a handle on pre-intellectual is to constrict it to pre-linguistic, but that does some raw things to Pirsig's notion of the intellectual. Ron: Precisely my point I think the problem being experienced with the terms Centers around the difference of what SOM WAS when it started (an intellectual form based Logic and reason) and how it conceptualized the world and what SOM Is NOW which is cultural as well as intellectual. This in itself muddies The waters, I think this is a pivotal point in understanding in order to fully grasp the difference of just what SOM WAS and IS now to better understand what MoQ is and it's relevance. I think it is forgotten how SOM and religion mixed to form Christianity. God is proven through logical deduction in the west in much the same Way a mathematical proof is deduced. It works under the assumption of Absolutes and perfect forms and of excluded middles. SOM has become The culture. It gives common reference of external objects And subjective experience. Ian and Gav Bring up the distinction of intelligence vs. intellect. Citing REASON as the dividing factor. This goes a long way in defining Intellect in relation to human understanding and gives the distinction In the place where Pirsig places intellect/pre-intellect to my initial Satisfaction. What are your thoughts? Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
