> Hi Krimel > > As usual I think we are quite close but I think some extra bits need > adding > to your view, bits that I consider as enriching. Like you I want to make > sense of experience-life and think the story of this cosmos suggested by > science has to be seriously brought into this understanding. Like you I > think > this can fit with the MOQ but, perhaps more than you, I think MOQ can > enhance our grasp of this scientific picture. > > What is DQ? What is Nothingness? > > In the beginning there was nothing. But here we are living with lots of > stuff > and activity. We can call all of this patterns. But why these patterns? > In the beginning was nothing. So in the beginning what was possible? > Was anything/everything possible? Is nothing therefore full of potential? > An infinity of potential? Such is DQ? DQ is the openness of what is > (which may be nothing) to change and potential. > > If our actual cosmos was entirely random would not everything happen > all at once and then be over? > > Can something complex like a human being just suddenly be created and > then disappear again? > > How is the actual different from the potential? > > Does the potential contain all possibilities? > > Is the actual finite? > > Perhaps we should see the finite-actual as a journey through the > possible-potential? > > In the beginning was nothing. Now let's take a walk out and into the > possible. > The first step out of the nothing begins with something simple. But this > step > has to set out in one direction and foresakes many other possible > directions. > The actual is a foresaking of the possible for just one choice. > > Physicists have the same picture and use the many worlds concept. > > We live in a cosmos where all the right steps have been taken to enable > MOQ discussing humans to exist in cyber space. That is actuality that > has been chosen, foresaking all other possibilities. And on the process > goes, as further choices take place and new possibilities are actualised > or left unmanifest. > > But how did we get here, to this actualised possibility rather than > others? > > This is the question the MOQ confronts,although a bit obliquely. > > How are patterns selected/chosen? MOQ dismisses any suggestion that > there are laws that determine the patterns that exist. Patterns are just > left > in the wake of the creativity of DQ. Science only ever comes afterwards > and identifies the patterns that have emerged in this cosmos it could not > determine them prior to their emergence. > > Evolutionary theory says nothing about how patterns emerge, it only > enables us to understand which patterns survive and prosper in the > context of the given environment we have (although that is dynamically > changing so it is hard to see who is today's likely winners). > > So which patterns? We have a number of possibilities? > > Randomness: there is no choice, from the possible patterns just > one is selected at random. And maybe on separate occasions a > new/different random choice is made. > > Mechanism-law: there are no possibilities/choices/openness, so everything > is as it must be. > > Choice -maybe in line with our human experience all existence requires > choice. > There are options/possibilities and we have to choose. And maybe all > activity > (organic/inorganic) requires choice. Sure atoms don't have to choose > dinner > or lovers, but they do choose which electron partners to hitch up with. > > What sort of world do we live in? Sure seems like the open one MOQ > suggests, and science seems increasingly to agree with this suggestion. > You can look at pattern selection in terms of the evolutionary advantages > of certain patterns. But is this the complete picture? > > How has this cosmos been achieved? Is 12 billion years enough to > allow time to try out all the options to hit upon the right one? > > Maybe, like when I overcome yet another opponent at chess, it is best > to only consider the interesting possibilities and ignore many others. > > Does the universe process itself like a computer or a human being? > > Does all choice (organic/inorganic) require some sense of what is > possible? > How else is selection and activity brought about? > > What is to be done? > > What choices do we have? > > Is there quality and the good? > > Is possessing value the very thing that makes it possible to create this > world > whilst forsaking all other possible worlds? > > Such is the task and our hope. > > Of course,it is not easy. And on our journey through the possible we have > stumbled across many a corner of hell. > > Regards > David M > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >> >> >> In a recent post I got sneered at as a reductionist by dmb. I think his >> point is well taken and illustrates something fundamental. By rejecting >> reductionism dmb hopes to hold the door open for some sort of top down >> organization system. He can correct me if I am wrong here but this >> definitely seems to be on tactic taken by one of his heroes Ken Wilbur. >> Ham >> has the same tendency with his faith in a first cause. Platt too, with >> his >> belief in a disembodied consciousness. gav does the same kind of thing >> with >> his seemingly drug induced visions of oneness everywhere. Dan also has >> this >> kind of view of oneness that can be tapped into through meditative >> discipline, Scott Roberts used to say the same kind of thing claiming >> that >> our brains are not producers of consciousness but receivers of it. >> >> >> >> According to this kind of view we see the panoply of nature spread before >> us >> as a kind of evaporation of this higher power spreading out in the >> material >> world. This results in a view of the MoQ that has Quality as some kind of >> perfection or source that breaks apart to yield the world of appearances. >> >> >> >> To any whose views I have miscast, I will happily back off but if this is >> a >> correct interpretation of the points of view expressed then I do indeed >> see >> my position and that of the MoQ as being against it. Taken at face value >> the >> levels show a bottom up progression from inorganic to intellect. It does >> not >> flow in the other direction. If seen in the proper light the value of the >> MoQ is its synthesis of Taoism with Darwin. I suppose this is what makes >> the >> evolution chapter in Lila such a disappointment. Pirsig points at the >> moon >> without seeing the moon. He does the same thing in his discussion of >> random >> access when he concluded that a metaphysics of quality would really be a >> metaphysics of randomness. He sees. He points. He turns away. >> >> >> >> I think the big problem I have in these discussions is that when I look >> where Pirsig points I see the connection. I recognize the pattern and I >> mistakenly assume that the pattern is clear to all who look. The levels >> that >> Pirsig offers do follow a clear evolutionary trajectory. At each 'level' >> the >> power of coincidence and pragmatism interact. Change (DQ) is always >> moving >> into the future and forms (SQ) are left in the wake. Which forms are >> selected depend on the past history and the present raw materials. The >> factors that influence evolution are well known and can be applied at all >> 'levels' regardless of how those levels are conceived. But is entirely a >> bottom up process. Higher functions emerge only from stability at the >> lower >> levels. Certainly there is interaction and higher levels can and do >> impact >> lower levels, a point taken up by Ian and occasionally Arlo. But no >> higher >> level pattern can materially disrupt the lower level patterns it depends >> upon without drastic consequences. >> >> >> >> If we insist on using the dismal concept of 'betterness' then it is >> 'betterness' that has been programmed into us by these very processes. We >> perceive this or that as better because it enhances our potential to >> reproduce. It limits the extent to which our higher level patterns are >> likely to disrupt the essential lower level patterns that we perceive as >> the >> true, the good and the beautiful. The perception of Value is in fact >> programmed into us at a genetic level. So yes, it is 'preintellectual'. >> >> >> >> I understand the reluctance to adopt this kind of view. It places too >> much >> emphasis and chance. It results is a fairly deterministic view. It leaves >> us >> adrift in a sea of coincidence without a Savior, without a purpose, >> without >> the divine. A host of MoQers turn away from this conception in fear and >> disgust. I would liken this one of Freud's ego defense mechanisms; >> denial. >> Ham calls it nihilism and rails against existentialism with its claim >> that >> existence precedes essence and that man must look inward to define his >> own >> purpose. Platt rejects the concept that anything as exquisitely beautiful >> and complex as this world we live in could arise from chance. I have >> described these positions and others like them as wishful thinking so >> often, >> I am reluctant to do it again but there it is. >> >> >> >> I think the moon Pirsig is pointing at is a true metaphysics of >> randomness. >> When you see evolution as the study of how random process interact to >> create >> the stabile patterns we see all around us, the connection becomes clear >> and >> the Value of the MoQ obvious. But Pirsig is not alone in pointing in the >> direction and perhaps others have seen the way more clearly. >> >> >> >> I have been dropping William James quotes recently to show how integral >> to >> James' thinking Darwin was. James was a leading spokesperson for the >> psychological school of Functionalism. This school was directly opposed >> to >> the structuralist school that believed that by looking inward one could >> identify structural units of mental processes. James said rather, that >> consciousness, in fact any behavior, must serve an evolutionary function. >> It >> must contribute to the reproductive success of those who manifest it. >> Neither functionalism nor structuralism have proponents today. >> Structuralism, with it reliance on a rather mystical methodology much >> like >> one frequently advocated by dmb, died long ago. But functionalism was >> absorbed and retained. Today it is most clearly seen in Evolutionary >> Psychology which is in many ways a direct descendant of James. >> >> >> >> The bottom line here? >> >> >> >> It's turtles all the way up! >> >> >> >> Krimel >> >> 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/ >> > >
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