Hi Matt
Don't think I've ever been caught with my pants down regarding "jumping the
gun"
as you did here. :-P Please accept my apologies, and thanks for your reply.
> Magnus said: And about the distinction between "understanding/model of the
> metaphysics" and "the metaphysics itself": If we here on MD come to a
> complete consensus about changing the biological level, i.e. changing the
> general framework, underpinnings etc. Would that affect all life on earth?
>
> Matt: If that's all your distinction means, the common sense distinction
> between, say, tigers and talking about tigers, then not only can I go along,
> but I would emphasize that we couldn't get along without it. When the tiger
> comes at me, it doesn't help to say, "By 'tiger' I mean a sweet, cuddly
> stuffed animal." If uttering that incantation is all I do, I will get eaten.
> We call "magic" the idea that a string of words could have that kind of
> effect (though, is not metaphysics, as Queen would say, "A Kind of Magic"?
> Yes, but this is a parenthetical, not a place to explain how).
>
> However, I think you are saying more than that. If you weren't, then I'd
> have to suggest not using "the metaphysics itself" synonymously with
> "causally-independent-of-words reality." "Metaphysics" is usually designated
> a branch of philosophy, an activity, and not wholesale equation with reality.
Yes, you're right. I do mean more than that. To paraphrase the above, I mean
something like "causally-independent-of-physics", but I'm a bit hesitant to
include the word "reality".
> Matt said: 1) Metaphysics is the general framework, or understanding, or set
> of assumptions, that people unconsciously (with various degrees of
> self-consciousness) interpret, or see, or live in the world. As an activity,
> it is the attempt to make the unconscious self-conscious (this activity is
> also known in some circles as "philosophy").
>
> 2) Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that attempts to display the
> basic, universal, ahistorical underpinnings of reality (this activity is also
> sometimes known in some circles as "Platonism," and in a few circles the
> acronymic "SOM").
>
> Magnus said: both of your definitions above use similar wordings to distance
> the metaphysics from the reality it explains. One use "general framework, or
> understanding, or set of assumptions", the other use "basic, universal,
> ahistorical underpinnings". I interpret both of these as carefully chosen
> words to hint that the metaphysics is outside of reality without really
> saying it out loud, because that would probably be considered "bad" in the
> philosophy community. Am I right?
>
> Matt: Well, that depends on which philosophical community you're talking
> about, and in fact on how you're talking about them. Most so-called
> "realists" would absolutely affirm that there is a reality outside of our
> words about reality and that we need to get those words closer to
> representing that reality. Most pragmatists would absolutely affirm that
> there is a reality distinct from our words (you can tell the difference in
> writing by the word "about"), but that these realists are talking
> Platonically when they talk of "representing"--the whole metaphor of distance
> is bad news.
>
> However, I suspect that's not what you are talking about when you say "the
> metaphysics is outside of reality". This begins to hinge on what you mean by
> "reality," because why aren't our words apart of reality? I did carefully
> choose my words in the two definitions, but the choices were focused on
> distinguishing pragmatism (words as tools to deal with reality) from
> Platonism (words as mirrors of a foundation). Your distinction between "the
> metaphysics" and "reality" is beginning to sound either other-worldly (like
> Plato's Forms) or idealistic (like Kant's noumena). I think both are bad,
> and I will say out loud that I deny that anything we say necessarily
> presupposes either image or apparatus. In fact, my second definition,
> interpreted appropriately, _does_ say that "the metaphysics is outside
> reality" because the latter sounds Platonic or nothing. The second
> definition is meant to say it "out loud," whereas the first is not mouthing
> anything unless you interpret all sayings as implicitly, out of necessity,
> stating a kind of Platonism.
First, of course our words are parts of reality.
I know about Plato's Forms, but Kant's noumena is unknown to me. I'll try to
show what I mean with an analogy.
Our reality is the inside of a tent, we can only see and interact with things
on
the inside. However, from the inside, we see that something is pulling the
fabric at a few places. We have no idea what it is and can only hypothesize
about it. Some may think that the fabric is pushed from the inside by some
unknown force, others think there's a giant on the outside pulling the fabric,
etc.
These different hypotheses are our different metaphysics models, and some may
do
a better job than others explaining the fabric's movements. However, I can
never
really let go of the thought of finding out how the tent is *really* held up.
> Magnus said: As metaphysics models, I see the MoQ and SOM as siblings. They
> are of the same kind. Both do their best to explain our reality, but as a
> self-declared "Pirsigian" (although I'd prefer MoQist), I do think the MoQ
> does a better job.
>
> Matt: This is the crux of the issue because what we mean by "metaphysics"
> (and also, it turns out, "reality") will determine in what way we think
> Pirsig's philosophy and his enemy moniker SOM are similar and dissimilar. I
> would say: they are both siblings because both are a collection of words that
> attempt to help us deal with reality. They are different because SOM
> supposes that it gets reality correct, whereas Pirsig's philosophy supposes
> that all philosophies are better or worse at dealing with reality, but that
> there is no One Way That Reality Is, which is the only way to make sense of
> "correct."
>
> The thing I don't know is how exactly you see them as similar or dissimilar,
> for the reasons displayed above. "The metaphysics is outside of reality"
> strikes me as odd for a Pirsigian because Pirsig teaches that
> experience=reality, meaning anything outside, tout court, of experience
> doesn't exist--if you can't (even theoretically) experience it, it doesn't
> exist. I don't think Pirsig is talking about a framework of laws that
> determine reality, even when he says suggestively, "There already _is_ a
> metaphysics of Quality." (Lila, Ch. 9, 124) Pirsig is saying that reality
> exists--we just splice it up differently according to our metaphysics, our
> understanding, our assumptions, our words. (Arlo was emphasizing this image,
> the analytic knife, in his answer.) Scientific laws are ghosts--Newton's law
> of gravity was not a really good stab in the direction of "_the_
> metaphysics," the determiner and ruler of reality, but a really good way of
> dealing with reality that we pass on to our children. Affinity for
> other-worldliness would lead one to believe that the _ghosts_ are in charge
> of reality, but the ghosts Pirsig is talking about are the voices of actual
> people across time who lived _in_ reality, voices giving us tips about living
> in it.
As the tent analogy suggested above, I think metaphysics may or may not be
outside of reality. I do realize the unwanted ramifications of placing it
outside, so I guess it would be better to have it inside the tent.
However, once you start hypothesizing about a metaphysics, you are trying to
reverse-engineer a blueprint that can be used to construct a reality such as
ours. Regardless of whether this blueprint is outside of reality, or somehow
built into the laws of nature of that reality, you are nevertheless assuming
that there is *a* blueprint that would result in a reality like ours, so why
not
try to find *the* original blueprint? The notion of reverse-engineering better
and better blueprints indefinitely without even thinking that there is an
original blueprint, sounds quite futile to me, not to mention boring. Boring
because it would be impossible to ever deduce anything from it.
If the blueprint is just good enough to explain everything we already know,
then
it's of fairly limited use. But if it's much better than that, we might be able
to deduce things we didn't know.
I would like to keep the MoQ out of this discussion though. I thought (and
still
think) it should be possible to discuss what a metaphysics is before getting
into specifics.
Magnus
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