Chris, Arlo & Moqtalk. (I'm lagging behind) 13 March:
Arlo had said: > > This is why Einstein considered the "I" an "optical delusion of > > consciousness". With the advent of intellectuality, we have the > > advent of the "I", but we also have different metaphysical responses > > to that "I", and one is the S/O dualism that underscored western > > intellectual development. This is why I disagree with Bo, I don't > > think the intellectual level is inherently SOL, I think it can be > > but that depends on the social-cultural foundations upon which it is > > built (this underscores the totality of intellectual patterns, not > > just the "self" pattern). Chris commented (and asked my opinion) > This is very valid stuff. But might it not be hypostasised that the > rationalism that evolved from the Greek cultures is in a sense the > "purest" S/O divide. I don't mean to sound Eurocentric, though that > ship might have sailed long ago, but the thought is worth > investigating. Arlo's about intellectuality spawning the "I" is far from valid stuff. Language has an "I" and language has been around for tens of thousands of years without giving rise to any metaphysics based on it, rather a lot of mythologies about how the gods interacted with humankind. Arlo's "intellctuality" is thinking - intelligence - and was denounced by Pirsig in the PT letter. > If it were so, that S/O thinking at any given time and at any given > place would start of a development towards "pure logic" or whatever one > wishes to call it, then we might explain the variations in terms of > how much the cultures that this thinking evolve in affects it. So, for > example, I'd say that there were some S/O thinking in India around > 500BC, there may have been a quite widespread notion of thoughts as > "entities in themselves" as you put it, but this thought pattern - this > way of interpreting Quality as we would say - was very much affected by > the social levels interpretations of Quality, and if the social level, > the culture, were too strong it might, well, put its mark on the > development of rationality. Most apt. If the said Upanishads was an Indian intellectual level (independent of the Greeks according to Pirsig) it either didn't fully make it out of the social level or some Quality-like development prevented it from growing into a SOM. I lean towards the latter and see the RT (chapter 30) in LILA as confirming this. It's a bit difficult to interpret though, it seems like Pirsig's main issue is the dynamic/static conflict finding a balance within Hindu tradition > So as not to give people the chance to judge me as imperialist I might > also add, that if this is a valid way of enterpreting the whole of it, > then there is nothing to say that we here have a "pure" rationality > either, since a rationality must grow in whatever environment contains > it. Chris you are polite, but intellect or rationality can only be the "objective over subjective" kind, be it in Greece, or on another planet. In intellect's SOM days (before the MOQ) it was common to regard the old myths, religions, whatever as "their kind of rationality" and we see how Arlo's reflects this relativism and thereby reveals his position as a SOMist. IMO Bo 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/
