Hi Ham, (Arlo mentioned) > I've been trying to make some sense out of this dialogue. You seem to be > discussing epistemology which caught my attention. So far, however, I can't > see where either of you is heading, but I know what Arlo is trying to prove. > > Arlo says: > > Knowledge is what we believe. It is based on our assumptions, > > assumptions that are culturally-derived. We value this knowledge > > based on how well it works. When it stops working, we change > > our assumptions, and our intellectual descriptions of nature > > change accordingly. > > First of all, knowledge is based on experience, which has nothing to do with > "culture". Practical knowledge is usually the result of factual information > that has been proven to work when applied to situations under controlled > conditions. For example, if we remove half of the eggs from a full dozen > carton, we will have six eggs left in the carton. Such knowledge is > generally accepted as a "truth", rather than an "assumption".
The underlying assumption in your egg carton example is that experience can be divided into wholes and parts. Not a bad assumption as assumptions go, but an assumption nevertheless. > [Arlo had quoted Pirsig]: > "Our intellectual description of nature is always culturally derived". > (LILA) > > But an "intellectual description" is not a fact of knowledge. It's a > perspective of the external world drawn from various attributes or qualities > experienced. > > Arlo then went on to assert that "knowledge rests on assumptions". It's a > pretty safe assumption that half a dozen equals six, or that a raw egg > dropped to the floor will break. But describing the mess on the floor as > "scrambled eggs" or some other analogy is neither knowledge nor truth. It's > an analogy, perhaps "culturally derived", or simply imaginative. > > So that Arlo has no logical justification for equating knowledge to > "assumptions". I assume you recognize some of the assumptions of your own philosophy, such as "we can know only what we can experience." (I assume you consider your philosophy a form of knowledge.) > [Arlo]: > > "Every form of knowledge rests on assumptions", including > > this statement. "All this is just an analogy", including this sentence, > > "There are no absolute truths", including this sentence, "Our intellectual > > description of nature is always culturally derived", including this > > statement. > > > > When you change your assumptions, if you feel the new form > > of knowledge has Quality, you accept both it and the assumptions > > underlying it. > > Inserting "quality" into this argument doesn't win any brownie points. It's > just a euphemistic way of saying that some knowledge is true. Truth is a value is it not, Ham? > > And this distortion of Descartes Cogito is laughable: > > "If Descartes had said, "The seventeenth century > > French culture exists, therefore I think, therefore I am," > > he would have been correct." (LILA) > > Here's a prime example of what I meant by radical empiricists "explaining > away" the individual. Descartes couldn't think, let alone exist, if it were > not for the culture of 17th Century France! Apparently our 21st Century > American culture has done away with individuals entirely. Platt and I are > not subjects; we are merely patterns of society. > > Thanks, Arlo, for explaining to us how Pirsig has overcome the > subject/object > dichotomy. I can understand if you just went by what Arlo says that you would get the idea that Pirsig is just another New Age Marxist since Arlo always extols the wonders of society, community, culture, co-operation, sacrifice and every other form of collectivism. But, let not your heart be troubled. Pirsig is an individualist from the get go, as witness his two books centered around the lives of very unique individuals, including himself. For further evidence, consider the following quote: "My personal feeling is that this is how any further improvement of the world will be done: by individuals making Quality decisions and that's all. God, I don't want to have any more enthusiasm for big programs full of social planning for big masses of people that leave individual Quality out. These can be left alone for a while. There's a place for them but they've got to be built on a foundation of Quality within the individuals involved. We've had that individual Quality in the past, exploited it as a natural resource without knowing it, and now it's just about depleted. Everyone's just about out of gumption. And I think it's about time to return to the rebuilding of this American resource...individual worth. There are political reactionaries who've been saying something close to this for years. I'm not one of them, but to the extent they're talking about real individual worth and not just an excuse for giving more money to the rich, they're right. We do need a return to individual integrity, self-reliance and old-fashioned gumption. We really do." Robert M. Pirsig Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Little doubt about where Pirsig stands regarding the individual and Marxist- inspired "big programs of social planning for big masses of people" like those proposed by Obama and Hillary. Further, in a recent interview he specifically rejected Arlo's favorite notion that the individual is dependent for his creations on others. "The best of literary critics know that an author has to work alone . . . because his source is not what everyone else has said. He has to be out there finding things where nobody has gone before." http://www.philosophersnet.com/magazine/pirsig_transcript.htm The key phrases are "work alone" and "where nobody has gone before." To Arlo, that's anathema. To Pirsig that's the dynamic force of evolution and human progress. Regards, Platt 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/
