> [Platt] > Taking Pirsig whole you would see he breaks out of your ridiculous > "assimilated collective mind" and "bounded proprietary experience" duality. > > [Arlo] > Taking Pirsig as a whole includes the following points. As anyone can > see, Pirsig as a whole absolutely supports the idea of the "self" to > be a conflation point between the assimilated collective mind and the > bounded proprietary experiences of the organism. It is not a > "duality" (but of course you would see it that way), it is an > undissolvable dialogic pair.
A distinction without a difference. > Indeed, Pirsig says "subjects are social and intellectual values". > > Read that again. It says EXACTLY what I said. Read this again about the individual. (Pirsig says "individual," not "subjects.") "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." So much for the value of your leftist agenda. > And where come "intellectual values"? "Our intellectual description > of nature is always culturally derived." (LILA) > > Some others. > > "Men invent responses to Quality, and among these responses is an > understanding of what they themselves are. You know something and > then the Quality stimulus hits and then you try to define the Quality > stimulus, but to define it all you've got to work with is what you > know. So your definition is made up of what you know. It's an > analogue to what you already know. It has to be. It can't be anything > else. And the mythos grows this way. By analogies to what is known > before. The mythos is a building of analogues upon analogues upon > analogues. These fill the collective consciousness of all > communicating mankind. Every last bit of it." (ZMM) > > "Our intellectual description of nature is always culturally derived." > (LILA) > > "This Cartesian "Me," this autonomous little homunculus who sits > behind our eyeballs looking out through them in order to pass > judgment on the affairs of the world, is just completely ridiculous. > This self-appointed little editor of reality is just an impossible > fiction that collapses the moment one examines it. " (LILA) > > "Science and reason, this myth goes, come only from the objective > world, never from the social world. The world of objects imposes > itself upon the mind with no social mediation whatsoever. It is easy > to see the historic reasons for this myth of independence. Science > might never have survived without it. But a close examination shows > it isn't so." (LILA) > > "Everyone seemed to be guided by an "objective," "scientific" view of > life that told each person that his essential self is his evolved > material body. Ideas and societies are a component of brains, not the > other way around." (LILA) > > "[Value] is the primary empirical reality from which such things as > stoves and heat and oaths and self are later intellectually > constructed." (LILA) > > "The cells Dynamically invented animals to preserve and improve their > situation. The animals Dynamically invented societies, and societies > Dynamically invented intellectual knowledge for the same reasons." (LILA) > > So, no, despite your objections, what Pirsig breaks out of is the > ridiculous dichotomy giving us only "evil collectivism" on one side > and "glorious individualism" on the other. None of your quotes deny the distinction between the individual and "big programs of social planning." > You can make all the talk-radio distortions you want, I can back my > position up with any number of quotes from Pirsig, nor do any of the > posts you make deny my position. You on the other hand have to > deliberately ignore 1/2 of his words in order to make your claim. Nonsense. Your quotes are irrelevant to the fundamental conflict in the MOQ. > This is why you and Ham butt heads on this. You deny 1/2 of Pirsig, > the half that talks about the collective consciousness and culture > and social pattern origins of intellect. He denies 1/2 of Pirsig that > talks about the individual and the unique experience of the organism. > So he wonders why you support a "collectivist" philosophy, and you > wonder why he doesn't see it as an "individualist" philosophy. > > Its because each of you are capable only of seeing things in your > dichotomy of evil-collective/glorious-individual partition. He can't > see the part of Pirsig that values the individual. You can't see the > part that demonstrates the social origins of mind. Sadly, you are > both wrong. And will likely always be wrong, since you have your > little war against "collectivism" to wage. Ham made the mistake of relying on your one-sided interpretation of the MOQ. > [Platt] > The basic theme of Lila is the constant struggle of the individual -- > whether Lila, the brujo or Phaedrus -- against stifling, static > cultural patterns -- whether represented by Rigel, priests or psychiatrists. > > [Arlo] > And behind this "struggle" is the idea that individual exists because > of culture, that her/his self is a pattern owing to social origins. The individual "owes" her existence to many things, primarily a biological pattern. Culture obviously has an influence on the individual's development, but has little effect on her creative, Dynamic responses. These unique responses are what make her a precious, special individual. Do I have to repeat Pirsig's description of the lone author? > "If Descartes had said, "The seventeenth century French culture > exists, therefore I think, therefore I am," he would have been > correct."(LILA) > > This demonstrates two sub-components. > > The seventeenth century French culture exists, therefore I think. > > And. > > The seventeenth century French culture exists, ...therefore I am. If Descartes had said, "I am because I can respond to DQ" he would have been correct. > [Platt] > To ignore this thematic conflict and its resolutions is to be blind > to the intellectual illumination provided by the MOQ. > > [Arlo] > I don't ignore it. I take it in full context. To be blind to that, > willfully blind I may add, is sad. What's sad is your blindness to the underlying thematic conflict of the MOQ in order to make it support your Marxist social agenda. You just don't fathom the profound meaning of: "All these battles between patterns of evolution go on within suffering individuals like Lila. And Lila's battle is everybody's battle, you know?" "Individuals" Get it? 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/
