Hey Ron, Thank you very much for the selections. I was actually only thinking a list of names and their books/articles, but certainly the slices are even better ;-)
The two names that stand out to me are Heidegger and Barry Allen. What Heidegger called "onto-theology" he also called just "Platonism," a naming practice I picked up from Richard Rorty--who picked it up largely from Heidegger. Barry Allen was a student of, and wrote his PhD dissertation under, Richard Rorty. You see where I'm going? I had a feeling, but now I'm pretty certain, that _we_ are pretty much going in the same direction (even more in the details maybe than some of the general commonality we might hold with the average Pirsigian). We might have a few disputes about the scholarly material, but the general story, I think, is the same. I think perhaps the only major difference is that, when I look at Heidegger and especially Allen, I see them as saying (and even if they don't, they should) that grammatical/linguistic evolution produced certain specifically Western philosophical problems, but philosophy has a dialectic of its own that, shall we say, lifts off from the launch pad of language-patterns. Now, one of my hang-ups in the conversation that I wasn't totally cognizant of is your use of "grammar." I've always thought of it as a basically post hoc set of convention-differentiators. As an activity, it didn't begin to arise (in the West) until in and around the 5th century BCE, as you've been saying. I think my trouble has been that you occasionally seem to use the term "grammar" to mean, not just "the categorization of conventional word usage," but also "word usage." This would be a mistake, I think, and it is one that I think Heidegger occasional commits. For instance, it might lead one to say that, before Plato and Aristotle, there _was no differentiation between nouns and verbs_. That would be a mistake and false. There was differentiation, it was simply that nobody was explicitly and articulately _aware_ of what the difference was--speaking a language is a kind of know-how, not a grammatical knowing-that. This isn't to exactly downplay what you are pointing out (following Heidegger and Allen), but just to try and become more aware of what we are exactly talking about. Because it is certainly the case that _after_ we became explicitly aware of the difference between a noun and a verb, that self-conscious awareness (particularly in Aristotle) effected language-patterns. And very specifically and germane to Pirsig and philosophy, it did effect the history and evolution of philosophical discussion. Another note about Heidegger: I would be careful in taking him as a Greek scholar. He's a very complicated thinker, much bigger than just a classics scholar. That makes taking his remarks about what was going on in Greece a complex matter. And this is doubly so with Heidegger's use of "Sein" in relation to the Greeks (or anybody else). However, in terms of the general story he tells, he's a great resource. I would rely more on people like Kahn, who are respected scholars, for the details of the situation. Matt > Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2008 11:35:21 -0400 > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Re: [MD] Truth and the Linguistic Turn > > Ron said: > My central contention is the ability to create an objective argument which > rests squarely on the agreement of the treatment of terms, nouns to be > specific. It is the anchor of logic. One standard which ultimately changed > the way we conceive of things. If nouns did not refer to tangible entities > logical arguments could not be made with any certainty. > > Matt: > Is there research literature on this subject you're thinking of? > > Ron: > The whole enterprise of SOM seems to me and unwittingly to Pirsig , > to be the origin of the question of "being" stemming from the > treatment of the word "being" in Indo European language. This was absent in > literature prior to the rise of Greek and Indic culture. this > and how the Greeks related the concepts of "truth" to "being" _________________________________________________________________ The other season of giving begins 6/24/08. Check out the i’m Talkathon. http://www.imtalkathon.com?source=TXT_EML_WLH_SeasonOfGiving 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/
