Ham, all pettiness aside, I choose not to speculate on a source. in fact I believe it gets in the way of competently meeting reality and whether you choose to believe it or not, "Essentialism " has nihlistic connotations. lets just say an everyday objectivist in this country would call you a nihlist. I just thought you should know that next time you are tempted to use nihlist as a dirty word.
sincerely -Ron ________________________________ From: Ham Priday <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Monday, February 2, 2009 3:25:49 AM Subject: Re: [MD] Wanted: A proper foundation Ron -- You have thrown a lot at me in your two posts of 2/1, including lengthy Wikipedia teatises on Nihilism which are too subjective to be worth critiquing here. Besides, nihilism is not the issue that divides us. For the sake of expedience, I'll restrict my comments to statements that you've made which strike me as disingenuous or just plain wrong. > I do not subscribe to a difference between mind and > matter, substance and attribute, fact and value, therefore > their relation is superfluous. Then you had better change your "subscription". Unless you live in some other dimension than the rest of us, your mind and its conscious awareness are not "matter" or material substance. Refusal to acknowledge the fundamental mind/matter distinction is like refusing to acknowledge that you're a human being. Cartesian duality may currently be out of favor for elitists, but to deny what is self-evident is the most foolish of hypocrisies. The same can be said for claiming there is no difference between a substance and an attribute or a fact and a value. > How old is that dictionary Ham? Call it what you like, > because it is valuistic, it is nihilism. Unless your essentialism > promotes a universal truth, morality and reality. This one I don't understand. If nihilism is the rejection of value, how can a valuistic philosophy be nihilistic? And how does one "promote a universal truth, morality, and reality" when the only truth we know about morality and reality is relative? > RMP's context is one of developing one's own convictions > not accept his. I have developed my own convictions, and expressed them in the same context. Yet, RMP's followers criticize me because they are not Pirsig's convictions. How does your analysis of Pirsig's "context" justify that attitude? > Please explain how that metaphor is a "catch 22", > I was not insulted as much as astounded at the level > of garbage it put forth, That metaphor clearly states > that hedging your bets and falling back on fear, is a > better stratagem to guide existence than developing > one's own beliefs, that a lilly livered cop-out. come on. The Catch-22 (or paradox) of existence is that evidence for a primary source is equally weighted on either side of belief or non-belief. Neither side can come up with unequivocal proof for his conviction. While you vent your anguish by calling it "garbage" and "a lilly-livered copout", Essentialism offers a reasonable explanation for this paradox (see below)*. [Ham, previously]: > I'm sorry the "nihilist" label offends you, Ron, but I see little > "conviction' in the mindset you've revealed, much less "belief", > and you've given me no evidence to persuade me otherwise. [Ron, offended by this "insult"]: > See, now it's this sort of belittling tripe that's insulting. > Give me some bit of evidence your essentialism isn't nihlistic. Aside from the fact that I posit Value as the ground of experiential existence, foster the spiritual development of man, and firmly believe in a transcendent source, my answer to your rhetorical question should qualify as additional evidence. > If it is valuistic in base, it is not founded in universal moral, > ethical and objective truth, now is it? It is subjective in nature > focusing on the individual value expereince which is hardly > universal unless you are asserting a collectivism. > correct Ham? No, Ron -- and this is where you reveal complete ignorance of my philosophy. Again, there is no "universal moral or ethical truth", and the only objective truth is "what works" pragmatically as a relative principle. This is an anthropocentric universe. Since all knowledge is derived from experience, Truth is relative to the individual, and moral systems are developed by man to achieve peaceful cohabitation in a collective society. *Man is driven by his value-sensibility and is the "decision-maker" of his universe. To insure that his value judgments (preferences) are freely exercised, he is created as an autonomous agent. Were man to have access to absolute knowledge (Truth) it would make judgment meaningless and violate his freedom. Man's role in existence is to provide an unbiased extrinsic perspective of Essential Value. He achieves this through experience by differentiating "pre-intellectual" value into the actualized world of things and events in process. In a metaphysical sense, however, the essence of being-aware is the value of uncreated Absolute Essence. If you view this philosophy as Nihilism, something is seriously wrong with your thinking. (Always appreciate an opportunity to clarify my position.) --Ham 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/ 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/
