Greetings Willblake2 --
Arlo is talking about the peripheral mind, that behavior above ground, and claiming that the subconscious thinking is also societal, control by language. This cannot be true, it is the other way around. A society has a completely different consciousness which we are not privy to, in the same way each individual nerve is not privy to our thoughts.
You're absolutely right Willblake, and I'm sure Arlo and Krimel realize that too, but in deference to Pirsig they prefer not to notice that "the emperor wears no clothes." Craig recently suggested that had Pirsig "... called [Society] the 'institutional level', he could have made his point without getting it mistaken for the biological activities of bees & ants." But even Craig misses the point.
Activity, behavior, and expression are terms designating objectively observed events or processes. Awareness, thinking, and cognizance (intellection) are subjective functions of the conscious self. The behaviors exhibited by bees or ants or people reveal nothing of their thoughts or feelings. Conciousness is proprietary to the individual and is non-transferable, or, as Ayn Rand once said, "No man can think for another." Of course one's thoughts and attitudes are influenced by society. But what is loosely referred to as "the social intelligence" can only be a collective reflection of thoughts and ideas that originate with the individual subject.
Why are the MoQists so reluctant to concede this? Obviously, because the author needed to do away with subjects and objects (SOM) in order to "overcome" duality. Instead of the duality we all know, he posited a four-level Quality hierarchy which can be interpreted in so many ways that even the charter members of this forum can't agree on which is "correct".
If all we are are our thoughts, what are we when we are listening to music without thought? I believe Arlo brought up a similar example with food. I suppose the argument would go that is: we are with thoughts, the music is the social level, and we are appreciating it through language. However, one does not have to understand music to appreciate it. It interacts with the inner self, that is separate (in a continuous) manner from the outer (ego) self. I can ski down a slope thoughtlessly, but I am still there.
The locus of awareness is the knowing 'I' of each individual. It's hard to define because it is not an existent; that is, it can't be measured, quantified, or localized objectively.
If it's any help, I refer to any kind of value response as "sensibility". The stimulus or trigger can be physiological (e.g., pain, taste, pressure, balance), psycho-emotional (joy, sorrow, fear, love, excitement), esthetic (music, art, poetry, beauty), or intellectual (freedom, morality, justice).
I reserve the term "experience" for interactive or relational awareness, such as meeting other people, working in the garden, or skiing down a slope.
In addition, there is recall of past experience (memory), learning (acquiring factual knowledge), and conceptualizing (figuring, comparing, abstracting, organizing, defining, etc.)
In all cases, awareness is proprietary to the individual subject.
We are the sum total of our awareness thoughts, our subconscious thoughts, our interaction with the environment, the beating of our hearts, the intelligence of our immune system, the thoughtless passions, emotions, feelings that arise to form thoughts. We are so much more than our thoughts (or ego as I believe you state).
True, but not all of these processes are conscious. For example, we're not normally aware of our heart or respiration rate, blood pressure, and other autonomic activities.
The problem with the notion that society dictates thought is that individuals arise (especially in politics), that argue they have a social solution to correct our inner selves. This is dangerous indeed, and leads to the polarization of people through the abuse of social ideas (fairness, security, compassion), who are each trying to fulfill their ideas. Such things lead to wars based on ideology, which can never be won, because the ideology is made up and doesn't really exist. There is no tangible winning, only a subjective sense of one.
I'm in general agreement, but would prefer to leave politics out of this discussion.
Nice to chat with you again, Willblake. Best regards, 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/
