On 12/10/09, 5:49 PM, "Joseph Maurer" <[email protected]> wrote;
Hi Ham and all, I agree "a meeting of the minds" is not to be since I feel your interpretation of Dq/Sq is erroneous. How do you know that Existence is not essential to Absolute Essence? You would have to claim absolute essence for yourself. In order to know that you have to define 'existence' and then claim it is 'not essential to absolute Essence.' You deny that existence has meaning in relation to absolute essence, it is imaginary. Your metaphysics does not exist. Only the supposition that Essence needs no Existence exists. Having said that you can claim anything you want for Essence and there is no way to question it. It is a matter of your Faith. Logic is useless. With Existence as the essential reality DQ/SQ then undefined Existence comes before reality and any meaning of reality has to acknowledge Existence, and is verifiable DQ/SQ. Metaphysics, then, becomes a statement of the rational not the irrational "uncreated source". I accept that I can¹t know everything.
I do not have to define existence because it is defined by experience. Since nothing comes from nothingness, anything that exists must have a source to create it. My definition for the primary source is non-descriptive because I have no direct knowledge of it. Yes, Absolute Essence is the ultimate reality I believe in. But it isn't simply "a mettar of faith." I can logically postulate that what transcends existence is not subject to the conditions of finitude (e.g., time, space, change, and differentiation).
I find it tongue-in-cheek that you are posting to an MOQ site espousing DQ/SQ and then state: Ham "Moreover, your assertion that Realism is a judgment about the reality of existence" is a nihilistic take on the objectivist position. It begs the question of how any other reality can be valid. Joe I reject idealism in favor of pragmatism. I accept realism in existence that accepts undefined DQ at a higher level than defined SQ. Nothing has no existence. However, the undefined DQ does exist. ...
I'll return your question: As a pragmatist, how do you know that something you can't define exists? How do you know that the existence created by your own experience is "reality"? Indeed, it it "realistic" to assert that an indefinable "dynamic quality" exists at a "higher level" than a definable "static quality"? You accept this on "faith". I don't see that your stance on existential reality is any more valid or logical than my belief in ultimate reality.
Are you trying to understand Pirsig¹s view of pragmatism, or do you simply reject it in favor of your own idealism?
I think I understand Pirsig's Quality hierarchy and his concept of experience as "the cutting edge of [existential] reality." I do not try understand this theory as pragmatism, however. The fact that you call this a "pragmatic view" is based solely on the author's refusal to theorize beyond experiential existence and posit a truly metaphysical thesis. That would of course have made the MoQ "idealistic", which you would find unacceptable.
Imho you have made a decision to find Dq/Sq pragmatism subordinate to idealism. You then accuse me of objectivism. I am sorry you put faith in idealism. You label my activities objectivism. I understand that you feel that existence contains no meaning in itself and evolution is bogus. This is odd on a MOQ website which supports evolution.
Again, you are begging the question of "pragmatism" versus "idealism" which is not the issue that divides us. I don't "put faith in" either of these ideologies, nor have I made a decision to subordinate pragmatism. Pragmatism and ultilitarianism are simply the use of objectively proven methods to solve practical problems. This is a logical approach to causal systems and relational processes. Obviously, pragmatism has no application to Essence which is not a system or a process.
Your concepts are intractably framed in objective reality. This limits your reasoning to empirical existence and denies you the broader perspective of a transcendent, uncreated source.
Anyway the best to you, Ham. Since the mind does not exist in Pirsig¹s thought I have no problem rejecting a meeting of the minds.
It is unfortunate for the MoQists that the mind (value-sensible self) does not exist for Pirsig, for it is the agent that brings Value into the world. It's even more regrettable that the celebrated author of a Quality-based philosophy did not realize this critical flaw in his epistemology.
Thanks again for your responses, Joe, and enjoy the holidays. --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/
