Dear Steve --
I don't have any problem generally with common sense,
but neither philosophy nor science is in the business of
confirming it. *Einstein said that common sense is just a
bundle of prejudices**acquired before the age of
eighteen. We need those predjudices to get by, but
we also do well to question our predjudices.*
I don't view common sense as "predjudicial". I view it as the universal
precepts we all intellectualize from experience. Like scientific knowledge,
common sense is open to falsification should experience change. In most
instances, however, the axioms of common sense reflect the "logic of
empirical reality" rather than one's predjudices.
[Ham, quoting J. L. Mackie]:
"For value to exist at all there must be a valuator - an agent - to impose
a standard on what is otherwise an indifferent universe. Things are good
to
agents, for the sake of attaining some goal; they are not simply good in
themselves. Put differently, reality comes before morality. Prior to all
good and evil, there must be a world of things that can become good, evil,
or neither. In that regard, value is conditional: it predicates on the
existence of agents who have some standard for the material state of
affairs."
[Steve]:
This is not an argument in support of your position. This quote just takes
for granted what you wish to prove. You have yet to explain how
epistemology does not support Pirsig's postulate that Value precedes
subjectivity and objectivity. All you've said is, "it's common sense."
Ok. Try this Values definition from
www.importanceofphilosophy.com/Epistemology_Values.html :
"Values are that which one acts to gain or keep. Living entities act to
achieve various ends. They decide, by some standard of evaluation, which
ends are wanted, and to what degree. The combination of an end to which one
can act towards, and the wanting to accomplish those ends, is a value.
"Values are automated judgments about particular ends. Similar to emotions,
they are originally derived through the use of reason. They are derived
from an initial judgment about the merits of particular ends to achieve some
goal. The automated response comes in the form of "wanting" something.
Since it is based on a previous judgment, it can sometimes be stale or
incorrect, just as an emotion is.
"Values are not desires. A desire is an emotional longing for something.
It differs from values in a couple ways. First, the desire may not be
achievable. One may desire to grow wings and fly. Values are concerned
with goals one is able to pursue. Only when a course of action is apparent
can one value something."
Note that "Value" presupposes "one" (agent or observer), "living entities",
and a "reasoning" or "wanting" subject. In no case is value defined as
independent or exclusive of man. Of course this doesn't "prove" anything
other than substantiating the epistemological understanding of Value. But,
by the same token, where is your "proof" that Quality exists independently
of man?
You think Pirsig has it all backwards, but is no big incite. That is
precisely the point. Pirsig says, suppose we've had it all upside
down all along. Pirsig is *deliberately* turning everything on its head.
[Ham]:
Playing 'let's suppose' may be amusing as a child's game, but it doesn't
shed any light on experiential values. Similarly, I could change my
perspective by imagining a flying cow or a talking lizard (Geico?), but
this won't change the way the world works or how knowledge is
acquired. There is simply no epistemological support for unexperienced
or unrealizable value. Asking me to "try it out" is like asking me to
believe in the Truth Fairy.
[Steve]:
This is a very closed-minded comment. Was it a child's game
when Copernicus said, let's suppose the sun rather than the earth
is the center of the universe? Was it a child's game when Einstein
said, let's suppose that gravity is not a force but rather the
experience of curved space?
It would have been a child's game if Copernicus and Einstein had only their
imaginations
to play on. Fortunately they had acquired the astronomical knowledge and
mathematical calculations necessary to empirically validate their theories.
[Ham]:
Steve, while I can appreciate RMP as an accomplished writer
and novelist, I don't regard metaphysics as an art form.
Judging a philosopher by these criteria demeans Philosophy.
It's not like trying on a shoe. I hope you don't think I'm gullible
enough to believe everything a gifted novelist sets in print.
[Steve]:
So you have no appreciation for Pirsig as a philosopher?
How do you regard metaphysics and philosophy if not as
an art form?
Are logic, analysis, intellection, and deduction forms of "art"? Philosophy
has always been a dialectical inquiry into the fundamental truths
(principles) of reality. Hegel codified this inquiry as a methodology based
on the stages of "thesis-antithesis-synthesis" according to the laws of
dialectical materialism. Metaphysics is a special case in that the
hypotheses posited are not limited to material reality. The only "art"
involved in this intellectual discipline is expressing the concepts in
comprehensible language. Some writers are more "poetic" than others --
especially those who call their philosophy "Metaphysics" while deploring the
very idea of a transcendent reality.
Regards,
Ham
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