Good morn, dmb. Continuing our dialogue,
dmb said: > > The first thing I did was supply a general definition of both Royce's > Absolute and the general idea of an Absolute. > > Joh replied: > Ok, dave, I did not accept your definition of Royce's absolute. dmb says: > > Okay, but Royce's relation to pragmatism is not relevant to the definition > of the Absolute, unless you're saying that Royce rejected the Absolute > altogether. Let me remind you that I used wiki for a basic definition > because you would not say what it is. Remember, I double dared you to > explain it? > > My response was Kuklick's explanation that you can't grasp Royce unless you read him pretty deeply and understand his logic, so a quick summation isn't easy. But I'll try harder. > John said:Honestly, if you're gonna take on Royce then any published work > ABOUT Royce, by somebody who has studied him intensely is fair. I don't > accept cursory summations in the SEP, Wiki, or anything that is a compendium > of different philosophers. I DID respond to this before, but perhaps you > suffer from a little of the ole attention deficit disorder yourself > > dmb says: > Yes, I did use published work about Royce. Obviously, I'm not resting my > case on a dictionary. I just used it to take up your slack. And I realize > that you responded before but I objected to the very thing you're doing > again. Don't you remember me asking you WHY these sources aren't good > enough? To simply declare that you don't accept them is not a reason. And it > is unreasonable to refuse such things because they are the ONLY things that > CAN count as evidence in a dispute like this one. John replies: Let's be clear dave, what I'm saying is that according to Kuklick, and I agree with him, just any old published summary of Royce's thought is not acceptable as authoritative because of the factors of non-scholarship that have contributed to ignorance about him. Thus a general compendium isn't going to be a helpful published source, but a focused study of his writings by a scholar who has really put the time and effort, is. You can't be the sole arbiter of what counts as authoritative in a debate. I may not be a pro, but even I know that. > If we want to know what Royce thought of the Absolute and compare that to > James's and Pirsig's thoughts about the absolute, what could be better than > quoting James, Pirsig, Royce, or the scholars who write about them? > The SEP, by the way, is peer reviewed and as a valid source it is > considered to be nearly as good as an academic journal. Anthologies are > usually compiled by people who are at the top of their field and are also > considered to be a totally valid scholarly source. > > Ri-i-i-ght. Which is why we go to them for definitions of Quality, right? Nope. Sometimes the most popular scholars get it wrong. > John said: > And if we're stuck at the "well my sources are better than your sources" > then I guess we're stuck. > > > dmb says: > > But I don't recall ANY of your sources speaking to the issue, to the > Absolute. That's a big part of why you got the double dare to explain it. > But you never did. So I whipped out my wiki. > > Fair enough. We do need a clear agreement on what is meant by "absolute" in general. I went back to wiki and got the rest of the stuff you left out in your clippage: wiki> The Absolute is the concept of an unconditional reality which transcends limited, conditional, everyday existence. It is often used as an alternate term for a "God" or "the Divine", especially, but by no means exclusively, by those who feel that the term "God" lends itself too easily to anthropomorphic presumptions. The concept of The Absolute may or may not (depending on one's specific doctrine) possess discrete will, intelligence, awareness or even a personal nature. It is sometimes conceived of as the source through which all being emanates. It contrasts with finite things, considered individually, and known collectively as the relative. As such, the word "Absolute" signifies a negative concept: non–relative, non–comparative, or without relation to anything else. This is reflected in its Latin origin absolūtus which means "loosened from" or "unattached." Examples of religions and philosophies which embrace the concept of the Absolute in one form or another include Hinduism, Jainism, Taoism, Islam, some forms of Jewish philosophy, and existential or metaphysical forms of Christianity. Terms which serve to identify The Absolute [1] among such beliefs include the Tao (the Way), Brahman, Parabrahman, God, the Divine and numerous other appellations.[citation needed] The human vital essence - soul, spirit, spark of awareness, is said to have originally derived in each case from the Absolute,[citation needed] and to be indestructible after the nature of the Absolute, and to be capable of returning to its source. This returning is the goal of those Eastern religions that have such a concept. The general commonalities between the various versions of the Absolute are: infinity, indescribability, formlessness, transcendence and immanence /wiki> I'll accept that as a fair and fairly complete definition. I notice you in your earlier statement associated it with that anthropomorphic view that you reject, but wiki says that is "not necessarily". John said: > ...the Absolute you're rejecting depends upon the definition of your > Absolute. Royce's Absolute isn't comprehended by either of you. > > > dmb says: > > Oh, so you do admit that he has an Absolute in his system? Well, that's > something. Teach me. Tell me. Help me comprehend Royce's Absolute. > Apparently it's a big secret they're keeping from all the scholars I quoted > on the topic and from those hacks over at Stanford. Plus I double dared you > to. Good! I like boldness in my dialectical opposition. Leaving aside all the rest, why don't we focus tightly upon this one point first. What is an absolute and whether Pirsig's system uses such. It's a very good place to start. From the wiki comparison of Tao, it doesn't seem as ridiculous an assertion as you make it out to be. And alas, I got a late start this morning and I have to go for now. Examine that definition of Absolute and if you agree with me that we can use that, then we'll have an adequate textual foundation for philosophical engagement. I asserting the commonality of Royce's Absolute with Pirsig's MoQ, you against. Are we good? John the simple laborer. > John said: > And according to my understanding, "direct everyday experience" can't be > contrasted with an intellectualized Absolute, because it IS an > intellectualized Absolute. > > dmb says: > > Huh? Look, the thing that has already been established for sure is that you > like this Absolute thing and I don't. But that's not the issue. That's not > the question. I quoted Pirsig on the Absolute because the dispute is about > what he thinks of it. It's not even about whether he's right or wrong about > it. I just want to establish the simple fact that Pirsig thinks Quality is > direct everyday experience and that this is contrasted with the Absolute. > I'd also add the answer I gave to gav, who'd asked about the "anti-theistic" > comments in the Copleston annotations. That God the idealist are talking > about that that Pirsig suggests we drop as a relic, that is the Absolute. He > was rejecting yet another form of Hegelian idealism in those comments. > Again, the issue is not whether his statements are true but simply that we > have his view on record. Pirsig's statements about what he thinks are the > best evidence we have for what he thinks. > > > John said: > There's no "transcendance" in Royces definition. His Absolute IS > Experience itself! You say that's not "much different" than a reality > that's beyond experience, and I don't know what's wrong with your reading > and reasoning powers... > > dmb says: > Oh, I see. Well, if you've ever said that before I missed it. Do you have > any source to cite on that? I can't just take your word for it, especially > since my sources say otherwise. That's a reasonable request, no? > > > dmb said previously: > It's also worth noting the basic rules of radical empiricism because they > practically tailor made to preclude the Absolute. > > > > John replied: > Yeah, well that I probably agree with you on. Considering who the > arguments were aimed at, there's a great deal of truth in the assertion. > But in a dialectical arena, you can't understand the combat by watching > only one side. > > dmb says: > > Well, there you go then. That's the only point, really. James was doing > combat against the Absolute and you know perfectly well that he had a pretty > good idea what that meant. Again, the issue is not whether James is > ultimately right about the universe or if his reasons for rejecting it are > valid. The only thing I want to establish is THAT James against it and > apparently we agree on that much. > > > dmb says: > James wants to reconstruct all of philosophy on the back of two simple > restraints. If it IS known in experience, your philosophy can't ignore it. > If it is NOT known in experience, you can't use it in your philosophy. > > > John replied: > And do you remember my refutation of this assertion? I do. It relates to > intersubjectivity as the precondition of knowing. > > > > dmb says: > > Again, you are confusing two different questions. Plus James isn't > asserting anything about conditions of knowledge. He's setting down some > rules as a method. The method's validity is not the issue, but simply that > he had one and that it ruled out entities that can't be known in experience. > If you want to make a case that Royce's absolute is knowable in experience, > then you'll have to show some evidence for that. Again, this assertion > defies the essential thing about Absolutes as they're defined and described > in every other source I've ever seen. I think that it is quite reasonable to > be skeptical of this assertion. And I think its unfair to act like this > conclusion constitutes some kind of prejudice or incomprehension or > whatever. As far as I know, you're the only one who's ever made such a claim > and you made it just this once without any support at all. > > I suspect that you're confused because the idealist see everything that > happens as an act of the Absolute, but the argument against this idea is > that we can experience the everything that happens but the Absolute itself > is just an abstract idea about everything, not an entity or mind that's > somehow underlying everything, as a unity which holds all of reality within > itself. > > > > > > _________________________________________________________________ > Your E-mail and More On-the-Go. 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