Dear John --
[Ham, previously]:
How do we know that an appearance (let's call it a "phenomenon")
has aspects unless we recognize them? Indeed, the aspects of a
phenomon are what make up the appearance.
[John]:
But many aspects cannot be witnessed first hand. The moons of
another planet, I cannot see with my unaided eye. I read about the
investigations of others and take their word for what they say is true.
I can't possibly investigate for myself many of the aspects of existence
that I believe and rely on and tell myself (and others tell me) are true.
"Appearance" relates to my third tenet: "Existence is the appearance of
differentiated otherness." As such, it is the direct referent of
experience. Something you may have read about the fourth moon of Jupiter is
not an appearance, not experience, but second-hand data. I doubt that your
life depends on such specious knowledge.
You are uncomfortable, I surmise, with my theory of experience as the
"objectivizer" of existence. There all these unexperienced
phenomena--quarks, neutrons, black holes, and the like--which seem to
suggest that there's more to existence than "mere" appearance. For example,
existence must be an "ordered system"; otherwise, how could it support laws
and principles that enable mankind to quantify and predict its evolution as
a cause-and-effect paradigm? How could science have advanced our knowledge
of the universe and its dynamics over the centuries if existence were not
more than the appearance of relational otherness?
Yet, we can only know what human cognizance is capable of fathoming. When
we conclude that the universe manifests "intelligent design", where do you
suppose that intelligence resides? When Mr. Pirsig says that we inhabit a
"moral universe", by whose standard is that morality measured? When Bo
speaks of SOM and intellect as one and the same, what is the source of that
intellect?
Do you catch my drift, John?
What is the difference between evolutionary change and making?
From outward appearance, they often seem identical. If the issue
is with agency, doesn't a flower "make" a sweet scent from the
biochemisistry of its existence?
But genetics and fragrances aren't "things". What constitutes a thing is
being (and its delineation by nothingness). But since you say that
"demonstrably, there's no such thing as nothing," I'll leave that aside for
the moment and deal only with "being". I maintain that experience (a la
sensibility) actualizes the appearance of being from value, including one's
own being. Considering that the MoQ equates Value with Quality, there is a
certain parallel here with Pirsig's theory of quality patterns. But whereas
Pirsig would say Quality (Value) "has the individual" as a pattern, I say
that the individual (sensibility) brings value into the world as beingness.
Value-sensibility (the individual self) is the "agency" here, John.
"Appearances are finally controlled by the functionings of the animal
body.
These functionings and the happenings within the environment of the body
are both derived from a common past, highly relevant to both. It is
thereby pertinent to ask, whether the animal body and the extemal regions
are not attuned together, so that under normal circumstances, the
appearances conform to natures within the environment. The attainment
of such conformation would belong to the perfection of nature in respect
to the higher types of animal life.... We have to ask whether nature
does not contain within itself a tendency to be in tune, an Eros urging
towards perfection."
A.N. Whitehead as quoted by Alan Watts
Whitehead's writing tends to be a bit obtuse for my taste. What does he
mean by the "common past" of body "functionings and happenings", and what
are the "external regions"? Does a "tendency to be in tune" connote
systemic order? I have several of Watts' books. Could you provide the
title of the one from which this quote was extracted? Of course, I say we
set the "tune" that nature plays, and whatever "eros" Whitehead is referring
to is man's, not nature's.
...only a society can define an individual.
What about a dictionary? This reminds me of Marsha's logic, that inasmuch
as she is nothing but interrelating patterns she could not confirm that she
had a self.
I agree with your (and Ayn's) disparagement of collectivism.
But even as a body is more than a mere collection of organs,
so is an individual much more than a collection of individuated
experience. I still hold with Pirsig's postulation of Quality as
the best possible understanding of this "something more".
"Understanding" or simply a handy label? An individual is indeed much more
than a collection of organs or experiences. He/she is the sole realizer of
value.
We will chat some more, I have some more reading to do,
and a juicy quote comparing Kant and John Stuart Mill
on "the good" that I'd like to run by you.
I like "juicy quotes", although I don't see the relevance of "goodness" to
this discussion.
Be good,
Ham
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