DT said:
I would add that the transfer of information between levels must be both ways
between the social and intellectual. I've taken to thinking that the two upper
levels might be better represented a one level split down the middle. Isn't odd
that a Wikipedia search for "intellect" redirects you to intelligence and ....
dmb says:
If you want to get at the difference between the social and intellectual
levels, I think you probably want to google around with the terms "mythos" and
"logos". I found a college website that gives you the basic idea. Please notice
the end, where it corroborates Pirsig's view of the point of departure...
MYTHOS and LOGOS
Sandra LaFaveWest Valley College
MYTHOS (Mythic world view)
Some people have called the mythic world-view “primitive” or “irrational”. In
the mythic experience of life, math/logic type thinking is not as important as
high emotionality — "low focus, high affect". The paradigm is the Aborigine
Dreamtime, a "strong" time, eternally “now,” “everywhen,” in which paradigm
roles and activities always ongoing. Some elements of mythos remain in
contemporary world religions, e.g., the ongoingness of Jesus' salvation act in
every Mass The mythic world-view is unhistorical because daily time is
unimportant. The only time that matters is "strong" time, which is always
ongoing. Ritual re-enactment of paradigm events and archetypal persons (Hunter,
Warrier, Lover, etc.) in strong time gives meaning to everyday life. In mythic
cultures, one achieves a kind of liberation from daily time by imaginatively
merging with timeless archetypes and repeating archetypal activities in a
ritual manner. According to mythic world-views, there has been a devolution (a
"fall") from Golden Age to daily time — things now aren't as good as they were
in a long-ago Eden. Oral cultures — those without writing — tend to be mythic,
so knowledge is limited to what the group can remember. Sacred places and
objects are thought to exist within the everyday world. So mythic people tend
to be wary of changing the natural world, and do not modify nature on a large
scale. The categories of being merge. A thing can be simultaneously both X and
not-X. Mythic people do not make the same distinctions we ordinarily do. Here
are some examples.Self is not different from tribe or ancestorsMythic cultures
tend to focus on groups. Individuals matter only insofar as they exemplify the
timeless archetypes. For example, mythic cultures tend not to have the concept
of an individual afterlife. One's eternal destiny is bound up with the destiny
of one's clan or tribe. If an individual's clan or ancestor has offended the
gods, the individual is doomed as well, whether or not the individual is
guilty.Self is not different from nature.Humans are part of nature, and the
interests of humans don't necessarily supersede the interests of animals or
plants. Mythic people typically participate in rituals to placate the local
gods of the animals and plants before undertaking projects that require killing
of local animals or plants.Thinking is not different from feeling.Living things
are not different from dead things.For example, the Australian Aborigine people
consider Ayers Rock to be alive, and to possess god-like powers.Body is not
different from soul.Conscious is not different from unconscious.Ordinary
wakeful consciousness is not privileged. Mythic people believe it is possible
for events that occur in dreams or trances or drug-induced states to be as real
as events of ordinary daily consciousness, especially if the dreamer is a
person of known special powers, e.g., a shaman.Animal is not different from
human.For example, some Native American creation myths say "At the Great
Beginning, there were The People. And some of the people decided to become
buffalo, and some decided to become crows, and some decided to become wolves,"
etc.Sacred ritual is not different from secular life activity. LOGOS (Logical
world view)
The logos world-view is what we usually call “modern” or “rational”. The word
"logic" comes from the word "logos" in Greek. So does the "-logy" ending of
words like "anthropology," "psychology," "biology," etc. The logos way of
viewing the world de-emphasizes emotions; it is "high focus, low affect."
Western philosophy and science are paradigms of the logos world-view. The logos
world-view features linear time, which goes in one direction only (forward).
The past is gone. Each particular event is unique in space and time. So history
becomes important as the record of unique non-repeatable events. In the logic
world-view, time is imposed on religious ideas. For example, concepts like
"beginning" and "end" start being applied to the universe. God becomes the
ruler of linear time; he decides when it starts and stops. Stories of creation
and last things emerge. The logos world-view features an empirical, practical
orientation.People begin to think of nature as governed by causal laws. Using
empirical methods, humans can discover the laws of nature and use them to
manipulate, predict, and control nature in increasingly large-scale ways. Logos
cultures typically have writing, which allows knowledge to be accumulated, and
not limited to what the current group can remember. Linguistic precision
becomes vital. The world of things is value-neutral. Everything is a something.
Everything has “whatness”, “nature”, “essence” — some specific kind of being.
If this is an apple, it’s not a banana. It has apple-ness; it lacks
banana-ness. Logos cultures often oppose thinking and feeling, and value people
who can think efficiently and use language clearly. Men are thought to embody
the logical ideal more than women, children, or slaves. Western religions offer
personal salvation after death. One's eternal destiny is not tied to one's
tribe or clan. Salvation is on an individual basis. THALES (c. 600 BCE)
represents the transition from Mythic to Logical world-view in the West.
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