Greetings Ham, On Sep 25, 2010, at 3:02 AM, Ham Priday wrote:
> Greetings Platt, Marsha, John and All -- > > On Sept 23 at 4:08 PM Platt wrote: > >> SOM axiom: "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so." >> >> MOQ axiom: Everything is good or bad before thinking at all. >> >> We can see what the MOQ is up against -- Pirsig vs. Shakespeare, >> a far out idea vs.conventional wisdom. >> >> Do the levels get in the way of Pirsig's Copernican revolution? >> >> Does he cater too much to SOM thinking? > > First of all, difference is the nature of existential reality; so there is no > "special difference" that applies to subject-object (SOM) experience. As for > Dynamic Quality being divided into four distinct levels, that is Pirsig's > theory of "causation by preference", and it limits the MoQ to the > evolutionary process of scientific objectivism. Quality is indivisible, undefinable and unknowable. It is static patterns that are categorized into four evolutionary levels. > No offense to RMP, but of course I side with Shakespeare on the question of > values. What is "good" or "bad" is man's judgment > (experiencing/thinking/feeling) based on his value orientation. More > recently, astrophysicist John Wheeler noted: "...what we say about the > universe as a whole depends on the means we use to observe it. In the act of > observing we bring into being something of what we see. Laws of physics > relate to man, the observer, more closely than anyone has thought before. The > universe is not 'out there', somewhere, independent of us. Simply put: > without an observer, there are no laws of physics." Andre quoted Ant''s PhD thesis where there may be two views of Quality. The first, from an ultimate point-of-view is good by existence, the second is a conventionally applied good or bad judgement dependent of relative experience. > I think he understates the case. Not only are there no laws of physics, > there is no physical world without an observer. A few days ago, Marsha > quoted a developer of quantum physics as saying: "Observations not only > _disturb_ what is to be measured, they _produce_ it." If, as Pirsig wrote > [in SODV], "the observation creates the reality," and if the sense of Quality > is primary to objective experience, then two conclusions can be drawn: > 1) An observer (subject) is necessary for objects to exist, and > 2) Quality (Value) is the essence of empirical reality. The "the observation creates the reality" statement is what I interpret the Lila character to be saying in the Chapter Fourteen soliloquy. And in the MoQ aren't these two points-of-view considered the (1) static view and the (2) Dynamic view. The insistence on an 'independent individual' is result of the static view. > > Yes, Platt, this is "SOM thinking". But we MUST think in SOM terms when > dealing with the differentiated world of objects and events. More > importantly, from a metaphysical standpoint, we need to dispense with > difference when postulating Ultimate Reality. The MoQ tries to straddle both > dimensions, using the same terminology to describe "static" and "dynamic" > phenomena, thus failing to break through finitude to an absolute source. And > therein lies much of the confusion regarding patterns, subjectivity, and > intellect. > > The pattern I've noted in recent posts is an attempt to deny both objectivity > and subjectivity and describe the world as if it could be understood without > observation. That's like trying to explain time in a world where nothing > changes. It makes no sense to deny the obvious; this only complicates the > issue and its exposition. To know the world in the static (conventional) sense does require the s/o split. On that rests my understanding of the Fourth Level being SOM, but there is unpatterned experience to expose that as illusion, an understanding that is beyond static knowledge. > In a different thread, John pointed out another important concept that has > been slighted in the MoQ: Freedom. If goodness is fixed to Quality in the > universe, we have no alternative but to experience goodness. But we > experience the bad along with the good. That's because Quality is only a > relative measure of goodness--which allows for free choice. To be detached from the total dependence on static knowledge is freedom. > [John to Andre on 9/23]: >> A response to Quality can be good or bad, right? You can harmonize, >> or be out of tune. There is choice. >> >> Good can exist with freedom, because choice is as fundamental as value. >> If there is no choice, there is no good. > > Indeed, as I have argued previously, it is our CHOICE of value, not the > patterns we construct from it, that is fundamental to human existence. And isn't this CHOICE only available in a detached awareness? > Essentially speaking, > Ham Marsha p.s. I've read 'Reason and Existence' by Karl Jasper. I was off to a good start and very much enjoyed the first lecture where I thought more than once 'This can be said of Quality too.', but I got lost in the rest of the lectures. I have still to read 'Introduction to Existentialism.' Perhaps I should have read that book first. - Right now, I am hot on the trail of "quantum reality." 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