G'day Mark --
At this point, I have to say that I haven't learned enough yet, from my side, to be able to provide added response. I believe you know what my problems with this ontology is, and I confess that they come from my side. The interpretation doesn't provide much more than light negating dark. However, I am always interested to read a new angle on this and ask questions since that is how I learn. So, can this Absolute Essence be seen as the background of what we are negating, or is the Essence actually differentiated itself, like a cobweb is visually differentiated with dew drops?
I would expect your problems with my ontology to "come from [your] side", Mark. Let's try to identify them and come to some kind of agreement. Before we go any further, however, please understand that I make no claim to represent or imitate Pirsig's thesis. When I parenthetically cite MoQ terms, it is intended only to provide a familiar reference point for the concept at hand. Now to your question...
First of all, Absolute Essence is more than a "background". It is the substance or "quiddity" of reality. And, because it is absolute, it is the very antithesis of differentiation. This is implicit in Cusa's First Principle (see my most recent post to Alexander). Indeed, "Not-other" can have no other meaning than Absolute Oneness.
Negation is a troublesome term for many, and using it as a synonym for "creation" seems to confound the most logically astute in this forum. This was a concept developed by Hegel who postulated that experiential existence is Appearance. To actualize this appearance, "being" is negated - that is, reflected in an image or "recognized" - which implies subjective cognizance of an objective "other". Value can be perceived only when it exists as an other to the perceiver, that is, when Awareness is differentiated from Beingness. All otherness is differentiated appearance; and what differentiates it is the nothingness interspersed between finite phenomena in the process of experience. Since the observing subject itself is a "negate", the experience of specific objects and events is the result of negation by a negate. This "secondary negation" reduces essent-value relative to a particular being or object.
Now, experience is the process of appropriating essent-value for oneself and objectifying the being that this value represents. In Sartre's vernacular, this exemplifies one's "desire for the being of the other." Of course, we cannot have another's "being"; we can only have our own. But what we can, and do, appropriate for ourselves is the "essence" of the other's being. And inasmuch as all beingness, including ourselves, is negated Essence which we only sense valuistically, what we really experience is "essent-value". which is to say the Value of Essence objectivized as finite "essents" -- things and events that represent our value-sensibility.
As you and Alex have noted, I am persuaded that the dynamics of value play a significant role in creating our "real world" experience, and am anxious to develop and advance this concept, whether or not it is compatible with Mr. Pirsig's metaphysics.
Incidentally, have you any more ideas on the application of physical constants to express metaphysical axioms? I know I haven't provided much support toward this approach, but still believe it has dialectical possibilities.
Thanks for keeping this thread alive, Mark. Best regards, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
