Dan, Ron, John and All --
On Fri, Apr 8, 2011 at 9:02 AM, X Acto <[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Dan, you had stated to John
I think the confusion is thinking that having a choice is freedom.
Conventionally, that is so. But we are not talking conventionally
here. We are using the framework of the MOQ. To have a choice is
follow intellectual patterns of value and when we are dealing with
static quality, we are without choice.
Ron:
Static Quality is nothing but choice and having choice is freedom.
To have intellectual choice is to follow intellectual patterns of value
which effect social and biological patterns of value which effect
inorganic patterns of value.
I make the intellectual choice to drink nothing but single malt scotch
whiskey, this choice effects more choices, social outcast as a drunk,
biological dependence and the breakdown of healthy tissue,chemicals
change their bonds. Our emotions are a complicated set of molecular
values and what are we if we are not our emotions, our values.
The illusion of these processes is that they are static.
[John, on 4/7]:
Quite a corner you've got yourself painted into there Dan.
One is only free to the extent that one follows DQ, but since
all experience is immediately translated into sq, the only time
one is truly free is in that tiny slice of time which is the pet of
existence to Radical Empiricism. Personally, I'd like a bit
more freedom than that. You need to reformulate, I think
[Dan then defends his position]:
Here is the exact quote from LILA:
"To the extent that one's behavior is controlled by static patterns of
quality it is without choice. But to the extent that one follows
Dynamic Quality, which is undefinable, one's behavior is free."
I have been following this thread with increasing frustration, as it
confirms my suspicion that neither Mr. Pirsig nor the MoQists can justify
Free Will in a reality controlled by Quality. As a consequence, they've
concluded that it's either insignificant or "illusional". This denies the
very meaning of existential awareness in relation to ultimate reality which
I understand it is philosophy's purpose to explain.
Being forced to follow an undefinable course is coercion, not freedom. It
means that man is channeled to a prescribed set of behaviors--even when he
"thinks" he has a choice--which is hardly the expression of Free Will by any
definition. If we are "controlled by patterns of quality" and are compelled
to follow DQ by cosmic law, as the good book says, then free will is a myth.
Subject to these conditions, why should the issue of moral values even
arise, let alone be endlessly debated in a philosophy forum?
In order for man to be a free agent, he is created as a 'being-aware', an
individuated entity that stands apart from the Creator or Source. He can be
neither indigenous to it nor the essence of its value. But so that he may
realize this value without the bias of absolute knowledge, the psychic core
of man's being is value-sensibility. In existential terms, cognizant
awareness is a non-entity: it cannot be localized, quantified, or directly
observed. The individual is a choice-maker only by virtue of the fact that
he is an autonomous entity.
I don't know how this translates in MoQ terms, or whether a cognizant self
made of quality patterns can even be considered "autonomous". I could care
less whether "Pirsig says" or "Dan says" something different. I do know,
however, that unless man is an independent creature, capable of realizing
value for himself and free to act in accordance with his choices, human life
has no purpose or meaning other than to complete the evolutionary process of
an insentient universe.
I'm sorry if this offends any of you, or if it qualifies as apostasy to the
"official dogma". But I hope you'll let me know if it doesn't make sense to
you.
Essentially speaking,
Ham
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