Dearest Ham,
On Sat, Apr 30, 2011 at 1:50 PM, Ham Priday <[email protected]> wrote:
[Mark previously]
>> I am not sure that there cannot be objects without a subject
>> to experience them. Could you explain that to me?
>
[Ham]
> Since the questions you're asking indicate that I'm talking over your head,
> let's back up a bit,.
> Although Pirsig equates value sensibility with "pre-intellectual"
> experience, it is primary to both experience and objects. Working downward
> from Essence, which is ultimate reality, here is the ontogeny as I see it.
[Mark]
OK, I am listening. Perhaps you are speaking over my head. By that
token a person speaking French is also speaking over my head.
>
[Ham]
> Essence negates (e.g., excludes, annexes, disowns) "part of its" sensibility
> to create an autonomous "other" which I call the 'negate'. This cosmic
> "split" or division creates Difference which is not indigenous to absolute
> Essence. The dichotomy thus formed splits individuated sensibility
> (selfness) from insensible otherness (beingness). In terms of magnitude,
> the division represents nothingness pitted against the absolute source --
> the supreme difference These two contingencies are bound together by the
> value of the Source (Essence Value). The negate derives its conscious being
> and experiential power from otherness.
[Mark]
Yes, I am aware of this in your ontogeny, we have discussed it.
>
[Ham]
> By "experientiaI power" I mean to infer that experience is an "effective"
> actualizing function, rather than merely a passive or "affective" response
> to otherness. What it actualizes are the forms and qualities that represent
> the value-sensibility of the self in relation to its other. These physical
> attributes become the objects and events experienced in the individual's
> space/time world. In this way we each create our own reality, subject to
> the universal laws embedded in Essence Value. (I hope this clarifies my
> epistemology sufficiently to make my assertions comprehensible, even if you
> disagree with them.)
[Mark]
I also can grasp this. You are speaking of a personal reality. Since
many share the fundamental building blocks of this reality, it is also
somewhat impersonal. You are also pointing towards Quality with the
above. The only difference is that Quality actualizes itself as
qualities.
>
[Mark previously]
>> If something has quality, does that not provide an emotive response.
>> If we group all the different qualities of everything together and
>> call that Quality, is that not extremely emotive? How is the word
>> Value (the noun) any more emotive than Quality?
>
[Ham]
> Combining all attributive qualities together gives you an agglomeration,
> which I doubt Pirsig had in mind as his undefined Quality. What kind of
> emotion would this mishmash elicit? We'd be as much "turned off" by it as
> fascinated ...plus Goodness would be lost in the chaos. Even as a "noun",
> Quality to me is a dead label with no generative power of its own. I've
> posited Value in the "verbal" sense -- as the affinity of the cognitive self
> for its Source, not a nominative entity that gets better over time. We
> desire what we value; the things we actualize are desiderata that
> provisionally satisfy our yearning for the estranged Source.
[Mark]
I am not pointing towards an agglomeration in a mathematical sense of
group theory, although I like the "fascinated" part. Look at it this
way. We agree in terms of value being an important presentation. You
may even agree with me when I say that all we experience is the
quality of objects, not the objects themselves. We define objects
through their qualities (big, small, red, blue, loud, soft, fun,
distasteful, easy, hard). That is, what is presented to us is a world
filled with qualities. Now, from that it is not a large leap to
propose the mother of all qualities to be Quality. This Quality is
then split up into subsets and further subsets, or as Tao says: Tao
created the one, which created the two, which created the three, which
created all things.
We can label it as a noun because it has obvious presence, much like
light. While we are influenced by Quality, we are also quality. For
example, our cells have the same relation to us, as we have to our
cosmos. They (cells) are a subset of us, and we are a subset of
something larger. This is, of course, where the levels come in. It
could be said that this yearning is not only directional, but
bidirectional.
>
[Mark previously]
>> What is it that we value? Is it not the quality of such a thing?
>> Isn't a feeling of a positive or negative value an experience? Are
>> you saying that an experience evokes and experience? I am not sure
>> how your are dividing this up. Could you please explain how a
>> feeling is different from an experience?
>
> Metaphysically, we value Essence. As existents, we turn sensible value
> (feelings) into phenomena differentiated by space and time, or what we call
> experience. (Experience always infers being, which we get from the
> otherness of our existential dichotomy.)
[Mark]
In my ontology, everything has being, we cannot separate ourselves
from all the rest. This gives us great power in a polytheistic
universe. It also provides great humility. We provide quality to
Quality and the other way around. I think you may be making this
sense of "being" a bit too grand. There is not need for it.
>
[Mark]
>> Yes, some claim that objects contain quality, which they clearly can
>> not. Quality creates objects, wouldn't you agree? This appears to be
>> what you are saying if I read you correctly. Personage is a quality,
>> no?
>
[Mark]
> Value (Quality if you must) actualizes objects, as I stated above and have
> been stressing all along, Mark. Personage can embrace a number of
> "qualities"; but the beloved does represent value to the lover. And this
> value is realized psycho-emotionally (if I may), as well as intellectually.
> As I said previously, all experience is value-based.
[Mark]
Yes, Quality actualizes objects, and all experience is Quality (so far so good).
>
[Mark previously]
>> Our experience of intellectual-ness is Dynamic Quality in action, I do
>> not see how it can be anything other than that. If it is not dynamic
>> quality, then we need to label it? It is not hidden from us. As I
>> read in another good post, does water get thirsty? Are our eyes
>> hidden from us? If we are dynamic quality, what is there to hide?
>> Can a finger point at itself? Can we point at Dynamic Quality. I see
>> a lot of incongruity in what some others post. How can we find
>> something when we are it?
>
> These assertions are so tied to the MoQ that I have difficulty interpreting
> them. "Our experience of intellectual-ness" is meaningless to me, so I
> don't know what it's supposed to define. Perhaps you could provide an
> example. "Dynamic Quality in action" is another metaphor I don't
> understand. The "actor" in my ontology is the value agent, not Quality or
> Value itself. And the only "hidden" element in my ontology is the Essential
> Source. (Incidentally, I'm running the entire 'Hiddenness' essay on next
> week's Values Page, and it may help you understand why we must be "innocent"
> of absolute knowledge in order to exercise free choice.)
[Mark]
Well, I guess here I am speaking over your head (heh, heh). However,
I am a bit disappointed in you Ham. There are many resources with
which to educate yourself on MoQ, this forum included. If you are
still out in the dark, all I can say is do not dismiss without
investigation. But let me give you an example. We humans
intellectualize like a flower gives off an aroma. It is what we do.
One can say that such a thing began with simply trying to understand
and bend nature, but is has grown to much more than that, thus the
artificial construct of the Intellectual level. This
intellectualization is always done in the present moment. As such, it
is dynamic in aspect, continually unfolding. Perhaps it is forming a
bridge to Essence like the tower of Babel.
Because we cannot point to something does not mean it is hidden. it
just means that we can't point to it. A finger cannot point at
itself, but it is not hidden.
We are still actors in Quality, that has not disappeared though MoQ.
We can certainly call ourselves value agents, I have heard worse
labels. But, we cannot be value creators since we do not have
anything to draw on to do this. If there is indeed something to draw
on, this would be Quality. So instead of yearning for essence, we are
sucking Quality through every pore of our being.
>
> [Ham, previously]:
>>
>> My answer is that, although value always "points to" some greater essence,
>> Essence is not our nature. Instead, we have a "sense of Value" that is not
>> experienced, but that drives experience to represent it objectively. Value
>> sensibility, like Pirsig says about Quality, is "pre-intellectual",
>> whereas
>> experience can be, and is, intellectualized. So what passes for the
>> essence
>> of Value as things and events ("quality patterns") is our intellectualized
>> synthesis of value-sensibility.
>
> [Mark]:
>>
>> If we cannot experience it, as you say, then why point at it? I
>> cannot experience being inside of an elephant either. This does not
>> make such a phenomenon special. If you are speaking of motivation
>> and hope, then there are much less hidden ways to explain these things.
>
[Ham]
> I'm not pointing to Essence, Value does by drawing us to it. It is not so
> much an expression of "hope" as it is the desire for spiritual fulfillment.
[Mark]
I have no problem with this concept. You say draw, I say imbue.
>
[Mark previously]
>> The objectification of experience is simply part of communication, a
>> tool of the Societal Level. If we had nobody to talk to, we would not
>> need to objectivize, since words would not be necessary. Experience
>> would be direct (as it is for most of our day). Objectification is an
>> impingement of the Societal Level. Does this not make sense? If not,
>> then why not?
>
> How did society get in here? I don't see objectivization as impinging on
> society at all. What we experience is not "words" but tangible objects that
> we manipulate, consume, or utilize in some way, whether for societal or
> personal reasons.
[Mark]
OK, let's drop the society bit (for now) or this could get long. And,
I agree, we do not experience words, but what they represent.
>
[Mark previously]
>> It would seem to me that the intellectual can have Value, can it not?
>> If it has value then it is associated with Quality. I do not see how
>> we can draw a strict line between what is real and what is an image.
>> Intellectual synthesis is dynamic quality in action. It has to be,
>> there is no way to tease it away from everything else. Isn't the
>> fragrance of a flower part of the flower? Isn't our intellectualization
>> part of our pre-intellectual?
>
[Ham]
> Now you're using "intellectual" as a noun. What is "the intellectual" that
> you say has value? If you mean the intellect or intellectual
> understanding, yes, this has value insofar as it helps us comprehend our
> existence. It's what we're utilizing now, in fact. Intellection, however,
> cannot by definition be "pre-intellectual". That is, we can't
> intellectualize something before we experience it, and experience is the
> actualization of value. So, unless you're talking about "conceptualization"
> which involves deductive or analytical logic (as in metaphysical concepts),
> intellection is the tail end of the comprehension process.
[Mark]
Noun it is. I forgot why I did, must have been in response to what
you wrote. My point was, that we do not create value, we are value
intellect and all. I also have reservation on how the term
pre-intellectual is being used, it sounds somewhat Jamesian. I do not
agree with others on where this begins and ends. However, if we use
simple building blocks, the sensory input gets refined by the brain
into what we call the intellectual. For example as you read these
words, there is a lot going on before your brain converts it.
It is possible to create experience with the abstract (not
experienced), we do it all the time. I don't think an example is
needed here.
>
> [Ham previously]:
>>
>> But because to know that the objective reality we create for
>> ourselves is an illusion would disorient us, rendering us ineffective
>> existents in this world, such knowledge imust be hidden from us.
>> This principle ...also affords us the freedom to "test" or measure
>> a wide spectrum of finite values experientially, which in effect
>> makes us the existential "agents of value".
>
> [Mark previously]:
>>
>> It would appear that you are tending heavily into solipsism here.
>> That is not what MoQ is about. It is not a subjective phenomenon.
>> We "actualize", as you say, from something that is already there.
>> We cannot create such things, there is no place to create them.
>> An illusion is an image of something that really exists. Otherwise
>> we would call it a delusion. If it is an illusion, what is it an illusion
>> of? I am not sure what you are pointing to here. Why would
>> we be ineffective if we saw the world that is hidden? ...
>
> I've been accused of solipsism before, Mark; but Essentialism isn't
> solipsistic, because everything in existence is derived from an ultimate
> source which we are looking at from the outside, so to speak. What is
> "there" is Essence. What we sense is its Value. What we actualize is our
> differentiation of this value. I dislike applying "illusion" to existential
> reality which is, after all, the reality we live in. Yet, one must make a
> distinction between this provisional existence and Absolute Essence, and
> from the metaphysical perspective existence is illusional.
[Mark]
I could argue that through your ontology, one could "create" the
ultimate source. I don't mind the conjecture of such a thing, but
saying it is so is insufficient. Besides our imagination, what else
provides the basis for believing in an Absolute Essence? If we stick
with Quality, there is no need for provisional existence. It is all
around us for us to see.
>
[Mark previously]
>> As always, I am trying to understand you and have many questions.
>> I hope you don't mind.
>
[Ham]
> Not at all, Mark. I realize that my ontology has you bewildered, and that
> language can sometimes compound the confusion. Hopefully my responses to
> your questions will clear up some of the problems and make Essentialism more
> meaningful to you.
[Mark]
Many times when you use the word Essence, I can substitute Quality,
and it works. Some differences are in the hiddenness areas. I also
have no problem with the concept, we have discussed before, that our
purpose is to look at Essence. I have heard this in other
philosophies/religions. For example: If God is everything, then why
do we have a separate consciousness? Some say that God wanted to be
admired. I also am fond of my Value Tunnel which I presented to you a
while back, Essence tunneling to Essence, and we get to feel it. I
think you may have a different notion of what Quality is supposed to
be than I do. I hope that the above will give you some thought.
>
Yours,
Mark
>
>
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