Steve:
I responding to dmb's suggestion of a definition for determinism:
dmb says:
>>> Here's how I understand the operative terms. "Determinism" is doctrine that
>>> says our actions are not really chosen by us, that we are not in control of
>>> our actions.
I responded...
>> Steve:
The problem with this definition is that the MOQ agrees that "our
actions are not REALLY chosen by us" since "us" doesn't have any REAL
metaphysical status. Lila doesn't REALLY have the patterns, the
patterns have Lila. So this definition doesn't work to show how the
MOQ disagrees with determinism. To affirm or deny that "our actions
are not REALLY chosen by us" would be to implicitly accept the s/o
metaphysical picture upon which this claim rests....
Ron:
Not so. Because you based your whole case on the use of the word "us".
"Us" certainly does have metaphysical status because it has practical meaning
in experience.
Let "us" examine that quote again, the one your whole case seems to rest apon
and work
with the same logic you are appling to using the term "us" in a MoQ
understanding.
" Lila doesn't REALLY have the patterns, the patterns have Lila."
If you notice the use of the term "have'" is still haunting the meaning per the
criticism
of accepting the s/o picture, the same attack may be brought to bear on
"the patterns have Lila". Lila is understood and expressed as an entity which
emerges out of patterns. Which you seem to limit and end the statement on
conceptually to express a deterministic entity with no free will because that
term
implies an entity to have something. But as you can see, it most certainly does
emply an entity, one emerging from a field of value. This amply links with what
Pirsig extends with the idea that Lila is an ecology of values.
But thats not where Pirsig ends with it, that is just the explanation of what
we commonly
understand as the "individual" the one the self the organism that responds to
Dynamic Quality.
Understand by elimentaing this concept on the basis you are, you are rendering
a good deal
Pirsigs explanation as "mu" also. Everything on "bettterness" morals evolution
change and
the expansion of reason because everything he says applies to the "individual"
the one
where it all has to start with their hands head and heart. Elimenate the
"individual" on the basis
that it would be to implicitly accept the s/o metaphysical picture upon which
this claim rests....
and you dont have much left in the explanation known as MoQ. That is a huge
consequence
you face in your assertion.
Steve:
(as punches up an
appearance reality distinction with the "really.") The MOQ can't do
that. Instead it ays "mu" to the free will determinism debate about
whether choices or causal laws are what is REALLY real and
reformulates the issue of freedom to a point where we stop wondering
whether "free will" or "causal laws" are more real. BOTH are real in
the exact same way. Both are intellectual patterns of value. NEITHER
free will nor causality
can claim the the metaphysical high ground--the more primary
metaphysical status.
Ron:
Dynamic Quality certainly claims the moral high ground in Pirsigs formulation,
it's the good, it is what his entire explanation of morality is based apon the
entire
explanation of evolution is based on.
Steve:
The metaphysical status that "freedom" has as
Dynamic Quality is not a capacity of will and is in no way threatened
by the fact that humans can often successfully predict experience in
terms of causal laws.
Ron:
The whole point is that it most certainly is a capacity of will in his
explanation
in fact he asserts that freedom as excercised through the will is exactly the
reason
why we value successful predictions of experience in terms of causal laws it's
WHY
we value the true. it why we evolve towards greater forms of freedom its why
the intellectual level is the highest level and most moral, of static patterns.
With no will in which freedom exercises through, there is no good in experience.
Steve:
I don't accept it as an axiom that determinism is incomptible with
ethics. If we are willing to subjtract the metaohysical baggage from
free will to allow it to function as an intellectual pattern in the
MOQ, then we can do the same with determinism. If both are seen as
aesthetic creations of the intellect, then both can peacefully coexist
like polar and rectangular coordinates without need to ask which is
teh REAL way to think of human choice.
Ron:
No one is asking about the REAL WAY only the BEST WAY.
Best,
Ron
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