Hi Steve, On Wed, Dec 7, 2011 at 8:25 AM, Steven Peterson <[email protected]> wrote: > Steve: > I think SOM is more than thinking that "reality is composed of objects > that exist independently of the subjective observer." I think it > depends on how that common sense notion is used for doing philosophy > if at all. If all one means in saying that is that most things are > unaffected by our beliefs about them, then I don't see anything > metaphysical in there let alone a metaphysical problem. We have good > reason to think that when our beliefs about something change, it isn't > the "something" that changes (and no good reason to doubt that) in > lots of ordinary situations. Where I think SOM comes in is when we use > the concepts of subjects and objects as the _basis_ for a systematic > approach to thinkngn--for metaphysics.
[Mark] In my opinion, SOM is a tool used for a variety of purposes, and the use of the term metaphysics is very loose. In order to converse and share ideas, we must objectify what we want to share so that we can deliver it. Thus words and concepts are objectified forms of awareness. If I want to provide on with the awareness of my frustration (for example), I must first objectify that awareness into a word or concept. This object is then delivered from me (the subject) to another (another subject). Once this is received, the objectified form is dismissed and the listener is left with awareness. There is nothing magical or reality nullifying going on with SOM, it is just conversation. When I objectify my hard work in the form of money, I can then use a representation of this work to obtain things from another. Money is not an end goal just like words and objects are not an end goal. Another use for SOM is to place oneself in an environment. If the preservation of the body is important, it must place itself in relation to what it creates as "other things". Therefore, if thunder clouds are on their way, we objectify that awareness in a way that is useful and we go inside. Again, there is nothing sinister about this form of SOM. A third use for SOM would be for memory. It is much easier to catalogue something by giving it boundaries rather than to deal with it in terms of the vast interconnectedness of it. If I feel frustrated, I catalogue it in terms of the events which surround this frustration. My memory thus encourages me to avoid these situations. This is, of course a vast simplification of the presence of my frustration (for example, again) since I am using these situations to justify my feelings, whereas it may be more appropriate to say that my feelings created the appearance of these situations. The exact same situations can be seen as either positive or negative. However, if we live in our creation of these justifications, then our awareness can be diminished. This is perhaps a detrimental part of SOM. If we encapsulate somebody by our memory of the words they use, rather than the context of these words, we limit our appreciation of the dialogue. For, dialogue should put rhetoric above dialectic (or Truth). > > As Pirsig said, the SOM is also a metaphysics of Quality, but it takes > the first division of Quality to be into subjects and objects rather > than into DQ and sq. When we _start_ with subjects and objects as our > first cut expecting all the puzzle pieces to fall neatly into place, > we find that they actually don't. We are left with a nest and brood of > resolution-resistant dualisms that have plagued thinkers for thousands > of years. Certain of these dualisms are the root of certain > psychological problems which Bernstein describes as "Cartesian > Anxiety." If, as pragmatism suggests, we can do well to understand > beliefs by thinking of them as habits of action, then we recognize > that a person has a given philosophy not only by what a person says > but by also what a person does and what the person fears. An SOMer is > not simply a person who is prone to say things like, "reality is > composed of subjects and objects" but a person who lives the > consequences of that belief in certain ways which "Cartesian Anxiety" > helps explicate. For them, certain "philosophical problems" are > problems. But if a person who says, "reality is composed of subjects > and objects" and doesn't display this anxiety, then perhaps this > person has simply made the usual practical inference (evolved the > usual static pattern) that almost all babies eventually do labelled > "object permanence" rather than made a claim about what is _ really_ > going on in the metaphysical sense of "really"--the One True Way the > the universe itself demands we describe it. Mark: It would seem that there is some confusion of the subject-object divide here. For it seems that by the analysis above, both the subject and object are treated as objects while only one should be. This could be at the root of such Cartesian Anxiety since it may claim that the spirit and the body are two objective things. This is impossible since the spirit is an act of creativity. It is always "in-becoming". And although the use of words here (such as the meaning of "is") may claim that the spirit "IS" something, this is not what the sentence above is pointing to. In my opinion, we live this existence more from the inside out than from the outside in. The first is the subjective, and the second is the objective. However, this "duality" is very unbalanced in this day and age. MoQ seeks to rebalance this trend by introducing the concept of Quality. I often find it useful to describe this existence of mine as a "window". A window is shaped by its four corners, but the view through it is much more. Take away the framework, and the window disappears. Take away the material and the spiritual disappears. Finally, I would like to bring in the word "anagology" to the forum although I am sure it has been used before here. In philosophical metaphysics the term "anagology" is perhaps more relevant than "analogy". If I may, I also direct your attention to the web site for Thomas Merton, who was an interesting thinker (religion aside), at: http://www.thomasmertonsociety.org.uk/ Cheers, Mark > > 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 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
