Hello everyone On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 2:32 PM, david buchanan <[email protected]> wrote: > > Dan said to Matt: > I would say in the common sense everyday world we all use the notion of > object permanence to great advantage... so much so that we tend to overlook > it and assume objects are real and independent of our experience. And that's > fine when it comes to common sense. But I also believe the MOQ (philosophy) > states that objects are not independent of experience and there is no way to > verify if they continue to exist or not when we are gone. ...and I have > been questioning the common sense notion that objects exist independent of > experience. I've admitted I'm not well-versed in philosophy but I assumed > that's what we're up to with this discussion. > > dmb says: > Oh, I think I see the problem. It seems you're suffering from a misconception > of the claim that says "objects are not independent of experience." To put it > crudely, you think this means that objects only exists when we're looking > right at them or otherwise experiencing them. I'm fairly certain that this is > a misconception of the claim.
Hi Dave I don't think that's quite right. As I said to Matt, I'm sure New York City exists even though I'm not experiencing it now nor have I ever experienced it. I'm sure the Statue of Liberty exists along with all the myriad monuments and buildings that make up New York City. Let's try this: "objects" is shorthand for patterns of value. In the MOQ, inorganic and biological quality patterns make up the common-sense notion of objects. "We" are tied to these patterns by social and intellectual quality patterns we call the subjective self in the common sense parlance. So the fact that I am looking at an "object" has little to do with whether or not it exists. Since it is a pattern of experience, it has value and it exists. But it doesn't exist independently of that experience. How can it? So far as I can tell, Matt and I have been discussing how to verify those patterns of experience that come to us second hand, or indirectly, like New York City. I suggested it is a matter of discerning a high quality pattern such as overwhelming evidence in favor of said existence while Matt suggests we can rely on hearsay evidence, such as Chris telling Don that his dog dish exists. RMP brought up the court of law analogy when he talked about "what tree?" and how presupposing the tree is a hypothesis contrary to fact. I wondered why Don's dog dish isn't also presupposed, especially since Don has left it in the kitchen and has no direct knowledge of its continued existence. Even if Chris reassures Don that the dish is there, that is hearsay evidence and is also thrown out of court as inadmissible. dmb: > As we saw in Pirsig's description of the infant's development, objects are > derived from the force of DQ, from experience, from that complex bundle of > sensations, desires and other phenomenal realities. This reverses SOM's > conception of objects as pre-existing, independent realities which we may or > may not come to know. According to SOM, experience is caused by objects, > experience is the subject's encounter with these independent objects. > According to the MOQ, objects are the products of experience. The existence > of objects is DEPENDENT on experience. It is in that sense that "objects are > NOT independent of experience." Reality as we know it intellectually is > entirely dependent on experience all the way down. You know, the whole pile > of analogies was invented as a response to Quality, was derived from > experience. Dan: Ideas come before matter. So objects (inorganic and biological quality patterns) are not derived from the force of Dynamic Quality. They are derived from ideas (social and intellectual patterns). The existence of objects are dependent on our idea of them, not necessarily our experience of them. It is a high quality idea that objects continue to exist (concept of object permanence) when we are no longer experiencing them but that is only an idea. It doesn't necessarily follow that those objects actually do continue to exist, or that they vanish. To say either is to fall into an intellectual trap. >dmb: > I'd also point out that the idea of "object permanence" includes the idea > that objects stay put even when we're not looking. In the MOQ we could say > that this feature of things is derived from the same complex bundle of > sensations and desires, is abstracted from the same experiences. The dog > might get up and run away but the dog's dish won't. I suspect that kind of > distinction is about as old as humanity itself just because it's important to > know which things will fight back when we try to eat them. Dan: Dog is an object too, albeit a biological pattern vs an inorganic pattern called dish. The dog dish could be stolen... it could burn up in a fire... a tsunami might wash it away... a tornado might blow it away. Again, it is a high quality idea to presuppose the dog dish will remain where it is placed but unless Don (or perhaps Chris) check on it from time to time the dish is hypothetical. We're assuming its continued existence. > >dmb: > This is why I think common sense notions of objects will come first. They're > old and basic and practical. Maybe these practical ideas don't exactly count > a "foundation" for subject/object object metaphysics or scientific > objectivity but I think it would be safe to say that the latter evolved out > of the former in some sense. The fact that "object permanence" is learned so > early in our individual development suggests that this idea was invented > early in our collective evolutionary development. Like Matt says, I think the > trick is to explain these common sense ideas in terms of the MOQ - as opposed > to the SOM picture - but we don't want to throw the baby out with the > bathwater. Dan: Well, yes. But insisting objects have a permanence independent of experience is not explaining them in terms of the MOQ... it is falling back into a common sense notion that objects come before ideas. > > > Dan said: > ...I understand we all operate under the common sense notion of object > permanence. On the other hand, to assume because that notion works well in > the real world it represents a fundamental part of our reality seems at odds > with the MOQ. > > dmb says: > But the "object permanence" lesson comes from Lila and I've been explaining > that objects are secondary products of experience, not fundamental parts of > reality. We are talking about static patterns of quality that are derived > from Dynamic Quality. We're talking about static patterns of quality that > have worked unproblematically for countless generations, worked well enough > to persist into our own time. Dan: Which is fine... as long as it is understood that the concept of object permanency is a high quality idea that comes before the patterns it describes. dmb: > I've been trying to explain objects in terms of the MOQ rather than in terms > of the metaphysics of substance. According to the MOQ, the common sense > notion works well because it agrees with experience, because it fits with the > world of our sensations and because it makes sense in relation to or > harmonizes with the rest of the mythos. That is all that pragmatic truth can > mean. That's what it means for an idea to work, to be true. It doesn't > require any kind of metaphysics to believe the arrow head still exists even > after it has buried itself in your chest. "Hard" and "sharp" and > "heavy" are not philosophical ideas, you know? They're practical ideas about > concrete and particular experiences. These qualities are not simply what > objects are like in and of themselves - but rather that's what things are in > relation to us. A rotting corpse is disgusting to us but the vultures love > it. To say that objects are independent of us is a metaphysical claim, a > claim involving two distinct ontological categories, us and the independent, > objective reality that we hope to gain knowledge of. Dan: And to say objects have a permanency is to imply they exist whether or not anyone is around. It may well agree with experience for the most part. That is why it's called common sense. It works pragmatically. We believe the world has existed long before we arrived and that it will continue to exist long after we're gone. The MOQ calls that a high quality idea. But the idea of the world existing doesn't come from the world existing... it comes from a sense of undefined Quality... a sense of harmony, if you will. Thank you, Dan 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
