Thanks guys, That was an interesting exercise in decrypting one message using the algorithm of another. I learned something.
Cheers, Sent laboriously from an iPhone, Mark On Mar 27, 2012, at 2:39 PM, david buchanan <[email protected]> wrote: > > Thanks for playing along, gents. Just about everyone seems to be reading it > the same way I do. Ant totally nailed it, of course, and it seems safe to > consider my hunch pretty well confirmed. I was fairly confident already but > we always gotta watch out for the Cleveland Harbor Effect and other kinds of > confirmation bias. I'll take a turn playing the game too. My additions are > bracketed in the passages below: > > > > ...experiences come whole [undivided or undifferentiated], pervaded by > unifying qualities [Quality as an aesthetic continuum] that demarcate them > within the flux of our lives [what James and Pirsig call "the immediate flux > of life"]. If we want to find meaning [intellectual quality], or the basis > for meaning, we must therefore start with the qualitative unity [undivided > Quality or Dynamic Quality] that Dewey describes. The demarcating pervasive > quality is, at first, unanalyzed [Quality is pre-intellectual experience], > but it is the basis for subsequent analysis, thought, and development. > Thought [intellectual experience] starts from this experienced whole [begins > with DQ], and only then does it introduce distinctions [static concepts and > definitions] that carry it forward as inquiry. > It is not wrong to say that we experience objects, properties, and > relations, but it is wrong to say that these are primary in experience > ["subjects and objects are secondary. They are concepts derived from > something more fundamental" (Lila 364)]. What are primary are pervasive > qualities of situations ["the immediate flux of life which furnishes the > material to our later reflection with its conceptual categories" (Lila > 365)], within which we subsequently discriminate objects, properties, and > relations. > > Dewey took great pains to remind us that the primary locus of human > experience is not atomistic sense impressions, but rather what he called a > "situation," by which he meant, not just our physical setting, but the whole > complex of physical, biological, social, and cultural conditions that > constitute any given experience—experience taken in its fullest, deepest, > richest, broadest sense. > [Compare that whole sentence (above) to Pirsig's: "If you compare the levels > of static patterns that compose a human being to the ecology of a forest, and > if you see the different patterns sometimes in competition with each other, > sometimes in symbiotic support of each other, but always in a kind of tension > that will shift one way or the other, depending on evolving circumstances, > then you can also see that evolution doesn't take place only within > societies, it takes place within individuals too. Lila then becomes a complex > ecology of patterns moving toward Dynamic Quality." (Lila 360)] > > Mind, on this view, is neither a willful creator of experience [subjective > idealism], nor is it a mere window to objective mind-independent reality > [scientific objectivity]. Mind is a functional aspect of experience [mind is > a process, not a thing] that emerges when it becomes possible for us to share > meanings [evolved as language], to inquire into the meaning of a situation, > and to initiate action that transforms, or remakes, that situation > [betterness is the purpose of social and intellectual static quality]. > > > The pervasive quality of a situation is not limited merely to sensible > perception or motor interactions [pre-intellectual experience is not merely > raw sense data]. Thinking is action, and so "acts of thought" also constitute > situations [there is a dynamic cutting edge of experience even within the > static conceptual world] that must have pervasive qualities. Even our best > scientific thinking stems from the grasp of qualities ["the MOQ also says > that DQ [is] the value force that chooses an elegant mathematical solution to > a laborious one, or a brilliant experiment over a confusing, inconclusive > one.. It is the cutting edge of scientific progress itself." (Lila 365-6)] > > [And finally, my favorite....] > > The crux of Dewey's entire argument is that what we call thinking, > or reasoning, or logical inference could not even exist without the felt > qualities of situations: "The underlying unity of qualitativeness regulates > pertinence or relevancy and force of every distinction and relation; it > guides selection and rejection and the manner of utilization of all explicit > terms." > > ["The preselection of facts is not based on subjective, capricious "whatever > you like" but on Quality, which is reality itself. ... It is the source of > subjects and objects and exists in an anterior relationship to them. It is > not capricious, it is the force that opposes capriciousness; THE ORDERING > PRINCIPLE OF ALL SCIENTIFIC AND RATIONAL THOUGHT which destroys > capriciousness, and without which no scientific thought can proceed." (Pirsig > in ZAMM)] > > > Now I'm hoping this forms the basis of some good discussion. It offers a > fresh terms and a new look at the MOQ's central terms and distinctions. > > > > 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
