Dan said:
...Moving on, from what I understand of the pragmatic theory of truth, it is
typical of correspondence theories in that value is found in the relationships
between symbolic representations and objective states of reality. The MOQ sees
truth as high quality intellectual patterns of value. It is a good idea to
believe these intellectual patterns correspond to reality but it is only an
idea. I think this is a stumbling stone for many folk when it comes to the MOQ.
They tend to liken intellectual patterns to corresponding objective realities
rather than to the idea of those realities being beyond our purview.
Ron responded:
Typically the Pragmatic theory of truth is understood as a reaction against
correspondence theory, value is found as a result of a process of inquiry
rather than relationships between symbolic representations and objective states
of reality. It is a means of clarifying thoughts. If anything, this has also
been a stumbling block for many when they confuse the two and apply MoQ's
attack on corresponence theory as an attack on all theories of truth.
dmb says:
The pragmatic theory of truth is a rejection of the correspondence and,
according to Pirsig, James's pragmatic theory is "right on" and "exactly what
is meant by the MOQ".
"James said, 'Truth is one species of good, and not, as is usually supposed, a
category distinct from good, and coordinate with it.' He said, 'The true is the
name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief.' TRUTH IS A
SPECIES OF GOOD. That was right on. That was EXACTLY what is meant by the MOQ.
Truth is a static intellectual pattern WITHIN a larger entity called Quality."
(LILA, p. 363-4. Emphasis is Pirsig's.)
Likewise, here is the opening paragraph of the Wikipedia article on Pragmatism:
"Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that began in the United States around
1870. Pragmatism is a rejection of the idea that the function of thought is to
describe, represent, or mirror reality [that's correspondence]. Instead,
pragmatists develop their philosophy around the idea that the function of
thought is as a instrument or tool for prediction, action, and problem solving.
Pragmatists contend that most philosophical topics--such as the nature of
knowledge, language, concepts, meaning, belief, and science--are all best
viewed in terms of their practical uses and successes rather than in terms of
representative accuracy [that's another way to describe correspondence].
The sub-section dealing with "Metaphysics" starts in a way that is very
friendly to the MOQ:
"James and Dewey were empirical thinkers in the most straightforward fashion:
experience is the ultimate test and experience is what needs to be explained.
They were dissatisfied with ordinary empiricism because in the tradition dating
from Hume, empiricists had a tendency to think of experience as nothing more
than individual sensations. To the pragmatists, this went against the spirit of
empiricism: we should try to explain all that is given in experience including
connections and meaning, instead of explaining them away and positing sense
data as the ultimate reality. Radical empiricism, or Immediate Empiricism in
Dewey's words, wants to give a place to meaning and value instead of explaining
them away as subjective additions to a world of whizzing atoms."
Isn't that pretty much what Pirsig says about his brand of expanded empiricism?
I think so.
“The Metaphysics of Quality subscribes to what is called empiricism. It claims
that all LEGITIMATE KNOWLEDGE arises from the senses or by THINKING about what
the senses provided. Most empiricists deny that validity of any knowledge
gained through imagination, authority tradition, or purely theoretical
reasoning. They regard fields such as art, morality, religion, and metaphysics
as unverifiable. The Metaphysics of Quality varies from this by saying that the
values of art and morality and even religious mysticism are verifiable, and
that in the past they have been excluded for metaphysical reasons, not
empirical reasons.” (LILA 99).
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