--- Of course I mean elicit and not illicit. :-)
Hi Paul, On Jun 18, 2013, at 4:29 PM, Paul Turner <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Marsha, > >> Perhaps I do but a mirage is defined as something which appears to be one >>> thing but is really something else, right? So you are saying that static >>> quality is like something which appears to be one thing but is really >>> something else. So I have to ask - in what respect does it appear to be >>> something while being really something else. And as far as that analogy >>> goes, what is it that it appears to be and what is it really? >> >> It is not that the mirage does not exist. A mirage appears to have >> substance, but upon close inspection it does not. > > On close inspection a mirage is "really" refracted light, right. So by > analogy, upon close inspection, what are static patterns "really"? Refracted light, too, is an analogy. I have no idea what you mean by "really"? >>>> I really see the MOQ as an attempt to >>>>> avoid that while still remaining a viable philosophy. >>>> >>>> Viable? What would be your standard for viability? >>> >>> It's difficult to be very precise and exhaustive about, Marsha, but I'm >>> thinking something like - providing explanations of sufficient clarity, >>> credibility, applicability, precision, elegance etc. (in other words, >>> intellectual quality) to support widespread acceptance and use. First of >>> all in academic communities and eventually into wider society. >> >> Have you presented your paper to the academy? Are you planning to? > > It's not good enough as it stands, I just wanted to get the thoughts down > mainly and then saw that it may help resolve some of the disputes I had > read on here (though I'm doubting that now). Plus I think it's too > abstract, on its own. I think the better approach is incorporating the MOQ > into other areas of study, as Patrick Doorly and others are doing. > > Also, there are other philosophers who see that value is real, or at least > argue that it has a "phenomenal reality" (McDowell and Oddie, if I recall > correctly) and I tend to think that elements of the MOQ will become common > sense over time. I see things like the "model-dependent realism" being > advocated by Hawking (which I think Adrie mentioned) and the two-stage > model of free will as theories moving closer to agreement with the MOQ. > This gradual reweaving of MOQ-like ideas into the mythos is more likely, > in my opinion, than the wholesale adoption of a whole metaphysics. But I > love the broad, ambitious strokes of Pirsig's work. > >> Are you genuinely interested in my answer, though, or just setting me >>> up for a trap? >> >> ? > > See below. > > >> >> >>> I feel like if we were in a room you would hit me with a stick to "snap >> me >>> out of it!" >> >> I could play with this sentence. > > Ha > > >>>> "We can update the analogy to make the point more plainly. Imagine >>>> three travelers along a hot desert highway. Alice is an experienced >>>> desert traveler; Bill is a neophyte; Charlie is wearing polarizing >>>> sunglasses. Bill points to a mirage up ahead and warns against a >>>> puddle on the road; Alice sees the mirage as a mirage and assures >>>> him that there is no danger. Charlie sees nothing at all, and wonders >>>> what they are talking about. If the mirage were entirely false—if >>>> there were no truth about it at all, Charlie would be the most >>>> authoritative of the three (and Buddhas would know nothing of the >>>> real world). But that is wrong. Just as Bill is deceived in believing >>>> that there is water on the road, Charlie is incapable of seeing the >>>> mirage at all, and so fails to know what Alice knows—that there >>>> is a real mirage on the road, which appears to some to be water, but >>>> which is not. There is a truth about the mirage, despite the fact that it >>>> is deceptive, and Alice is authoritative with respect to it precisely >>>> because she sees it as it is, not as it appears to the uninitiated." >>>> >>>> (Garfield, Jay L., 'MOONSHADOWS: Taking Conventional Truth >>>> Seriously', pp. 29-30) >>> >>> I'd need to read this a few times to try out different interpretations with >>> respect to the MOQ. My initial reading is that Alice is seen as >>> authoritative because she sees "static patterns" as "real illusions." I >>> don't know, the language just seems so unnecessarily tricksy. How would >>> you translate that last paragraph into MOQ terms? >> >> Up to a point, dmb seemed to make sense of it. > > I saw Dave's interpretation but, seeing as you want to push this analogy, > what's your MOQ translation? I am "pushing" nothing, and I have no desire to translate it into MoQ terms. >>> I advocate a middle way between the extremes of such things as the >>>>> "illusion" and "certainty" you dichotomise above and the two contexts I >>>>> discern in the MOQ offer a practical way to implement the middle way >>>>> philosophically. >>>> >>>> I am not interested in truth, so there is no dichotomization. >>> >>> >>> You suggested that the alternative to your mirage analogy was clinging to >>> certainty but now seem to say that.....well, I don't know actually, that >>> you didn't mean it? >> >> That was my poor presentation. I didn't mean to juxtapose the two >> statements as extremes. I should have left it at stating that recognizing >> a mirage for what it is is not "relativism, a nihilism and an >> anti-intellectualism." >> >>> Should I ignore anything you say because you have no >>> interest in whether it is true (by any definition) or not? >> >> That's not for me to decide. >> >> >>> I'm being genuine here. >> >> Me too. Ignore me if you like. >> >> >>> You will know from your reading that Pirsig translates true >>> as "having high intellectual quality" so are you not interested >>> in whether your words are of high intellectual quality? >> >> "... the good to which truth is subordinate is intellectual and Dynamic >> Quality ..." >> >> The good is good enough for me. I can be concerned with presenting the >> best explanation I can without worrying about truth. > > OK, it's just that you seemed to be saying that because static pattern = > mirage is just an analogy I shouldn't take it too seriously or read > anything into it. I was saying that a mirage, as an analogy for a static pattern, is not "relativism, a nihilism and an anti-intellectualism, and it was written in response to a comment dmb made. > But if we start from the premise that everything we say, > think, conceptualise etc is an analogy there is no "just" about it. Either > we mean what we say or we don't and some analogies are better than others. I take every last bit of it to be analogy, turtles all the way down, and that includes the big "we". I have no idea what your reference to "just" is indicating. That last sentence is too much a cliche to deal with. > To me a mirage means something which rests on an appearance-reality > distinction by definition so when we apply that analogy to something in a > philosophical discussion it has consequences whether you meant them or not. Oh, a philosophical discussion should be restricted to your interests? I don't remember Jay Garfield or Nagarjuna referring directly to the "appearance-reality distinction" in the MMK. Though, if that philosophical problem is a concern of yours you might have been able to interpret in that light. Did RMP speak *directly* to the "appearance-reality distinction" as a named philosophical problem? I don't remember him addressing it such. > We should remember not to confuse fingers with moons but taking someone's > words seriously and inferring from them doesn't mean we are hopelessly > deluded. I have no idea what I said to elicit this comment, or what it is referring to. Not a clue. I never considered you hopelessly deluded, or myself either, for that matter. >> I'm sure you are, I'm just trying to get a feel for how to talk to you >> without getting hit by a stick. >> >> I have a cane with a raven handle. Would I hit you with it? I don't know. > > You mean you don't know the severity of my delusion? I don't know you at all, and I never accused you of being delusional. I look forward to hearing more about your Two Context theory. Meanwhile, I'll continue to marvel at this wondrous, conventional mirage. Marsha ___ 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
