Ant, Good to hear from you! For those who haven't heard, our friend John suffered a fall while trimming trees. He broke both wrists as well as his neck and what sounds even more dire, when they did the scans on his head they discovered a brain tumor. From what I understand he is doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances and hopefully (at least for me) we'll see him back here soon.
On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 5:42 PM, Ant McWatt <[email protected]> wrote: > Dan, John C and all! > > Well man... it was a dreadful flight so honey disconnect the phone... Been away so long I hardly knew the place.... > > On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 5:04 PM, John Carl <[email protected]> wrote: > >>> Jc: It has taken me a while, but I think I understand better what >>> James meant by immediate experience. One thing for sure, immediate >>> experience requires Radical Empiricism, as DQ requires the MOQ. But >>> more on that later. >>> >>> Dan: >>> Dynamic Quality and immediate experience are both intellectual terms >>> pointing to that which cannot be quantified. The terms themselves may >>> require explanations, however. >>> >> Jc: That's right. All terms only have meaning to the extent that >> they've been fully explained. Full explanation is the business of the >> meta-physician. > > Dan replied July 15th: > > I do not believe there can ever be a full explanation of Dynamic > Quality and experience. > > Ant comments: > > Well Pirsig says somewhere (in LILA, chapter 9 probably) that the MOQ is > actually a contradiction in terms because it claims to be a metaphysics > (which as John points out should ideally define all the terms it uses though > I doubt any term can be FULLY explained to exhausation) but with a central > undefined term. As we know Bob calls this "Dynamic Quality" but "The Tao" or > "No-thingness" or even his near final "Unpatterned Quality" (as opposed to > "Patterned Quality") are thought to be equivalents by him and such MOQ > scholars such as myself. Dan: Sure... so far as intellectual terms pointing at the ineffable. >Ant: > If you read a book such as John Blofeld's fascinating account ("Taoist > Mystery & Magic" originally published in 1973) of his time as an > English-Chinese translator during the 1930s when he visited all these ancient > Chinese Taoist monasteries (before the 1948 "Uncultural Revolution" destroyed > most of them and the wisdom contained within, you can begin to understand why > Pirsig and myself think this is the case. Pirsig thought the latter book > pointed out some great mystic truths but you will have to read it for > yourself to see why. Dan: Sounds worth a read. I will order it as soon as I scrape together a few dollars. >Ant: > This is going to lose some people here (and no doubt elsewhere!) but one of > the primary reasons that the MOQ can be so difficult to pin down for a > traditional Western intellectual is its basis on the logic of the Tetralemma, > the four pronged logic that East Asian philosophies (certainly Buddhist and > Taoist traditions) use rather than the syllogistic logic of Aristotle's which > is used by nearly every Western philosopher that you can read today. The > latter are still largely unaware that East Asian logic can operate in two > contradictory contexts while syllogistic logic can operate (or presumes) that > there is only one. I guess you call the latter "the world of everyday > affairs" and is what all the static quality patterns in the MOQ refer to. Dan: I think that would depend upon how one defines 'the world of everyday affairs.' If all static patterns refer to that, then the tetralemma is also part of the world of everyday affairs. It is a collection of intellectual quality patterns... what else could it be? >Ant: > As such, the MOQ (unlike a metaphysics based on just on syllogistic logic) > can incorporate Dynamic Quality (or at least "point to it") within its > system. Paul Turner's paper about the Tetralemma explains this in more > detail: > > "Logic is a set of rules that define valid inference. The validity of > inference provided by syllogistic logic and its descendants is based on an > assumption that propositions and the relationships between them are made and > inferred in one context, whether this is tacit or stated within a premise. > Because the rules of inference defined by the syllogism operate within a > single context, contradictory propositions cannot be contained within a > single structure of thought without being illogical." Dan: Right. That is on account of the underlying assumptions set forth... sort of like researchers measuring the speed of light using the assumption that the light they are measuring is really there and not a representation of light, which of course it is. I think this is a trap most Western philosophers fall into even inadvertently when they begin reading the old 'masters,' even those in the East. They are apt to overlay the underlying assumptions that objects are 'out there' just waiting to be observed by an astute 'subject.' If one sees past that roadblock, then often times they swing too far the other way. They end up delving into the esoteric as if there is some mysterious facet of reality that is hidden from the purview of all but the insightful. The MOQ starts with experience. That in itself is a stroke of genius so profound most everyone overlooks it in a mad scramble to understand what the MOQ 'really' means. > Ant: > "The tetralemma (catuskoti) provides alternative rules of valid inference. > The tetralemma is a logical formulation of the dual context of the Buddhist > principle of “two truths,” or “two worlds.” Because the rules of inference > defined by the tetralemma operate across two contexts, contradictory > propositions can be contained within a single structure of thought without > being illogical." Dan: Exactly... and be doing so it opens up a more expansive way of viewing/ordering reality as we know it. > Ant: > The two truths of Buddhism are typically designated “conventional” and > “ultimate” or alternatively they are described as “the world of everyday > affairs” and “the world of the Buddhas.” > > Conventional truth applies to facts about the everyday reality of things, > people and events. It is designated conventional in the sense of being the > product of human interests and dispositions and does not correspond to > anything independently or inherently true. Syllogistic logic works very well > for justifying beliefs in the context of conventional truth. Dan: The logic of the tetralemma works better to justify beliefs in the context of conventional truth... it is simply not familiar to most Westerners. > Ant: > Ultimate truth applies to the world of the Buddhas Dan: Ultimate truth/the world of the Buddhas refers to immediate experience, or simply experience for those who know... Dynamic Quality in terms of the MOQ. That is where it all begins. Without that foundation, anyone seeking to further their knowledge about the MOQ or about life in general will falter and fall by the wayside, trapped in their own confusion. Ant: > and is inexpressible in the sense that, in the absence of convention, there > is no candidate for predication, including the ascription of > existence/non-existence itself. Significantly, the conventional and ultimate > truths have the same consequence – nothing can be said to exist by virtue of > its own essence. Syllogistic logic has no meaning with respect to ultimate > truth. Dan: Nor dos the logic of the tetralemma. > Ant: > The tetralemma comprises the inferred relationship of four propositions and > is expressed positively or negatively*. Where p is any proposition and ¬p is > its negation, a positive tetralemma takes the form of: > > > p > p > ¬p > Not p > p & ¬p > Both p & not p > ¬(p V ¬p) > Neither p nor not p > > > The positive tetralemma is an expression of the conventional validity of the > two truths. The positive import of the two truths is that whilst it is > stated that nothing is inherently real, i.e., nothing exists by virtue of its > own independent essence, the familiar everyday world is, nonetheless, > conventionally real and exists in a way which does not contradict experience. > With this acceptance of conventional truth we are not left with an absurd > conception of reality in which nothing exists in any sense whatsoever. Thus > the extreme standpoints of (naïve or philosophical) reification and nihilism > are repudiated in favour of a “middle way.” > > The positive tetralemma operates as follows. The truth of the first > proposition can and should be subject to the syllogistic rules of inference, > then, from any given proposition which is true of the conventional world, the > three remaining propositions are validly inferred. > > e.g.: > > The self is real (conventionally real, i.e., it exists in a dependent reality > along with everything else we derive from experience) > The self is not real (ultimately unreal, i.e., it has no essence) > The self is both real and not real (conventionally real but ultimately unreal) > The self is neither real nor not real (neither ultimately real nor completely > nonexistent) > > ----CUT---- > > > A negative tetralemma takes the form of: > > > ¬p > Not p > ¬(¬p) > Not not p > ¬(p & ¬p) > Not (p & not p) > ¬(¬(p V ¬p)) > Not (neither p nor not p) > > > The negative tetralemma is an expression of the self-negating “logic” of the > ultimate truth (the emptiness of emptiness!) which denies the validity and > inference of any philosophical assertion of any kind including that of the > attribution of existence and non-existence to anything. The import of the > negative tetralemma is that, unlike its positive counterpart, it denies the > validity of the doctrine of two truths which, by comforming to logic, is > itself designated a conventional truth. The negative tetralemma can be seen > as a paradoxically logical formulation of the inapplicability of logic to > whatever proposition it is applied, insofar as that proposition is related to > the world of the Buddhas. > > An example of the negative tetralemma as applied to nirvāna: > > It is not the case that nirvāna exists > It is not the case that nirvāna does not exist > It is not the case that nirvāna both exists and does not exist > It is not the case that nirvāna neither exists nor does not exist > > > To put all of this in the context of the MOQ, conventional truth, the world > of everyday affairs, applies to static reality and its difference from and > relationship to Dynamic Quality. As such, the positive tetralemma would be > used to express, in a logical way, the reality of subjects, objects, and so > on and their strictly static existence whilst acknowledging their > contradictory “unreality”, i.e., their lack of individual essence, that is > entailed by their dependence on Dynamic Quality. Ultimate truth, the world > of Buddhas, thus applies to the preintellectual “context” of Dynamic Quality. > The negative tetralemma would be used to prevent any logical treatment of > Dynamic Quality as a putative metaphysical “entity” of which properties and > attributes may be predicated. > ( robertpirsig.org/Tetralemma.htm ) Dan: It is worth noting again that the tetralemma (both positive and negative), while expressing the reality/unreality of objects and subjects as well as preventing the logical treatment of Dynamic Quality, is itself static quality. Thank you, Dan http://www.danglover.com 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
