In any case, I disagree with his use of the use of the word 'resistance'. The word makes is sound as though pleasures of the flesh are something to be avoided. It seems like some disagreement in the boards, or as far as I've seen, revolves around the morals surrounding more basic pleasures versus higher social and then even higher intellectual values and specifically how it translates to real life. Freudian theory, which I'm not a huge fan of aside from some very basic concepts of value, is all about the battle between the values we learn later in life versus our more basic needs. The way I see it, too many people forget how to let higher values serve lower ones in terms of providing freedom to enjoy them at our leisure. Most basically, not doing that at the expense of others and the selves health, along with other social/intellect rules are abided, providing the pleasures of the flesh to be enjoyed do not impede them. I see nothing wrong with enjoying something on a lower level as long as higher ones are not impugned, they must all be held in step at once. It is not ONLY the highest level which we live by, but the hierarchy all at once to be held as a process by which we mentally (both consciously and automatically; one decent thing about freudian theory) decide how to act in decisions during our everyday lives. I also believe that the two hemispheres of the brain, while not too different between individuals (except in autism, schizophrenia, ADHD, etc.), operates in a complimentarily dichotomous way; in which the left processes information more locally on one thing at a time and the right on more globally across multiple things at once, this is caused by underlying differences in neuronal structure reflecting the same local/global parsing and is shared through the corpus callosum. I believe this is what gives rise to some of the aspects our human way of thinking. As the split-brain patients of Gazzaniga and Sperry have showed us, the right is the silent partner in this deal; it deals with things quickly and adjusts our global knowledge construct. The left, on the other hand, and as Pirsig pointed out, therefore cannot 'see' the value-judgements fed to it by the right. I hope to complete more research on the subject before I connect it TOO much to Pirsig's MOQ, but this is where my own personal 'global knowledge construct' development has lead me so far throughout my life of learning and seeking the truth to basic philosophical questions like how we are conscious, and why I should accomplish anything in life.
On Sat, Mar 7, 2015 at 1:39 PM, Blodgett, Nikolas <[email protected]> wrote: > I came across a sign along a path in the woods, and on the back it said > "He who is in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe > -Marcus Aurelius"; it has always stuck with me. > > On Thu, Mar 5, 2015 at 11:30 AM, ngriffis <[email protected]> wrote: > >> >> >> I came across this thought #55 in Book 7 in "Meditations" by Marcus >> Aurelius >> (Roman Emperor and Philosopher, 121 to 180 AD): >> >> >> >> "Do not look around at the directing minds of other people, but >> keep >> straight ahead to where nature is leading you - both universal nature, in >> what happens to you, and your own nature, in what you must do yourself. >> Every creature must do what follows from its' own constitution. The rest >> of >> creation is constituted to serve rational beings (just as in everything >> else >> the lower exists for the higher), but rational beings are here to serve >> each >> other. So the main principle in man's constitution is the social. The >> second >> is resistance to the promptings of the flesh. It is the specific property >> of >> rational and intelligent activity to isolate itself and never be >> influenced >> by the activity of the senses or impulses: both these are of the animal >> order, and it is the aim of the intelligent activity to be sovereign over >> them and never yield them the mastery - and rightly so, as it is the very >> nature of intelligence to put all these things to its' own use. The third >> element in a rational constitution is a judgment unhurried and undeceived. >> So let your directing mind hold fast to these principles and follow the >> straight road ahead: then it has what belongs to it." >> >> >> >> I think this quote touches on some of what Mr. Persig built his >> philosophy upon, perhaps similar ideas from different sources. It gives us >> an idea of the foundations that brought us to MOQ. I am always delighted >> when historic knowledge dovetails into present-day leading-edge >> knowledge. I >> hope the subscribers to MOQ find this of interest. >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> 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
