In a message dated 7/18/99 2:15:17 PM Pacific Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > <David: All Philosophers: This is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. > Jonathan's "argument" is entirely free of any intellectual content. It > deliberately ignores the issues and ideas raised in the genocide debate > in favor of mocking disapproval, a dismissive attitude and the > implication of unfair "tactics". It is pure social level stuff. Its not > really a "thought" so much as an irrational, emotional feeling. Lee Raiken (and Platt's agreement): > The *ad hominem* attacks in this group's postings lack both QUALITY and > MORALS. ME: Actually, the basis of MOQ says that nothing lacks quality or morals, just a concept of high or low quality in relationship to a principle of relative importance. What I'm trying to say is that the Quality that you (Lee and Platt) are looking for is not apparent to in David's or Jonathan's posts. But that does not mean their posts are low quality. They contain a thread of discussion that I believe is very important to understanding the Social and Intellectual Levels in the MOQ. It is the importance of the Social Level in interpreting and disseminating the Intellectual Level. David is trying magnify it by his Celebrity posts and I will comment on those in later posts. His argument in the above quote are quite relevant to the MOQ. Argument and debate are full of Rhetoric and Logic. Plato logically tried to trash the Sophists by saying Rhetoric is arguing the weaker to look the stronger. And the post-Plato philosophers have almost always put Truth and Logic above Rhetoric. But look in the Social Level at jury trials. The winner is not always arguments based on Truth and Logic. In fact, there are many that say it is mostly Rhetoric. I believe that this is justified in the MOQ. There are many people that say ZMM is superior to Lila as well as the converse (is that the right term?) of the statement. In most cases the ZMM proponents point to the popularity of the book (Social recognition) and their relative enjoyment, or perhaps the more mystical (romantic) nature of the underlying concept. Those that like Lila better point to the overall structure of thought that is more complete and the more rational nature of the underlying concept. Which book got its point out better? ZMM! and again it's the more Social Level acceptance and celebrity thing that's going for it. Intellectual ideas will always need advertising and push from the social level to succeed. Furthermore they always ride on the social culture that create the intellectual ideas. It is important to remember that the MOQ does not recognize abstract principles living a separate existence in an Objective world! Let's talk more about this idea in the celebrity posts because I agree in 'principle' that logic overrides the rhetoric, but the logic must use rhetoric to have it's voice heard. So I think David is half right about Jonathan... xcto MOQ Online Homepage - http://www.moq.org Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/ Unsubscribe - http://www.moq.org/md/index.html MD Queries - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
