Hi MOQ DISCUSS
I found a message (by Platt Holden from 12 March in the
"Independent Reality" thread) and trust him to have given a credible
summary of the current status of that particular topic. This is so
important an issue that I subscribed just to deliver this.
> A review of recent posts reveals that most of us currently
> participating in the discussion are believers in a reality �out
> there,� independent of us. The nature of this transcendent reality
> varies: To Ken Clark it�s a �function� or �process.�
> To Jonathan Marder it�s �forces.�
> To David Lind it�s �too big� for us to understand.
> To Matt Coughlan it�s �spiritual� or �Mu.�
> Whatever it�s nature, most seem to agree with Justin Binktmons who
> wrote that there is �� a distinction between Reality and the mind�s
> perception of reality.� As to the question of whether patterns also
> exist �out there,� there�s some disagreement. Matt Ketchum says, �We
> experience patterns of value then construct more patterns of value to
> explain them.�
> Peter Lennox says, �� the patterns we perceive are subjective
> impressions of some other, objective reality.�
> David Buchanan says, �� every sort of static quality has subjectivity
> AND objectivity simultaneously.�
> But at least three of us believe there is no reality (or patterns)
> �out there� independent of us: Roger says, �� reality or experience
> exists, but it by no means is independent of us.�
> Horse says, �We are created by reality as much as we create it.�
The above is Platt's interpretation of the cited persons' views and
may be incomplete, but I don't have the capacity to look into them
all so I ask everybody's pardon.
> I say, �Mine is the only world.�
> My reasoning:
> Reality is experience;
> There never was, is, or will be any experience other than present
> experience; The only present experience I know is mine. As yet we
> haven�t heard definitively from Pirsig on the subject � or so it would
> see
I think Platt says it, yet there is a ring of SOMish idealism -
solipsism even - to his reasoning that don't quite fit with my
reasoning. Dynamic Quality has spawned the known four static
levels (IMHO a new level is stirring). Nowhere in this sequence
does it shift from outside to inside. That split IS the subject-object
metaphysics which the quality metaphysics is supposed to replace.
The physical universe (the Static Inorganic Value Level) isn't any
more "out there" than the Static Intellectual Value Level is "in here"
or the Biological and Social levels are somewhere in between. I
know that some tend to see the universe as created as some
separate OBJECTIVE external reality that by and by gave rise to
life, communities of life, and then some developed life forms that
had brains enough to ask for an explanation.
This is not very controversial to the staunchest SOMist but rather
unMOQish. The "creation" may be this or that, it is of no relevance,
the universe IS the Inorganic level, no more real than the rest of the
value sequence, and nowhere in this Q-evolution does "experience"
turn internal or become "mind"!
The notion of Intellect as SOM's "mind" has haunted the
discussion from the very start, and Platt is right: Pirsig is not very
clear here. He has even said that Intellect can be seen as "mind",
but that the mind expression should be avoided (not easy to
interpret). This is what the whole SOM-MOQ controversy hinges
on. The quality sequence is one seamless development -
admittedly a break from level to level, but nowhere a matter/mind
quantum jump.
Q-Intellect must not be seen as a mental realm where thoughts
reside in various value layers (i.e: that intellect can judge among its
own values) only a higher level determines what is good for itself
among the values of the lower levels (It is preoccupied with the next
lower, but evaluates the whole of existence in its own light). To the
Inorganic level all is own value, but Life is very choisy regarding
matter. To Biology the bacterium and the human body is of the
same worth, but the Social level discriminates among the living
things. At the social level, bushman tribes and modern countries
are all out to preserve the common cause, but Intellect prefers
some before the other (this point could very well be elaborated on
but 'nuff said' as DMB says :)
No, Q-Intellect is not thinking, but rather the ability to see what's
objective from what is subjective. From there Society looks
"subjective" while Life and Matter looks "objective".(Pirsig's
contaiment idea). My idea is that Q-intellect IS Subject-Object
Metaphysics. Only a budding new level above intellect can see
what intellect is up to. Immersed in intellect (or SOM) we keep
harping on the eternal intellectual pastime of dividing existence into
external and internal.
Before the great upheaval I tried to formulate other approaches to
the level-forming to show how the Intellect got its subject-object
quality. I found great use in comparing Charles Peirce's "sign
interpreting" (Semiosis metaphysics) with Pirsig's, but all that has
gone to the archives tomb obviously. But don't you see how
vulnerable the mind/matter interpretation of MOQ makes it? (For
instance: The MOQ an intellectual pattern in here, compared to the
corresponding patterns out there?? I had almost wanted Struan to
home in on it). It's very well in an closed circle where nobody wants
to be rude, but the Quality Metaphysics has a world-shaking ability
if its tenets are understood. Think of it; the first time the dreaded
subject-object, mind-matter, inside-outside spell is broken. This is
the essence of the Quality idea, and it must not be compromised.
Thanks and goodbye for now.
Bodvar "Bo" Skutvik
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