Re: MD Metaphysics of Cities, Societies and the Stock market

[Simon Knight]

Hi to all   This posting is also to make my presence known as a lurker, although by responding does that negate my lurker status? First I should like to offer one possible answer to a point raised by Geoffrey, which I quote:   "I can not understand how people can become friends with there sub-society, through school, higher-learning and social events. But are to scared to become friends with anyone outside there sub-society. The mass quantity of numbers in cities could be the problem or maybe the television news has made people suspect other people as being thugs, murderers and some how dangerous people."   Geoffrey's idea that we fear to approach those outside our sub-society because we are afraid of what they might DO TO US seems logical, a basic human instinct is safety first. But I would argue that we are actually more afraid of what they might THINK OF US. In today's metropolitan, urban society image has become the pinnacle of human psychi. Therefore if we feel we have some sort of bond with a person, eg membership of the same club or seeing them with a symbol that denotes an interest of our own, we feel able to approach them and strike up a conversation, safe in the knowledge that we can stick to the common ground without denting our own image whilst we get to know them. The irony is however, the larger the society the more we take this into account, despite the fact that we are less likely to meet them again which renders the neccessity of an image to these people useless. I hope that is clear, my use of English appears to have deserted me in that final sentence. Then Geoffrey moved on to talk of the Stock Market (the total downside of society and humanity as I see it), and again I quote from his text:   "It is its own entity by itself. Humans no longer control the Share Market and they never will. It is a rather big monster that we defenseless humans can not control, instead it controls us. It tells us when to invest and when to sell. It controls the job market. It controls recession, depressions and booms."   As I have mentioned, I consider this driving force behind modern life to bring out the worst sides in human nature; greed, ruthlessness and lack of compassion etc. I hope this ties in with what I first took from my reading of ZAMM, that Quality is a higher goal, encompassing both subjectivity and objectivity, and as such, human decisions and actions should be directed to both what you ( the subjective), and the central human consciousness (the objective) feel is good. On reflection that appears wrong, but I will stand by it until offered a viable alternative for the objective.   Added to the Stock Market as a controller of human lives is the computer now, in my opinion. We manage for years without computers. Then we get one, and run our lives by it. As such, when it crashes, as all intelligent things must ( by which I mean all things with their own intellect and electric life force, as with the Stock Market), we are left stranded, despite the fact that only weeks before we did without. Nowadays, as concerns computer crashes, the majority of the help files are located on the internet, and all that resides inside the physical shell of our computer is addresses. The stupidity of this system is that it presupposes that you are on the internet. If it is the internet section of your computer that fails, then your computer alone cannot help itself, you have to turn to someone else's computer instead, again presupposing that they are on the internet. I know that eventually you will get to a hard copy of the neccessary help files, but that is beside the point. My point is that an offshoot of the computer, the internet, is used to support the computer. It is similar to the way an offshoot of our experiences, the mind, is used to support us. We can LIVE without our mind, even experience things in our consciousness (the awareness of being alive), and if push comes to shove experience things without being aware of them (take for example the sea eroding cliffs - the cliffs experience the effect of the sea, but they are not aware). But without our mind, we cannout FUNCTION AS WE HAVE GOT USED TO. We are not fulfilling the purpose we feel we were designed for, like the computer that lacks the internet, nowadays we expect the internet as standard, much as we expect a mind.   I feel that I had better define what I have termed "mind". That is, even the most inanimate of objects/subjects experiences, only objects/subjects with a consciousness are aware of experiences and respond to them (Trees?Plants? Insects?), but to use experiences, we require a mind. I put insects in the consciousness column, as contemporary scientific study appears to suggest that they have a collective mind not individual ones from what i have understood - point me in the right direction if I am wrong. At its different levels a mind can learn from experience, react against impulse to experience, order its experiences, and in my view, ascertain the quality of an experience. Therefore, an experience first hits the experiencer, then if they contain a consciousness they acknowledge the experience, THEN, and only if they contain the necessary filters to order the experience, they make sense of the experience, judging it on its quality. I apologise for writing so much in so bulky clauses and shapes, but it was my first attempt, and I hope some sense can be made of what I have wriiten. As I said in my introduction on Sunday, I am not a philosopher, and if I have made any mistakes, grievous or minor, I beg to be given alternate approaches. Only that way can I learn. Since joining on Saturday, the amount of material I have ammassed is huge, and there were so many more ideas and thoughts I wished to include. Here is one that I really didn't want to leave out, which is Jonathan Marder's response to David B's "People and stoves don't just magically and suddenly pop into existence at the moment of experience either.": "Surely the "existence" of people and stoves is extrapolated from the primary experience. Without the experience, people and stoves might as well not exist."   It doesn't need any analysis, least of all from me. Thanks Si   PS Please could some one furnish me with a dictionary of the many acronyms you are using, or direct me to where I might find the Rosetta Stone. ----- Original Message ----- From: Geoffrey Balasoglou To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, April 09, 2000 4:57 AM Subject: MD Metaphysics of Cities, Societies and the Stock market Thanks everyone for noticing my introduction, This well be my first real post on:  -------The Metaphysics of Cities, Societies and the Stock Market.--------- Throughout Chapter 17 and 18 Robert Pirsig talks about Cities as being a higher evolutionary being and how they are like Giants using humans as resources as we use farm animals as resources. RMP: "A social pattern is a higher form of evolution." I found chapter 17 as being one of the most interesting part of the book. I myself have some worries about the urbanization of society. Pirsig talks about the craziness of New York and how people are different over there. The City has made them scared of interacting with anyone they don't know. A quote that has been repeated through both of Pirsig's book was how the look and then ignore syndrome was present in the Western parts of America and in New York alike. RMP in ZMM: "Once in a while one gives a quick glance and then looks away expressionlessly........as if embarrassed that we might have noticed he was looking at us" again a similar quote was repeating in LILA: "A woman coming toward him hasn't clicked yet, that quick New York dart-of-the-eyes, but she will....Here it comes.....Click!...Then looks away....She passes by.....Like the click of a candid-camera shutter.." I have seen this happen in other cities to and I think I know why it occurs. This kind of thing doesn't happen in small towns (although I have been a city folk for all my life). This occurs because people in cities are afraid of making contact with people outside there own small sub-society. A sub-society is a person's group of friends, teachers, family and other people they have meet and have got to know. In cities it is impossible to have a sub-society that includes everyone in the city so anyone outside people's sub-society are presumed as being dangerous unless found otherwise. In small towns I think people can avoid this timidness. They can get to know most of the locals therefore expanding there sub-society into a community which is a major thing missing in city life. My philosophy is that I can not understand how people can become friends with there sub-society, through school, higher-learning and social events. But are to scared to become friends with anyone outside there sub-society. The mass quantity of numbers in cities could be the problem or maybe the television news has made people suspect other people as being thugs, murderers and some how dangerous people.  Pirsig used a metaphor to show the super organism cities. The metaphor was a Giant. He talks about how scientist where being corrupted in the late 1940s by being offered jobs to make profit rather then finding the truth. (The still happens all the time). In some ways I feel that the Share Market is the same. It is its own entity by itself. Humans no longer control the Share Market and they never will. It is a rather big monster that we defenseless humans can not control, instead it controls us. It tells us when to invest and when to sell. It controls the job market. It controls recession, depressions and booms. Thank you for reading this post. I hope you all understand it and I am looking forward to discussing this subject further. Geoffrey Balasoglou