[Platt] Can't help but ask if there isn't "One True Way of Thinking" since many times you have extolled the value of "critical thinking" and urged that it be taught to all children.
[Arlo] This, like the MOQ, is just a map. But, like Pirsig points out, at cultural-historical points in time, we can argue that some maps are "better". "Critical thinking" is a map that deals with information location, analysis and synthesis, and foregrounds the "mapness" of other "paths", and as such I'd argue that this is an important finger pointing at the moon at this point in time. I also that the MOQ be taught in schools, but this does not mean I think it is The One True Philosophy. But, I gather, you are trying to get back to your beloved "it's all relative is an absolute statement". This was (as I suggested) a fatal flaw in deism, that said "all this is just an analogy, except this statement". I think the MOQ would say, "all this is just an analogy, including this statement". That you find paradox in this only demonstrates what's at the center of any (sufficiently complex) symbolic system, paradox and recursion (I'm think GEB here). We can, of course, limit a given symbolic system, but this makes said system less and less powerful (the more and more we try to "nail it down"). This is, in fact, what we do with "literalization". For limited, pragmatic matters, limiting a symbolic system to do particular tasks give us great flexibility in activity. But the downside is we move further and further away from the power to anything more than "mundane" transactions. By building more and more complex systems, to do more and more powerful things, we unavoidably must deal with paradox, strange loops, recursion, chaos, self-organization, and all the other oddities that reveal an incompleteness to the system. All this is just an analogy, including this statement. Isn't this a lot like a Zen Koan? 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.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
