Arlo, Seems like an excellent answer!
Marsha At 01:56 PM 3/8/2007, Arlo wrote: >[Arlo previously] >Here, with evolution, we see a singular process (the movement of patterns >towards "betterness") occurring throughout nature and history. I think it's a >safe inference to say this process will continue. Indeed, I think evolution is >simply the visible manifestation of Quality. > >[Case] >Arlo, you have made this sort of statement several times and while >it jibes with >Pirsig, it does not accord well with evolutionary theory as I understand it. >What is this "betterness"? Is this "betterness" in the sense that history is >written by the survivors so it is or was better for them? > >[Arlo] >Hi Case. Your question seems to focus primarily on social-historical >evolution. >In this sense, yes, I'd argue that people act in accordance to what they think >is "better", and history tends to side with the victors of conflict. Don't >confuse, however, my statement that things evolve towards betterness with the >idea of a straight, upward-slanting line. > >Violence is often used to reify static patterns and stifle, or even destroy, >movement towards "betterness" that threatens the foundations of instantiated >power. History could be seen as a constant struggle to move forward when each >step forward creates additional webs of power that want to stop that movement. > >In the aggregate, however, and we could be talking tens of thousands of years, >the overall tendency is towards Quality (if you prefer that over >"betterness"). >Our lives are in nearly all ways "better" than early human life. >Does that mean >we haven't misstepped, or ran too quickly towards a false idea? Not at all, we >most certainly have. > >The question also harkens back to how we fix a belief that something is >"better". Many Germans felt following Hitler was movement towards >"betterness", >as did the flood of European immigrants who decimated the Native >populations of >this land. This is why I find critical thinking to be so, well, critical. >Peirce identified four ways we "fix" our beliefs; tenacity, >authority, a priori >and scientific methodology. Although Peirce was not able to comment >on Pirsig's >extension of science, the basic tenants seem to reveal that most people are >satisfied relying on tenacity and authority to fix many, if not most, of their >beliefs. This was the central problem of The Reich and the Native American >exterminations. Power, in these cases centralized in Europe, manipulated the >understanding of "better" to advance their own power, while most simply bought >in either out of fear or promises of sharing in the power. > >Also realize that I place no preeminent, extra-natural role to "man". There is >no extra-natural entity protecting us, as "his children", from the natural >processes of biological and inorganic reality. An asteroid is an asteroid, a >virus is a virus, ice ages come and go, and we can only respond, and maybe not >when the time comes and we are driven into extinction. In a sense, of course, >that asteroid is itself following inorganic quality, it is doing >what asteroids >do, and while its existence follows inorganic quality, it may very well bring >about the end of certain biological and social and intellectual patterns. > >[Case] >Or do you see this as "betterness" in some metaphysical or cosmological sense? >This smacks of teleology and Microsoft Word does not even recognize >"betterness" as a word. > >[Arlo] >My version of Word does not recognize "Machinima" either. Should you >stop using >it? I see "betterness" as the reason anything moves from point A to point B. >Can you think of anything that moves from A to B because of >"worseness"? Or, if >its a completely indifferent state, why move? > > >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/ 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/
