[Krimel]: > Collective intelligence, the collective unconscious and consensual > hallucinations may be speculations and metaphor but collective > memory is the stuff of history. It's at the library. You can check it out.
[Ron]: > Collective history figures heavy in the concept, we are what we know, > eh? I thought it was interesting insofar as behavioral intuitiveness, > cultural identity, social order. > > It interests me because it was and is a troubling observation for me. > The "herd" mentality both fascinates and irritates. "Intellectual collectivism" is a pernicious view of reality that seems to be shared by many MoQers. The notion that Knowledge is the essence of our universe, and that we are only "what we know", is a total contradiction of the Value concept which Pirsig posited as the "primary empirical reality". Heaven help us if we are only what we know! That's your "herd mentality" speaking, Ron, and it irritates me, as well. The body of experiential knowledge can never exceed the organic limitations of the human brain whose cognitive faculties are attentive to only one thing at a time, and whose capacity to integrate intelligence is limited by the finite perception of the observer. Indeed, the very idea of an "external reality" is a construct of the individual mind. The myth that this "reality" is constituted of factual knowledge that is plucked by man as he intellectually evolves is carry-over from the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden. The essence of man is what he values, not what he knows. Factual knowledge simply represents man's differentiated experience of value, intellectualized as an objective world. The principles, laws, and relational aspects of existential reality that we catalog as "collective intelligence" only reflect the anthropocentric perspective of the cognizant creature. To posit Intelligence as an external realm that defines or constitutes reality is a meaningless abstraction that demeans the valuistic nature and purpose of man. This panobjectivist worldview would reduce reality to language, numbers and symbols, refute conscious awareness, and make computers more intelligent than human beings. You can forget about morality in a world where the individual is nothing but a robotized anomaly of biological evolution. For that matter, you can forget about philosophy, too. I'm distressed and disappointed to see the Collective Intellect repeatedly idolized in this forum. --Ham 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/
