Hi Ron --
> I think I see your beef with the term "intelligence"
> but I must ask you then, what of this information that is commonly
> held in the human mind?
> Does a collection of communicating minds have more success in it's
> value assessments than an individual mind? Does this then qualify it
> as an evolutionary step?
[Ham]
Your question is fundamental to the issue, but the wording is ambiguous.
I've found that if there's a chance for ambiguity to confuse, it will;
and since I've already unnerved some anti-SOMists here, please accept
these suggestions as my attempt to clarify rather than nit-pick.
[Ron]
Thank you for your patience, I tend to express ideas rather clumsily and
you are correct for orienting
The conversation.
[Ham]
When you say "information commonly held in the human mind", I think you
mean "universal information held in human minds." That gets rid of
"common", as well as the suggestion that an individual's knowledge has a
collective mind.
Secondly, "minds" don't communicate; people do, and people only
communicate information or ideas, not mental images or values. Thirdly,
I'm frankly confused as to the meaning of "evolutionary step" in this
context.
(Perhaps you could explain that to me.)
[Ron]
I termed evolutionary step to mean that functioning in a group is more
successful as it relates to survival
than functioning as an individual.
[Ham]
Since I believe that value perception is proprietary to the individual,
any assessment of value is a survey to determine the "majority opinion".
This is the basis of our justice system, as you know if you've ever
served on a jury of your peers. So, yes, pooling ideas in a collective
effort is often more effective than individuals working alone in
achieving certain goals, particularly where a project calls for
multi-tasking or value assessment.
The point in contention is that intelligence and/or knowledge is a
community reservoir from which individuals pick fragments in some
"hit-or-miss"
manner. All knowledge comes from experience, and only individuals
experience. Therefore, "collective knowledge" is a misnomer. The
knowledge isn't collective, only the information communicated is. A
pool, or collection, of facts, ideas or values is only a reflection of
individuals who lend their expressed thoughts to the pool. That
societies and cultures can adopt common behavior patterns or belief
systems does not mean that knowledge is collective. Even what we call
"universal knowledge" is no more than the experiential observations of
individuals that have been accepted by the community of mankind at
large.
[Ron]
That's pretty much the idea I have of It, you are correct, it is a
matter of terminology.
[Ham]
One final note: The reason you see "collective intelligence" bandied
about here is that MoQ's author early on was obsessed with eliminating
the mind-matter dualism of philosophy. He came upon Quality as an
aesthetic property that seemed to transcend the duality because it was
neither subjective (mental) nor objective (material). [If you haven't
yet done so, I suggest you read Pirsig's SODV essay in the archives.]
After this epiphany, he sought to remove everything from the inorganic,
biological, and societal world and attribute it to Quality. That of
course included human consciousness, intellect, love, creativity,
judgment, freedom, and evolution itself, all of which were defined as
"patterns" of his "primary empirical reality". By this abstraction,
Pirsig believed he had resolved the duality problem. There is no
subject or object. There is only a monism: Quality.
It replaces God, mind, matter, and spirit. And, if you can't accept
this radical new idealism, you'll eventually find yourself as
disappointed as I am.
[Ron]
I have read SODV many times through and this is a radical concept, but,
being fascinated by it,
I've come at it from various angles and I keep coming up with what
Pirsig did. I do not see it
as the death nail of the freedom of the individual or the spirit but
really, who does know?
There is no way for us to really know whats happening or how it really
works, but it is fun to
speculate with you and every one else, it's healthy to have conflicting
viewpoints, in the
defense of those viewpoints you re-define and further your own
understanding of them.
[Ham]
Thanks for what may be my last opportunity to expound here, Ron.
[Ron]
Ham it is allways a pleasure conversing with you, I hope you decide to
stay and if not
I hope we may stay in contact offlist.
Essentially yours,
Ron
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