[MD] Intellectual and Social

[plattholden at gmail.com]

Hey Ham,

Always a pleasure to converse with you. 

On 10 Jan 2010 at 4:04, Ham Priday wrote:

> 
> Greetings, Platt --
> 
> 
> > Hey Steve, Bruce
> >
> > Bruce's example is an empirical fact established by observation and
> > experiment. But, where is the evidence that values are involved?
> > How do we convince doubters that the germ-immunity conflict is a
> > moral struggle? I mean it's easy to say that all battles are moral 
> > battles.
> > But, how do you prove it in court?
> >
> > I'm beginning to suspect that Pirsig's theory is like evolution,
> > climate change and God's will because no matter what happens
> > the theory applies. ...
> >
> > I wonder.
> 
> So do I, Platt.
> 
> Unfortunately, Pirsig's theory IS evolution.  It's the evolution of 
> "universal betterness" with or without man's participation.  Evolution 
> toward complexity, as in the development of "higher-order" species, has been 
> the objectivists' theory ever since Darwin.  It is disturbing to see it 
> applied to morality by a philosopher.

Pirsig's theory is one among many, including yours. I find them all 
interesting and none "disturbing," except those of radical Islam. 

> For one thing, there is no empirical evidence that organic complexity is any 
> more "moral" than low-order simplicity.  Has intellectual development in 
> Homo-sapiens made us moral creatures?

Besides begging the question of what makes creatures moral, your 
question was answered by Pirsig when he pointed out that current 
intellectual development divides experience into subjects and objects, 
allowing "no provision for morals" -- the reason why we find ourselves 
today in a moral mess where we can't even identify a terrorist as a 
terrorist.  

> Bruce also said "anything that is 
> organized into patterns did that out of Dynamic Quality and is Quality 
> itself," but this prompted him to ask "what is it that moves things from a 
> state of organization back to chaos?  Is that Quality?"  He bases his 
> ontology on the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states that the usable 
> energy in the universe diminishes over time and that the most probable state 
> for any natural system in one of disorder.  Some scientists believe this 
> refutes the theory of biological evolution.  Here's one:
> 
> "Of all the statements that have been made with respect to theories on the 
> origin of life, the statement that the Second Law of Thermodynamics poses no 
> problem for an evolutionary origin of life is the most absurd. The operation 
> of natural processes on which the Second Law of Thermodynamics is based is 
> alone sufficient, therefore, to preclude the spontaneous evolutionary origin 
> of the immense biological order required for the origin of life."  -- [Duane 
> Gish, Ph.D. in biochemistry, UCLA]

I acknowledge that Darwinian evolution is an arguable theory. It does a 
nice job explaining changes in moth colors and bird beaks, but when it 
comes to explaining the sudden appearance of a new species it 
stretches credulity. The best it can do is offer something like 
"punctuated equilibrium" or some other imaginative abstraction. Life 
miraculously springs from no-life and mind from no-mind. How? Why? 
The evolutionist answer: "Oops."       

> But the most grievous aspect of Pirsig's evolutionary thesis is that it 
> ignores the cognizant subject of quality and morality, without whose 
> sensibility value would be meaningless, as would any effort to improve man's 
> well-being.

By the same token, any thesis would be meaningless without human 
beings around to give it meaning. I don't see how such a platitude adds 
anything to understanding. 

>  It makes no sense to talk about Quality or Value as a level we 
> "attach to" when we all feel it as that which is immanently desirable, 
> inspirational, something to aspire to.  What do you suppose would happen to 
> the Beauty you revere so much if there were no human beings to  appreciate 
> it? 

"Beauty" describes a particular kind of human experience involving 
sudden, direct and immediate pleasure prior to concepts. But, the 
existence of something is not dependent on human experience of it. The 
color red was around for many years before man learned of its  
presence. By the same token, beauty may be intrinsic to the fabric of 
reality. I believe it to be so.

> If man's motives and behavior play no part in the creation process, 
> human existence has less meaning than a spring-driven cuckoo clock.

This sounds like Idealism, the theory that man creates existence. To me 
that's ridiculous on its face. A chicken doesn't need our surveillance to 
lay eggs.  

> I sense that you're beginning to get my drift, Platt.  Perhaps my 
> anthropocentric universe no longer seems so strange to you.

I never considered your universe to be strange. Your arguments for it 
make a lot of sense. But, it contains a mysterious creator you call 
Essence (or the negate of Essence, I'm not quite sure which). I'm 
somewhat suspicious of theories that attribute the source of existence to 
some imaginative being like Plato's forms or a bizarre force like the 
physicist's Big Bang. In that respect, Pirsig's Dynamic Quality is equally 
suspect. It's saving grace is that it's more believable to me than some of 
its competitors although yours comes in as a close second.  

But, as always, i could be wrong.

With best wishes for a safe, healthy and Happy New Year.
Platt




> 
> Essentially yours,
> Ham
> 
> 
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