[MD] Intellect's Symposium

[Mary]

Hi Dave,

Wasn't sure if a "Pirigism" was a "Pirsigism" or some word I didn't know.  Went checking.  Google returned a post between David L. Thomas and Struan Hellier dated 1/15/2000.  Was that you?  Were you in the Squad back then?  If not, this has to rank right up there on the coincidence meter.  Think I was still in it at that time, but I'm not sure.  I might have dropped out a little before that.

- Mary

-----Original Message-----
From: moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org [mailto:moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org] On Behalf Of David Thomas
Sent: Sunday, January 17, 2010 2:41 PM
To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
Subject: Re: [MD] Intellect's Symposium

Bo,
>[Bo before]
> Whoa yourself Dave, the use of "intellect" as synonymous with
> "intelligence" is MOQ's very problem. Intelligence is merely (not
> merely, yet ..) the biological brain computing power, while intellect is
> the 4th. level (in my now well known opinion). The 4th. level employs
> intelligence like the 3rd before it. Had Pirsig not used "intellect" in the
> same breath as intelligence (IQ) all would have been fine.
[Dave]
Based on just this one, first, mention of "intellect" I don't believe RMP is
using it synonymously with "intelligence" and neither am I. Quite the
opposite. But neither am I accepting your definition of intellect. Let me
reword RMP again to see if  we can get closer.

Human intellect (now) is not much different in intelligence (its basic
biological structure rooted in genetics and environmental factors) or its
intelligence quotient (the modern attempt to measure the variable "power" of
intelligence individual to individual) than it was in ancient man. IMHO
modern science in general agrees with this and only argues about just when
this occurred historically.

How intellect differed between modern man and ancient man is their different
"concept(s) of thought". Their "metaphysics" if you will. What they each
though was "real". Ghosts of ancestors were "real" to Indians prior to
European contact. Just like God is "real" to many people today. As the
passionate flaming in the other threads and wars around the world
demonstrate. 

>> [Dave before]
>> If we do your: "ambiguous as if there is an intellect of pre-modern
>> man" concern goes away.
>[Bo before]
> Well, I'm still worried about the sloppy use of "intellect". The term
> indicates (according to my dictionary) the ability to distinguish
> between reason (objectivity) and emotion (subjectivity) i.e. SOM,
> while - again - "intelligence" can be all kinds of aptitudes. If this is
> observed everything falls in place.

[Dave]
Ok, Let's un-slop it.
Your dictionary, as I recall, has the word "Oxford" in it. We Americans took
up arms to divorce ourselves from those English tyrants. ;-)
I have my copy of the Webster Collegiate Dictionary that was give to me as
high school graduation present 1962 and a newer one published in 1974 that I
bought on in the Montana State campus bookstore when returning to college
there after Vietnam. I believe they are more appropriate sources. I have
checked them against the Websters Online version and they are nearly
identical so I used it for cut and paste convenience.

Main Entry: in·tel·lect
Pronunciation: \ˈin-tə-ˌlekt\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French or Latin; Middle French, from
Latin intellectus, from intellegere to understand — more at intelligent
Date: 14th century
1 a : the power of knowing as distinguished from the power to feel and to
will : the capacity for knowledge b : the capacity for rational or
intelligent thought especially when highly developed
2 : a person with great intellectual powers

The first definition say, "the power of knowing" the "capacity for
knowledge". (I see the feeling and willing, read on Bo) Only when we get to
the second entry does the word "rational" show up. If we turn to the
etymology we find Latin- to understand. And if we trace the etymology back
we find.

Etymology: Latin intelligent-, intelligens, present participle of
intelligere, intellegere to understand, from inter- + legere to gather,
select — more at legend

Etymology: Middle English legende, from Anglo-French & Medieval Latin;
Anglo-French legende, from Medieval Latin legenda, from Latin, feminine of
legendus, gerundive of legere to gather, select, read; akin to Greek legein
to gather, say, logos speech, word, reason.

So if we trace the roots on intellect back we find: to understand, to
gather-select, to gather-select-read, all of which are AKIN TO the Greek:
To gather, say, logos speech, word, and finally at the tail end of the list
even to the Greeks, REASON is the last and only ONE of the root definitions
of INTELLECT.

So, as we all know, Pirsig traced, rightly, the "concept of thought" in the
Western World to the Greeks and showed that ONE of these meanings, REASON,
evolved through Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and on and on until the present
day where it has become the default basis of WESTERN reality, SOM.

The whole point of his books IMHO were to denounce that this way was THE
ONE, THE ONLY, OR THE BEST WAY the intellect could, should, or DID operate
for all of humankind over all of history.

Do we agree yet?

>> [Dave before]
>> RMP says humans have  these characteristics, qualities, (again
>> regardless what they mean)  back to at least  medieval times in both
>> Europe and America. If one understands and agrees with the biological
>> evolutionary theory of Darwin, even a little bit, this conclusion it
>> not at all surprising or unlikely.
> 
>> Agreed?
>[Bo before]
> Yes, agree 150 % I would say that intelligence has been constant
> since Homo Sapiens. Before that there surely were intelligence, but in
> step with neural complexity.Many animals obviously think albeit not
> by way of language
[Dave] 
Hey, we agree on something! Whoopeeeeeeeee!
>> [Dave before]
>> An aside. (I think an important one) when the word "evolution" popped
>> into my mind above I decided to search both texts for its use. ZaMM
>> (1) Lila (82) A huge difference. In comparing and contrasting MoQ-1
>> and MoQ-2 "evolution" is not used in the first  at all and is a
>> significant part of the second. Even though the many branches of
>> evolutionary science have been making big strides in last 50 years
>> they still have not come up with  definitive agreements between them
>> on what, when, why, where, etc makes humans different (or not) from
>> all rest. And this is particularly the case of what qualities
>> developed in our human ancestors allowed them to emerge from
>> biological level. So the misunderstanding and discord here is in part
>> because of the lack of progress  and agreement in science.

>[Bo before]
> I'm not all sure what your "aside" point is. That SOM's science hasn't
> 
> " ... come up with  definitive agreements between them on what,
> when, why, where, etc makes humans different (or not) from all
> rest..." 
> 
> is because the S/O matrix has no existential levels, there were just
> matter that by chance started to proliferate and crawl around. Then -
> after aeons - some by-product called "mind" emerged and then
> thinkers who began making up "subjective" theories about it all.
     
[Dave]
>From an evolutionary point of view as we move from the biological level we
really have few theories (or better said one overall theory, we have many)
of how the upper levels work. Dawkin's has proposed "memes" and "extended
phenotypes." Which has gotten him label a reductionist in the same vein as
scientific materialists when they try to reduce everything to atoms or
quarks or whatever newer tiny thing they come up with. The danger of trying
to impose the rules of one level to another has ample history.

Ok if we use the computer analogy you like. The brain is the whole box with
the body as an input/output devises. "Intelligence" is the process power of
the CPU. RAM and ROM the memory of the brain. ROM is the genetic hardwired
stuff of Operating System that keeps us breathing,seeing etc. RAM is the
storage for experience and all the application software.

What if "intellect" is like a software that runs on individual brains that
starts with some basic genetic/generic core but can and does get updated and
rewritten constantly based on individual experience.

The key point is "individual". Intellects are only present in individuals.
The intellectual level emerged out of, is dependent on, and was preceded by
social groups. So what I think we have with "intellect" is the same problem
we had with "social". Individual social characteristics, qualities, values
go deep into the biological level. Only when humans evolved sufficient
numbers and types of social qualities did the Social Level emerge. And only
when social groups evolve to a sufficient numbers, types, and qualities did
the intellectual level emerge. Therefore it highly probable that individual
intellectual qualities emerged deep in the social or maybe even in the later
stages of the biological level.

Am I wrong? I'll let you count the ways ;-)

A brief comment, hopefully, on levels in general.
Dawkins, who I happen to be reading now, introduced me to a concept that I
hadn't heard before. The problem of the "discontinuous mind". As we divide
things up to help in our understanding of complicated things like evolution
or genetics or life we automatic introduce the this problem at all the
division points. Because life, genetics, and evolution is all a continuous
flow. No matter how we divided it into one tiny little event after another
we still are wrong. But it is the best that we can do.

>[Mary]
> Dave, your first Pirsig quote from ZMM, below, seems to bolster my
> contention that the Intellectual Level is an attitude rather than an actual
> difference in kind between the mind of early man and modern.  What I've been
> saying is that the Intellectual Level represents basically the mindset of
> the scientific method, which serves its own purposes rather than those of
> society or belief systems.

[Dave]
I told you I would answer this here but if you find it I applaud your
diligence.

I wouldn't disagree a lot with your claim. But would expand it by saying
that the most basic operating instruction for intellectual level is the
Pirigism:

"The pencil is mightier than pen...... because it has an eraser"

Equally important whether you are an artist, scientist, or just making the
grocery list.

Still scribbling,

Dave






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