[MD] Intellect's Symposium

[skutvik at online.no]

Hi Dave. 

19 Jan.u wrote:

Dave:
> Just to make sure you don't wriggle away I want to recap this way a see
> if you still agree. Intellect is some combination of evolving "wetware"
> and "application software" that emerged at or near the border between
> the biological and social levels.  

"Wetware" is biological hardware ..no? Without wriggling I don't agree 
with intellect (even in society's service) emerging simultaneous with 
the social level, that screws the system.. Biological wetware 
(intelligence) ran biology's program for aeons. Then social value 
plugged its program on top of the biological and for tens of thousands 
of years intelligence served social purposes. 

The question when the first intellectual pattern - the first skeptic who 
said "Is this god-explanation true, aren't there principles that even 
gods must obey?" ...I don't know. There are those who say that 
Homer's "Iliad" is all-mythological" ('social' in moqspeak) with gods and 
humans intermingling, while his "Odysseus" show traces of modernity 
(intellect)  the gods acting more like fate, none directly showing up.      

> It then latched on, grew, and evolved over some substantial period of
> time until a critical mass of (shared information?) was reached and the
> intellectual level emerged. It's probable the emerging intellect may
> have been the defining event that separated the two levels. In other
> words in highly probable you have to have an intellect before you can
> develop really effective, teachable, communication techniques such a
> language. Agreed? 

No agreement on language. It is immensely old - the Neandethals are 
now believed to have had language, and intellect BEFORE the social 
level is completely nonsense. God, knows what ails you all about this 
intellectual issue? What is it that prevents intellect to be seen as 
Phaedrus did in in ZAMM - as SOM - and its emergence described in 
that book? Aretê then becomes its parent. This way ZAMM and LILA 
are seamlessly joined, instead of the present situation where ZAMM is 
some embarrassing relative.  

> All your qualifications and objections above (opposition, skeptical,
> objective, etc) we will address as we move along from what "intellect"
> is, to what "intellect" does and how it does it.

Yes, it is what intellect DOES that really proves my case. All 
intellectual patterns mentioned in LILA point to the objective, rational 
attitude!.

> [ An aside] In a weird coincidence the first mention of "intellect" in
> Lila is also on page 19, with Indians, peyote, and its chemical
> (physical<>biological) effects on the brain and its workings.

Drugs effect our objective - sober - ability , that's their very lure. 

> Moving on. The first mention of "intellectual" in ZaMM shows up on
> page 32 with the shim incident and continues on expanding on it up
> through 62 associating with it such words as: rational, classic,
> analytical, forms, concepts, etc. On page 60 we read:

> Pg 60: "In Part One of formal scientific method, which is the
> statement of the problem, the main skill is in stating absolutely no
> more than you are positive you know. It is much better to enter a
> statement "Solve Problem: Why doesn¹t cycle work?"

Right, the scientific attitude is the objective, rational INTELLECTUAL 
one.

> Can we not say from this that the most basic use, good, function of
> the intellect is to "Solve Problem:"?

Sorry Dave for being so obstinate, but my proverbial crow that found a 
way to get to some food was "solving a biological problem". The 
person RMP had is wetware running both social and intellectual 
programs, the latter helping him in maintaining his motorcycle.  

> The most basic problems that all animals have to solve are:
 
> How to get food?
> How to do it without getting killed?
> How to get sex?

Agree." 
> As far as we know humans are the only animals that can attack this
> problem by making  "mental" constructs of them, work on them
> individually and jointly over time, and then individually and jointly
> take actions to solve them. 

Objections your honor. I think the 4th. levels internal view that the 
term"intellect" means self-consciousness is the block. My  crow 
obviously "manipulated data" in the sense of fetching earlier 
experience from its RAM into some "chache" where it was run through 
logical gates and out came the solutions. Not by language "hey, I'll use 
my beak to hoist the string  ...etc" but by sensual means, visual 
primarily. The crow knows no (intellectual) mental/corporeal dichotomy 
it just did it.   

> One of the key attributes of the intellect that allows this to occur is
> foresight. The ability to when trying to "Solve Problem" to ask a more
> basic question, "What possible real difference would it make if this
> possible solution were to come about" 

Admittedly, animal brain is limited, but with the human article and 
language, thinking reached a new level literally!!!  But I insist, this is 
still INTELLIGENCE, intellect was still a level away.     

> I think there is enough here for you to disagree with that I should
> stop now.

Right,