[MD] Static latching & faith

Sat Apr 22 10:32:35 PDT 2006

SA,

In this discussion I am only attacking the claim that the MOQ is 
"empirically based", and in questioning MOQ assumptions I am more or less 
just playing Devil's Advocate. What I am saying is that this "field" of 
Northrop's may or may not "just" be the human subject -- as far as we can 
tell *empirically*.

You said: "You are included in the field as well.  So are animals and stars. 
Why replace field with subject when in the old SOM you and the stars are in 
the
field?  When I go into the field I see people, trees, flowers, etc..."

This is why I made the distinction between intentional subject and Cartesian 
subject -- a distinction which Pirsig unfortunately seems to be unaware of. 
The latter is human mentality. The former is that which takes *anything* as 
an object, including human mentality. Merrell-Wolff describes it as the 
thread on which all objects --including thoughts, feelings, the idea of 
oneself, and of course perceived objects -- are strung. Now M-W holds that 
this thread is more or less like Northrop's field, and I agree with that. 
But *empirically*, there is no way to choose between this view and a view 
such as Dennett's that this thread is just a convenient fiction.

- Scott

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Heather Perella" <spiritualadirondack at yahoo.com>
To: <moq_discuss at moqtalk.org>
Sent: Friday, April 21, 2006 8:29 PM
Subject: Re: [MD] Static latching & faith

Hi Scott and others,

     Ant stated according to Northrop:
> (a), we shall call the indefinite or
> undifferentiated aesthetic
> continuum,
> the latter, (b), since they are many in number, the
> differentiations."
>
> (Northrop, "Logic of the Sciences & Humanities",
> 1947, p.96)
>
> Scott:
> It seems to me that (a) can be replaced by the word
> 'subject' in its
> intentional sense (not in its Cartesian sense) --
> that which is aware of all
> objects, including mental objects. There is no
> empirical evidence to suggest
> that it exists outside of a human being.

     You are included in the field as well.  So are
animals and stars.  Why replace field with subject
when in the old SOM you and the stars are in the
field?  When I go into the field I see people, trees,
flowers, etc...

> Ant said:
> Northrop then provides an answer to your query for
> why "the undifferentiated
> aesthetic continuum" isn't taken on faith (or at
> least as a non-empirical
> assumption):
>
> "The Concept of the Indefinite or Undifferentiated
> Aesthetic Continuum [is
> the] most difficult of these. concepts for the
> Westerner to appreciate.
> because of the influence of Berkeley and Hume.  They
> insisted that all
> concepts are concepts by intuition but tended to
> regard the continuum as
> nothing but an aggregation of secondary and tertiary
> qualities. That this is
> false, an examination of what one immediately
> apprehends will indicate. We
> directly inspect not merely the white and the noise
> but also these in a
> field. The field is as immediately given as any
> specific quality, whether
> secondary or tertiary, within it."
>
> Scott:
> That doesn't imply falsehood. The immediately
> apprehended may just have a
> slightly "larger" background that we aren't focused
> on while we are focused
> on the smaller. If one wants to identify an
> all-encompassing background, one
> can do that with oneself as intentional subject,
> which, again, we can't
> assume exists beyond that of human consciousness.

     Your use of subject with field and focus is
confusing.  The field is this universe and everything
in this universe.  The focus is a particular within
this universe - a star for instance.  What is
universe?

> Northrop continued:
> "Moreover, most of the directly experienced field is
> vague and indefinite.
> Only at what William James termed its center is
> there specificity and
> definiteness. Thus it is evident that the
> indefinite, indeterminate,
> aesthetic continuum is as immediately apprehended as
> are the specific
> differentiations within it. Hence, the concept of
> the indefinite or
> undifferentiated continuum, gained by abstraction
> from the differentiated
> aesthetic continuum, is a concept by intuition, not
> a concept by postulation
> [or non-empirical assumption]. (Northrop, "Logic of
> the Sciences &
> Humanities", 1947, p.97)
>
> Scott:
> More photons are processed by the fovea than in the
> rest of the retina. So
> what? But of course more germane is the question:
> just because I have a
> concept by intuition, doesn't make it empirical (or
> true).

     What is intuition or empirical?  There seems to
be on the one hand Ant talking and on the other hand
Scott talking and two paradigms are talking as a
crosswind where something behind the assumptions of
both are being missed by the other.  Not to say one is
wrong or right, at this moment, it just seems that
Scott and Ant are bringing up something that are
somehow in the same dialogue, and at the same time in
a different dialogue.

> Ant said:
> I hope that is of _some_ help!
>
> Scott:
> I see nothing but a spinning of arguments to
> convince oneself that something
> that one is already convinced of can have the word
> 'empirical' attached to
> it. I see nothing here that rules out the old
> mechanistic Newtonian
> worldview

     ok, nothing is ruling out Newton.

     Scott said:
> (one gets around the quantum physics
> oddness by assuming that all
> that is relevant to human mentality kicks in at the
> macroscopic level).

     Who is trying to get around quantum physics?
Focus in the field and notice photons theorized.

     Scott continues:
> Now
> there are arguments (I've advanced some) for
> rejecting that worldview,

     What worldview are you rejecting?  I've read all
the posts of this [MD] so far and I see no rejection
on your part other than a field-focus, DQ/SQ
metaphysics.

     Scott continues:
> but
> those arguments by themselves do not imply that
> "there is" an
> undifferentiated continuum beyond the human subject
> -- much less that it
> deserves the characterization "aesthetic".

     There is no undifferentiated continuum beyond the
human subject?  The universe stops before it gets to
the moon, stops before it gets from the moon to Pluto,
and the universe stops between my finger and this idea
I have?  Why are you chopping up the universe into all
these separate little pieces without any 'glue' tying
it all together?  And sure I as a human being
experience the universe this way.  What other way is
there to experience life.  Now how will you experience
this life as a human being?

      Quietly I stand in a creek, fishing, hoping for
that single trout that I may focus upon as I reel the
line in.  Trout hooked!  All sounds and colors
disappear.  Just that trout and the pull, the swim
this way and that way.
      The sound of the creek returns, but surely this
sound never left.  The colors of spring - white,
green, brown, dashes of yellow surely they where
always here.  I take the trout into my hand and look
around.  I experience a universe... aaaaah that trout,
to eat not just a fish, but life itself!

Thanks,
SA

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