[MD] Static latching & faith

[Scott Roberts]

DMB,

Scott continued:
But here's the issue. What claims are you making that are based on "direct
awareness"? If they are sense-based then there is one way of justifying them
to someone else, and these ways are easily carried out. If they are not,
then how do you justify them to others?...

dmb replies:
You see? You've confused the narrow and broad meanings here. You keep asking
for justification of "direct awareness" as if it were the object of a
physics experiment.

Scott:
Quite the contrary. I know they are not the object of a physics experiment, 
and that is why I am asking how they are justified.

DMB continued:
You say you understand the distinction but then demand
answers about one in terms of the other. Nobody is saying that "direct
awareness" can ever be justified in the same way that "objective" realites
are measured. And I keep trying to explain that Pirsig is not making any
such claims. You keep asking for the justification for claims that nobody
made.

Scott:
On the contrary, I am asking about Northrop's claim of an "undifferentiated 
aesthetic continuum", and about Pirsig's claim that there is value in the 
inorganic. We are in agreement that physics-type justification does not 
apply. So what does?

DMB continued:
 I'm not offering any such justification because I don't think there is
any. All I can do is try to explain why your questions are confused, why
your argument is non-sense and what Pirsig actually is claiming.

Scott:
Good. That's what I thought the answer was. So they are just assumptions, 
given that they are not a matter of direct awareness, at least for a 
non-mystic. Right?

Scott said:
The traditional distinction between these two is to call the former
'empirical'. To extend the word to the latter is to imply that justification
is just as straightforward as with sense-based awareness, when it isn't.

dmb replies:
Who said it was "just as straightforward"? Isn't my repeated point just the
opposite? If the broader meaning were "just as straightforward" then in what
sense would it be broader? Again, you claim that you understand this
distinction, but here you demonstate that you are confused about the
difference.

Scott:
No, I think this is the first time in this thread that you have made the 
point that some kinds of direct awareness are esoteric, available *as* 
direct awareness only to very few, that they lack straightforward 
justifications. So with these two claims (the undifferentiated aesthetic 
continuum, and that there is value in the inorganic) is there any 
justification other than "mystics say so"?

Now you also said a while back that their justification comes from assuming 
them and working out, based on assuming them, an adequate and coherent 
metaphysics. True, that is a kind of justification. The problem is that one 
can work out equally adequate and coherent metaphysics by assuming something 
else, perhaps a different sort of mystical revelation. My metaphysics in 
particular is somewhat different from the MOQ in that it is based on 
slightly different mystically based writing (that of Merrell-Wolff and of 
Plotinus) than the sort of mysticism that Pirsig seems to be familiar with. 
Since the difference is slight, there is a good deal of overlap, but there 
are differences. The point is that the choice of metaphysics thus rests on 
faith -- in one sort of revelation or another -- followed by reasoning using 
that revelation as a basis. I see nothing wrong with this, in fact, I think 
that is the only way one can do metaphysics, but of course you can't 
possibly accept it because Pirsig claims that his so-called empiricism is to 
be distinguished from faith, while as I see it, by broadening the definition 
of 'empirical' to include direct awareness of any sort, including mystical 
experience, means that the line between the empirical and the faith-based is 
obscured.


Scott continued:
Northrop talks about an"undifferentiated aesthetic continuum". What is the
philosophical basis for talking about it, to respond to someone who says
"Whaaa?" To say that it is a matter of direct awareness, and therefore
empirical, does not help the skeptic, who will just say "Show me."

dmb replies:
Whats the philosophical basis? Whaaa? Show me the undifferentiated
continuum? Again, you say you get it, but these are clearly the utterances
of a confused person.

Scott:
No, they are the utterances of someone who has no direct awareness of an 
undifferentiated aesthetic continuum, and wants to know what Northrop is 
talking about when he says "undifferentiated aesthetic continuum", and wants 
to know why the concept should be taken seriously. Care to answer?

Scott continued:
In other words, with the old meaning of empirical, it is relatively
straightforward to back up an empirical claim ("You don't believe that
Jupiter has moons? Well, look through this telescope"). This is different
from the way one backs up a deductive claim ("You don't believe me that the
square of the sides of a right triangle add up to the square of the
hypotenuse? Well, here's the proof..."). And both of these are different
from the way one backs up a mystical claim (which can't really be backed up
-- and so can at best be taken by the non-mystic as an assumption. There are
ways to argue for them, but they are different from the traditional
empirical and the deductive). So by keeping the word 'empirical' restricted
to its traditional meaning, one knows what sort of arguments to expect to
back up a claim. By extending it to "direct awareness", one runs into
trouble. The mystic has direct awareness that everybody else does not have,
but we all have pretty much the same range of direct awareness that is
sense-based. That is why it is useful to keep the old meaning.

dmb says:
I should take this paragraph apart and scrutinize each sentence, but I
won't. Instead, let me just say that the moons of jupiter are seen with the
eye of flesh, the geometric proof with the eye of the mind and the mystical
experience is seen with a third kind of eye, and yes, each kind of
experience has its own rules. In each case, the observer only needs to be
competent in the ability to preform the "experiment" and report the results.
To confirm the moon, one only needs sense organs, but to confirm a logical
proof one needs to be able to "see" what that means. And so it is with
mystical experience. But this is epistemological pluralism. It goes along
quite nicely with radicial empiricism, but is not the same thing. But more
to the point, it seems that it is most definately NOT "useful to keep the
old meaning" of empiricism if your aim is to understand the MOQ. The "old
meaning" is exactly the thing we are trying to overcome with radical
empiricism. Its not useful at all. Its worse than useless. Its confusing and
counterproductive to disallow Pirsig's definitions when were discussing the
MOQ. And frankly, that's the polite way to put it.

Scott:
But the point is that one can have epistemological pluralism and one can 
start with experience, rather than pre-supposing subjects and objects, 
without changing the meaning of 'empiricism'. Just say: "in addition to 
sense-based experience there is rational and transcendental experience" and 
say "we will not presuppose that experience comes only in subject/object 
form". Now by broadening the meaning of 'empirical', all that has been 
accomplished is to *lessen the value of the word*. In the narrower meaning, 
if someone says such-and-such is empirical, then one has a good idea of how 
to justify it (with the eye of the flesh). With the broadened meaning one 
has no idea how to justify it, or if it can be justified at all -- in 
particular, one doesn't know if it is just being assumed or not.

Scott said:
Now there is something which is direct awareness that we do all share that
is not something known through the traditional senses (sight, hearing,
touch, smell, and taste), and that is an awareness of value. So I have no
objection to extending the word 'empirical' to include this, by, as Pirsig
says, saying we have a sense of value.

dmb replies:
If all we do is add a sixth sense to the five sense organs, then you're
seriously in danger of retaining the assumptions of SOM. The only difference
is that the pre-existing subjective self has a slightly increased power to
percieve the pre-existing objective world. This simply is NOT what Pirsig
says about his radical empiricism and would leave his object of attack in
tact. This reading would turn Pirsig into nothing more than a romantic
SOMer.

Scott:
Why should adding a sense have anything to do with SOM assumptions? Surely 
we can talk about vision, hearing, etc., without assuming SOM. Why not a 
sense of value? (And remember, that's Pirsig's term).

And you're right that Pirsig goes well beyond this "sense of value", namely 
into mystically-based assumptions. That is why the MOQ is faith-based.

Scott continued:
...It is when one gets to claims for which there is no common direct
awareness (the claim of an "undifferentiated aesthetic continuum" and the
claim that there is value in the inorganic in the absence of life) that to
say these are empirical creates huge difficulties.

dmb says:
I think you are creating the "huge difficulties". You say you understand
that Pirsig is using a broader definition of "empirical" but then insist we
can only use the narrow definition. You see, the narrow definition and the
reductionist materialism that uses it is the very problem Pirsig is trying
to overcome.

Scott:
It is quite easily overcome by simply allowing epistemological pluralism and 
not assuming pre-existing subjects and objects. One doesn't need to change 
the traditional meaning of empiricism.

DMB continued:
 All that is based on SOM assumptions, which is what the MOQ is
attacking. He's not saying that the undifferentiated continuum is the CAUSE
of experience or that it is a pre-existing entity like a subject or an
object, he's only saying that it all begins with experience and any infered
"causes" or prerequisites are theories that come later. So, again you are
asking for the wrong kind of "empirical" evidence and you're asking for it
to justify a claim nobody made.

Scott:
I never implied that the undifferentiated continuum -- or anything else --  
was the CAUSE of experience (strawman, anyone?). I was only asking why 
Northrop postulates the term. All of my direct awareness is differentiated.

DMB continued:
See, Pirsig's radical empiricism doesn't make any claims about experience so
much as attack the metaphysical assumptions of those who do. Unlike the
positivists and other SOMers, the MOQ asserts no assumptions about what is
required for experience to occur. It just begins with experience and any
causal explanations come later, as in the hot stove example, which is
another way to explain this same idea. But then, if memory serves, you
hacked that one up badly too.

Scott:
I never said he did assert any assumption about what is required for 
experience to occur. What I have been asking for is the justification for 
talking about an undifferentiated aesthetic continuum, or for saying that 
there is value in the inorganic. You have now answered this: there is none, 
so I assume he assumes these two claims because mystics say so. So it sure 
looks to me like the MOQ is based on faith in mystics.

- Scott