[MD] Quantum Physics

[PhaedrusWolff at carolina.rr.com]

Oh, I see what you mean.  No, Zen has no levels. 
> In the East and West:  MoQ clarifies, [MD] I show how
> the MoQ not only joins with Zen but joins with the
> West (science, technology, etc...).  The MoQ
> clarifies, as some in history thought Dogen changed
> Zen, but Zen masters, and others know Dogen did not
> change Zen, he clarified Zen.  MoQ may not necessarily
> be changing, but clarifying.  This clarification will
> help avoid gumption traps for the time being maybe.
> 
Hi SA,

Sorry about the late reply, but weekends happen, huh? 

The jury is still out on this for me, but I feel the MOQ well worth 
considering. I have been considering it for sometime now, and it still 
holds my interest. 
 
> SA)    Masao Abe {who graduated from Kyoto University in
> Japan and studied Zen Buddhism with Shin-ichi
> Hisamatsu (at the Kyoto University a huge effort was
> underway while he attended to make distinctions
> between western and eastern philosophies), and Abe
> taught Western and Eastern philosophy in the U.S. @
> Columbia University, University of Chicago, Carleton
> College, Princeton University, Claremont Graduate
> School, University of Hawaii, and Haverford College}
> says Zen is spiritual and Zen is philosophical.  The
> spiritual aspect of Zen is compassion and being with
> those suffering.  I haven't read this part of the book
> yet, in detail, but Abe mentions this, and I also
> quote, "In Dogen, we find a rare combination of
> religious insight and philosophical ability.  In this
> respect, he may be well compared with Thomas Aquinas,
> born 25 years later." (Zen and Western Thought; Ch. 2)
> How would you define spirituality? 
> 
Chin) I’ve come across this before. Laird mentioned a Catholic Priest 
earlier he personally knew, and I would love to come across one myself 
that was willing to go past “Because the Bible tells me so.”  Through 
the internet and TV, I have come across many Catholic Priests that 
considered fields well beyond what Dogmatic Christianity would accept, 
and have offered this thought before here, but without backing it up, 
as I do not keep track of what I come across, as it slows me down. 
>From what I have seen, the East and West have influenced each other 
throughout history, The major difference I would see would be that the 
Eastern philosophers, or mystics as we might label them, find no 
reason to apologize for considering Western thought where in the West, 
the priests seem to always be aware of the knee-jerk reactions they 
may receive from the church. 

SA)
>     Zen is a way of life, and intellectual and social
> are not distinguished as in MoQ.  Where the MoQ
> doesn't distinguish social and intellectual is when we
> just say static quality, and leave it at that.  Zen
> does involve a community of practitioners, and
> patriarchs (those that personally transmit the
> teachings of Zen; the master-student relationship) are
> involved, too.  
>     

Chin) This is one of the problems I have with MOQ, the intellectual 
level, and what would be considered to be the intellectual level, or 
what might be accepted as the intellectual level. Philosophy and 
science are accepted, but I concern that Art may not be accepted as 
intellectual. I’ve heard much as to what philosophers say, but not 
much of what artists, such as Shakespeare, Shaw or any others who do 
not fit into the philosophy/science realm have to say. What was it 
Pirsig said about using the word ’Art’ in Code of Art? Theology is 
also denied as intellect, as at the moment Christianity seems to have 
taken a wrong turn from the intentions of establishing the USA. 
Dynamic Quality would be what comes in the future. 
  
SA)
>      Well, quality is dynamic quality and static
> quality, and yes, this would include code of art. 
> Quality is to include everything, including nothing.

Agreed
 
SA)
>     oh, yes, I agree.  Code of art is quality
> realizing true self is quality.

Chin) This is something else I would be concerned with in the MoQ.  It 
would not be realizing the true self, unless the true self comes from 
intellect; intellect being the highest order. One definition of 
intellectual might be “given to study, reflection and speculation.” If 
I felt more comfortable this would be the meaning of intellect, I 
would have no problem with it. Reflection you see, but I am not sure 
most here would. Speculation would be a strange word considering what 
most here seem to consider intellectual.  
 
>     [Chin]
> > What the MOQ does not say is 
> > that the lower forms, or lower levels are equally
> > capable of recognizing this Quality. The tree did
> not choose to
> > be.
> 
> SA)    Static patterns, according to the MoQ, are values
> latching to each other.  It is a value system.  Atoms
> latch to other atoms because they value each other. 
> This is evolution, as you put it earlier,
> systematically founding itself on lower levels that
> value and latch until we have biological level all the
> way to intellectual level.  I would agree that human
> beings are only capable of realizing code of art, but
> this doesn't mean code of art isn't everywhere, at
> anytime.  This is the same idea of Buddha saving All
> beings, as in when Dogen says, "All beings are the
> Buddha-nature."  When Buddha was enlightened all
> beings were enlightened at the same time.  Dogen
> doesn't say All life, he states all beings, this is
> how Dogen clarified Buddhas message.  All beings is
> sentient and non-sentient.  This is to avoid
> homocentric, that is human egotism, which is samsara. 
> To go beyond just human birth-death and to realize
> existence-extinction, which all beings experience, and
> then enlightenment is beyond these dualities, but the
> return home is into this dualistic world as compassion
> where suffering is.  This is where spirituality steps
> in, if that is the same as religion, if not then this
> is where religion exists in Zen.   

Chin) I agree this is how Zen sees it, but does the MOQ? My main 
thought here is “The tree chose to be.” It was not a happen-stance of 
biological latch, but a choice. If the electrons ‘choose’ to be, why 
cannot a tree choose to be? 

SA)
>     The lower forms, lower levels according to the
> MoQ are valuing.  I found dharma in Lila as follows,
> which also explains how the lower levels value:  
>     "Dharma is Quality itself, the principle of
> 'lightness' which gives structure and purpose to the
> evolution of all life and to the evolving
> understanding of the universe which life has created.
>     ...within modern Buddhist thought dharma becomes
> the phenomenal world - the object of perception,
> thought or understanding. A chair, for example, is not
> composed of atoms of substance, it is composed of
> dharmas.
>     This statement is absolute jabberwocky to a
> conventional subject-object metaphysics. How can a
> chair be composed of individual little moral orders?
> But if one applies the Metaphysics of Quality and sees
> that a chair is an inorganic static pattern and sees
> that all static patterns are composed of value and
> that value is synonymous with morality then it all
> begins to make sense."
>     Are you saying systematic is valuing?  Where does
> choosing fit in here?

Chin) What I am saying about systematic would be the levels. One 
problem as you may have already realized I am saying is with the idea 
the intellect is always superior to social, and social always superior 
to biology. Art and religion (spirituality) in intellect, and sexual 
desire in biology being lower than sexual oppression in social as 
examples. 

> Chin) But, is this not also becoming enlightened? It
> is what I am 
> saying about Dharma, or at least Dharma as Hinduism
> which is many 
> varying traditions. The one important thing I see in
> Hinduism as well 
> as pretty much all Eastern philosophy, spirituality,
> religion, would 
> be the suspension of the ego. Anything that leads you
> away from your 
> small self.
> 
>     That's very interesting.  You said, before I knew
> you said this, and I went ahead and mentioned this as
> well above.  We are on the same path here. 
> 
> 
> 
> Chin) Yes, this is Quality realizing itself, and it is
> Pirsig becoming 
> enlightened. There are many paths to this
> enlightenment; meditation, 
> the pure love of Buddha or Christ, as Pirsig did with
> his trip to 
> the ?High country of the mind,? walking through the
> woods, or just 
> simply chopping wood.And pretty much all this involves
> finding the true self, the real self or beginning mind
> prior to the influences of our culture, or the
> influences of our culture including religion, politics
> and education. 

SA)
>     Exactly, and this is what I call quietness.  It
> is an experience that is not silent and is not total
> sound.  When I am quiet, sitting in meditation, I
> realize something/nothing.  I call this realization
> quietness.  This realization must be an event that
> shifts our perspective in order we may understand the
> deeper implications that come with, oh let's say
> quality, where experience and practice can only
> provide what Pirsig talks about, but even Pirsig
> states it is not found in words themselves.  To know
> this and be wise with this, are two different
> experiences.  To realize and experience, as for me,
> quietness has helped me notice these deeper
> implications that books and thought can point at, but
> what good is something if it can't be lived.  Have you
> a Way to notice these deeper implications?
> 

Chin)  I would agree quietness is a way to enlightenment. But, where I 
feel this enlightenment comes is from within. It would not necessarily 
come from only experience, or knowledge gained from outside sources, 
but from intuition. This is what I was saying earlier about the 
electron ‘choosing’ to do what it does. The child chooses to be, the 
tree chooses to be. The Mythos over Logos argument does not fit here. 

Would Pirsig agree with the Mythos over Logos argument that the child 
is born as ignorant as the first caveman? 

And, yes I do have a “Way to notice these deeper implications.” For 
me, it is just simply self-observation, you might call self-
reflection, and you could say it is a concentration on Quality that 
leads me. We know what Quality is, and we know what Real is, so when I 
say the Real-self, I am saying the Quality-self. This could be as much 
as stripping away the intellectual prejudices imposed on us by society 
as the cultural, artistic and religious. 

> [Chin]
> Without looking back through ZMM, it may have been
> Phaedus that said this. Arete was a word that offered
> the definition of Quality 
> before the Greeks invented mind/matter,
> subject/object, forms and 
> mannerisms. He asked if the Hindu word Dharma could
> mean the same as Quality. The Ancient Greeks did not
> have to ask ?What is the 
> good??, Indians do not have to ask ?What is the
> good??, Arete, Dharma, 
> Quality do not need to be defined. 


SA) 
>     Yes, this would be the same as when I say - just
> be quiet.  Then, with effort, I didn't want to lose
> this quietness, even as I talked.  For there was a
> time, that I felt that as soon as I talked I lost this
> quietness, this realization that happens when I'm
> quiet.  I needed to keep practicing, and realized and
> still practice realizing just how much all is this
> quietness.  This has been my Way of noticing these
> deeper implications without becoming disheartened,
> distracted, and lost to what this quietness really
> does mean, which for one, from birth, this world is
> quiet.  This world talks, birds sing, and deer have
> messages, but these deeper implications as to the
> questions of life, the what's, why's, where's, and
> when's are only understood while I'm quiet.  To put
> these realizations into words, these realizations I
> have while I'm quiet, are still a practice, and a
> significant aspect of this wording quiet, is it must
> be experienced or else the effort to live this quiet
> can be drained, lost, and degenerate.  The head would
> become too full of sounds/words and not this living
> quiet that is to be in order to realize fully.


Chin) Meditation is a good way to get there, but as I offered earlier, 
chopping wood would also be a way to get there. It is simply a 
stripping of the false identities we have built in the ego, the ego 
that does not understand Dharma, Arete, Quality.  
 
>     [Chin]
> Whether it was meant to be or not, Pirsig?s
> self-reflection through 
> ZMM appears to me to be an analogy to self
> remembering; stripping away the influences of society,
> in Pirsig?s case, Phaedrus prior to 
> society bringing him back down to his ?Sane? self, his
> socially acceptable self, through shock treatments. 
> 
SA) 
>     Yes, without this quiet, I feel an insanity
> creeping in.  This is also why I love the woods so
> much.  A first hand perspective, a first hand real
> experience as to this real life on this real earth,
> not clogged with human, human, human ego everywhere.
>     Shock treatments, sounds like this deep living
> quietness realizing itself as the woods, koans, or as
> a Zen master once answered when somebody asked, "What
> is the Buddha?" and the Zen master said, "a
> shit-wiping stick."
> 

Chin) I was looking at this differently, or possibly sanity 
differently. The shock treatments were given in an attempt to bring 
Pirsig back to a sanity as society defines it. I must ask the 
question, Was Pirsig or Phaedrus more dynamic? It is my concern Pirsig 
may have lost something in the attempt to become sane, a sanity 
society says is acceptable. Sure he is much more acceptable as Pirsig, 
but I would ask is that our culture inflicted view? 

BTW Ham, if you happen to read this, I did see your reply about chaos. 
After two dropped conversations, I am reluctant to enter into another 
with you.