[MD] Food for Thought

[ARLO J BENSINGER JR]

Ian, Dan, DMB, Dave M, anyone else...

Regarding demarking the division between "social" and "intellectual" levels, I
too must confess some haziness. It is perhaps, of all aspects of the MOQ, the
one that is most troublesome to me personally. So let me play devil's advocate,
think outloud, and toss out some informal and unstructured musings.

Before I start, however, I hope we can dispell the "social-collective versus
intellectual-individual" stuff. Its evident to me that Pirsig's MOQ consists of
"individuals" on every layer, and it from the "collective activity" of these
individuals that individuals on the next higher level are able to emerge. From
individual inorganic patterns working collectively are individual biological
patterns able to emerge. Then, when these individual biological patterns behave
collectively, individual social patterns emerge. Etc.

So... I have, for the most part, adopted the following distinction. Social
patterns are patterns of human activity, intellectual patterns are patterns of
human thought. (Note, I disagree with the restriction of these levels to
humans, but will save that for later). Thus, driving around a racetrack or
forming a family unit are "social patterns", the law of gravity and free speech
are "intellectual patterns".

But this is not without its pitfalls. For example, we consider the "belief in
god" to be a social pattern, but the "belief in physics" to be an intellectual
pattern.

Now, I could say that it is "from where" a belief originates that differentiates
its placement. Thus, a belief informed by "authority" is a social pattern. A
belief informed by "science" is intellectual. But then I'd have to conclude
that my belief in astrophysics is social, because it rests on authority.

Is it "falsifiability"? Are intellectual patterns ones that can be falsified?
But how do I falsify "free speech"?

I could, perhaps, go to the idea that intellectual patterns are "above" or
"outside" cultural forces, but (as Pirsig quotes) "we are suspended in
language". In ZMM, Pirsig describes the Indian ghosts as being as "real" a
pattern to them as the law of gravity is to us.

The option I generally side with is this. One would be to excise "believing in"
from the pattern description. "Believing" as a "human activity" is always a
social pattern. The object of belief, the thought, is always an intellectual
pattern. In this way BOTH "god" and "law of gravity" are intellectual patterns,
but vary in their Quality. God is a low-quality intellectual pattern because it
stifles DQ. Science is a high-quality intellectual pattern because it preserves
(in much the same way as the "free market") an open door to DQ. "God" is the
socialist market of Eastern Europe. "Science" is the capitalist economy of the
West. (I like the analogy because, I feel, BOTH "science" and "capitalism" can
be similarly criticized as adhereing to an SOMist paradigm).

So that brings me back to "activity" and "thought", but takes me somewhat away
from the MOQs conventional langauge. Here the "battle" between religion and
science is not a battle of social versus intellect, but of two social
institutions (the church and the Academy) fighting for the dominance of
intellectual patterns (the idea of God versus the idea of science), and what
the MOQ does is illuminate which of these intellectual patterns is of higher
Quality (science, because of its openness to DQ, correlation with experience,
etc.). In addition, the MOQ can criticize science for not being "as high
Quality as it could be" because of its neglect of "morals".

Regarding vegetarianism, hunger is a biological pattern, how we organize our
farms, distribute our food and the like are "social patterns". This is informed
by intellectual patterns. Vegetarianism is a higher Quality intellectual
pattern than ambivorism (or carnivorism) because it recognizes that a cow is a
higher life form than an ear of corn (and I'd add that the cow also partakes of
social patterns, albeit ones of minimal complexity, while an ear of corn does
not. It is in this sense that I'd personally differentiate the eating of a cow
versus a dolphin Both are biologically complex, but the social (and
intellectual) patterns engaged by the dolphin (although primative by human
standards) are of greater complexity than the cow.)