[MD] Food for Thought

[David M]

Hi Arlo

Useful points made below. I wonder about what distinguishes
intellectual achievements from social achievements?
There is something about intellectual achievements that are
disinterested about social benefits. They open up possibilities
that reach out beyond society towards nature, life and the cosmos.
Yet they are different from religious achievements and patterns.
Although real expressions of love inspired by religion also reach
out beyond the given in moral terms. But much of religion reaches
back into a mythic past and has created stories and art and thoughts
that are cloudy, metaphorical and of unknown origin. They are also
strongly mixed in with the rule of elites and their claims of
authority. Maybe the intellctual brings light and the social is
about warmth. But there is still some extra distinction here to
do with the individual breaking away from social order and
static social structures. Is the intellectual just that which helps
us gain new freedoms and possibilities?

Ta
David M

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "ARLO J BENSINGER JR" <ajb102 at psu.edu>
To: <moq_discuss at moqtalk.org>
Sent: Thursday, December 14, 2006 2:53 PM
Subject: Re: [MD] Food for Thought


> 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.)
>
>
>
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