[MD] The Edge 2006 Annual Question

[skutvik at online.no]

Ian and Moqtalk. 

On 4 Jan. you wrote:

> Bo you said,

> > I see that Platt has responded, but it did not sound like Platt saw
> > Beauty as very dangerous, rather a welcome development.
 
> I think you miss the double edge Bo, unless I miss your irony.
> Platt clearly sees it.
> We (the pro-MoQ'ers) all welcome the enlightened truth that ineffable
> beauty (quality if we prefer) is more fundamental and valuable than
> any pseudo-objectivism.

OK Platt can answer when he has settled down, but the 
participants at the "Edge" site mostly saw their respective ideas 
as dangerous in the straightforward sense. For instance John 
Horgan regarding Francis Crick's "The Scientific Search for the 
Soul" (another name I have referred to) and Tor Nörretranders 
was clearly frightened by the "social relativity" idea.

What Rupert Sheldrake regarded as dangerous was a bit more 
mysterious. He talks about the homing instinct of birds (pigeons 
most notoriously) that it never will be explained in scientific 
terms. That goes for Eric Kandel's about consciousness where 
Benjamin Libet and his "finger moving" experiment was 
mentioned. 

What I "fear" from the Quality Idea is that this "objective" way of 
approaching things will fade. That the search for the mechanisms 
of homing birds or for the site of the soul or consciousness will 
have no motivation in a Quality future. I can see this 
development in myself, earlier I was an ardent reader of science 
journals, and new findings in physics thrilled me. After Pirsig it 
has lost its attraction. This goes for philosophy too, I subscribe to 
a magazine but the content seems so outdated compared to the 
MOQ that I don't read it.  

> But the truth is dangerous stuff. The danger is that that correct
> fact, could be immensly de-stabilising to the established order,
> outside this little ivory tower, even if the long-run order that
> eveolved out of it would be superior to the present.

IMO the real danger about the MOQ is that "truth" is shown to be 
a static level that made its entry on the historical scene with the 
Greeks, already this undermines it, particularly if the MOQ is 
supposed to introduce a "many truths" reality as you, Paul 
apostles, want it to ;-).   

> One hell of a lot of eggs would get broken making that new omelette.
> The kitchen would get dangerously hot in the process. Choose / mix
> your own metaphor :-)

Exactly and you seem to relish it.  

Bo