[MD] Julian Baggini Interview with Pirsig

[Scott Roberts]

Bo:

Scott said:
> But the postulate "Experience=Value" does not address the question I
> raise below:

> > For
> > example, if there was once nothing but inorganic patterns, how do we
> > know they were inorganic patterns of value? Why couldn't value have
> > emerged from a value-less universe?

Bo said:
I did not have much hope of meeting your demands, but I still see
my answer as relevant. If what "precipitates" is value the source
must necessarily be value too.

Scott:
Remember that I am playing Devil's Advocate here, so my next question in 
that role is: why is this so? Cat hairs (which precipitate from cats) are 
not cats, humans are not (or not just) minerals. Why should the appearance 
of value in life and humans be assumed to come from the inorganic which, as 
far as I can see, just exists, does not "experience", and so forth?


> Bo said:
> We know because the MOQ says so. I don't know if you ask the
> same (silly) question as David M. (how the Q-evolution could
> have proceeded before Pirsig) or it is some even sillier one ;-) but
> if the first static latch is seen as a VALUE latch, it must
> necessarily have emerged from/in a VALUE universe, that's plain.

> Scott:
> First, why do you assume that in the inorganic world there is any
> *experience*? Isn't experience limited to entities with nervous
> systems?

Bo said:
I assume it from the Experience=Value postulate! As the static
levels are value levels, they may as well be called "experience
levels". About the "nervous systems" see lower down.

Scott:
But my question is why did you make that assumption and not, say, the 
assumption that there is no value in the inorganic level but there is in the 
biological level? Why not say that the difference between a rock and a cat 
is that the rock has no experience but a cat does?

Scott said:
> That is, you are simply begging the question here. Why should
> the first static latch be seen as a VALUE latch?

Bo said:
Is it now the first value latch you question? Your original puzzle
was why the source of the first latch had to be value. Make up
your mind.

Scott:
Either one will do. The first static latch, according to the MOQ, is the 
occurrence of reproducing carbon-based molecules. I still (as Devil's 
Advocate) see no "experiencing" in DNA. As far as I can tell, it's all just 
mechanical operations.

Scott said:
> Why can't it just be
> a happenstance -- nothing to do with what we know of as value or
> experience?

You switch from experience=value to experience=consciousness,
but we go on living even if unconscious. Biological value-
experience isn't self-aware, i's so to say detrimental to it. Ever
heard of the millipede who was asked how it kept order of its
legs? Afterwards it could not move;-)

Scott:
No, YOU are extending the word "experience" to a realm (the inorganic) to 
which it doesn't apply, and I say this is a question-begging move. If 
"whatever happens is experience" is your definition of "experience", then I 
say you are making  the word 'experience' useless. See below.

Scott said:> Put another way, why should one say there is value or
> experience involved ....

Bo said:
Again, your "experience" clearly indicates "consciousness". If you
remember I once forwarded a theory how it (consciousness)
emerged and developed to the fantastic "inner world" of humans,
and here the nervous system plays a role. Biological complexity
(the various nerve layers or "brains"; the limbic, the olfactory
...etc up to the neocortex, all gave an opportunity to store
experience (memory) and re-run it to various degrees, in dreams
for animals, as "thoughts" with humans.

Scott:
Sure it does: The New World Dictionary defines 'experience' as: "the act of 
living through an event or events; personal involvement in or observation of 
events as they occur". There are more definitions, but they all refer to 
people. By this it is nonsense to say that a rock experiences falling down, 
since if it did it would have awareness or knowledge that it fell down. So 
if you claim that consciousness emerged then you are claiming that 
experiencing emerged. Hence there was none, and by your postulate, no value, 
in the inorganic.

Bo said:
This is not "mind from brain" as you once deemed it because
there is no mind/matter divide in the MOQ, this theory merely say
that biological complexity enabled the social level to latch on top
of it. And now in society's service it (bio. complexity) likewise
enabled the intellectual level to latch on top of society. However,
this complexity (intelligence) is not intellect, I harp on this
because here is the wrong turn almost all take; Intelligence and
intellectual value are thoroughly mixed, while intellectual value is
inner/outer distinction and the many variants and problems
thereof, who you, Scott, are an expert of multiplying.

Scott:
This is arguing against me as Scott, and not as the D.A. that I am trying to 
impersonate. As such, I don't care what you mean be intellect or 
intelligence. All I care about is why you say there is value at the 
inorganic level.

> ....when an atom absorbs a photon, or when a planet
> orbits a star?

Above I spoke of biological complexity, but there is biological
simplicity - organisms without nerves that nevertheless do their
things. At the inorganic level the "simplicity" is total, but
"knowledge" of inorganic value is infallible. However, I don't see it
as useful to develop any Q-Physics or Q-sciences at all. The
intellectual level is science itself and its model of forces guiding
the physical universe works perfectly. MOQ's only mission is
metaphysical.

Scott as D.A.
Huh? Are you saying that rocks sit around and groove on their infallible 
knowledge?

- Scott