[MD] Distinguishing Levels (Individual level)

[Platt Holden]

> Arlo, Platt. At this point you're just yelling the same things again and
> again after the other. Does seem like it'll actually Do anything? If an
> argument fails the first time, repeating it also tends to end in
> failure. This is not a surprising fact. Shift to some new arguments.
> I'll say that I am on Arlo's side of this discussion, but Platt raises
> some interesting points that should be addressed with some new ideas.
> And Platt, maybe you could move out of familiar territory for a change?
> For a man who says only intellectal patterns can respond to dynamic
> quality, you sure seem set on the static patterns. Try some new ideas,
> maybe they can explain your points better.
> 
> You both need to shift into some new ideas and new directions of
> conversation, cause this is just like watching two huge dudes kick each
> other square in the nuts until one goes down. Funny, but doesn't
> accomplish much, and frankly it starts to hurt to watch it after a
> while.

I agree. I'll no longer respond to Arlo unless he comes up with 
something new.

> And so as to throw something to yell at me about:
> 
> Platt: The idea that static quality is somehow also on the front of
> experience is just something you made up. Admit it. It's an interesting
> idea, but has no relation to the MOQ other than vocabulary. Such an idea
> would in every way destroy the MOQ. In ZMM Pirsig makes an analogy for
> Reality to a freight train. The rails are Dynamic Quality, the front of
> the train is experience, which follows DQ, and all of the cars that are
> trailed behind the train are staic patterns of value. His wordage, of
> course, is not that of the MOQ yet, but I think in Lila he goes over it
> again and uses those terms. Clearly, DQ is first, it's always there, we
> follow it, and drag around all our static patterns with us. The case
> seems pretty clear against you on this one man.

To repeat what I wrote to Arlo: 
 
Here it is step by step. 

1. "Quality is direct experience

2. "Quality (is) divided into Dynamic and static components."

3. Ergo, there are both Dynamic and static components in direct 
experience.

> "Following betterness" and "escaping badness" are essentially the same
> idea a lot of the time (notice I didn't say All the time). Maybe the
> amoeba isn't going away from the Acid because the Acid is bad, but
> because away from the Acid is better. It's seeking some sense of
> betterness in it's Reality. Phrased that way, it sounds a lot like it's
> aware of DQ to me.

IMO an instinctive, automatic response to the threat of death is not 
DQ. Rather it is a static, predictable pattern of behavior.

> And finally, I'd really like to see an answer to this question as well:
> 
> Before humans, could animals respond to DQ? If so, did the appearance of
> > humans in Africa so many tens of thousands of years ago cause animals
> > living on the North American plains at the time to suddenly lose their
> > ability to respond to DQ instantly? Or did they lose it when the first
> > human stepped onto the North American continent?

Animals lost their ability to respond to DQ when their responses to the 
environment became programmed in their response mechanisms so that they 
reacted predictably to external stimuli. 

> When exactly in human evolution did animals
> (animals Other than humans, that should say. Guess what, we're still
> technically animals!) stop being able to seek Dynamic Quality?

The animal part of our nature reacts predictably to external stimuli. 
In the face of danger, our instinct is to fight or flee just like the 
aardvark. 

Platt
 



> 
> -Gene
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