[MD] Does the MOQ invalidate Subjectivity?

[Ham Priday]

Steve [Matt mentioned] --

Ham said:
> A metaphysical ontology should not have to be limited
> by the time precept, so I don't like the chicken-and-egg
> paradigm of which came first.  Let's stick to primary and
> secondary, which infers "source" and "derivative",
> respectively.

Steve said:
> Yes, that's what I mean.
>
> Here Paul talked about the fundamental difference between
> your philosophy and Pirsig's:
>
> "The difference between what you are saying and the MOQ
> is really quite subtle. You seem to be making an assumption
> that an individual "agent" exists that makes these value
> judgements and is therefore logically not the value judgements
> themselves.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying.

> The MOQ is saying that value assertions create the individual in
> that they *are* the individual. So it isn't saying that individuals
> don't exist and that there is just this big collective mass of static
> patterns, which is the conclusion you are drawing."
>
> I don't think there is a way to resolve this issue. We can argue
> over which position is more empirical, but why make that the
> standard by which to judge which is better? The bottom line is
> that you don't want to follow where the MOQ leads. I don't
> think you are going to convince anyone here of problems in the
> MOQ that your philosphy resolves. You simply don't like to
> think in terms of Quality, and you find quality in the term
> Essence that I don't see.

By what standard would you judge the quality of a philosophy?  For me it's
the one that makes the most sense.  And please note that I've never said
that the subject "precedes" its object.  The two form a concurrent
dichotomy.

Now, before you give up on me, I'd like to review the analysis by Matt whom
you invoked to "sort out" my question.  [My own comments are in brackets.]

[Matt]:
I saw Ham's question (to which he tagged me, but mistakenly attributed
something to me that Mike said), but I think the question pretty silly, so I
didn't enter into it.  "Uh, no...?"  I
mean, it could be an alright question if properly handled, but I think Ham
bobbled the ball again.  He keeps presupposing lots of common ground that
people like us just don't have with him.  Case in point: you said that you
follow me in thinking that meaning is determined by use.  That makes us
followers of Wittgenstein and Ham does not like (the later) Wittgenstein.

[I'm not qualified to pass judgment on Wittgenstein (the "earlier" or the
"later") because, frankly, I don't understand semiotic reality and I don't
converse in equations.  But if Matt thinks the issue of subjectivity is
"silly", it's quite clear that he fails to see the significance of
proprietary awareness.  In which case he's right that I'm a misfit with
"people like us".]

Some of the fundamental differences between Ham and I (and most good
Pirsigians) are left at Wittgenstein's doorstep.  And that makes conversing
difficult.  If I'm not mistaken, you've found yourself in the same difficult
position: trying to untangle Ham's background beliefs that he takes for
granted and (curiously) assumes everyone else has, too.  Metaphilosophical
conversation between Wittgensteinians and non-Wittgensteinians will always
be difficult, but it is made worse by certain styles and Ham exhibits one of
the those styles.  Here's the bit that needs entangling:

Steve had said:
The MOQ says that the subjective/objective knowledge distinction is a high
quality intellectual pattern.

Ham replied:
That's nice to hear; but, again, this depends on who's making the judgment,
since everything in existence is relative.  (That's Ham's Third Law of
Metaphysics.)

Steve responded:
So you are saying that I've presupposed such a knowledge distinction in
saying that such knowledge distinctions are patterns of value?

Matt:
In all honesty, I'm confused.  Personally, I think Pirsig and everyone else
should run as far away as possible from the "subjective/objective knowledge
distinction".  [Why, for heaven's sake?]  But that doesn't help decipher
anything.

Here's what I think: you say, "the S-ive/O-ive knowledge distinction is a
high quality intellectual pattern," Ham thinks that you passing judgment on
the distinction requires a S/O distinction (and so says, "everything in
existence is relative [to the Subject]"), and you read him as suggesting
that you're begging the question by already dictating that distinctions are
patterns of value.

If that's right, then I think you're (kind of) right: Ham should be
suggesting that you're begging the question.  The tricky part is the
movement from "subjective" to "subject" that Ham makes.  I think people
should be more careful in moving back and forth between the two.

[A subject possesses knowledge as part of his subjective awareness.  Where
is the confusion?]

But the basic gist is the same claim Ham's been pressing for a while: that
for any judgment at all, you're going to need a judger (or a "decider", if
you will).  Judging presupposes a subject/object distinction.  Ham would
like to say that Pirsig's project of getting "patterns of value" off the
ground requires a subject, which is like Scott's claim that Pirsig does a
terrible job with consciousness, which is why Ham and Scott (as Ham presents
them) are on the same side of this issue.

[I think that is a fairly accurate description of my perspective.]

I think the way out is to just grasp the nettle Scott offers us and say that
Value indeed requires Consciousness and Consciousness is ubiquitous.  Not a
lot, as far as I can see, follows from this.  All we need is to say that a
locus of consciousness, a monad of judging, is simply a "center of
evaluative gravity", a point that we call "the pattern of value we call X".
All this means is that anything can be an object if you judge it to be
useful to treat it as distinct from other things.  One of the things that's
useful to distinguish is "you" from "everything else".

[Well, thank goodness that's "all we need to say", since any more would run
out of space.  Consciousness is "ubiquitous" only where there is no
nothingness.  Since existence includes nothingness, I think Matt's
conclusion is false.  Yet, his assertion that it's "useful to distinguish
'you' from 'everything else' indicates to me that the question of
subjectivity isn't really as "silly" as he makes it out to be.]

What it does not allow you is what Ham wants: a special, milky secretion
that is different from all that, something called "the proprietary nature of
experience" or simply "subjectivity."  Ham looks like a phenomenologist,
somebody who thinks that the _actual experience of experiencing_ is
different (and prior to) "patterns of value" or anything else we might call
it or say about it.  That's why he thinks the Subject/Object distinction so
fundamental--because "patterns of value" will never get at our actual, lived
experience.

[I have no idea what a "special, milky secretion" is intended to infer,
though I suppose Essentialism could be regarded as a form of phenomenology.
But I'm still mystified that what he admits to be "our actual, lived
experience" has no significance for him.  Maybe you can sort that one out
for me.]

Thanks for participating in this discussion, Steve.  And good luck in
Qualityland!

Best regards,
Ham