[MD] Static latching & faith

[Scott Roberts]

SA,

     Scott said:  "I fail to see what all this has to
do with the following philosophical question: do you
think that the MOQ -- a philosophical treatise -- is
justified in calling itself "pure empiricism"?  I'm
not (in this thread) concerned with emphasizing yin
over yang or DQ over SQ. I am concerned with the MOQ
making a misleading philosophical claim. I have
pointed out two claims that the MOQ puts forth that
strike me as having no empirical basis.  All I am
getting from you is "let's not get caught up in the
distinctions".  Well, ok, if you don't want to, then
don't, but then you're not doing philosophy, and
you're not responding to my concern."

SA said:
      I guess I'm going out on my own without you in
understanding what empiricism is.  You say it is sense
perception without the perception aspect defined.

Scott:
No, I am not saying this. I am saying that an empirical claim is one that is 
based on common experience. Sense perceptions are an example of such common 
experiences (as opposed to hallucinations or mystical experiences). Pirsig 
showed that value is a common experience, so I have no argument with saying 
that our common experience is a differentiated aesthetic continuum. However, 
Pirsig's concept of DQ is modelled after Northrop's *undifferentiated* 
aesthetic continuum, and I am saying that that is not a feature of common 
experience. It is a feature of mystical experience: what is called satori, 
moksha, etc. It happens rarely and only to a few. I see nothing in your post 
that sounds anything remotely like an undifferentiated aesthetic continuum.

SA continued:
  I
am saying who is sensing the empirical fact.  It's not
the moon.  It is I, you, us, etc...  So where does the
I and moon separate in the empirical fact?  I cannot
notice the moon without I.  Surely the moon is not in
my head, and I wouldn't notice the moon without the
rock that it is orbiting the earth.  Point to me and
say this is empirical and that is not empirical.

Scott:
This sounds like SOM to me (you've divided the experience into an 
experiencer and an experienced). But that's a different problem.

SA continued:
 What
is not empirical?

Scott:
Claiming something for which there is no common experience to back it up. 
"God exists" is an unempirical claim. That doesn't make it false, just not 
empirical. "There is value in the inorganic (that is, in the absence of all 
living creatures)" is an unempirical claim. Ditto.

SA continued:
  1+1 is empirical I see it with my
eyes then think about it and might even hear myself
say it equals 3 and feel my fingers type this to you.
All of this is involved in the equation.  Why leave
anything out?  Even as I feel the cold air that air is
involved in my calculations.  Not really sure how you
philosophize, and leaving the distinctions out, having
them in that's all quality.  It's MOQ unless you like
to SOM.

Scott:
Frankly, I think it is totally unresponsive to what I am talking about. It's 
not MOQ, and it's not SOM. It's just you rambling unphilosophically on.

SA continued:
     Do you ever have a moment in life that is beyond
words?  Indescribably awesome and you try to explain
that moment, but you never recreate that moment no
matter how much you try to recreate it with words or
explanation or even acting out in your behavior in a
way that you hope to trigger the event, but it doesn't
happen?  Why wouldn't the event happen again, because
it did happen.  Could such a moment be of something
that is always here and indefinably awesome -such as
life!  Or do you have it all figured out and
statically patterned in some neat little idea.  Or do
you notice the DQ involved in the moment,

Scott:
Why do you call it DQ? Why doesn't just the word 'value' serve? Remember, 
what I am asking about is why one talks about an *undifferentiated* quality. 
Everything you are talking about here is differentiated.

SA continued:
 and the one
long moment called life and that moment we call death.
 Yet, I live this always and will die when I die - yet
where's the static pattern?  Life is not something you
can statically pattern only.  You need a little dash
of DQ, too, even though you purely empirically
experience, act, live, or do whatever you think you do
since you been born here.

Scott:
Of course it isn't just static. There is change, and there are inexpressible 
experiences. But what does that have to do with talking about an 
*undifferentiated* aesthetic continuum? Or with how we are justified in 
saying there is value in the inorganic? On this last, I do not mean to deny 
that there is value in the inorganic for us. I am asking if there is value 
in the inorganic if there were no biological forms at all.

- Scott