[MD] Distinguishing Levels (Individual level)

[Steve Peterson]

Hi Platt,

> You said to me, "As you stated above, the levels are
> interdependent and include one 
> another to one degree or another."
> 
> That is definitely not what I meant. The levels can't
> include other levels. They are discrete.

Didn't you say that government isn't strictly a social level value 
since government includes thinking which is an intellectual level 
value?
Yes, government is not an example of a single type of pattern, but the levels themselves are sets of patterns of a single type. The intellectual level only contains intellectual patterns. The social level only contains social patterns, etc.

Levels containing other levels is Wilbur not Pirsig. They do not include one another. Pirsig says these levels are discrete.

> Platt continues, "Thus some individuals are dominated 
> by biological values (terrorists), some by social
> values (socialists) 
> and some by intellectual values (rational
> empiricists). I identify the 
> levels like Pirsig does, by their dominance or
> subservience to levels 
> below and above."
> 
> Me:I agree that it can be useful to think about
> whether a person seems to be more or less influenced
> by a certain level's patterns as compared to another
> person, but I can't see how that defines the levels
> themselves.

Platt:
Pirsig makes it clear that the social and intellectual levels are human-
centric. Thus, to define the levels in human terms seems to me 
appropriate. 

Steve:
Though Pirsig uses people to help describe the levels (Phaedrus, Rigel, and Lila) he does not define the levels as types of people as you are trying to do. He talks about patterns of value.  Clearly you are attempting to adapt Pirisg's levels to support a conservative perspective on individualism.

He also never describes a person as "being on the X level" like it seems everyone in this discussion group likes to do. He describes the conflicts between people like Phaedrus, Rigel, and Lila as conflicts between types of patterns of value rather than using the levels as containers for different types of people. The levels do help us understand people but types of people is not what they are. They are types of patterns of value.

The Randian individual versus second-hander herd mentality conflict is probably describable in MOQ terns, but the MOQ terms were not invented as containers for these types of people. They were conceived as types of patterns of value.

Here are some of the things that Pirsig has said about the intellectual level where I don't think it would make any sense to substitute "individual" for "intellectual":

'After the beginning of history inorganic, biological, social and intellectual patterns are found existing together in the same person. I think the conflicts mentioned here are intellectual conflicts in which one side clings to an intellectual justification of existing social patterns and the other side intellectually opposes the existing social patterns. A social pattern which would be unaware of the next higher level would be found among prehistoric people and the higher primates when they exhibit social learning that is not genetically hard-wired but yet is not symbolic.'

'In the MOQ, laws are a species of intellectual
patterns that are associated with a lot of social
authority and are slow to change.' Lila's Child

'My statement that "Both the genius and the mentally
retarded person are at the social level" is intended
to refute the statement that "the genius appears to be
on a higher evolutionary level." A person who holds an
idea is a social entity, no matter what ideas he
holds. The ideas he holds are an intellectual entity,
no matter who holds them.' Lila's Child

'Intellect is simply thinking' Lila's Child

Annotation 29 from LC p506:
"The MOQ, as I understand it, denies the existence of a "self" that is independent of inorganic, biological, social, or intellectual patterns.  There is no "self" that contains these patterns.  These patterns contain the self.  This denial agrees with both religious mysticism and scientific knowledge.  In Zen, there is reference to "big self" and "small self."  Small self is the patterns.  Big Self is Dynamic Quality."

Note 32. "since the MOQ states that consciousness (i.e. intellectual 
patterns) is the the collection and manipulations of symbols, created in 
the brain, that stands for patterns of experience . . ."

Note 95. "Intellect is simply thinking."

Note 140. "The MOQ divides the hominem, or "individual" into four parts: 
inorganic, biological, social and intellectual."

Note 25. "For purposes of MOQ precision, let's say that the intellectual 
level is the same as mind."

Regards,
Steve



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