[MD] Distinguishing Levels

[Michael Hamilton]

Arlo,

Turns out my memory is a bit foggy - Paul charged me with using a
correspondence theory of truth, not representationalism. This was
because I was trying to argue that matter, as a postulated entity, is
an intellectual pattern (as opposed to empirical inorganic patterns).
Not really much similarity between that discussion and this one,
except that I detected SOM overtones in your argument just as Paul
detected them in mine.

I still owe Paul a response, really...

Regards,
Mike

On 5/31/06, Michael Hamilton <thethemichael at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Arlo,
>
> I thought I'd take you up on your tangent:
>
> > [Arlo]
> > Let me take a tangent and say, I think that social patterns described *are*
> > intellectual patterns. "Family" is an intellectual pattern used to describe
> > particular social habits, but it is not the social habits it attempts to
> > represent. This is true too of biological and inorganic patterns. "H20" is
> > not the inorganic pattern it attempts to symbolically represent.
>
> I remember saying something similar to this to Paul in our last
> discussion. He rightly pointed out that I was bringing a kind of
> representionalism, a SOMish view of language, into the MOQ. It's not
> much different from saying that intellectual patterns are subjective
> representations of objective social/biological/inorganic patterns. In
> any case, you're perilously close to saying that all language is
> intellectual. To make sense of Pirsig's levels, we need to keep
> language as a social basis from which the 4th level arises.
>
> You're suggesting that by naming things, such as "family", we create
> an intellectual pattern. I have a suggestion for keeping things fairly
> simple while staying away from representationalism. I suggest that it
> is by naming "family" that we individuate it _as a pattern_.
> Obviously, the "social habits" you alluded to - procreation, mothers
> and/or fathers caring for offspring, etc - existed before being named
> in a human language; however, it is only when these habits are
> gathered under a single name that they become the single pattern -
> family.
>
> Now, "habit" is another word for a pattern, isn't it? And some of
> these habits surely pre-date human language. So the problem for this
> theory is: how are these primal habit-patterns individuated and
> perpetuated? More precisely, how do they become patterns or habits in
> the first place? This is a question for biologists, so I can only
> speculate. Staying with the "family" theme, let's take the example of
> a mother brown bear taking care of her cubs and teaching them how to
> survive. (Incidentally, isn't this an interesting instance of
> biological necessity giving rise to the first basic social patterns?)
> The 'motivation' for this habit is survival of the brown bear species
> as a whole, so it seems reasonable to suppose that DNA plays a part in
> this habit, although I hesitate to posit something as simple and
> clear-cut as a "child-rearing gene". Anyway, the question of the
> extent to which animal habits are individuated, by DNA or otherwise,
> prior to our naming of them, is a very interesting one. To what extent
> are they codeified and passed on, and to what extent do they 'just
> happen'? Imitation of elders must play a part, too, but imitation also
> requires that the imitator individuates patterns to be imitated.
> Hmm...
>
> <snip>
> > Believing or disbelieving, I'd go so far as to say, ARE intellectual level
> > activities.
>
> Kind of agree. Deciding whether to believe or disbelieve is an
> intellectual activity. However, we need to distinguish considered,
> justified belief from unquestioning belief/acceptance, which can be
> identified as a crucial mechanism of the social level.
>
> Regards,
> Mike
>