[MD] Flying Spaghetti Monsters

[Ham Priday]

Hi Platt [Micah mentioned] --


> I hope I haven't led you astray with my celebration of the individual vs.
> the mob. To me what is proprietary to the individual is ability, not
> awareness. Awareness (mind) is something shared by all living creatures,
> and to a primitive extent, particles and atoms.

It wasn't my intention to strike up an argument with you, Platt.  But now
that I have, it has elicited a clearer description of your position on the
MoQ than I've heard before.  So perhaps we're demonstrating a new
dialectical principle: A misunderstanding can lead to greater understanding.
Whether that's valid or not, I think you may have misunderstood ME.

By proprietary awareness, I don't mean the "capability" of awareness, which
of course IS shared by all human beings, among other species.  Some degree
of sensibility is universal
to all creatures, and in that sense it is a property of living organisms.
But 'being aware' is not a general property or capability: it is the
conscious perception of specific values relative to the individual and
perceived only by the individual.  The perception of value, for example, is
unique to each of us and is not shared by any other individual.  But you
already know this; it's why you prefer Rachmaninoff to Tchaikovsky and I
don't.

Animals don't have values or make moral decisions; they exhibit behavioral
preferences.  Animals don't plant gardens, design automobiles, admire art,
or ponder their fate.  Whatever "planning" they do is instinctual and based
on their genetic makeup.  All knowledge of reality is human.  All values
experienced are human.  All the decisions, theories, and principles we live
by are human, and they originate with the individual.  Man is the
choice-maker of his world, and the physical universe is an anthropocentric
reality.

As Micah has eloquently stated to Arlo ...

> Humans exist independently of Dodo birds, or any extinct
> plant or animal, for that matter.  We could kill all monkeys, and
> humans would still exist. We can remove anything, except humans,
> from reality, and reality still exists.  But reality cannot be shown to
> exist without humans.  Man is the measure of all things.
>
> Monkeys don't have points of view, humans do.
>
> When two or more humans are present, shared objective reality
> is the measure of all things.  But either way, humans are the
> measure of reality - not monkeys, only humans.
>
> People have died, and reality still exists.  But when the last human
> dies, reality cannot be shown to exist.  Reality, in fact, is human.

This is so fundamentally Essential that I wish I had said it.  What I don't
understand is how one could arrive at these conclusions by reading either
Pirsig or Rand.  (Could it possibly be Micah's own "proprietary" concept?)

You said:
> As for the idealism that you, Micah and Pirsig seem to share,
> I don't buy it. I didn't make the universe; I wasn't even there
> at the time. Nor does a chicken depend on my seeing her lay an
> egg for me to enjoy eating it for breakfast. That when we turn
> around what's in back of us disappears is fun for freshman in
> high school to argue, but hardly a worthy conjecture for serious
> philosophy. The days of Bishop Berkeley and his "esse is percipi"
> are long gone.

That just isn't true, Platt.  Idealists are just as determined to establish
logical proof for Berkeley's axiom as they ever were, because the quest to
know the "unknowable" still goes on.  It is true that there has been a
falling away from idealism in the last two centuries, and we've observed
many "hybrid" philosophies which attempt to universalize (collectivize) the
fundamentals.  Your Panexperientialism, for one; also Vitalism, Semiotics,
Transcendental Consciousness, and Social Constructivism, of which the MoQ is
an example.

> But, despite reservations about idealism, I consider myself a Pirsigian
> because what counts in his metaphysics is that the world is a moral order.
> The underlying premise that some things are better than others fits nicely
> with my honoring the individual. And, the MOQ's explanatory power is
> second to none, answering, for example, such imponderables as, "Why
> survive?"

It's clear that you've taken comfort in Pirsig's idea of a moral universe.
You've more or less accepted it because it makes you feel good, and because
it somehow supports your interest in art and "fits nicely" with your
position on individualism.  Lots of people cling to religion for the same
reasons.  Concerning your praise of the MoQ for its "explanatory power",
just how does it answer the question, "Why survive?"  I must have missed
that chapter.  Incidentally, I don't consider "It's better than the
alternative" an explanation.

Regards,
Ham