[MD] The MOQ for dummies.

[skutvik at online.no]

Hi Heather  

10 Feb. you wrote:

[Bo]
> > My so called "SOLAQI" (SOL for short) interpretation
> > says that the intellectual level is the former S/O
> > metaphysics.

> Then what is this dynamic/static: meta-level?  I
> understand it is where ultimate reality is discussed,
> and such, as you said in this post, but as you might
> see where I'm going with this, how can this meta-level
> differ from intellectual?  Maybe it has to do with
> experience, as DM likes to remind us about.  

Well, look at it this way. We have the SOM. While it reigned it 
created a S/O-divided world, yet SOM itself was neither objective 
nor subjective (particularly not subjective because that is next to 
non-existing in SOM) It was a meta-level outside itself. When it 
comes to the MOQ the same goes.:

It began as an intellectual patter (in the sense of itellect=S/O) 
because Phaedrus kew no other reality than the SOM. However 
after his initial Quality=Reality epiphany he was nowhere, in 
limbo (I call) he had left SOM but not yet arrived in MOQ) but as 
the latter took form his metaphysical journey had ended, and 
looking back from the "mountain" the old SOM was seen as 
MOQ's static intellectual level. 

This is what Pirsig SHOULD have seen, but (it must ave been a 
cloudy day) his about the MOQ an intellectual pattern  - supposed 
to improve that level - makes it all nil and void.  A static level ca't 
be improved, its value is fixed - that's what "static" means - and 
can only get more and more complex until it is so unstable that it 
spawns a new level. OK enough.      

> So, would
> experience be this meta-level?  If so, I'd rather
> discuss this experience/meta-level, for this is where
> all the action, the living philosophy, takes place.  I
> see how a living philosophy would mend or rid S/O
> dualism, for I really don't think subjects and
> objects. 

Experience tends to adjust itself to the reigning metaphysics. 
Pirsig says something about seeing ghosts or hearing voices is 
normal in some cultures (social value-steeped ones) while absent 
in other (intellectual-steeped ones)    

> Actually in my experience it seems to be
> more about the atmosphere of the place, the whole
> event.  Then this wider view has particulars, but I
> don't readily divide the world up.  I would love to be
> able to separate myself from the problem kids I work
> with, but I can't, they force me into their lives.

Right, yours is the social experience and it FEELS good because 
it's undivided. Even if our western culture is intellect-dominated 
and we are supposed to be objective - impartial - the social 
experience  is there "down under" as strong as ever. The 
biological, even more so, but that's another discussion.  
 
> This is how I see stories, metaphors, or real life
> experiences saying much more than just this and that. 
> We've got this whole world of feeling, perspective,
> and wind blowing. 

Feelings or EMOTIONS is the social "expression" (I call). 
SENSATION the biological one and REASON is intellect's 
expression. I have INTERACTION as the inorganic expression 
for the sake of completeness.  

> So much at once, why try to break
> it down and reduce it, when I can experience, and do
> experience it as one event with all these particular
> happenings.  Do you see where I'm coming from?  Maybe
> we could bridge what your saying and what I'm saying.
> Maybe we're more in agreement than we realize.  With
> dialogue I'm willing to see just where we're coming
> from.

Yes, we are close to agreement, my last "but" is that we can't but 
interpret experience and that the dynamic/static interpretation is 
better than the subject/object one. The. static levels allow us to 
sort reason from emotion and emotion from sensation, this was/is 
just a porridge in SOM   

> If find only the practical day to day philosophy
> of S/O is required, then what's the big deal with the
> MOQ?  From this non-S/O view, I notice thoughts that
> are different from just going around dividing things
> up?

"The practical day to day philosophy of S/O" I agree. As said in 
the previous post:  

    For all normal day-to-day purposes we apply S/O-intellect 
    and speak about subject and object, mind and matter, 
    mental and material ...etc, to our heart's delight, 

The big deal is this: 

    only when it comes to the "extremes" - i.e: the ultimate 
    metaphysical questions - the MOQ must be applied.    


IMO

Bo