[MD] -elitist ideas

[Case]

> [Case]
> That's a fair question but what do you mean by value-experience? Are you 
> including value judgments and sentience as part of the value-experience
> package?

[Arlo]
I'd say "sentience" is a complex mix of social and intellectual patterns,
but is different from the experience of the amoeba not in "kind" but in
"degree".

[Case]
And I would say that probably social patterns and certainly intellectual
patterns required nervous systems to be manifest.

[Case]
An amoeba is a complex system that moves toward some optimum state of
balance with its environment.

[Arlo]
Um, isn't "optimum" just another way to say "better" (or "best", perhaps)?
What is different from my saying "an amoeba is a complex system that moves
towards some better state with its environment"?

[Case]
Except that "better" implies awareness the difference and ability to choose,
disappointment. Introducing these notions provides the illusion of empathy
without any real improvement in understanding of the events.

> [Case]
> Viewed in terms of value-as-preference or aesthetic judgment, one could as

> easily focus on vinegar's preference for an amoeba free environment. 
> Vinegar's tolerance for amoebae could also be measured by introducing 
> amoebae into various pH values of diluted vinegar see how much vinegar is 
> needed to realize an environment free of amoebae.

[Arlo]
Sure, why not? Although this is an inorganic pattern of value, and the
amoeba's is a biological pattern of value.

[Case]
What do you see as the gain from such anthropomorphism?

[Arlo]
As I've said before, in addition to the broad MOQ strokes, I see a lot of
inter-level gradation. An amoeba and a dolphin are both biological patterns,
but even granting for the time being only biological value-experience to
both, its clear to me the dolphin's is much more complex.

So I'd say the amoeba responds exclusively on the biological level, but that
doesn't mean there is no value-experience on this level. The amoeba
certainly lacks a post-experiential symbolic repertoire, as is required for
ascribing social and intellectual value. That is, "betterness" for the
amoeba is experienced strictly within the biological and inorganic levels. 

[Case]
This is a little weird but about what you expect when you get close to the
edge but I would say an amoeba's responses are not purely biological in the
same way that carbon bonding is not purely inorganic. In other words an
amoeba is a biological system that responds in a purely electrochemical way.
It is simply the level of complex chemical interactions that it involved in
its behavior.

[Case]
No but I think "experience" required a nervous system sophisticated enough
to encode memory.

[Arlo]
So the amoeba does not "experience" anything? I know its a strange
alteration of common language to say an electron "experiences" inorganic
value, but if that amoeba doesn't experience, what does it do?

Now, representing that experience symbolically, that's the biggie. And
that's where minds, brains, and all that come in. For me, anyway.

[Case]
This is where I like Whitehead's notion of occasions or events as the
fundamental units of process. Experience implies memory and learning; the
integrations of the past with the present. These terms carry tons of extra
meaning with them that simply do not apply. If the intent is to alter our
understand of the terms themselves perhaps it is better just to use value
neutral terms to start with.