[MD] -elitist ideas

[MarshaV]

At 12:04 PM 3/19/2007, you wrote:
>[Marsha]
>What about your use of 'betterness'?  It's a word you've used as an
>equivalent of 'value'.  Doesn't this 'betterness' imply a comparative
>(subjective) value?
>
>[Arlo]
>Again, this comparative state is experienced within the confines of
>the level in question. In the moment of direct experience, an amoeba
>experiences value (in the case of the acid, this is experience as a
>low-quality state). In that moment, I suppose you could say the
>amoeba becomes the "subject" and the low-quality environment the
>"object", but again this is not to suggest the "subjectiveness" of
>the amoeba is anything like the complex "subjectiveness" we
>conceptualize on the social and intellectual levels.  In fact, I'd
>say the amoeba never experiences "subject/object". Having no symbolic
>representation of "self" or "other", the amoeba is "trapped" in
>primary, direct experience limited not only to inorganic-biological
>value, but to pretty unsophisticated biological value as well (a
>"wolf", for example, experiences a much more complex range of
>biological value).

Arlo,

In our discussion, I do not remember you limiting the use of 
'betterness' to the two subjective levels (Social and Intellectual).

m