[MD] What is SOM?

[Krimel]

> [Krimel]
> This is not an invitation to ignore or devalue the study of
> the nervous system where in ALL experience resides. Like consciousness
> experience is not a thing, it is a process. It is a process that takes
> place among the biological patterns of a nervous system.

[Platt]
Krimel's assertions are not only denied by sponges (they have no nervous 
system), but also by Pirsig who inhabits a somewhat higher level:

"I think the answer is that inorganic objects experience events but do not 
react to them biologically socially or intellectually.  They react to these 
experiences inorganically, according to the laws of physics." Note 30, 
Lila´s Child

[Krimel]
And what a lovely example of the fuzziness of taxonomy. Sponges are at the
borderline of plants and animals. In what sense does a plant or a sponge
have experience? Purely at the biological level. Then "experience" of an
individual sponge is only recorded in its genetic structure. That memory of
what worked and didn't in an individual sponges is manifest in the next
iteration of the species. But the events in an individual sponge's life do
not impact its own future behavior at least in terms of the sponge's
individual ability to choose its destiny.

I find Pirsig's use of many terms sloppy. "Experience" is one of them. It
has lead to the stagnation, confusion and lack of progress in the MoQ. I
think Pirsig has remarkable instincts for pointing in the right direction
but I am afraid that leaves many like yourself just staring at his finger.