[MD] The SOM/MOQ discrepancy.

[Ham Priday]

Greetings, Kieffer --


About Arlo's assertions . . .

On 12/11 Arlo wrote:
> Ham has said that at some point in the historical timeline, call it
> Point Alpha, there were primates that did NOT have consciousness.
> Then, at a later point, call it Point Beta, there were primates that
> DID have consciousness.
>
> Perhaps Ham would care to explain the process by which the
> consciousness of those at Point Alpha "evolved" into the greater
> consciousness we see at Point Beta?

You responded:
> To some extent (that is with some qualification) I can agree with his
> statement, first being: the effect we refer to as consciousness

For the record, I never said such a thing.  Arlo, who is obsessed with 
historical explanations, insisted that I accept an anthropological timeline 
of man's development.  Arlo came up with the alpha and beta points, and he 
is the one who needs to justify Consciousness as a biological event.  Quite 
naturally, as you seem to understand, I do not care to reduce metaphysics to 
the human experience of changing events in time.  As you noted, "Ham could 
only explain this by falling back on to Darwin."  And that is exactly what I 
told him.

The fact that man's experience of reality is sequential does not prove that 
consciousness or value is a product of cause-and-effect.  To claim so is to 
dismiss the ontogeny that is implicit in Essentialism and also (I believe) 
in Pirsig's Quality thesis.  Neither conscious awareness nor the Value it 
actualizes is an 'existent'.  Creation is not a sequence of events 
chronicled by a timeline; it is the ever-present Sensibility/Otherness 
dichotomy from which being-aware is derived.  So those who ask "Which came 
first, the chicken or the egg?" questions are much more 'SOMist' than yours 
truly.

As far as teleology is concerned, only the likes of Arlo could twist it into 
an apologist's argument for theism:

[Arlo]:
> Ham also claims we were "intended" to be here, that is man was
> created by a Source that wanted something to "perceive its
> magnificence".
> While such a needy-Source would do better creating therapists
> than adulators, it certainly demonstrates a theistic approach.

[Kieffer]:
> Again, without any nit-picking, I, and I think you also, agree
> with this statement.

What Arlo doesn't understand is that ALL Value is our perception of the 
essential Source.  It is finite Man who "needs" to relate to Essence, for 
without Essence he is literally nothing.

Thanks for showing some understanding, Kieffer, and have a Merry Christmas.

Essentially yours,
Ham