[MD] Consciousness

[skutvik at online.no]

For Mel..

Who had written: 

> Oh, the wailing and the gnashing of teeth I have been consigned to a
> circle of  Skutvikian hell.   Oh, the tearing of clothes and the beating
> of breast as I wallow in my shame. I have frustrated the Bo.  (...and
> the Debbil pokes me with his fork and says. "Don't annoy the Bo.")   ;-) 

I know I evoke scorn and sarcasm  by being so (Scandinavian) blunt, 
but after more than ten years of this discussion I can't go through all 
these niceties, I say what I think ..........  

Bo before:
> > The thing is that the intellectual level is static and its static value
> > is the S/O aggregate (in the "objective over subjective" sense) or
> > REASON for short, and it is incapable of  ..."going into stillness,
> > beyond reason, beyond formal logic ...etc"

mel:
> I only address mind, intellect, and its fellow travelers when I see
> what seem to be counter- productive wastes of energy, and direction. 
 
????  Too deep.

> If you underestimate what intellegence is, you risk failing to
> understand its limits and that is an invitation to build a bridge too
> short to cross the canyon, leaving you on one side. 
 
Me underestimating intelligence? You must be joking Mel, but the thing 
is that intelligence is NOT intellect, but something that occurred at the 
biological level with the growing neural system (brain) and increasing 
in step with the primate's big brain, reaching a peak with the Homo 
species neocortex layer. The point is that animals can learn new 
tecniques - pass them on (I think this is what you said to Platt) all in all 
be pretty smart without any notion that this manipulation of stored 
(RAM) experience is "thinking" or  taking place in a subjective mind 
different from objective matter.This chasm is INTELLECT!!! But in 
between comes the social level so enough for now.     

> [My approach to real life (outside MoQ discussion) is to let silence
> still the illusion of mind-self-separateness and let Quality(?) lead,
> push, slide where it will.] 

You may be such a profound MOQ scholar that I don't manage to 
follow, but what provoked me was your uttering about INTELLECT 
being more than the S/O (Reason and Science) because THAT is not 
understanding the 4th level. Transforming it into something mind-like 
is poison. This is what I call the "intelligence pitfall".
 
> Hence:

> The Dynamic runs two directions.  It is not a simple binary. 

Who says the Dynamic component of reality itself runs in any 
direction? It causes a static evolution towards betterness. 
 
> The Intellectual level is not static, nor is the Social, nor the
> Biological, nor the Physical.  Each level is an accretion of earlier
> Dynamic Quality folding into-- creating--structure.  Each level still this 
> responds to the dynamic according to its structure and each is still
> being created, destroyed, changed. (Obviously "lower" levels are "more
> structured" as any foundational level should be to "support" what is
> above.) 
 
If the levels aren't static what's the purpose of Pirsig dividing reality 
that way? That each level is an accretion of earlier levels is plain. So is 
it that it's response is according to its "structure". In other word the 
various levels' structures  are STATIC responses. No need to make it 
so damn complicated. As said by some prophet: "If you want to be 
good don't yelp about God" There's far to much yelping about "DQ" at 
this discussion. The levels are static, but the level shift was as Pirsig 
describes it "DQ taking advantage" of an ambiguous pattern of the 
lower level to form the next. 

The internal evolution however is my present concern ...??  

Bo:
> > There is a sphere around the static levels, namely  the MOQ itself and
> > this contains all these fine states, insights, mysticisms that you speak
> > about. 
 
mel:
> This statement seems to say you are creating just the split in
> existence that the MOQ is able to do away with. 

I admit that MOQ's relationship with itself is where we are at the end of 
our tethers, but one thing is for sure: The intellectual level is a MOQ 
subset, by no twist of logic can the MOQ be an intellectual sub-set, 
thus the MOQ somehow is outside its static range. By the way what 
the "metaphysics" term means. 

Bo:
> > This interpretation is called the SOL and have been promoted by this
> > person for years and years as the only way to look upon the intellectual
> > level that harmonizes ZAMM and LILA and makes the MOQ one solid
> > unassailable edifice. 

mel:
> The oddly ironic part is, it seemed to me that (BO was) you were caught
> in a mind-intellect vortex, as it appeared to me, by power-welding
> Subjective-Objective onto the intellectual level. 

Only if you equate intellect with mind. But please elaborate.

               ---------------------------------------------

Regarding religion it will take us too far. In the MOQ the mystical 
element of all religions is and encounter with DQ, while the established 
rules and regulations are static social value. However the Semitic (I 
call) religions are a far cry from the Eastern Tradition, but as said. 
Enough!


> ...Midway through the course of my life I find myself awakening in a
> forest and there appears a guide. Is it Virgil? No, it is a man on a
> motorbike... And thus begins the literary masterwork, the epic of
> "Skutvik's Inferno." 

> Now, which ring of hell am I in?   ;-)
 
> Seriously, though, sorry if I DO annoy you, but thanks for the prompt
> and opportunity. 

No, no annoyance at all, it's just me having been with this for more 
than ten years and IMO seeing the same "pitfalls" encountered ...The 
MOQ is a mighty new metaphysics, but its explanatory power rests 
with the intellectual level being limited to its intended S/O pattern. If it 
is expanded to a dynamic mental mindish realm the MOQ is just 
another - more complicated - SOM. 

Merry Christmas 

Bo