[MD] Metaphysical issues: DQ

[skutvik at online.no]

DMB and Christoffer

12 Oct.:

> Christoffer said:
> The Question we need to focus on here is "what should we say about DQ
> in order to make the MOQ work best?" We want the MOQ to replace old
> SOM as a metaphysical basis for human activity, and thus it is of
> course crucial that the MOQ in no way I perceived as standing in
> contrast to scientific understanding and method. And it won't do that
> either, unless we start to talk too much about DQ. If we say "DQ is
> that part of reality that we can't put into any kind of static
> understanding" that works. Because when someone experiences something
> new or invents something new (say Stephen Hawking finds a new small
> thingie in some lab) we just say: "Oh, right - you took something that
> before was DQ and incorporated it into our SQ understanding. Good."
 
> dmb says:
> Actually, Hawking is a good picture of what's wrong with science. He's
> like a mythical figure, a disembodied mind pondering a mathematical
> universe that is indifferent to humanity. There is no place for
> anything like DQ in such a scientific world view. What you describe
> here as new experience or new inventions sounds a lot more like an
> undiscovered fact. Such a scientific worldview is an interpretation of
> the facts, a particular way to construe the data. As I understand it,
> the data themselves are considered valid because they are derived from
> experience but there is more than one way to understand them. As you
> probably know, the idea of scientific objectivity is one of the
> central problems that the MOQ addresses.

I like Chris' probing the very foundations of the MOQ and I agree with 
DMB regarding Stephen Hawking embodying (!) the disembodied 
"brain in a vat" which is the essence of science, which is the essence 
of SOM. But no longer is 

"scientific objectivity one of the central problems that the MOQ 
addresses".

Perhaps it was when SOM was regarded as some villainous idea that 
had invaded an idea-intellect, but with SOM=MOQ's 4th. level 
objectivity is no longer a problem, rather the highest static value, but 
the 4th. level is brought under control by the MOQ  (as a"meta-level") 
To go on talking about science as a problem is to have missed MOQ's 
point. 

> The trick, I think, is to realize WHY the MOQ says that DQ can't be
> defined, WHY we can assert the reality of DQ even though it can't be
> captured in a static formula or otherwise pinned down. 

OK

> Chris said:
> Now, Krimel got angry at me for saying that DQ is constant, 

Krimel has never acknowledged the MOQ so it's a bit weird that he 
has opinions on any of its concepts, but it's a bit fun to see him and 
Ham delivering their perfunctory Q-like phrases to be able to stay 
around this discussion.    

> but the reason I say that is because if we say DQ is some force or
> something that swoops in and makes stuff happen, we will be at odds
> with science, and we will have become mystics. If we however say that
> DQ is the part of reality that - at any given moment at any given place
> - hasn't been incorporated into SQ understanding - why then we aren't
> at odds with anything. 

I agree with Christoffer and I will use "life" as an example (because 
Pirsig speaks at length here) science (as intellect) is conflict with 
religion (as social) over how life (the bio. level) came to be (Darwinism 
vs Creationism) Pirsig says that the MOQ resolves this conflict  How? 
By doing what I say above of reducing science to an intellectual 
pattern and religion to a social pattern. Their respective claims that life 
must be the result of either chance or divine interference are both 
wrong for the very reason of being static level thinking.      

> dmb says:
> Don't worry about Krimel. He and his anger are only virtually real. He
> also tends to be scientistic and, as a result, fairly clueless about
> the MOQ.  I think its important to see that DQ can't be incorporated into a
> static understanding, no matter when or where you are. And even more
> importantly than that, the MOQ is a form of philosophical mysticism
> and DQ is the mystical reality. 

Agree about Krimel, but forget about mysticism, the MOQ does the 
trick by its Dynamic/Static split and making the former S/O its own 
highest - yet static - level. Regarding the dynamic/static relationship it's 
like the ocean/wave one. The waves are water too, but it's the 
undulation vs smoothness that matters.  

Thus spaketh 

Bodvar