[MD] Philosophy and Philosophology

[Matt Kundert]

Hi John,

John said:
But just for the record, what the heck do you mean by "hypostatization"?  I looked it up on my dictionary and got "relating to the trinity".  Hmm?

Matt:
Oh, its one of those fancy words I know how to use, but have a tough time defining.  So I looked it up on dictionary.com and it said this: "to treat or regard (a concept, idea, etc.) as a distinct substance or reality."  The paradigmatic example in philosophy--and what I'm always thinking of when I use that word--is Plato's Forms.  You have "good" as it appears in life, and Plato raises it to a separate substance removed from life entirely, as the Form of the Good.  (For Christianity, I imagine the word plays a role in keeping God, the Son, and the Holy Spirit separated.)

I brought it up to say, roughly, that ideas for Pirsig are ideas-in-life, and that we should avoid thinking of them in isolation from it.  Intellectual patterns don't exist without their foundation of social/bio/inorganic.

John said:
Well money is another one of those things I think gets too much attention. It's become the shortcut to evaluation in a value free metaphysics - or VFM, which is how I describe SOM from now on.

Matt:
Yeah, I think I'm in the minority in thinking that money doesn't get enough attention _here_, because most here think that--roughly--you have to fix the spiritual crisis in our culture before any of the others, whereas I think we have to fix the economic crisis before the others (though I think everyone will agree that we can probably walk and chew gum at the same time).

Perhaps you think I'm talking about being obsessed with consumption and greed.  Rather, I'm talking about the fact that our consumerism and greed was created by an economic vision that has created an overclass and an underclass, and that the overclass would like to continue this situation (because they are greedy) and the underclass doesn't have enough money to subsist, let alone even get to flex a greed muscle.

I'm not talking about a cultural pattern--I'm talking about being able to put food on the table.

Matt said:
For instance, kids are being raised by TV, right?  Hear it all the time.  Where are the parents, to turn that shit off and shove a book in their face?  They're at work, by and large, because _both_ have to work, and nowadays two or even three jobs.

John said:
Well I deny the force here.  I don't believe anybody HAS to work as much as they choose to.  They prefer to work within the system rather than accept the dynamic freedom which comes from being homeless bums.

Matt:
I'm not sure whether you're trying to be funny or not, but it is a nice Thoreauvian thought.  Thoreau spent the whole, massive first chapter of Walden talking about work, and the slaves it has made us.  Which is true, as far as it goes, which isn't far if--unlike Thoreau--you have kids who are hungry and no rich friends who own a pond you can retire to.

Matt

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