[MD] epistemological first musings and poetry's recognition

[Ham Priday]

 On Sat, Jun 13, 2009 at 11:46 PM, John Carl answered Ham's two questions:

1) If goodness is intrinsic to reality, where does 'not-so-good' come from?

> This question is answered by Royce:  Evil is real and part of
> the good.  The absolute perfection of the totality of existence
> includes the process of overcoming evil.  The ultimate perfection
> of the good is realized in the struggle to overcome evil.
> The way I interpret in the light of the MoQ is that Good would
> be completely static if not for the necessity of overcoming evil.
> The process of overcoming evil is what makes dynamic quality dynamic.

Evil as "part of the Good" seems illogical to me.  Evil is on the negative 
end of the value-sensibility scale, so it exists within the range of 
relative values experienced.  But I can't accept evil as part of goodness. 
The "reality" of evil or goodness is its realization by man.  WE are the 
agents who make value "real" by bringing it into existential being.  Also, 
"absolute perfection" does not include a process of overcoming anything. 
Essence is immutable and free of space/time differentiation.  We don't know 
perfection because our awareness is separated from Essence.  Instead we are 
free to appreciate the difference between the relative values of a finite 
world.

2) If morality is univcrsal, how do you account for man's immorality
    and the destructive acts of nature?.

> Similar question as above.  Same answer, almost.
> Except I don't view acts of nature as "destructive".  I mean,
> they destroy the works of man, but that is not the same thing
> as immorality.

Earthquakes, tornados and floods destroy the landscape along with the 
habitat of animals.  Plagues and disease wipe out whole populations of man 
and beast.  None of these natural events are "works of man", but they 
demonstrate that the universe is not intrinsically good by man's standard. 
How do you reconcile such natural occurrences with Pirsig's 'Quality = 
Reality' principle?

> Is man part of nature?  He possesses a dynamic intellect which he uses to
> disassociate himself from nature, but I would put such thoughts in the
> "immorality" category.

I don't think it's fair to say that we use intellect to disassociate 
ourselves from nature.  We apply knowledge and reason to rise above nature, 
such as by controlling the environment or predicting foul weather 
conditions.  It would be intellectually foolish to disregard the fact that 
we are creatures of nature.

> I meant "Jacob Needleman", not "Needham", btw.  Let me quote
> a little of him at you and tell me when we lose you:
>
> "Man is the universe in miniature- such is the bare statement of the
> idea of the microcosm.  But as our conception of the universe is
> dictated to us by the scientific world view, the idea in this bald form
> adds nothing to our self-understanding.  In this form, the idea tells
> us only that the same laws and substances that govern and
> constitute the stars also govern and constitute the human organism.
> But what kind of laws?  What kind of substances?"
>
> So Ham, atoms and rocks do respond to laws of physics and
> these laws are statements of value.  That seems simple enough.

Statements of value, like the laws of physics, are precepts deduced by man. 
To say that because atoms and rocks conform to the laws of nature they are 
"responding to value" is a childish reversion to ancient animism.  Although 
Pirsig wants to endear himself to empirical rationalism, he missed the boat 
here.  I can't imagine a scientist crediting an atom or rock for sensing 
value.

> Needlman again:
>
> But more than that, there are the laws that govern all these
> processes, the intelligence that adapts, reacts, creates and
> destroys within ever larger and more fundamental scales of
> intelligence and law.  Is this intelligence, this all-penetrating
> hierarchy of purposeful law, something that is only of
> the earth?  Or does it not pervade the whole of reality?"
>
> And finally in summation:
>
> "In whatever sense and whatever way all this is in man, it is not
> in my life or in my awareness.  I, this individual person, pursue
> my life nowhere near an awareness in myself of this incredible
> spectrum of time, force and structure, not to mention the
> intelligence that governs it from without and within.  This
> realization is the key to the idea of the microcosm:  Man is a
> microcosm, but I am not that man."

I don't really follow the author's train of thought here, except that he 
views the complexity of the objective world as a mystery.  Yet it is a 
mystery of his own creation, provided of course that you believe as Pirsig 
and I do that experience creates reality.

> Deep Ecology is specifically a non-anthropocentric philosophy.
> What man "learns" in his intellectual study of nature is by way of
> analogy and distance from reality.  The closer man's analogies
> get to "the real thing" the higher quality we accord his thoughts.
> But simple animals do not "learn" or analogise. They experience
> directly the cosmic harmonies we struggle to attain.

Animals may be closer to nature than man, but I've seen no evidence to 
suggest that they have more "direct experience" of cosmic truth than we do.

> You say Nature is our beingness, but that's not a
> metaphysical perspective?

It's a metaphysical perspective of existence, but not Reality.  Understand 
that I distinguish relational existence from absolute Essence.  Beingness as 
evolution in  space/time is an experiential (empirical) concept of reality. 
Empiricism does not recognize any other reality than the physical universe.

> I see  the physical world as an ordering of energies
> in shifting interrelationship.
>
> Zen tech koan:  What is more important?  Hardware or software?
>
> Answer:  It's all software.  It's all ordered, programatic, dynamic
> relationship, even the things which seem static and fixed are only
> that way from a certain PoV.

Reality can't be all software, else there would be no being.  That's like 
saying the shadows are more real than the creatures who cast them.

> Good news!  I am easily satisfied with whatever theory
> I hold at the moment, while remaining open to refinement.
>
> The open question is whether I will find harmony with other's
> theories or not.

I appreciate your candor, John, but the real question is: What do you 
believe?  Be true to your self.  You don't want to be a chameleon who 
changes his stripe according to the latest pronouncement.  Everyone is a 
philosopher at some level.  You have an analytical mind and, I assume, 
discriminating taste.  Test your values and see what works for you.  That's 
the only way to be intellectually--and spiritually--satisfied.

Essentially yours,
Ham