[MD] SOL

[MarshaV]

Greetings Steve,

Bo's SOL is not something with which I agree, or disagree, for I do not
fully understand it.  I agree with Bo primarily on two issues: 1) that the
Intellectual Level should be understood as the subject/object level, and 2)
that the MoQ's dynamic/static point-of-view is best modeled as a level above
the Intellectual Level. I do not think I have much to add to my
interpretation, but I will try to explain one more time.

For me, the Intellectual Level represents patterns/processes that objectify
and manipulate abstract symbols.  From Wikipedia's entry on objectification:
"Objectification is the process by which abstract concepts are treated as if
they were concrete things or physical objects. In this sense the term is
synonym to reification."  And while within the Intellectual Level subjective
values are rejected, these objectified(reified) entities are acted upon by a
'subject'.  Voila!  Subject and objects!  Algebra and machine language are
sets of rules used by subjects to manipulate the 'objects'.  Ian very nicely
reminded me of the lecturing Physicist that said during his explanation of
the calculation to determine particle spin, that this is not just
mathematics but something "real".  There, seems to me, is a very good
example of the reification of something that is not immediately identified
as an object.   

The Quality(Dynamic/static) level is more difficult to explain because our
language has evolved with the Intellectual Level and is focused on subjects
and objects.  To me it is a point-of-view based on ever-changing,
interrelated patterned experience and undifferentiated experience,
experience all the way.  No subject and no objects, but the experience of
interconnected patterns responding to the indifferentiated.  It is at least
a leap of understanding as great as that that separates the Intellectual
Level from the Social Level, and because it represents experiencing
interconnectedness rather than the subject/object dichotomy is best modeled
as a level beyond the Intellectual Level.  

RMP's comments in LILA's CHILD seem to address a discussion with Bo that is
not entirely presented in that short chapter: Intellect as Rationality
[January 1998], so I do not consider the comments addressing my
point-of-view.  And besides I would want more than flat comments from 2003,
I would want explanation, some back and forth discussion and an opportunity
for further questions to be considered. 
 
 
Marsha    





-----Original Message-----
From: moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org
[mailto:moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org] On Behalf Of Steve Peterson
Sent: Wednesday, September 02, 2009 12:54 PM
To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
Subject: Re: [MD] SOL

Hi Marsha,

You mentioned that the only opinion you cared about with regard to Bo's 
SOL interpretation is RMP's. In fact, as Bo well knows, Pirsig did 
"rule" on the issue and not at all favorably to Bo's interpretation.

The following is from Lila's Child:

Bodvar:

Gentlemen! I must hasten to say that “rationality” wasn’t meant to 
replace static patterns

of intellect as the official name in the MOQ. The reason for 
introducing the term stems

from a thread in the early days of TLS when the evasiveness of this 
value dimension

dawned upon us. At first it was pinned down as thinking, mental 
activity, consciousness,

“mind” for short, but this really screws things up. The MOQ rejects 
mind/matter as the

fundamental division of reality so defining intellect as mind means 
lapsing back to the

SOM.

I long stuck to “Symbolic Language” (and still think it’s a good 
definition), but someone

caught the idea that intellect can be seen as rational thinking. Long 
before the Lila Squad

days, it had puzzled me greatly that Subject/Object metaphysics maybe 
viewed as the

intellectual level of MOQ! I even raised the question in a letter to 
Pirsig, but he did not

respond. [88]



Pirsig responded with this annotation:

88.     I don’t remember not responding, so it must have been an 
oversight. I don’t think the subject-object level is identical with 
intellect. Intellect is simply thinking, and one can think without 
involving the subject-object relationship. Computer language is not 
primarily structured into subjects and objects. Algebra has no subjects 
and objects.

Case closed? Of course Bo is welcome to come up with his own 
philosophy, but a subject/object level is clearly not what Pirsig means 
by the intellectual level in his MOQ. What do you think?

Best,
Steve

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