[MD] The Word is Not the Thing

[skutvik at online.no]

Platt, Andre   .... Anthony again.
  
For Platt:  You shouldn't be a relative of William Holden? ;-)  I recently 
purchased some golden age films digitalized, among those "Picnic" 
with the said character plus Kim Novak.  Also "The Wild Bunch" with 
Holden, Borgnine, Ryan, and some other, Holden more haggard but 
still going strong.    

To continue with your message of 14 Sep. (after recovering from the 
shock of delight seeing (once again) Pirsig inadvertently or not 
affirming the SOL. 

Platt continued:
> Or, as my old college textbook on semantics says, "The word is not the
> thing."  A map is not the territory, a menu is not the food, a
> pointing finger is not the moon.

Your college textbooks surely were SOM -steeped.

> Obvious? Of course. But I easily forget. I forget the independence of
> symbols from the experiences symbolized. I fail to remember that the
> differences between actual and symbolic experience are great. I am not
> at risk of being killed by watching a movie like "The Longest Day;" 
> don't feel the cold while reading about the Antarctic. 

Does it mean that you tend to forget the symbol/what's symbolized 
distinction as if normally unaware of it? I would say that we are told by 
intellect to believe"that the twain shall never meet" because it is a S/O 
as good as any.     

> And so it is with the MOQ. It's intellectual pattern contained in ZAMM
> and Lila is the map at the intellectual level. Dynamic quality
> experience is the territory. Many focus on the former and call it the
> MOQ. Bo focuses on the latter and calls it the MOQ. Like the heads and
> tails of a coin, both are right. 

Hmmm, lets see what Andre says. 

> 'As a description of reality it's a static intellectual pattern. As
> the central reality it's Dynamic -- beyond words.' (Pirsig) 

> How does this 'conclusion' differ from Anthony's 'official' version
> (posted a little while back) that there two ways of 'tackling' the
> MoQ...the static and the dynamic one?
     
"Beyond words" indicates MOQ's fundament to be Quality/Words 
which leads to the Quality/MOQ meta-metaphysics. Let's see if 
Anthony has something to say here.  

Platt again: 
> Here we battle over interpreting the map. At the same time as we write
> to express our views, we  engage Dynamic quality.   I'm sure others
> have reached this conclusion before and may have presented it here. For
> me sometimes  the dawning comes late. 

IMO the map/terrain - along with words/reality, symbols/experience, 
abstract/concrete ... etc. etc. - are all S/Os and as such NOT 
fundamental. Maps can change terrain, words can alter reality,  
symbols can kill  ... those who believe in it and that's the point. Intellect 
has liberated existence from the social level's superstition. Yet if there 
was no S/O before intellect it means there is none in the MOQ 
generally. I bet you ask for examples of maps changing terrain? The 
Panama Canal builders had maps over what it was to look like, and by 
intermediaries these changed this terrain.

> As always, I could be wrong. 

Me too

Bodvar