[MD] Waving goodbye to particles

[david buchanan]

Arlo said to John:
The problem I see with YOUR view :-) is that definitions are "whatever you want them to be", can be this, can be that, who cares, hey, we don't want to be "too static". And this is fine if you are simply grooving on Quality. But a "Metaphysics of Quality" is an attempt to create at least a fairly stable pattern of value describing "Quality".  ...Again, process and artifact are entwined to be dialogically inseparable. But this is the whole DQ/SQ thing in a nutshell. What you are really saying is that the "MOQ" is DQ.   And I am saying, to that, that again you are confusing "Quality" (the undefinable) with SQ emanations from its wake (in this case, a high-quality intellectual pattern of value.) ... At this point I should restate too that I prefer Ant's (I think it was his term) use of "stable patterns of value" over "static". "Static" does imply permanence and "fixedness", where "stable" implies something that can, and does, evolve and change.



dmb says:

I think that's just right. Static patterns are not supposed to refer to something that's eternally fixed. In fact one of the most salient features of the idea is their evolutionary nature. In terms of intellectual static patterns, truth is provisional and plural. But that doesn't mean that static means dynamic and it certainly doesn't mean that stability is a bad thing. 

like I said to Steve, you don't get to decide what a word means any more than you get to decide what a buck is worth. These forms of common currency only work because they have a common meaning. That doesn't mean the value of a dollar is fixed forever but if the value fluctuated from person to person it would soon be worth nothing at all. Nobody could trust them. Nobody would trade in them. Words are like that too. There's plenty of room to be artful and expressive about what you want to say, of course, but if you want to be understood by other speakers of english then you have to  ... um ... be normal. Why is this even an issue? It just seems so bloody obvious to me. Communication of ideas is the whole game here, no? That means using the language properly, as it was so carefully explained in the Journal "Duh!". Perhaps you saw their wildly controversial article titled, "Please Say What You Mean"? I've only read the abstract, but this audacious author claims that words have recognizable meanings or definitions and he even says this is an important thing to notice about words. Can you imagine!? Where does he get the balls! I don't who this guy thinks he is, but that's just blatant fascism. He's just a freakin nord wazi, if you ska me. 

I wish I had a huge pile of words, ten million words - in small bills. I'd take my clothes off and roll around in them. I'd spend a few thousand on naughty librarians and then pay my taxes with four-letter words. Yea, then I'd be happy.