[MD] Thus spoke Lila

[rapsncows at fastmail.fm]

Ham,
we may be getting somewhere... but I'll keep my expectations in check
this time.
Tim


> 
>[Ham] First let me say I'm honored that you've taken the time to explore my 
> philosophy of Essence and have come up with thoughtful insights and 
> analogies by way of interpreting it.

[Tim]
Let me say, if I had come across your thesis randomly, without having
the expectation of a real discussion with you (and thank you for taking
so much of your time and effort on me too!), I'm almost sure - but not
quite sure! - that I would not have finished it.  Let me just suggest
that I think you will have the greatest success if you can meet those
you are teaching more than half way.  I don't know if you think you can
do that to success though.  Anyway, this is all just to say that I think
you should give my ideas based on 'impossibility' a close inspection. 
This is even more so if it ends up confirming your essence!

So, to reiterate, I don't see why your 'essence' is essential to you. 
Neither to your conclusions of a proprietary self, nor to your physics
of 'negation', nor to 'Value' either.  I am just suggesting that all
those conclusions might be just as reachable without 'essence'.  I have
suggest one possibility, if 'essence' were to be reduced to
'impossibility'.  BUt, you have said that you will address the reason
why 'essence' is essential.  So I'll hold off - as much as I can - until
then.  It just seems to me that it is hovering over everything else,
non-essentially.

more responses within:

> 
>[Ham] It's certainly the mindset I most frequently encounter here, although I 
> suspect the aversion to anything tainted with spirituality or "the 
> supernatural" is an impediment I confront in contemporary society, as
> well.

[Tim]
well, I think the greater part of society is open to spirituality.  You
will have to overcome their particular tastes though!  I am in
conversation with Christians from time to time, and despite the ease
with which their fundament (the perfection of the bible) can be
dismissed by many who do not share it, it is their impressive
intellectual hold on everything that comes after that which is their
strength, and what you would have to overcome.  Really, the intelligence
of their position is something to behold.  But, I can come to most of
their conclusions without their fundament - too.


> 
>[Ham] Siuce it's your right to dismiss, or even reject, the primary source as
> you see fit, I have no right to "object".

[Tim]
which is why I have not objected to your dismissing the primary source! 
;)

>[Ham]  I regard metaphysics as an attempt to theorize reality as an all-encompassing system.  Anything less is for me an incomplete thesis.  Certainly the source of creation is fundamental (the "fundament") to Essentialism.

[Tim]
then why have you replaced it?  (I hope this comes off in a nice way,
just mildly provocative.  I am trying to *spur* you to see essentialism
as I see it: either you will help me see it right, or I will help you
see it right; or, more likely, we will both see that we were not quite
right.)

> [Ham]  To ignore it as a matter of "personal preference" is tantamount to a physicist saying "I'm going to ignore the
> law of the conservation of energy because I canot submit to it happily."

[Tim]
but this is not fair from my perspective.  From my perspective it is not
I, but you who is ignoring it as a matter of personal preference.  If I
continue with your example of the conservation of energy, I see your
'essence' as a term which always sums to zero by itself, such that there
is no need for me ever to carry it in to the energy balance.  So why
burden myself with it?  I'll wait for this, just want to help you see
where I'm coming from now.

again see:

> >[Tim previously] So, it seems we can get to: "The critical point . . .that
> > conscious awareness (sensibility) and the intellect by which
> > it functions are proprietary to the individual self" without
> > (recognizing) a '..."uniform, unchanging, and limitless" Source
> > called 'essence'.

$$$$$$$$

> 
> [Ham] You see, this is another "impediment" to understanding by the Pirsigians. 
> The MoQ reduces selfness to one or more "interrelating patterns of
> Quality".  This is meaningless to me.

[Tim]
I know it is.  ...  I am wondering if it has anything to do with the big
question I have raised of your ontogeny.  IF the proprietary self is a
negate of essence, which is merely sensible of value, what good is that?
 How can one negate differ from another negate?  How can a timeless and
eternally uniform essence create different negates merely by negating
its timeless and eternally uniform self --- producing different
nothingness-es?!

and again, how does mere sensibility of value permit a nothingness to
will anything?  If we start as nothingness... and if every other
proprietary I starts as nothingness...  and we have no direct access to
essence...  from whence comes the *power* to will?

> [Ham]  If the self doesn't realize the Quality it is a 
> pattern of, where or what is the Quality?  If Quality is the "operating 
> agent" of existence, what purpose do 'I' serve?

[Tim]
wisdom would have me avoid this.  But...

first, as I understand 'realize' is part of your physics which I might
actually have to leave alone due to the fact that I only understand it
generally.  But regarding the latter, Quality is ubiquitous.  Within the
MoQ, I am not disconnected from Quality, as your proprietary I is
disconnected from essence.  While Quality produces my proprietary self
(if I am to use the language of the MoQ, to which I have not fully
subscribed), I too am Quality - or at least I have it ('Lila has
quality').  But Quality is not uniform and unchanging.  There is a
range: low Quality to high Quality.  The purpose you serve is choosing. 
Perhaps, this was a real loose treatment.

>[Ham] Epistemologically speaking, there is no such thing as unrealized quality or value.

[Tim]
remember that within the MoQ even the inorganic can realize quality.  It
doesn't take a genius.

$$$$$$$$$

> 
> [Skipping Tim's remark to Mark]

> >
> > [Tim previously] “Death is a cosmic event, merciful in its completeness, and capable
> > of redeeming Desire in the sense that (for want of a better analogy)
> > the "lover" and the "love object" are reunited in what must
> >  approximate a divine consummation.”
> 
>[Ham] I thought this Eckhartian language was an appropiate apotheosis with
> which to tie up the loose ends and round out my thesis.  Of course it's 
> euphemistic and "sentimental", as I indicated parenthetically;

[Tim]
you had me worried for a second that I had made an improper extraction
of your work.  I looked again and think I'm okay.  'Sentimentality'
wasn't the issue and I did not your parenthesis.  This death thing does
cut to the heart.  I wont touch it with a ten foot pole!  You seem to
have it all wrapped up: a reunion with essence.  IF there is no essence
though; or if rather there is 'a veiled impossibility', or
'impossibility' proper...?

>[Ham] nonetheless, I'm convinced that, as the individual's link to Essence, Value has a 
> reciprocal function that is "essential" to the overall ontology.

[Tim]
again, my perspective is that Value, and your physics of negation, your
ontology, might all be valid even if 'essence' is to go away!  Like I
said before, it seems that 'essence' is hovering over all this,
non-essentially as it were, and that there can be other formulations
that reproduce value, and your physics of negation, a proprietary I,
etc.  And I think you are missing this perspective because you are
holding on to a wordplay, that nothingness is really nothingness.


>[Ham] It's an "act of faith" only in the sense that it will never be proved by 
> empirical science;

[Tim]
it is faithe if there is a simpler explanation and essence is extraneous
to it.



> 
>[Ham] I don't like it, [equating Ham's 'nothingness' and RMP's 'Quality']

[Tim]
but I don't think you have given it a chance yet.  Listen Ham, back a
week or two ago, or whenever it was that I got frustrated with our
conversation, I got frustrated because I felt, intuitively, that you
were calling my fundament 'nothing'.  I mentioned that I thought your
fundament might rather be 'nothing' - and then I took a break.  I am
challenging you to do the same.  Or at least to see things from my
perspective now.  I don't think your monistic essence will ever gain
purchase because it is too much to hold that there can be a real
nothingness; that is, that there is a nothingness which is a negation of
essence, but it isn't really other because it is nothing.  That nothing
is something!  And if it is something, I don't see how your conception
of essence can be maintained.  But your physics of negation of a 'new
essence' might be just as valid.

>[Ham] especially as Pirsig has equated Quality to Value.

[Tim]
Pirsig never equated his Quality to your Value.  (Did he?)

and even though he did equate quality and value (he moreso equated
quality and morality), Quality was the source of quality.
 
>[Ham] Value 
> is positive, "essential", and functionally dynamic in existence.  It does 
> not "divide" -- it "affirms".

[Tim]
why can't 'divide' and 'affirm' be two sides of the same coin?  Just
like your proprietary self is an affirmed self specifically because it
is cut off... from your thesis:

"But let us suppose that the Creator in his/her infinite wisdom so
designed the world that each creature would have the privilege of living
its own reality, guided by its own unique perspective, free of the
restrictions that knowledge "beyond the experience" would impose on its
attitudes and behavior.  Supposing further that the free expression
allowed the individual in his innocence, and the attendant realization
of values not otherwise possible, were the very purpose of the Master
Plan.  Given this scenario, it should come as no surprise that the tree
of knowledge should not only be forbidden but so well concealed that
even the wisest of creatures would be at a loss to discover it.  In
deference to the atheists, I submit that the "missing clue" is our
assurance of individual Freedom, that the inscrutability of life's
meaning confirms the teleological nature of our experienced world. "

and even your physics of 'negation' suggests that 'division' is integral
to 'affirmation', no?

>[Ham] Only nothingness delineates and separates existents, just as the '/' bar 
> divides one by two in the fraction 1/2.

[Tim]
Haaaaammmmmmm?

>[Ham]  Moreover, only nothingness can be negated by Essence without impugning its absoluteness.

[Tim]
Hhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

If you can come to my side for a second... something is.  Don't worry
about impugning its absoluteness.  nothingness is impossible.  Something
that delineates and separates existents should get a proper name:
essential delineator maybe.

now, within the MoQ, I have suggested thinking of Quality as delineator:

>[Ham]  All of existence is differentiated by nothingness.
> Being itself is defined by nothingness -- it's OUR nothingness that 
> actualizes finite being from Value.

[Tim]
so, to help, I have suggested the substitution of 'Quality' for
'nothingness':

All of existence is differentiated by *Quality*. Being itself is defined
by *Quality* -- it's OUR *Quality* that actualizes finite being from
Value.

Now Ham, these words are yours but for the substitution of one string of
letters for another.  I can understand if you don't like it, but do you
hate it?  If so, Why?  Is it due to the overtones that 'Quality' is
burdened with?  Well then, why not:

All of existence is differentiated by *the essential delineator*. Being
itself is defined by *the essential delineator* -- it's OUR *the
essential delineator* that actualizes finite being from Value.

Shoot, looking at it, it seems a short bridge to the Christians too,
look:

All of existence is differentiated by *The Holy Spirit*. Being itself is
defined by *God the Father* -- it's OUR *God the son* that actualizes
finite being from Value.  (hhmmmmmmmm)


>[Ham]  "Bad faithe", Tim.

[Tim]
really?  Why?  I still don't think so.  The only reason I see is a
favorite method of bookkeeping on your end.  Or a favorite conception of
God on your end.  Why not open the door to other people too?


>[Ham] (Incidentally, why the extra "e" on faith?)

[Tim]
faithe as a verb, versus faith as a noun.  I don't much like the noun
though.

> 
>[Ham] I'm running too long, so will only quote your "better" conclusions to
> close this out.
> 
> [SNIP]
>
> > Ham,...I encourage you at least to open up to the possibility that
> > the absolute fundament can be eternal in potential, but finite in
> > actualization.
> 
> But I have, Tim!  As you quoted (in part) above, I said . . .
> 
> "Cusa reasoned that if actuality did not exist, then nothing could
> actually be.  But the being of things and their relations is what we call
> existence. Things appear; therefore actuality exists.  Possibility and actuality are 
> co-dependent in existence but coincide in the non-contradictory Source — 
> ultimate reality in which opposites like 'positive/ negative' and 
> 'being/nothing' are equivalent.

[Tim]
perhaps ...  Is this like the part in your thesis when you tried to
convince me that a jagged line segment would appear not-jagged from the
infinite?

which reminds me, I wanted to give you an example of something which can
be bounded and infinite, simultaneously, without contradiction: a
geometers ray.  Something-is appears much like this to my limited
conception.  Though it is complex, opening up in more than one
direction.  BUt, none-the-less, all bounded by the fundamental
impossibility of nothingness on the one end.

Anyway, I will await your proof of why I must submit to a
non-contradictory Source in which possibility and actuality coincide.


> [Ham] If the possibility of contradictory 
> otherness is always present in Essence and becomes actualized when there
> is 
> an awareness to experience it, then it is this actualization that we call 
> existence."

[Tim]
but I don't see why I need essence, look - one substitution (but keep in
mind the ones I used before for it too):

If the possibility of contradictory otherness is always present in
*nothingness* and becomes actualized when there is an awareness to
experience it, then it is this actualization that we call existence. ---
and I might add that that 'nothingness' would not then be nothing, but
potential.

> 
>[Ham] So, for your benefit: Essence is Absolute Potentiality.

[Tim]
but, for me, absolute potentiality is bounded by the strictly
impossible.  Will this still work for you?


>[Ham]  Existence is the actualization of Value as 'essents'.

[Tim]
and it is my perspective that essence, as you have envisioned it and
presented it, might not be necessary for existence.

> 
>[Ham] I'll get back to you shortly as to why Essence is needed for all of this.

[Tim]
I look forward to it.

> 
>[Ham] Meanwhile, thanks to both of you for giving me so much of your time.

[Tim]
and you too, for sure

> 
> Seizing the Essence,
> Ham
> 
> 

Seizing something,
Tim
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