[MD] Three Hot Stoves

[Ham Priday]

Greetings, John --


Excuse me for breaking into your discussion with Dan, but I wanted you to 
know that you've won my Words of Wisdom (WOW) award for the week ;-).

You said:

> Without conceptualization, there can be no experience.
> The very essence of experience is a realization of a something
> which requires a concept of some kind.

Right on, John!  Realization is what prompts Conceptualization, from which 
experience is actuated.  You are also correct in "arguing against the idea 
of 'pure and direct' experience."  What needs to be defined is the 
"something" that is realized.  According to the MoQ paradigm, it is Quality 
(DQ), or what I prefer to call Value.  But in order to conceptualize such an 
ontology as a metaphysical principle, one must first understand
the epistemology you have so succinctly stated above.

In June of 2009 in a thread called "epistemological first musings" I said to 
you:
> My point, however, is that Essentialism is a valuistic philosophy,
> whereas the MoQ is neither valuistic nor "qualitative" because of its
> collectivist epistemology which rejects the subject.  Value exists as
> a "realization" -- specifically, the realization that there is something
> greater than one's self-awareness.  And that realization requires a
> sensible agent as its subject.

I also said:
> I sense that you are actively searching, which is commendable.
> It may take some time, but you will eventually arrive at a theory
> that resolves the enigma of existence to your satisfaction.
> You will come to sense that ontology as your supreme value.

To which you replied:
> Good news!  I am easily satisfied with whatever theory I hold
> at the moment, while remaining open to refinement.

I suspect that laissez-faire position has been crystallized over the past 
two years, John.  You appear to have unraveled the epistemology problem and 
are now expressing thoughts that support my ontology.  We do, indeed, 
realize something called Value as primary to both experience and 
intellection.  What is this Value, and where does it come from?   Perhaps 
more important as regards the MoQ, does Value exist before it is realized?

As I've said before, "unrealized value" is an oxymoron.  Only an autonomous 
agent can realize value, and the cognizant self is that agent.  Existence is 
valuistic; and Mr. Pirsig deserves full credit for advancing that precept. 
A metaphysics requires more than a qualitative foundation, however.  For if 
Value exists only where there is a sensible agent to realize it, "existence" 
infers an ultimate Source from which that Value (Quality) is derived.

We can talk about "patterned" and "unpatterned", "static" and "dynamic", 
until we're blue in the face, but all we're defining in the process is 
differentiated existence or its aggregated whole as "beingness".  Since 
beingness is the product of experience which, in turn, is dependent on 
value-sensibility, the primary Source logically must transcend existence. 
For me, that means the Source is not a 'being' or an 'existent', not subject 
to the conditions of space/time and cause/effect, but the uncreated 
Absolute.

I have posited the Absolute as "Essence" because it is essential to any 
metaphysical thesis and because it is by definition the essence of reality. 
Whatever "is" or appears to be has Essence as its primary source, even if 
nothingness differentiates it as otherness.  Without getting into the 
dynamics of negation, this is the ontology of the essentialism I have been 
espousing.

Back in 2009 you said. "I'm willing and even eager to play.  I just need 
some small agreement before knowing how to proceed."  Well, inasmuch as you 
seem to like some of what I've been saying and are basically in agreement 
with my ontology, maybe it's time we had another talk.  What's say, John?

Essentially yours,
Ham