[MD] Bo vs. Bob
MarshaV
valkyr at att.net
Sat Jul 17 08:08:17 PDT 2010
Ron,
I am not much concerned with Aristotle
since it would be too easy to translate ancient
greek by modern points-of-view. Scholars are
still arguing what is the proper interpretation.
Marsha
On Jul 17, 2010, at 10:56 AM, X Acto wrote:
> Metaphysics
>
> that which comes after physics
>
> regarding the complete works of Aristotle.
> as it sat in the library of Alexandria.
>
> Aristotle called it a collection of class notes
> concerning the theory of explanation.
>
> a misnomer
>
> on a collection of works most philosophers have not read.
>
> so how can one make a comment about any of it.
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: MarshaV <valkyr at att.net>
> To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
> Sent: Sat, July 17, 2010 1:27:33 AM
> Subject: Re: [MD] Bo vs. Bob
>
>
> Greetings,
>
> Seems to me the subject line is a setup!
>
>
> Marsha
>
>
>
> p.s.
>
> met·a·phys·ics - Philosophy The branch of philosophy
> that examines the nature of reality.
>
>
>
>
> On Jul 16, 2010, at 8:44 PM, Matt Kundert wrote:
>
>>
>> Hi John,
>>
>> John said:
>> The thing is, we're born at the top of the mountain. All the
>> paths (intellectual games and religions) lead DOWNWARD,
>> away from the top of the mountain from that point.
>>
>> Matt:
>> That is an interesting gestalt switch. I think it's _misleading_,
>> but that's because I think the kind of "back to origins!"
>> rhetoric that is latent in almost every religious and intellectual
>> tradition is misguided (the kind of rhetoric that has us talking
>> about how DQ the baby is). What about this: being born is
>> like falling from the sky, out of nowhere, to the ground.
>> Being intellectual is climbing that mountain, or building that
>> Tower of Babel, trying to get back to what you imagine as
>> the origins. The misleading bit of the very traditional Fall
>> Story is that there is somewhere to get back to. I think the
>> better part of 2500 years of Western philosophy has taught
>> me that there's no there there. The climb up the mountain is
>> real, as is the process of climbing into a culture (the length
>> of the "fall"), but there is no heaven (which has its parallel in
>> the Eastern notion of Enlightenment) where you completely
>> evacuate your connection to "fallen" life, the world. I think
>> that's just a specific kind of effect created, like everything
>> else, from a specific kind of connection to the world.
>>
>> John said:
>> As far as the point that intellect = SOM, I agree completely
>> with Bo. That's just the definition of the term and the
>> metaphysical reality of the concepts. Intellect is only half
>> the evolved human consciousness, however, and Pirsig
>> calling the 4th level "intellectual" was due to Pirsig's
>> particular blind spot - the one that Phaedrus hated and
>> overthrew in ZAMM.
>>
>>> From my perspective today, (and I'd claim from the snip of
>> the Oxford DVD that Mary shared, Pirsig's as well) It should
>> have been called something indicating the
>> Intellectual/Artistic continuum and perhaps we wouldn't
>> have suffered so much conflict and strife in our attempt at
>> making this map back up the mountain.
>>
>> Because Intellect IS SOM. Make no mistake about that.
>>
>> Matt:
>> Might you more systematically deploy the kinds of
>> definitions you are using for your terms. Because,
>> argumentatively speaking, you beg the question about
>> whether intellect is SOM or not when you define it that
>> way. The obvious response is, "Well, of course 'intellect is
>> SOM' if you _define_ it that way. What if you don't?"
>> Which means we need to talk about what parts of reality
>> are being picked out by our terms, and then whether they
>> fit together in the specified kind of way (and then whether
>> Pirsig also thinks they fit together in the specified kind of
>> way).
>>
>> For example, do you differentiate between a
>> "subject/object distinction" and a "subject/object
>> metaphysics"? That'd be a good place to start. And then,
>> "how do you define metaphysics and the performance of
>> that activity (if it is an activity)?"
>>
>> You seem to be saying that you wish the levels had been
>> named Inorganic/Biological/Social/Consciousness, with
>> the top level broken into, roughly, Classic and Romantic,
>> as Pirsig had it in ZMM. Right? If that is so, then--moving
>> to Pirsig interpretation--you'd need to defend the notion
>> that in ZMM (or, in some other complicated inferential
>> pattern based on what he's said), Pirsig defined "classic"
>> as "SOM." That doesn't strike me as true, but I haven't
>> read ZMM in a long while (and have no complex
>> interpretational pattern on hand). The interpretation of
>> "the S/O distinction as classic" strikes me as decent, but
>> I'd need to know more about what you mean by
>> "metaphysics," and how you differentiate (or relate)
>> Pirsig's enemy in ZMM (dialectic) to his enemy in Lila
>> (SOM), and both to how you perceive a reconstruced,
>> I've-successfully-defeated-my-enemy version of any of
>> these items (i.e., are you saying there's no difference
>> between SOM before and after any critique of it?).
>>
>> These, I think, might be some of confusions that haunt
>> appreciation of what ideas hide in the slogan
>> "intellect=SOM."
>>
>> Matt
>>
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