[MD] Intellect vs. Intellectualism

[Platt Holden]

On Sun, Nov 28, 2010 at 1:00 PM, John Carl <ridgecoyote at gmail.com> wrote:

> Taking up thee task at hand, (and it's been a long-running battle)
>
> On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 3:34 PM, david buchanan <dmbuchanan at hotmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> "You should be able to see that intellect and the flaw are two different
> things. Your task is to discover where one concept ends and the other
> begins."
>
>
> I agree.  I call the flaw, "intellectualism".  Intellect is a good thing.
> Without intellect, we'd be screwed. However, putting intellect as the sole
> value of evolution or the highest value is the stance that over-emphasizes
> the head at the expense of the heart.  Intellectualism is the name of that
> particular problem.  That is where one concept ends and the other begins.
> Therein is the reason Bo's SOL is an issue and Platt, Marsha and others
> cannot rest easy with the MoQ as it is formulated.  Because the MoQ states
> that the highest and most moral level of evolution is intellect.  This is
> wrong and immoral because it puts thinking alone in front of feeling
> whereas
> this task of ours should be to integrate heart and head; to demonstrate
> science that is not ugly, and art that makes sense.
>

Hi John
Hate to break it to you but in the Copleston papers Pirsig says, "In the
MOQ
feeling corresponds to biological quality." So SOM intellect that inhabits
the
intellectual level is still the most moral level in Pirsig's hierarchy, but
with a
fatal flaw. Feelings drop down to the biological level.

John

The common definition of intellect:
>
> "the power or faculty of the mind by which one knows or understands, as
> distinguished from that by which one feels and that by which one wills; the
> understanding; the faculty of thinking and acquiring knowledge."
>
> I've posted supporting evidence (Schlain) for the leading edge of human
> evolution being the aesthetic sense.  Pirsig himself posits rationality as
> an art and support for the idea that the artistic sense is the highest
> (closest to DQ) human mentation so it should be plainly obvious that
> unfeeling rationality is not the highest of all.  And yet, because we use a
> hierarchical model for evolution with intellect at the top, we get stuck in
> these conundrums, over and over.  Making intellect your highest value
> forces
> you logically into an intellectualism.  In this regard, the MoQ is inferior
> even to the Academy, which at least has a liberal arts arena and lets the
> two fight it out on somewhat equal terms.   The MoQ, which should have been
> a synthesizer, instead has inadvertently come down on the side of
> intellectualism with it's labeling.  And until that problem gets cleared
> up,
> I don't think we're going to get anywhere.
>
> Platt
The problems clears itself up by holding the essence of MOQ outside the
hierarchy where
it rightly belongs for it cannot be a part of itself. By "essence" (a word
Pirsig himself uses
to identify the MOQ) is, as you say, an aesthetic sense. Further, as you
correctly state,
the aesthetic sense is the leading edge of evolution. This "Quality" sense
is an inherent trait of all entities, from the lowliest atom to the highest
artistic genius.

I suppose you can call this sense akin to feeling. But I think it's better
to keep this finer, artistic sense apart from general crass feelings of
hunger fear, greed, jealously, etc.

In fact, I like to call this sense of the essence of things a meta-sense of
which we have many including a meta-sense of perfection, truth, harmony and
of course, value.

For example, my meta-sense of "goodness" applies to your posts. Compared to
some others they always seem "fresh" with challenging ideas.

Best,
Platt