[MD] From Psychology to Empiricism

[Andre Broersen]

  dmb quotes:
"In 'Does Consciousness Exist?', which Bertrand Russell claimed 
'startled the world', James says the answer is no. 'Consciousness is the 
name of a non-entity'. As we generally conceive of it, consciousness is 
the 'faint rumor left behind by the disappearing 'soul' upon the air of 
philosophy'. If we were to speak precisely, James says, consciousness is 
'only a name for the fact that the 'content' of experiences IS KNOWN'. 
The reason James makes this explicit break is because he has in his 
sights the old and comfortable dualisms of subject and object, spirit 
and nature, mind and matter. James argues that instead of dueling 
entities there is only process. 'I mean only to deny that the word 
(consciousness) stands for an entity, but to insist most emphatically 
that it does stand for a function'.this was not a wholly new idea for 
James. Indeed, he specifically refers back to his PRINCIPLES OF 
PSYCHOLOGY, published 14 years earlier, in which, he reminds his 
readers, 'I have tried to show that we need no knower other than the 
'passing thought'.'

Andre:
Great dmb! Compare the above with this observation:
"...one should try and imagine all things, objects of experience and 
oneself, the one who is experiencing, as just a flow of perceptions. We 
do not know that there is something 'out there'. We have only 
experiences of colours, shapes,tactile data, and so on. We also do not 
know that we ourselves are anything other than a further series of 
experiences. Taken together, there is only an ever-changing flow of 
perceptions- vijnaptimatra. Due to our beginningless ignorance we 
construct these perceptions into enduring subjects and objects 
confronting eachother. This is irrational, things are not really like 
that, and it leads to suffering and frustration. The constructed objects 
are the conceptualized aspect. The flow of perceptions which forms the 
basis for our mistaken constructions is the dependent aspect'.(Paul 
Williams,'Mahayana Buddhism',pp 83-4).

A 'knower' without anything 'known' is a contradiction in terms. The 
'objective' looking over the 'subjective' is a contradiction in terms. 
It is a fallacy, and for some here on this list to suggest that the 
intellectual level is just that: the objective over the subjective, is 
plain silly.

Marsha apparently still has not shaken the SOL interpretation and Mary 
has just found out that 'the real action might be to understand the 
empty space between the matter'.

My response is that the MOQ does just that: it suggests that we look at 
the 'events', the relationships, the space(which is not 
empty!)between... . That IS where the action is. As a matter of fact, 
that is the primary stuff. The relationships ARE the 'preferences', the 
valuations, the quality.

Yes there are dualisms. We cannot do without them. Our language is an 
attempt to assist us in making explicit these quality events, these 
relationships. The West has taken these to the extreme, indeed that 
dualims are opposed to each other and as dmb has pointed out in various 
of his references, different schools have sought different ways of 
uniting the two. Thing is; they were never 'opposed'.

I suppose in some ways 'language',a patterned series of sounds evolved 
from ritual to perform a revelatory function. It sought to 'reveal'. As 
with many rituals, we began to believe in the ritual itself and forgot 
what it sought to reveal...arete, rta... .

I had a friend around last night over a good old BBQ who can read 
Chinese and I showed him the second verse of the Tao Te Ching. The verse 
is about the 'opposites' and goes something like: 'Under heaven beauty 
is beauty only because there is ugliness'.  (this is the English 
translation) but he said: 'No, that is not what it says here in Chinese! 
Lao Tzu never said this!

What it says is, beauty IS ugliness, high IS low, front IS back etc. 
What it made clear to me is that the 'Eastern' intellectual pattern 
comprises dualisms but it is a 'no-two dualism'. In MOQ terms this may 
perhaps be likened to the intellectual/code of art dance-in-one?

Mr. Pirsig did say that LILA was written as a koan. Well, that is pretty 
close as far as my understanding of the function of a koan goes.

Anyway,this is the way I am trying to comprehend the MOQ, as it 'stands' 
i.e as a metaphysics (a static intellectual pattern of value)and as a 
guide to 'being'.