[MD] self: agent of action & thinker of thoughts

[MarshaV]

On Aug 17, 2011, at 12:48 PM, Arlo Bensinger wrote:

> [Marsha]
> While the way discussion has been framed, the 'self' does seem to be an intellectual static pattern of value. But I'd like to remind you that within the MoQ the self is also a collection of organic, biological, social and intellectual static patterns of value:
> 
> [Arlo]
> This isn't quite what I meant, and I don't think I said the "self" is an intellectual pattern of value. I said it is a pattern of value (what else is there, other than DQ?), and of course with a MOQ a higher pattern ipso facto consists of the lower patterns that support it.
> 
> What I'd say is that your "description" of "self" is an intellectual pattern of value, but like other descriptions can point outside the intellectual level. For example, I could define the "self" as the "human body", in which case the "intellectual pattern of value" (which is the definition) points to a biological pattern of value (the human body).
> 
> And, yes, I think we use the self pattern of value to make sense of inorganic, biological, social and intellectual activity. In some contexts it is useful to think of the "self" as bounded by the biological body ("You stepped on my foot", for example), while at other times we dismiss this (when I had my appendix removed, I didn't feel as if any part of "my self" was removed). When a skydiver is falling out of an airplane suddenly the "self" as rooted in inorganic patterns is intensely salient (gravity matters).
> 

Marsha:
RMP has called an autonomous self is an illusion,  In Lila he states: "This self-appointed little editor of reality is just an impossible fiction that collapses the moment one examines it."  And in Lila's Child he states that the MoQ "denies any existence of a “self” that is independent of inorganic, biological, social or intellectual patterns. There is no “self” that contains these patterns."   Statically, conventionally, and for that matter linguistically, from any of those point-of-view, it is illusory.  Call it remnants of the subject-object point-of-view if you like.   

At least that is how I understand it.   I'm not sure how far apart are our views.   
 
 
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