[MD] The other side of reified

[Ham Priday]

David and Ron --


On June 1, 2011 at 11:53AM, dmb <dmbuchanan at hotmail.com> wrote:


> I agree with Ron. Ham's key terms are so highly abstract that they don't
> even refer to anyone's actual experience. The whole system of relations
> is purely verbal, untestable in experience and unusable in life. This is 
> exactly
> what James hated most about the rationalistic philosophers, especially the
> Absolutists. Ham's Essentialism seems to be a matter of moving a few 
> pieces
> around on some metaphysical chessboard and none of those pieces makes
> contact with actual experience at any point. The game is confined to those
> 64 squares and none of the moves makes a difference to anyone or anything.
> That's vicious abstractionism. That's why reification is a real problem.
> This is an abuse of concepts and such misuse is to be avoided because it
> will lead you down a dead-end road, lead you into confusion and isolation
> and endless arguments about nothing at all.

That's an unfair criticism, David.  Actual experience is the basis of 
empirical knowledge, not metaphysical conceptualization, as you should know. 
Metaphysics is always "abstraction".  Can you cite a philosopher, other than 
Pirsig, who provided "testable" data for a metaphysical theory?   Pirsig 
defined four levels of DQ.  I suppose you don't consider this hierarchy an 
abstraction, but is it experientially testable?  If the author couldn't even 
define Quality, how could he posit his fundamental principle as a "reality"? 
And if Quality is not an abstraction, how is it that we are still arguing 
about its nature?

[DMB quoting Pirsig]:
> "Historically mystics have claimed that for a true understanding of 
> reality
> metaphysics is too 'scientific.' Metaphysics is not reality. Metaphysics 
> is
> names about reality. Metaphysics is a restaurant where they give you a
> thirty-thousand page menu and no food."
>
> "The central reality of mysticism, the reality that Phaedrus had called
> 'Quality' in his first book, is not a metaphysical chess piece. Quality 
> doesn't
> have to be defined. You understand it without definition, ahead of 
> definition.
> Quality is a direct experience independent of and prior to intellectual 
> abstractions."

Pirsig had disdain for metaphysics, so he ridiculed it as "names about 
reality", a "menu without food," etc.  What he really wanted to do was 
reduce metaphysics to the experiential level.  (Oops! ...that's one he 
didn't name.)  Oh well, we'll just equate Quality to Experience and avoid 
the need for definitions altogether.  It's a nice euphemism, but hardly a 
metaphysical thesis.

For one thing, we don't "directly experience Quality independent of 
intellectual abstractions."  Quality is an assessment of the aesthetic or 
moral value of a phenomenon relative to other phenomena experienced or 
observed.  That involves memory recall, intellectual judgment, and 
sufficient experience with the type of phenomenon in question to make such 
an assessment.  (And please don't quote me the hot stove analogy again. 
Getting one's ass burned is not experiencing Quality--high or low, positive 
or negative--it's feeling pain.)

If I'm guilty of "vicious abstractionism", your esteemed author is at least 
guilty of "extreme reifiication".
IMHO.

--Ham