[MD] Awareness and consciousness in the MOQ

[John Carl]

Dr. Ant,

I've heard this assertion before, and refuted it before but a little
reiteration can sometimes be a good thing.


On Apr 10, 2012, at 9:49 AM, Ant McWatt <antmcwatt at hotmail.co.uk>
>
> Ant McWatt comments:
>
> That's a good selection of philosophers/philosophy that you have cited there Mark and you're correct they all have covered areas that Pirsig examined later on but, as I said previously, none of them put values ahead of subjects and objects in the empirical train of events or/and added that these values are evolving and can be ordered in a moral framework.  That is original to Pirsig.

There is one other philosopher that I know of, who preceded Pirsig
with a refutation of SOM, a relatively unknown guy today - Josiah
Royce. He uses a different terminology than Pirsig, of course, he
calls SOM Realism, to designate the idea that the objects of our
perception or imagination have a completely independent from us
reality of their own.  He critiques this theory of being, along with
three others in his The World and the Individual.

I suggest you check it out if you don't believe me.  It's readily
available on the web and contains many fascinating insights that
coincide with the MoQ and some that expand upon it marvelously.   Some
quotes so support my assertion:

"to be real means to be independent of an idea or experience through
which the real being is, from without, felt, or thought, or known. And
this, I say, is the view best known as metaphysical Realism, the view
which, recognizing independent beings as real, lays explicit stress
upon their independence as the very essence of their reality"

"And now for some hint of the historical fortunes of Realism. I have
pointed out how wide-spread is this realistic conception of Being in
the history of philosophy. I may now add that I think that this
conception has never been held wholly alone, and apart from other
conceptions of reality, by any first-rate thinker."

An important point he makes illustrating why SOM has such a
stranglehold upon the Academy :

"Accordingly, in the history of thought, Realism is the metaphysic of
the party of good order, when good order is viewed merely as something
to be preserved. Hence the typical conservatives, the extreme Right
wing of any elaborate social order, will generally be realistic in
their metaphysics. ".

An interesting aside as to why Phaedrus was so vehemently persecuted...

"The realist is fond of insisting upon the “sanity” of his views. By
sanity he means social convenience. Now reflective thinking is often
socially inconvenient. When it is, the realist loves to talk of
“wholesome” belief in reality, and to hurl pathological epithets at
opponents. It is thus often amusing to find the same thinker who
declares that reality is quite independent of all merely human or
mental interests, in the next breath offering as proof of his thesis
the practical and interesting “wholesomeness ” of this very
conviction."

An Illustration of why I deem SOM the kindergarten of the 4th level...

"Yet Realism, if indeed strictly sane, as sanity goes amongst us men,
is a view as falsely abstract as it is convenient. This sundering of
external and internal meaning is precisely what our later study will
show to be impossible. As a shorthand statement of the situation of
the finite being, Realism, laying stress as it does upon our vast and
disquieting inadequacy to win union with the Other that we seek, is a
good beginning of metaphysics. As an effort to define determinateness
and finality, it is a stage on the way to a true conception of
Individuality and of Individual Beings. As a summary indication of the
nature of our social consciousness, and of our social world, Realism
is indeed the bulwark of good order. For good order, in us men,
practically depends, from moment to moment, upon abstractions, since
we have at any one instant to think narrowly in order to act
vigorously. But viewed as an ultimate and complete metaphysical
doctrine, and not as a convenient half-truth, Realism, as we shall
find hereafter, upon a closer examination, needs indeed no external
opposition. It rends its own world to pieces even as it creates it. It
contradicts its own conceptions in uttering them. It asserts the
mutual dependence of knowing and of Being in the very act of declaring
Being independent. In brief, realism never opens its mouth without
expounding an antinomy."


Take Care,

John