[MD] Idealistic static value patterns

[Tuukka Virtaperko]

[continued from part 1]

Part 2 didn't go through before I removed a certain formatting...



> Tuukka said earlier:
> My first intuition is that stating Quality to be normative can only be
> true if it means, that because everything is by definition Quality, the
> property of being Quality is normatively defined. This can be a valid
> thing to say. But it can lead to conflicting use of terminology.
>
> If you were to say that everything is normative, and I were to refer
> to the descriptive pattern systems (idealistic and physicalistic) as if
> they were not normative (to distinguish them from the normative
> patterns) we would appear to disagree with each other. Apparently
> we don't, but our choice of words would make it seem so.
>
> Matt:
> Yeah, I suppose Quality ipso facto being normative isn't an entailment
> of the notion of value.  I treat it as such because I think the only way
> to separate value from normativity is to reinstate a faculty psychology
> with an epistemological power of intuiting values.  I have no use for
> such a notion of intuition.  Value is not sensuous the way pleasure is,
> and if it were, it would run afoul of Sellars' Myth of the Given.  I've
> put this into terms that should seem heretical to some of Pirsig's
> formulations, but this is a problem I have with some of Pirsig's
> formulations.  (Whether or not this particular heresy gets me thrown
> out of the Church of Pirsig is something I disagree about with other
> disciples.  I can't see that Pirsig would throw me out for it.)
>
> As for your juxtaposition of descriptive and normative, this indeed has
> been a problem in the philosophy of language.  For much of the first
> half of the 20th century, linguistic moral philosophy consisted in trying
> to reduce the normative/evaluative to the descriptive (the paradigm
> of which is emotivism).  Recently, however, there's been a rising tide
> of post-Fregeans (of which Robert Brandom is my hero) who have
> tried to show, rather, that the descriptive mode is a subset of the
> normative mode.  For Brandom, what this means is that the
> normative is conceptually prior to the descriptive.  This doesn't mean
> that the descriptive disappears or is reduced to the normative, or that
> we can't still understand the two of them separately (by contrasting
> them, which is the problem you specifically pointed out).  What it
> does mean is there must be norms already in place for there to be
> descriptions.  Brandom calls this "the primacy of the practical," and
> finds its source in Kant and its paradigmatic philosophical wellspring
> in the classical American pragmatists.

Tuukka:
Has someone said you should be thrown out?

Hmm... an interesting philosophical development. But I think those, who 
argue about that, have misunderstood the question. There's nothing to 
argue about, because the normative can be constructed from the 
descriptive, but the descriptive can also be constructed from the 
normative. Only the way of construction is different. I think it is 
strange that these people expect only either one of them to be correct, 
with the consequence that the other is not correct. They should 
seriously question their assumption that both are not correct. If they 
still want to portray only one of them as correct, they should just 
explicate the context in which it is correct, and acknowledge that they 
have only proven it correct within that context.

> Tuukka said earlier:
> I consider "subjective quality" to be idealism, and "objective quality"
> to be physicalism. Pirsig is right in the SODV paper, if "Cartesian
> mind" is the union of romantic social quality and romantic intellectual
> quality, and "Cartesian matter" is the union of romantic inorganic
> quality and romantic biological quality. But the objective/physicalisic
> social and intellectual patterns cannot be Cartesian mind, and the
> objective/physicalistic inorganic and biological patterns cannot be
> Cartesian matter. This is because LILA's pattern system is a variant
> of emergent physicalism even though the rest of the MOQ isn't. But
> Cartesian dualism is inherently dual - not a form of emergent monism!
>
> Matt:
> I'm not sure I understand all of the distinctions you have in play, but
> let me ask you this: are you suggesting Descartes as a model for
> paralleling pattern systems?  I can't tell if you are, but your schematic
> wouldn't seem to for the simple reason of the normative pattern
> system between subjective and objective.  (I consider this a virtue, by
> the by.)

Tuukka:
In my theory, I see three at least remotely possible alternatives for 
interpreting Cartesian dualism:

1. Cartesian dualism is subjective patterns and objective patterns. 
(This is what you find me to suggest.)
2. Cartesian dualism is romantic subjective quality and romantic 
objective quality.
3. Cartesian dualism is romantic quality and classical quality.

Option 1 is isomorphic to option 2, because subjective quality and 
objective quality are forms of classical quality that are isomorphic to 
their romantic counterparts. Option 2 is also isomorphic to option 3, 
because romantic subjective quality is isomorphic to classical quality. 
Therefore, it could even be argued, that Cartesian dualism is neither 
option 1, 2 nor 3, but the isomorphism between all of them or some of them.

My understanding of Cartesian dualism is limited, and I do not know 
which one of these alternatives is correct. But the functionality of 
recursive patterns as a theory does not depend from Cartesian dualism in 
any way, so trying to place Cartesian dualism in the theory is not of 
primary importance, although it is interesting. I would like a 
professional philosopher with proper education to do that, because there 
are plenty of such people around compared to how many people there are 
around, who can do this kind of work on the MOQ. There would be many 
like me, if formal education on the MOQ were available somewhere in the 
world, but it isn't. I do also study mainstream philosophy, but I'm 
currently studying the problem of induction.

One thing I do know about Cartesian dualism, though, and that is it's a 
dualism. Not an emergent monism, like Pirsig portrays it. Pirsig's 
mistake is so simple I feel uncomfortable saying this.



> Tuukka said earlier:
> In any case, LILA features neither separate pattern systems nor a
> bidirectional pattern system, at least not in clear terms, so if their
> existence is to be stated clearly, that must be done in some other
> work.
>
> Matt:
> I still can't help but wonder whether you're still slighting the
> conceptual capabilities of the Metaphysics of Quality as Pirsig
> elaborated it in LILA.  I think the very notion of an "intellectual
> pattern" is capable of a lot more work then you might be giving it
> credit for.  I would consider, as an example, your elaboration of the
> normative dimension to be a static intellectual pattern.  Pirsig's goal
> wasn't to elaborate all intellectual patterns, or even all the ones he
> conceptually needs, but rather to elaborate the metaphysical
> dimension needed to hook in an evolutionary story of existence.  For
> such a _naturalist_ story, "inorganic" goes at the bottom.  But with
> "intellectual" at the top, it gives you the expressive power to add as
> many more as you need.  At the very least, it is a skeletal frame I
> haven't seen anyone seriously doubt.  (I don't count Bo Skutvik as
> having done so, and I also don't count myself and others who
> seriously considered the idea that the social/intellectual distinction
> had problems.  And besides, I've also come to think that that
> distinction is even needed.)

Tuukka:
 From the viewpoint of the physicalistic pattern system, it is true that 
the normative pattern system is an intellectual pattern. But it would 
also be possible to construct a philosophy, in which there is only 
romantic quality, idealistic quality and normative quality. It would of 
course be quite incomplete, but history has proven many people can live 
their lives in such incomplete systems. For example, many people 
seriously claim they are materialists, or that they are idealists. They 
are considered perfectly sane and can do important scientific work, even 
though their metaphysical understanding is downright primitive compared 
even to the MOQ introduced in ZAMM.

What happens, if we construct a philosophy, in which there is only 
romantic quality, idealistic quality and normative quality? Well, in 
this philosophy there is no intellectual pattern, because the 
intellectual pattern is a physicalistic pattern. So even though the 
intellectual pattern is capable of constructing the normative pattern 
system, it is not necessary for it. The normative pattern system could 
also be constructed from the idealistic pattern system, with no aid 
whatsoever from the physicalistic pattern system.

Because of this reason, I am not slighting the conceptual capabilities 
of the physicalistic pattern system. But please bear in mind the following:

-The normative system can be constructed from the physicalistic system 
without the help of idealistic system
-The normative system can be constructed from the idealistic system 
without the help of the physicalistic system
-Even if we have the idealistic system, or the physicalistic system, or 
both, we have not necessarily constructed the normative system.

This means the normative system is a separate entity and should be 
introduced as such. Pirsig can be interpreted to implicitly introduce it 
by introducting the intellectual pattern, but such an introduction is 
obviously incomplete in the sense that it does not state all essential 
information. I'm almost certain I do not state all essential information 
either, but I state more information than Pirsig.

Pirsig's goal may have been to elaborate the metaphysical dimension 
needed to hook in an evolutionary story of existence. And I require no 
more of him. But two decades have passed, and apparently nobody has done 
the kind of work I'm doing here? I'm not doing this to bloat my ego. I'm 
doing this because I love it. And I could maybe share this love with 
some others. I have no intention of devaluing Pirsig, or thinking 
derogatory thoughts about him. But please understand that I have spent 
six years working on something Pirsig did, and I have often been working 
full-time, such as, eleven hours per day. I think everyone must regard 
it as obvious I value Pirsig's work highly, and that it would be 
ridiculous to suggest that I do not do so. But I will not pat him in the 
back, because to do so would not be a philosophical statement.

I do not care what Pirsig's goal was. Even if I do, my work is not about 
finding out whether Pirsig succeeded in his goal. I have different goals 
and I am interested about them. But the MOQ community is conceivably a 
place where I might find people with similar goals, because my work is a 
derivative of Pirsig's MOQ. That is why I am here. So please do not 
defend Pirsig's theory any more because I am not here to attack it.

The work I am doing is complicated, and many in the MOQ community will 
not understand it, and they wish to consider themselves as followers of 
the MOQ despite that. I think that is fair. But because it is not 
impossible to reach some sort of a consensus about whether my 
complicated add-on is correct, I would only be a sulky pessimist if I 
didn't even come here to present it. Perhaps this consensus would be 
limited to some people, who have put a lot of effort into working on 
this, and perhaps they would later form their own esoteric circles. But 
if I don't come here at all, there was not much point in me doing this work.

Even if esoteric circles are later formed, it would remain to be seen 
whether the people in those circles are considered as people who discuss 
the MOQ at such a deep level it does not interest the more casual 
majority, or whether that group is considered as a bunch of people who 
are wrong and banned, such as the SOL people. So there are many possible 
outcomes here. Outright lack of interest to recursive patterns is also a 
thinkable outcome, although pretty much the "whimper" instead of the 
"bang". But then I'd better move on.

Please do also note, that the normative patterns are not added on top of 
the intellectual pattern.

Wait a second.

That is actually a pretty interesting idea. I'll have to think about it. 
It would lead to a circular, unified pattern system that would be 
morally bidirectional. I'll have to think about this, and whether it 
makes any sense upon scrutiny. Thank you.

If this works, the patterns system will become circular, and there will 
be no way to prevent Cartesian mind emerging from Cartesian matter, and 
the opposite. That means if Cartesian dualism is placed in the pattern 
theory, it will cease to be decisively dual. If this works, it will 
become more like a matter of opinion whether Pirsig is right in the SODV 
paper. To be sure, he still wouldn't appear to know why he's right.

I doubt anything written about Cartesian dualism will be complicated 
enough (but surely boring nevertheless!) to explain where it should be 
included in this kind of an extremely recursive theory. Would be nice to 
be proven wrong, though.

I don't think Skutvik or the "social/intellectual-problemists" seriously 
doubted the MOQ. They just wanted to work out some details. The 
social/intellectual distinction is not absolutely necessary, but even 
though I am aware of the existence and perceived importance of this 
debate, I have not myself understood what was the problem to begin with. 
Saying this could open the can of worms, but I should be honest about 
where I am.

Best,
Tuukka