[MD] Quality as the fundamental building block of reality

[118]

Hi Tuukka,

Some little comments below to keep it lively.

On 1/5/12, Tuukka Virtaperko <mail at tuukkavirtaperko.net> wrote:
> Mark,
>
>
>> Mark said:
>>
>> One way to approach Quality is through a structural paradigm as you
>> present.  That is, Quality is an essence which comprises all in a
>> building block scenario.  There are other approaches however, which
>> are equally intuitive.
>>
>> Consider the following:  Quality is a "stimulus" from which all else
>> arises.  By stimulus, I can use the following analogy (one of many):
>> The smell of food makes you hungy.  You then go into a restaurant and
>> order a meal which you eat.  We cannot rightly say that "the smell of
>> food" is a "building block" for the restaurant or eating actions you
>> took, in that the smell of food does not comprise eating it
>> subsequently except as a stimulus.  However, without the smell of
>> food, your actions would not have happened (at least not right then).
>> Now, we can argue that "the smell of food" is a property, but that is
>> not how I am using it.  There are better analogies (I have to think,
>> however), but hopefully this one will give you an idea.
>>
>> In this manner, Quality can be seen as the stimulus for everything
>> that we experience.  Being Quality, it provides all the qualities of
>> life.  These qualities are what we can experience, since we cannot
>> experience something "directly", only its expression.  In a way, we
>> can say that it is the interaction of qualities (us an others) which
>> come from the fundamental ground of Quality.  If we ask where do these
>> qualities come from, we can say Quality.
>
> Tuukka:
> How is this MOQ different from phenomenology?

This has nothing to do with phenomenology, although it can be used to
explain phenomenology.  Quality generates experience.
>
> I think the input is romantic quality and the rest of static quality is
> classical quality.

Yes, we can use this as a useful distinction to devide Quality up.  I
have been reading your posts on that subject.  I did not want to
derail your creation as it was happening, but I will respond to these.
>
>> Mark: Another answer would be that
>> it is "qualities all the way down", which is the Buddhist approach to
>> reality.
>
> Tuukka:
> This is a logical fallacy (turtles all the way down) and Dalai Lama said
> that if science proves an aspect of Buddhism wrong, Buddhism will have
> to change.

Being a scientist, I believe science should change, not Buddhism.  In
fact science always does change so if we have to change Buddhism to
meet the demands of science, then it will be of a different flavor
every five years.  No, Buddhism cannot change, something has to be an
anchor (if we have to choose between the two), otherwise we revert
back to relativism.  Also, Buddhism does not have to change since it
does not have to abide by Western thought.  However, for Buddhism to
take hold of the West, it does have to change its analogies a bit.
Emptiness and Nothingness means something completely different here in
the West.  Nobody wants to be Empty of Money, do they?
>
>>
>> Mark:
>>
>> There are many ways to explain reality.  The Western method seems to
>> be a linear or structural mode.  This is of course what logic is,
>> which subscribes to truths.  The Hindu method is more of a circular or
>> "dance" mode, which subscribes more to narrative or rhetoric
>> (remember dialectic v rhetoric from ZAMM?).  They are different
>> enough, that a different woldview (Weltanschauung) can be had.  It is
>> often difficult to relate the two since they are formed from different
>> assumptions.  I prefer the interactive or "relational" approach rather
>> than the linear or "relative" approach.  East v West as it were.
>>
>
> Tuukka:
>
> John Wheeler was a scientist from the West, and he said a reality theory
> may not be linear, but rather, a self-excited circuit. See pages 8-11 of
> the following paper if interested:
>
> www.iscid.org/papers/Langan_CTMU_092902.pdf

Thanks for that.  Yes, I have followed Wheeler.  It is similar to God
wanting to look at himself, that is why existence, and also, humanity
was created.  (If God is everything, then why did he need to create
anything?)  I have proposed a similar analogy for Ham's Essentialism.
What you propose is a perpetual motion machine which is really what
the universe is since no energy comes in or out, but work is done.
>
> Basically, what I have done is to construct a Wheeler-style reality
> theory of the MOQ. The problem with the linear model is you can't have
> arbitrary axioms in a reality theory because that would beg the question.

Yes, I agree with you whole-heartedly.  And yes, turtles all the way
down is not satisfactory for some although it is entirely possible.
The thing about logic and axioms is that at some place there have to
be assumptions, whatever they may be.  Logic works in a circular
manner so that the assumptions are proven through the logic which came
from them.  (Please note, that I am not denegrating philosophy the
same way in which Wittgenstein tried to).   Since any metaphysics is a
creative process, this is not a problem.  That is, it is not a problem
unless we want it to be more than that.  As I have said many times,
there is nothing to find, but plenty to create.  This is dealt with on
Page 33 of your link.  So, I say, onward with your Wheelerian MoQ!

Did you know that life is a process of self-assembly?

This all reminds me of the MC Escher print of a hand drawing itself.
See http://www.mcescher.com/Gallery/back-bmp/LW355.jpg

Cheers,

Mark
>
> Thanks for your response!
>
> -Tuukka
>
> PS. If you want to read about my theory, see: http://www.moq.fi/?p=120
> and http://www.moq.fi/?p=166 .
>
>
>
>>
>> On 1/5/12, Tuukka Virtaperko<mail at tuukkavirtaperko.net>  wrote:
>>> All,
>>>
>>> Let's suppose no philosophy besides the MOQ ever existed. What, then,
>>> would it mean to state that everything is Quality?
>>>
>>> If "being Quality" is the property of any thing, the following question
>>> will arise: which one is more fundamental - that thing or its property
>>> of being Quality?
>>>
>>> Yet, if you can't identify the properties of everything, you can't
>>> really state anything about it.
>>>
>>> Of course there are also other philosophies than the MOQ, such as SOM.
>>> Therefore, it is reasonable to say that "everything is Quality", because
>>> this conveys the idea that anybody who says so wishes to discuss
>>> philosophy from the viewpoint of the Metaphysics of Quality, and not
>>> from the viewpoint of some other doctrine. But if other doctrines would
>>> not exist, I don't know what it would mean to say that "everything is
>>> Quality". It's not, in a strict sense, a philosophical statement. It's
>>> mostly an instruction for humans to choose the right tradition of
>>> discussion from multiple alternatives.
>>>
>>> -Tuukka
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