[MD] SOM Problem #6523213: Relativity and Truth

[David Harding]

Hi Marsha,

To me it appears that you are conflating static quality with change and in my opinion, through doing so you have unintentionally destroyed the Metaphysics of Quality.  I'll explain...

Firstly, you're insisting on static quality being 'impermanent' and 'relative' to stress the importance of how 'Dynamic Quality is going to change things anyway' but by changing your definition of static quality this has actually inadvertently defined Dynamic Quality.   Static quality is fixed quality. Everything you can define and point your finger at is static quality.  Without Dynamic Quality, static quality gets old and dies. This is a core part of the first division of the MOQ. A single first Metaphysical split only works when a clear line is drawn as to what happens in the absence of another thing otherwise there is no definition. 

To this you may respond. "Of course without Dynamic Quality, static quality gets old and dies. That's why I insist on everything being relative and static quality being impermanent.'  But let me repeat.   Static quality in the absence of Dynamic Quality gets old and dies.   It doesn't get better. It doesn't improve. It gets old and dies. You cannot use word tricks, or mind tricks to get around this. You cannot 'outwit' Dynamic Quality. Because Dynamic Quality isn't anything. See?

> SOM has more than a few problems; especially the implication that entities are things-in-themselves. If every SOM statement is tossed out, we'd be left with very few.  Who will choose which statements go and which statements stay?  Should choice be based on a cultural bias?  
> 
> The statement 'All swans are white', 'All dogs are mean' or 'All anything is anything', for that matter, hane a problem from the subject-object perspective.  It's an inductive problem at the very least.  "Truth is relative" from a MoQ perspective works quite well.

I agree, I have a problem with the statement 'All swans are white', no matter what your perspective.  In that case, I think that 'truth is relative, so we don't really know what's true' is a SOM statement.   'Truth is relative' does work from a MOQ perspective, however that comparison between two truths only exists once the comparison is made.  It is not necessary in order for those two truths to exist. 

> To say static patterns are relative is to say static pattern exist dependent on other static patterns.

But how can you prove this? What is it exactly you are saying here? Why is this 'relativity' so important? As stated previously, I don't think that truth must be 'relative' in order for it to exist.  In fact, I think that comparing two truths is simply creating another pattern, independent of whatever it is that you're comparing.

> Static patterns of value are processes, conditionally co-dependent, impermanent, ever-changing and conceptualized, that pragmatically tend to persist and change within a stable, predictable pattern.  Within the MoQ, these patterns are categorized into a four-level, evolutionary, hierarchical structure:  inorganic, biological, social and intellectual. Static quality exists in stable patterns relative to other patterns.  Patterns exist relative to innumerable causes and conditions (patterns), relative to parts and the collection of parts (patterns), relative to conceptual designation (patterns). Patterns have no independent, inherent existence.  Further, these patterns pragmatically exist relative to an individual's static pattern of life history.  

I agree with all this except for the conditional co-dependence and the emphasis on how some patterns are 'relative' to others.  Fundamentally, patterns don't exist but here we are Marsha, talking now.  Good patterns have great harmony.  Two good patterns don't need to be 'relative' to one another in order to exist.  All we can say is that they do exist and that's better than nothing.  Right Marsha?

> In the MoQ there are Dynamic Quality/static quality.  Static patterns of value are categorized by their function: inorganic, biological, social & intellectual.  From a MoQ point-of-view there is no categories differentiating between ''truth of something' and 'thing itself'.  What is known to us is static patterns.  If the term 'truth' is to be used it can only represent the conventional-static-provisional existence of patterns.  We can drop the word truth:  no relative truths or pragmatic truths.  That is what is meant by conventional (relative) truths being labeled illusion, anyway.

Truth is intellectual quality.  It's no different that what you find in a dictionary.  

That which is true or in accordance with fact or reality: "tell me the truth".

e.g. An Intellectual description of reality (value).

> Static patterns of value are ever-changing, whether representing the inorganic, biological, social or intellectual category.  Static patterns are NOT some concrete, abstract ideal ala Plato, unless you've misunderstood the MoQ.  Seems to me it is a lack of paying attention that make patterns appear changeless.  

Here is your response to my mistake of claiming that static quality is permanent. I agree - it isn't.  Static quality is not permanent, however it doesn't get any better in the absence of Dynamic Quality - it gets worse and dies.

>> In order for static quality patterns to change, that requires Dymamic Quality.  From the perspective of Dynamic Quality, or enlightenment, there are no patterns.
> 
> Static patterns change because of Dynamic Quality.  Patterns, conceptual and perceptual, are overlaid onto Dynamic Quality (as some have tried to explain within the constrictions of language).

You cannot explain it and by doing so you define Dynamic Quality and destroy the Metaphysics of Quality.  There's so much conflating of Dynamic Quality with change going on.  I even inadvertently did it when I suggested that static patterns are permanent.   But doing so destroys the Metaphysics of Quality.  I shudder at thought of defining Dynamic Quality.  It should not be defined. 

> They are not the same for even one moment, but they change within a stable, predictability.

Yes, they 'change' but this change is Not Dynamic Quality. This is what destroys the Metaphysics of Quality. 

> Imho, of course,  

Oh but of course,

-David.