[MD] Moving On

[Tuukka Virtaperko]

Mark, Ian, all,

> Mark:
>
> My "thesis" is similar to yours.  As I see it, MoQ is a Western
> interpretation of a perennial philosophy.

Tuukka:
Agree. Ecspecially taking DQ into account, the MOQ has an origin in 
tribal-scale mysticism, with elements that have not been integrated into 
Western philosophy, but have been seemigly independently discovered in 
various parts of the world.


> Mark:
>
> I too do not want to get into a debate on what the intellect is
> because this simply misdirects one as to what is being accomplished
> here.

Tuukka:
There is some superficial inconsistency in the use of "intellect" 
between ZAMM and LILA. I don't think that inconsistency is a problem. In 
ZAMM, there's at least one passage in which Pirsig seems to be saying, 
that intellect is classical quality. But "intellect" is such a common 
word I don't think one can make out much of a contradiction by pointing 
out that in LILA, "intellect" means something else. My opinion is, that 
this "inconsistency" is so simply explained away, that it isn't much of 
a point of debate. At the time of writing ZAMM, Pirsig probably did not 
expect to have a use for the word "intellect" as a specific metaphysical 
term.


> Mark:
>
> As I have stated in previous posts, it is very difficult to
> distinguish between the conceptual and the preconceptual.  It would
> appear that the line is drawn by the social level.  That is, once we
> share something it becomes "conceptual".

Tuukka:
If we use ZAMM's definitions of "conceptuality" and "preconceptuality", 
they mean "classical quality" and "romantic quality", respectively.

If we use LILA's definitions of "conceptuality" and "preconceptuality", 
they mean "static quality" and "Dynamic Quality", respectively.

We ought not have contradictory definitions for concepts, because in 
real life discussions we will not remember to specify whether we are 
speaking the language of ZAMM or the language of LILA.

Therefore, I propose that we define "conceptual" as "classic quality". 
Set theoretically, such a definition would be an intersection of the 
different notions of conceptuality in ZAMM and LILA. "Preconceptual" 
could well mean "not classical quality", that is, romantic quality and 
Dynamic Quality.

However, regardless of whether we use ZAMM's or LILA's terminology, I 
find that your proposal here is, frankly, not well in accordance with 
the MOQ. The patterns, which are static quality, are conceptual with 
regards to their classic part, but preconceptual with regards to their 
romantic part. If they were only conceptual, they would not refer to any 
observable phenomena, and the MOQ would thus not be empiricist. If they 
were only preconceptual, we could not discuss them.

Thanks for your input,
Tuukka