[MD] Words and Metaphysical Mysticism.

[Dan Glover]

Hello everyone

On Fri, Sep 7, 2012 at 6:37 PM, David Harding <davidjharding at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Is a nerve firing really what creates our experience of trees? Is a 'nerve firing in our heads' what creates the 'trees'?  Let me repost a quote here from Pirsig and go into this in more detail:
>
> "This is difficult to untangle. Bohr’s “observation” and the MOQ’s “quality event” are the same, but the contexts are different. The difference is rooted in the historic chickenand-egg controversy over whether matter came first and produces ideas, or ideas come first and produce what we know as matter. The MOQ says that Quality comes first, which produces ideas, which produce what we know as matter. The scientific community that has produced Complementarity, almost invariably presumes that matter comes first and produces ideas. However, as if to further the confusion, the MOQ says that the idea that matter comes first is a high quality idea! I think Bohr would say that philosophic idealism (i.e. ideas before matter) is a viable philosophy since complementarity allows multiple contradictory views to coexist."
>
> So, 'nerve's firing in our heads' is more 'matter'.   They are no more real than the trees we experience which cause those nerve's firing in our heads.  The MOQ says that where these ideas of 'trees' come from isn't random or just imaginary however.  The MOQ says that it is a *high quality* idea to think that the trees and nerve firings exist and that we give these trees and nerve firings names.  But what the MOQ reminds us is that really this is just an *idea*; like all other ideas which can be ranked based on how good they are.
>
> What do you think about this?  Is what we call 'trees' actually 'nerve firings', or are the 'trees', something else?

Dan:
Please read the Lila's Child quote again, more carefully this time.
Quality comes first, the sense of value. Our ideas grow from this. But
this isn't to say matter doesn't exist. Of course it does.

Now, read what you just wrote, David: "They are no more real than the
trees we experience which cause those nerve's firing in our heads."

Aren't you are simply reiterating that matter causes the idea of
trees? That matter comes before ideas? That is NOT what RMP is saying
in his quote above. He says Quality comes first which produces our
ideas which produces what we know as matter. Nowhere does he say
matter doesn't exist or that it is only in our heads. This is part of
the confusion that arises as a consequence of an inadequate
understanding of the MOQ, and I know that you know better.

 I cannot help but note that the Quality of your dialogue here is
markedly lower than during our discussions. What's up with that?

Dan

http://www.danglover.com