[MD] Misunderstandings are driven by what we value not by the logic we use.

[David Harding]

> D. Harding said to All:
> Why does Dan not see what I'm saying? ...We have had an ongoing discussion about the MOQ for a long time now and our differences *appear* to have come down to what 'experience' is.  Dan insists that 'experience' is DQ and everything else after that - is not 'experience'.    I have said to him time and again that experience includes *both* DQ and sq.   ...But the trouble is - if all you're interested in talking about is DQ - then why are you on a philosophical discussion board?  Like Marsha, the place for Dan isn't a philosophical discussion group.  It's a Zen retreat…Zen Master Dan wrote: "You say we experience static quality. NO!!!! Not in the MOQ!"
> 
> dmb said:
> .. I don't see how this particular point is even debatable. It must be that you have different ideas about what the operative terms mean, exactly..

djh:
But that's just my point dmb.  There is a *reason* why Dan is saying that the term 'experience' is best seen as only DQ. 

As Dan himself has explained -  the insight that the world isn't composed of pre-existing subjects and objects is very profound and it appears to have had a great affect on Dan.   And indeed it is something very profound in this day and age of scientific discovery where the all powerful SOM rules so supreme it continues on without hardly ever being questioned.

So the point he is making isn't logically wrong and I've told him this many times.. But as we both know there is *more* to experience in the MOQ than just Dynamic Quality and Dan doesn't seem to want to move on from this point..  In Zen lingo he appears too attached to the idea that DQ is the source of all things..  The difference is a matter of emphasis not logic.

dmb said:
> If static quality is conceptual, to say that we don't experience static quality is to say that we don't experience concepts. But that's absurd because one cannot say anything without experiencing concepts, without using words and ideas. It's a performative contradiction wherein you're indeed doing the very thing you are denying. It would be like saying, "we do not experience words or concepts." I seriously doubt that Dan means to say anything so absurd.

djh:
Again. This is my point.  Of course he doesn't intend to say anything to absurd.  No-one on this planet intends to say anything absurd (unless of course you're an absurdist).  But our logic - it follows what we value.  Dan wants to not include sq as a part of 'experience' because he values DQ so much. That's why he is wanting to call sq 'memory of experience' and maintain that it's incorrect to say that we experience sq or that experience includes sq.  It's all because of his value of DQ. Dan values the primacy of DQ over sq so much thats all he seems to be able to focus on.. In Dans mind if we say 'something experiences something else' - then we must no longer value the primacy of DQ and so we must be making an incorrect statement.

And this isn't logically wrong - but that's the whole point of the degeneracy of the intellectual level.. It's all to do with what you value and finding a balance. 

This point seems lost.

dmb also said:
> ..That's the kind of experience we're talking about, a unconventional use of the term used to distinguish a pre-verbal immediacy from reflective thought… And this is important for overcoming SOM precisely because it takes subjects and objects as the cause of experience rather than a product of reflection, rather than concepts which has been derived from experience. Our radical empiricist are correcting a conceptual error, one known as "reification"...
> 
> This attack on subjects and objects is really why we want clarify the distinction between concepts (sq) and pre-intellectual experience (DQ). The point is to show how subjects and objects are just static concepts rather than the basic starting points of reality, to distinguish the primary empirical reality from the ways we conceptualize it. And BOTH of these elements are necessary....


djh:
Exactly. Both are necessary - but if you're not interested in static quality (or rather in talking about experience of static quality) then it's easy to throw it under the carpet because it's not logically wrong to say that it doesn't actually exist and that sq experience is just a memory. It's easy to come on here and constantly point folks to DQ when they start talking sq because DQ logically wins every time..  But is that any good?  

The place for such folks isn't a philosophical forum - it's a Zen retreat.