[MD] Post-Intellectualism

[John Carl]

Dan,

We've wandered whither the wind will take us on this subject of
post-intellectualism, but I think we are actually getting somewhere
now.
At least I feel like I am.  Ant's take on the Code of Art, helped me a lot.

> Dan:
> Well, I rarely if ever write what I like as I write it. I just write.

Jc:  You must be a lot pickier than me.  I aim at liking what I write
and by that I mean, it matches an internal idea of expression.  If I
didn't like it, I'd write something I did.

Dan:

> The interpretation of whether I like it or not comes later. Writing is
> a sort of zone (I suppose that's the word) where time has no meaning
> and even my 'self' tends to fade away.

Jc:  Well I don't disagree with that, it's your experience after all.
But it's not mine.  I need satisfaction in the moment.  And expressing
textually, the truth of now, makes me happy.  Satisfies.  Scratches a
certain itch.  Or I wouldn't do it.  And the entire effort is fraught
with meaning.  It's understanding meaning and creative of new meaning
and sometimes even meaningless, but in a meaningful way.  If there
isn't a meaning, then I've got nothing to say.

Dan:

 Later, when I read what has
> been written, I feel as if someone else wrote it.
>

Jc:  I think that's always true.  The accomplishments of the
individual are all in the past, and while that might be our history,
we are more in the now than our history.

Dan:

> I approach life in much the same way. If there is work to do, I do
> it... not because I like it or dislike it, but simply because it needs
> doing. I am not working to please the boss or to make money... that is
> all secondary. It is the same with my art... I don't write to sell
> books or to impress anyone or to disagree with them. All that, again,
> is secondary.
>

Jc:  Ah, I see what you mean.  Focusing in upon the primary
experience.  That sounds good.  Again, I'm not built that way.

Dan:

> What it comes down to is: either you do it or you don't. Period. It is
> as simple or complex as you make it.
>

Jc:  Sure.  And most of the time, using the scientific method on
motorcycle maintenance is over-complicating the matter.   Just like
philosophizing when you should be working.  Philosophy is the
scientific method of rhetoric, in a way.  I guess I just have a dreamy
personality.  I've been plenty of accused of that on the job.



> > Jc:  Writing can be artful, but a technical manual is constrained a
> > lot more than a novel.
>
> Dan:
> Of course creative writing is more expansive than creating technical
> manuals. Still, there are certain skill sets involved... some
> instruction manuals are better than others, right?

Jc:  I think we need to examine where this betterness lies - a manual,
the betterness is functional and in a novel its imaginative.  That's
really two distinct spheres of human endeavor.  Or differing abilities
of human intellect. Unless you happen to be RMP!  The rest of us have
to specialize.


> > Jc:  Art is taking what is in your head, and putting it on paper, or
> > canvas, or into rotisserie assemblage, but once it's out there, in the
> > world where other's can experience it it's not just in your head.
> > Likewise laws and ideas.  At the same time, the existence of a  rock
> > or an amoeba, is filtered by mental pre-conceptions also, so I'm not a
> > big fan of the "bottom levels objective, tow levels subjective" way of
> > looking at things.
>
> Dan:
> I don't think it is wise to begin dividing the world in that fashion
> either. That's what the MOQ is meant to counter - a
> subjective/objective vision that you're describing here.

Jc:  The self might be only a pattern, but it's a pattern primary to
philosophizing.  I don't see how viewing things in a S/O framework is
unwise or bad in any way.  It's the reification that's the problem,
not the conceptualization.

Dan:

It is helpful
> in elucidating the MOQ in that manner as long as it is understood the
> levels like subjects and objects are not really 'out there.' They are
> convenient shorthand symbols for arranging our ideas of the world.

Jc: Exactly.  Completely agree.  And part of that rearranging is
delineating ideas that I've chosen from those ideas forced upon me by
circumstance.  Sam Harris would have it that there is no difference
between those, but I disagree.

>
> >
> >
> >>
> >>> JC:
> >>> So is reality, but that doesn't make it
> >>> "only".  But I agree, reality is filtered through our cultural leans.
> >>> Therefore the  past is the same as reality.
> >>
> >> Dan:
> >> Again, that depends on what reality you are talking about.
> >>
> >
> > Jc:  Perceived reality.
>
> Dan:
> Who is perceiving that reality and is it objective? Can anyone perceive it?
>

Jc:  From the reality of the self to the reality of reality, we're
covering all the bases, Dan!

Now that you pin me down, I mean by "Perceived reality", a precise
philosophical term - possible experience.


> >
> >
> >
> >
> >>> JC:
> >>> But there's more to reality
> >>> than the past!  This fits so well, all of our experience and it also
> >>> illustrates DQ.  If the past is SQ, then DQ is the future.
> >>
> >> Dan:
> >> I don't think so. The future is an intellectualization based upon the
> >> past. Dynamic Quality becomes synonymous with experience in the MOQ.
> >> Direct experience comes first but it is not the future.
> >>
> >
> > Jc:  I will set this aside for now.  But I have some more thinking to
> > do on Pirsig's equation of DQ with the future in ZAMM (altho he didn't
> > know it yet of course)
>
> Dan:
> Allow me, please:
>
> "A rush of wind comes furiously now, down from the mountaintop. "The
> ancient Greeks," I say, "who were the inventors of classical reason,
> knew better than to use it exclusively to foretell the future. They
> listened to the wind and predicted the future from that. That sounds
> insane now. But why should the inventors of reason sound insane?"
>
> "DeWeese squints. "How could they tell the future from the wind?"
>
> "I don’t know, maybe the same way a painter can tell the future of his
> painting by staring at the canvas. Our whole system of knowledge stems
> from their results. We’ve yet to understand the methods that produced
> these results."
>
> Dan comments:
> Here it is... right here! How does a writer tell the future of the
> book they're writing? By staring at a blank screen, or paper if they
> are old school. There is no other way. Reason is not going to create
> anything new. That's why thinking about art only leads to dead ends.
> The thinking comes later.


Jc:  What the Greeks listened to was pneuma, which your standard new
testament calls "spirit" and I'd say equates nicely to the MoQ's DQ.
So yes, it all fits.

But then, if you say, intellect is blocking us from DQ, how are you
going to keep from getting lumped in with anti-intellectuals?  You
gotta admit, that's a toughie.



> > Jc:  I do not understand how the future can be a remnant of direct
> > experience.  The future, when brought into consciousness, is a
> > projection.
>
> Dan:
> Didn't you just answer your own question? The future is a projection,
> static quality, a remnant of direct experience.


Jc:  No, I'm seperating here the ideas about the future, which are
formed of static knowlede, etc, from the actual future that is coming,
but nobody knows what it is.  That future, is certainly not connected
to direct experience.


> >
> > Jc:  Speaking of horses, do you think we'll live to see a triple crown
> > winner in our lifetimes?  The owner of California Chrome (who lives in
> > Yuba city, less than 40 miles from me) pointed out how difficult it is
> > to race in the Belmont Stakes against rested horses.
>
> Dan:
> I wonder if he'd like some cheese with that whine of his. :-)


Jc   -)


> >> Dan:
> >> Oddly, number one is directly related to number three in that nuclear
> >> power is not a source of greenhouse gases. Are there going to be
> >> accidents? Sure. I don't think it takes a genius to figure that out.
> >
> > Jc:  He was speaking to the hubris of the post-war optimism in science
> > and technology to solve all our problems.  To the assertion that we
> > can through reason, perfect our technology.
>
> Dan:
> The few scientists that believe we can perfect technology are not
> scientists in that sense of the word. I'm guessing laypeople are more
> apt to believe in that scenario than any reputable scientist.

Jc:  Oh my yes, you laid your finger on a the pulse of a major issue
right there.
      The way scientific knowledge gets dumbed down for the use of
politicians or the masses is a big problem.


>
> >
> > Dan:
> >
> >> And so far as number 2 goes, everything in moderation. I know folk who
> >> routinely pop antibiotics every time they sneeze... smart people too.
> >> They don't seem to understand the consequences and when I say
> >> something  they look at me like I'm the crazy one.
> >>
> >> Unless we all go back to living in caves and beating each other over
> >> the head with clubs, this is the world we've got.
> >>
> >
> > Jc:  I'm  fatalistic also.  You've heard of the Tragedy of the
> > Commons?  Well today we are experiencing that tragedy.  It would be
> > nice if everybody else diminished their carbon output, but since
> > that's not gonna happen, I wanna make sure I get mine.  That's the way
> > the world ends.
>
> Dan:
> Platt? Is that you?
>

Jc:  Funny.  Good ole Platt, may he R.I.P. but I'm saying of course,
Randian self-interest magnified by technologically-multiplied effects
= Chaotic devastation eventually.

Dan:

> Think: doing more with less. I'm not fatalistic at all. The Tragedy of
> the Commons is a 19th century myth that should not be taken too
> literally. Foretelling a future based on the past fails to take into
> account new and unexpected circumstances... in other words, Dynamic
> Quality. That does not mean that the future is Dynamic Quality,
> however.
>



Jc:  No, it could be a complete mess.  There's no guarantee that our
long climb upward in material comfort and technological will keep
going forever and there are many signs of system failure.   Maybe some
miraculous cure could come.  Maybe Jesus in the clouds will appear.
Who knows?

It's just looking pretty doubtful to me.


John