[MD] Julian Baggini: This is what the clash of civilisations is really about

[Dan Glover]

John,

On Mon, Nov 9, 2015 at 1:32 PM, John Carl <ridgecoyote at gmail.com> wrote:
>  Dan,
>
> Sorry for the long delay in reply, Oct. is  always such a busy month
> and this year it's bled into November.  But the rains have come, at
> last.

No worries. Glad you found the time to write. Believe it or not, 2016
is sneaking in through the back door as we speak.

>
>
> On 9/27/15, Dan Glover <daneglover at gmail.com> wrote:
>> John,
>>
>> On Mon, Sep 21, 2015 at 5:31 PM, John Carl <ridgecoyote at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dan:
>>>> So old angry white dudes outnumber everyone else in Texas and Montana?
>>>> That's a pretty bold statement. Care to back it up with statistics?
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Jc:  No, just it's just my personal experience.    And Trump appeals to a
>>> broader demographic than old angry white dudes, or he wouldn't be as
>>> popular as he is.  And even if he shrivels up and blows away, the fans he
>>> is making will still be here and the ideas that he has coalesced will
>>> remain.  Upper level patterns are not dependent upon "material" for
>>> propogation and continuence, eh?  Or at least not the same material.
>>
>> Dan:
>> Well, the way I understand the MOQ, intellectual patterns arise from
>> the social level
>
> Jc:  That's the theory, at least.  But  How?

Dan:
Social patterns are drilled into us from the day we're born. In fact,
the role of formal education is more involved at instilling social
patterns than intellectual patterns. Conformity is what's required.
Whether a person works on an assembly line or inside a corporate
office, they have to learn to conform if they wish to get along.

>JC:
> The most rudimentary society is mostly concerned with biological
> issues, right?  The security of the tribe, to which we are born.  How
> do new ideas arise?  And for the most part, like all mutations,
> they're maladaptive, right?  The elders know best and it's in the
> interest of the group to follow the traditions.

Dan:
Honestly, I doubt there are too many tribes-people reading this
discussion. I'm guessing for the most part all of us here have a roof
over our heads and food in our stomachs. Our basic biological needs
are met. So I'm unsure how productive it is to imagine social patterns
evolving in that setting, though of course they once did.

>JC:
> But on the other hand, when good  new ideas do come into the picture,
> they create more successful social patterns.

Dan:
Not necessarily. How about Karl Marx and his ideas of a communistic
utopia? At the time, it seemed like a good idea. But in practice,
human nature got in the way.

> JC:
> So the creativity flows
> from the top down, rather than the bottom up.  The whole "bottoms up"
> picture of the big bang "evolving" into planets and plants and
> animals, doesn't work in the MoQ framework because it assumes
> mechanistic chance as the fundament of the cosmos.

Dan:
Apples and oranges. A theory like the big bang deals with inorganic
patterns of value.

>
>JC:
> But... there's more.  In fact, it has spun off into a whole 'nother
> thread on the relationship between the 3rd and 4th level and I intend
> to address that, there.
>
>
> Dan:
>
>
>>but they can be seen as opposing social mores.
>
> Jc:
>
> Maybe they "can" be seen thus, but is that really the best?  Isn't it
> best when social patterns allow for intellectual patterns to evolve
> freely?  When we talk about the American ideal of freedom, isn't that,
> at root, what we mean?  When the levels are in opposition, that's a
> low-quality situation, if you ask me.

Dan:
Look at it like this: suffering is a low quality situation yet if
there was no suffering there'd be no reason for anything better.
Social patterns are a kind of stuckness. Anytime a new idea arises it
is bound to challenge the status quo. Toes will be stepped on. People
will be pissed off. And sure, that is a low quality situation, just
like suffering. But unless we are allowed the freedom of debauchery,
we're stuck in a holding pattern with no chance of evolving into
something better.

>
>
> Dan:
>
>> think that's why anyone with a modicum of intelligence can see through
>> the media sniping of candidate Trump and will oppose his nomination.
>
> Jc:  Imo, the possessors of modicums are rare.  I don't encounter a
> lot of deep thinkers, in my day to day existence.  Maybe I just need
> to get out more.
>
> But, the whole issue has gotten even more interesting with the entry
> of Dr. Carson to the top of the polls.  He's sorta like a homey, so
> I'd have to vote for him.  Even tho' Adventists are all crazy, their
> MY crazy, ya know?  It'd be like rooting for a guy because he's from
> Grass Valley, the way I do with Royce, or the 49er's because they are
> the home team.  Certain loyalties are just handed to us, and sure, we
> can always choose to be disloyal, for a higher cause, but I really
> think the whole political game is meaningless, except as a spectator
> sport.

Dan:
I'm pretty much apolitical. But it's interesting, with the emergence
of Carson as a potential front runner, how the media has begun to trot
out all the sordid details of his past. Sort of like the social level
attacking the intellectual level and visa versa.

>
>
> Dan:
>
>> On the other hand, there is certainly a base that he caters to, the
>> less educated and the more virulent who tend to see themselves and
>> their ilk as the center of the universe.
>
> Jc:  I think there is a large segment of the population that just
> wants to give a big pbllttt to the whole shebang of politics and
> government and Trump definitely fits the need of that demographic.

Dan:
Perhaps.

>
>
>>>
>>>> Dan:
>>>> I'm not so much arguing that novels are true or not but that we need
>>>> some sort of commonality in order to make sense of the world and
>>>> dictionaries and encyclopedias help in that regard.
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Jc:  Well I think it is a good discussion to have.  There are certainly
>>> nuances in the term's "factual" and "truth" that need to be fleshed out.
>>> I
>>> do have my own thinking on those terms that is probably different from
>>> what
>>> you're used to.
>>
>> Dan:
>> Perhaps. I tend to see the truth as high quality intellectual
>> patterns.
>
>
> Jc:  Exactly!  And a novel can certainly contain within it, and be as
> a whole, a high quality intellectual pattern.  That's my point.

Dan:
Agreed.

>
> Dan:
>
> On the other hand, there are terms which we must abide by in
>> order to have intelligent discussions. That novels are fictional is
>> one. Can a novel contain truths? Certainly, just as lies contain them
>> too. I doubt too many people blatantly lie without at least attempting
>> to coerce others into believing them. Yet a novel is just such a
>> blatant lie. It says, suspend your disbelief and fall into my trap and
>> in return I will spin you a memorable tale.
>>
>
> Jc:  So it's all just amusement, eh?  Crime and Punishment is no
> different from any other sordid pulp fiction?  I dunno Dan.  Your
> insistence upon a certain definitional stance seems based upon common
> acceptance, but I can't imagine any deep thinker on the subject
> agreeing with you.  But disentangling our conflict might take more
> work than it's worth.

Dan:
I didn't say that it's all just amusement, though it's interesting you
took it that way. In one sense, yes. Fiction is an amusement. Great
fiction has many levels, however. Amusement is certainly one level but
the reader can also delve deeper into stories like Crime and
Punishment.

I recently read a book called The Life of Pi. Not a bad story. In the
beginning, the narrator tells the readers how he is going to tell a
story that will make them believe in god, or words to that effect. But
which god? On the surface, your normal Christian reader from the West
will simply assume it is The God. The one and only god... that bearded
bible thumping guy in the sky staring down from heaven.

But as the story evolves, we learn how as a young man Pi comes to
believe in all gods. As we sink deeper still into the story we
discover the tale we've been told might or might not have really
happened. We are forced into going back to re-examine our own set of
beliefs and how they pertain to whatever reality that might or might
not exist.

That is how a great piece of fiction operates, at least in my opinion.
The story necessarily has to amuse the readers in order to draw them
in but once they're hooked, deeper insights can be revealed. In the
end, it matters not whether the story is true or false. What matters
is whether or not we are better people for reading it.

>
>
>
>> Dan:
>> But aren't facts and truth synonymous?
>
> Jc:  Aha!  There's the rub.  They are absolutely  different.  Truth is
> a statement about a fact.  Truth is meta-factual.  Ellul puts it
> elegantly that they are of two differing realms, Truth and Reality.
> Reality is empirical and Truth is abstract and conceptual.  He
> contrasts sharply between the image and the word.  Conflating facts
> and truth is a huge error of modernity, which any student of the way
> image-oriented journalism has changed the American Mind, could tell
> you.

Dan:
Luckily (or perhaps unluckily) I am not a student of image-oriented
journalism. I haven't read Ellul so I am at a disadvantage, but if he
claims Reality is empirical and Truth is abstract, I think he is going
against the grain of the MOQ. I'll see if I can brush up this image a
bit more...

Let's go back to the gravity metaphor in ZMM. According to the
narrator, gravity and the law of gravity are synonymous. What that
seems to mean in terms of Ellul is that reality (gravity) and the law
of gravity (truth) are the same. How can there be any difference?

>
>
>>
>>>JC:
>>> As to what On the Road had to do with Cassady serving time in prison...
>>> well, he enjoyed a certain notoriety in the Bay Area scene, while Jack
>>> was
>>> off in New York and all the cops had to do was read the book
>>
>> Dan:
>> Cops? Read a book? Really? Now that's gotta be a fictional scenario if
>> there ever was one. I'd have to say that Cassady serving time in
>> prison probably had more to do with his own deeds than anything
>> Kerouac wrote.
>>
>
>
> Jc:  Jack pretty much says the same thing in Big Sur.  Neal's
> notoriety was due to On the Road.  Which, btw, in an ongoing twist,
> was highly inspired by a letter that Cassady wrote to Kerouac, a
> letter that has recently been discovered after many years.  It seems
> highly unfair, that Neal Cassady's heirs have to fight Kerouac's heirs
> for the possession and full rights.  I mean, not only did Neal write
> thing, but Kerouac has been hugely popular and his books still sell
> well and Cassady, who was the inspiration of Kerouac and so many
> others, his heirs never got a dime from his life and work.  That
> really pisses me off to see them grabbing for more.  Jack wouldn't
> approve, I'm sure.
>

Dan:
Kerouac is the one who sat down and wrote the book, not Cassady. That
he took inspiration from a letter seems a stretch so far as the
Cassady heirs having any claim on the rights to On The Road. It'd be
like the Sutherlands or the DeWeeses suddenly claiming they have
rights to ZMM simply because they're mentioned in the book. I doubt
any court would uphold a lawsuit like that, but I've been wrong
before.

>
>
> Whew.  I'm glad I finally got all that off my chest.  Now what was the
> point of this thread again?  I need to go back and refresh my memory
> of Baggini's article.
>

If you feel the need...

Thanks,

Dan

http://www.danglover.com