[MD] On Pirsig's letter to Paul Turner

Adrie Kintziger parser666 at gmail.com
Thu Jul 21 11:36:51 PDT 2016


learning, books!

2016-07-21 20:36 GMT+02:00 Adrie Kintziger <parser666 at gmail.com>:

> As Dan wrote;,
>
> "I am a writer. Not that you would know that, and not a good one,
> apparently. A writer. Me. Not a writer that enough people read to
> enable me to write full time. Nope. Instead, I have to work a job to
> keep the lights turned on and so forth and so on. Nevertheless, I
> can't help but think I have it in me to write something good. Not
> withstanding the fact I have yet to do so. Write anything good."
>
> ----------------------------
> This piece and the above that i left out of the snip was so nice to read
> and
> enjoy the words that it deserves to be spoken of.
> You have a very good handling of words and the syntaxis to connect them,..
> if i'm allowed to use  a metaphore here,you have the ability to make the
> chords sing and sound.It is not about knowing the chords,or about the
> setting of your fingers on the guitar's neck,but about how to make them
> sound.
> You'r a very capable writer, Dan,and the story's are simply there to
> harvest.
> Look around you,they are everywhere.Searching for the narrator to tell
> them.
> Simply look around in your national parks, your country's history, The
> records on Ellis island,....etc ,etc....,there are no limitations other
> than one's imagination or skills to record it and to reshape it into a book.
> It always starts with page one.
> Gaugin moved to Tahiti to get inspired, Van Gogh went to Arles, Jaques
> Brel moved to Hiva Oa ,...but the works they made in France, Belgium or
> Netherland were not of any lesser importance.Not a bit.Proving the point
> that it is possible to remain in 'situ',and recreate the universe in one's
> own way.
>
> I'm learning Diets, Plaudiets, and Plattduuts for the moment,(but only to
> read.)
> An enormous historic record becomes availiable these days for common
> people, after and during the google bookscan project.They are scanning book
> that are more than 300 years old.Keeps me occupied.
> I'm learnig about the rootlanguage that made up my Flemish.
>
> Thinking of what you said about pronunciations of French and Spanish and
> so on,just try them on native speakers, sure they will try to help you.
> Some creativity is allowed here.
>
> Adrie
>
>
>
> 2016-07-20 8:25 GMT+02:00 Dan Glover <daneglover at gmail.com>:
>
>> Tuukka, all,
>>
>> On Mon, Jul 18, 2016 at 3:35 PM, Tuk <mail at tuukkavirtaperko.net> wrote:
>> > Dan, Adrie, all,
>> >
>> > I've thought of things and yes, some things in the pattern language
>> (thanks
>> > for the concept, Adrie!) I'm proposing need to be reformulated.
>> >
>> > The discussion between Dan and me has uncovered some problems in the
>> pattern
>> > language I'm proposing. Dan proposes that biological patterns are
>> identified
>> > as such by virtue of containing DNA. Pirsig proposes life is carbon
>> > chemistry. I've tried to develop an alternative view featuring some
>> kind of
>> > sense-based behavioral heuristic, of which I'm not sure how it exactly
>> > works.
>> >
>> > I did that because neither Dan's nor Pirsig's approach seemed to
>> describe
>> > what biologicality is in a way that matches the immediate experience of
>> > being human. Only on a car ride today did I realize that the pattern
>> > language works even though it doesn't explicitly describe
>> biologicality. It
>> > may simply state that "the distinction between inorganic and biological
>> > patterns is an intellectual pattern" without stating exactly what
>> pattern
>> > that is or which patterns qualify as that.
>> >
>> > That is to say, we don't need to resolve this issue in order to have a
>> > pattern language that is, apparently, complete in the sense of
>> addressing
>> > all currently pressing issues. Of course some other issues might turn
>> out
>> > pressing later.
>>
>> Dan:
>> And yes so then in our quest for knowledge, in any search for knowing,
>> we are using our senses to make sense of the often-times inscrutable.
>> Yet that doesn't mean we give up. We simply need to recognize, to
>> realize, that we are inherently limited in our outlooks upon the world
>> that we imagine is out there separate and apart from us and yet in a
>> real way is inside us all, a shared dream, if you will, or nightmare,
>> depending upon of course our imagination, or lack of it.
>>
>> Language is of course a pattern too. Me, I am limited to the English
>> language though I do at times incorporate other tongues mostly in my
>> writing and yeah sometimes in my speech but then I am never quite sure
>> how to sound out certain words in German or French or even Spanish and
>> so I'm a little reticent in using those particular words, at least in
>> speech, fearful of being the idiot, though most times people I'm
>> talking with have no idea how to pronounce them either, the words.
>>
>> But anyhow, so far as resolving issues, no, I doubt that's even
>> possible. Instead, what we ought to be doing, what the MOQ seeks, is
>> to expand our reach into the unknown, to continue the journey even
>> while knowing there is no end to the search. That no matter how smart
>> we are or become, what we know is but a grain of sand upon an endless
>> beach of unknowns.
>>
>> >
>> >
>> >>>
>> >>> Tuukka:
>> >>> Pirsig writes that the ancient Egyptians were social whereas the Greek
>> >>> were intellectual, but the MOQ wasn't invented back then. So I guess
>> >>> rocks were inorganic and dinosaurs biological, too.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> Remember the gravity analogy from ZMM? That pertains to this point
>> >> too. When we begin to mistake the map for the territory, when we take
>> >> concepts as concrete reality, well then it only seems common sense to
>> >> think biological and social patterns existed before Robert Pirsig
>> >> invented the terms for his MOQ. Just like gravity existing before
>> >> Newton's laws of gravity. If we think about it, however, the only
>> >> conclusion we can make is that like gravity, biological and social
>> >> patterns did not exist before they were invented.
>> >
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> > In any case, once Pirsig's letter to Turner was published the ancient
>> > Egyptians became social and the ancient Greek intellectual. That's the
>> > notion I'm trying to grasp here.
>>
>> Dan:
>> Well, I think Mr. Pirsig answered the questions put to him as best as
>> he could rather than deferring. Check it out:
>>
>> "Dear Paul Turner
>>
>> "The question you raise about the intellectual level has troubled me
>> too. When I answered Dan Glover in Lila's Child, I remember being a
>> little annoyed that anyone should ask what the intellectual level
>> is-as though he were asking me what I mean by the word, "the." Any
>> definition you give is more likely to complicate understanding than
>> simplify it. But since then I have seen the question grow because the
>> answer I have given is inadequate.
>>
>> "First of all, the line that, "Biologically [Lila's] fine, socially
>> she's pretty far down the scale, intellectually she's nowhere. . ."
>> did not mean that Lila was lying on the cabin floor unconscious,
>> although some interpretations of the intellectual level would make it
>> seem so. Like so many words, "intellectual" has different meanings
>> that are confused. The first confusion is between the social title,
>> "Intellectual," and the intellectual level itself. The statement,
>> "Some intellectuals are not intellectual at all," becomes meaningful
>> when one recognizes this difference. I think now that the statement
>> "intellectually she's nowhere," could have been more exactly put: "As
>> an intellectual Lila is nowhere." That would make it clearer that the
>> social title was referred to and the dispute about her intellectuality
>> would not have arisen.
>>
>> "Another subtler confusion exists between the word, "intellect," that
>> can mean thought about anything and the word, "intellectual," where
>> abstract thought itself is of primary importance. Thus, though it may
>> be assumed that the Egyptians who preceded the Greeks had intellect,
>> it can be doubted that theirs was an intellectual culture."
>>
>> Dan comments:
>> See, notice how he qualifies his answer by first stating how difficult
>> it is to answer. The question. How by doing so may in fact only sow
>> more and greater confusion, especially since this language, English,
>> is prone to alternate meanings even given the same word and sometimes
>> even the same context. But on the other hand, he decides to do it,
>> damn the torpedoes and all that.
>>
>> More from Robert Pirsig's letter:
>> "When getting into a definition of the intellectual level much clarity
>> can be gained by recognizing a parallel with the lower levels. Just as
>> every biological pattern is also inorganic, but not all inorganic
>> patterns are biological; and just as every social level is also
>> biological, although not all biological patterns are social; so every
>> intellectual pattern is social although not all social patterns are
>> intellectual. Handshaking, ballroom dancing, raising one's right hand
>> to take an oath, tipping one's hat to the ladies, saying "Gesundheit
>> !" after a sneeze-there are trillions of social customs that have no
>> intellectual component. Intellectuality occurs when these customs as
>> well as biological and inorganic patterns are designated with a sign
>> that stands for them and these signs are manipulated independently of
>> the patterns they stand for. "Intellect" can then be defined very
>> loosely as the level of independently manipulable signs. Grammar,
>> logic and mathematics can be described as the rules of this sign
>> manipulation."
>>
>> Dan comments:
>> I think this paragraph answers your questions about guitars and
>> clothes and how they can be strictly inorganic patterns or inorganic
>> and biological patterns simultaneously depending upon the origins of
>> materials used to construct said patterns. Also it shows how social
>> and intellectual patterns, although discrete systems in their own
>> right, cannot exist without the underlying inorganic and biological
>> patterns that uphold them. In essence, when we walk out of a room, it
>> cannot be said to exist or to not exist. The room. The story ends. And
>> yeah, then we can perhaps walk back into the room and reassure
>> ourselves that it does indeed exist. The room. Or not. If something
>> has occurred in our absence to destroy the room.
>>
>>
>> >
>> >>
>> >>> Maybe, if an inorganic pattern accumulates value as the extension of a
>> >>> biological pattern, it simply retains the value.
>> >>>
>> >>> Come to think of it, even in my current model the inorganic level can
>> >>> have
>> >>> more value than the biological if the biological level has negative
>> value
>> >>> and a biological pattern uses an inorganic pattern to do something
>> good.
>> >>> Perhaps I have to measure value here so that it never has negative
>> value.
>> >>> Yeah, that would seem to work.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> If there is no negative value, then what impetus drives progress and
>> >> evolution?
>> >
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> >
>> > What I meant is that we have to measure value without negative values in
>> > this context because of the following problem:
>> >
>> > Suppose a biological pattern Jane of a value of -5 playing a guitar of 0
>> > value so that 3 units of value are accumulated. In this case the
>> biological
>> > level would have a value of -2 whereas the inorganic level would have a
>> > value of 3. This makes the pattern language contradict Pirsig because
>> Pirsig
>> > says the biological level has more value than the inorganic level.
>> >
>> > We can resolve the contradiction in the following way:
>> >
>> > Negative value and positive value accumulate as biological patterns make
>> > choices. However, we have to store the negative and positive value to
>> > different variables. If we sum these variables, we get the relative
>> value of
>> > the pattern. The aforementioned problem features relative values.
>> However,
>> > if we sum the absolute values of these variables, we get the absolute
>> value
>> > of the pattern, which would be 3 for the guitar and 7 for Jane. When
>> Pirsig
>> > writes that the biological level has more quality than the inorganic
>> level
>> > he means that it has more absolute value.
>> >
>> > Relative value drives progress and evolution.
>>
>> Dan:
>> The way I understand it, there are no absolute values in the MOQ. You
>> seem to be arbitrarily assigning value to patterns and then making
>> assumptions on those values arbitrarily assigned and then saying, see!
>> Here is a contradiction.
>>
>> >
>> >>
>> >>>>> Do you see what I'm aiming at? In everyday life it doesn't matter
>> >>>>> whether
>> >>>>> an
>> >>>>> article of clothing is made from synthetic fibres or human hair.
>> It's
>> >>>>> still
>> >>>>> an article of clothing. It's an object. It doesn't walk around on
>> its
>> >>>>> own
>> >>>>> and it doesn't breathe, and so on. I just think this kind of a
>> division
>> >>>>> between the inorganic and the biological is more in accord with
>> >>>>> everyday
>> >>>>> common sense use of language than focusing on the point that clothes
>> >>>>> made
>> >>>>> of
>> >>>>> human hair contain DNA. Who cares about that? And why?
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Dan:
>> >>>> First of all, it is okay to use subject/object terminology as long as
>> >>>> it is remembered that those terms stand for patterns of value.
>> Second,
>> >>>> we are discussing the MOQ and its terminology, which may or may not
>> >>>> differ from everyday terminology. Is blood a biological pattern? It
>> >>>> doesn't walk around and breathe. How about organs awaiting
>> transplant?
>> >>>> A heart, or a set of lungs? Kidneys? Are those biological patterns?
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> Tuukka:
>> >>> Well, they're *parts* of a biological pattern.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> So is a baby part of a biological pattern too?
>> >
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> > Whichever it is, the pattern that decides that is an intellectual
>> pattern.
>>
>> Dan:
>> Ah. So we throw up our hands?
>>
>> >
>> >>
>> >>>> Who cares? Well, maybe no one. On the other hand, people still seem
>> to
>> >>>> be reading Robert Pirsig and discussing his work. So maybe a few
>> >>>> people care. I know I care enough to be working out this reply to
>> you.
>> >>>> I mean, I could just say the hell with it. I've got better things to
>> >>>> do. But I care. And too, it has been my experience, sometimes sad)
>> >>>> that common sense ain't all that common. Truthfully.
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> Tuukka:
>> >>> You can't seriously believe I, out of all people, intended to
>> >>> trivialize metaphysics.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> You asked the question. I take it that it was rhetorical. The question.
>> >
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> > It meant: "Why do you care?"
>>
>> Dan:
>> Me? Personally? Well, let me see if I can explain it in terms others
>> might (or might not) understand. Recently I suffered, though no,
>> suffer might not be the proper word. Experienced. Let's say I
>> experienced the need for emergency surgery. Which to me, someone who's
>> never been in a hospital other than to visit others who are in
>> hospitals, was rather disconcerting.
>>
>> But so anyhow yeah there I was in some weird room, when I woke up,
>> alone, and above me was a ceiling, which in itself was not all that
>> surprising since I pretty much knew I was in a hospital and what had
>> happened to me, the preconditions that were set in place to
>> necessitate my hospitalization, and most all rooms, at least in this
>> part of the world, have ceilings.
>>
>> No, what was rather awe-inspiring were all the words written in the
>> blazing white ceiling in a small and cramped and black cursive sort of
>> writing and as I lay there I could just about but not quite make out
>> the words on that ceiling and yeah a part of me knew those words
>> weren't really there, of course, but on the other hand, laying there,
>> it seemed to another part of me that if I could read those words,
>> which I couldn't quite manage no matter how I squinted, well then I
>> might or might not learn something I didn't know. Before.
>>
>> I am a writer. Not that you would know that, and not a good one,
>> apparently. A writer. Me. Not a writer that enough people read to
>> enable me to write full time. Nope. Instead, I have to work a job to
>> keep the lights turned on and so forth and so on. Nevertheless, I
>> can't help but think I have it in me to write something good. Not
>> withstanding the fact I have yet to do so. Write anything good.
>>
>> So why do I care? I care on account of the possibility that those
>> words I saw on the ceiling in that hospital room really did mean
>> something. That those words are inside me, somewhere, waiting to be
>> born. And maybe these words right here are part of them. Those words I
>> saw but couldn't quite read. Or maybe this is all just a bunch of
>> silly shite and none of it means a thing. Either way, caring seems
>> better than not caring.
>>
>>
>> >
>> >
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>>> Dan:
>> >>>> But isn't that so for the universe in general? When the story stops,
>> >>>> so does the universe.
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> Tuukka:
>> >>> Yeah. Quality is modeled by the mind, and the mind is biological.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> Ideas come first. Then comes the biological mind.
>> >
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> > What do you mean? Intellectual patterns come first? In a temporal sense
>> or
>> > in a priority order? Do you mean that the biological mind is an idea?
>>
>> Dan:
>> What else can it be but an idea?
>>
>> >
>> >>
>> >>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Dan:
>> >>>> Yes, I can see that. But can't we say the same of social and
>> >>>> intellectual patterns?
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>> Tuukka:
>> >>> The volition of social and intellectual patterns manifests via
>> biological
>> >>> patterns.
>> >>
>> >> Dan:
>> >> I would say rather that biological patterns manifest at the behest of
>> >> ideas, or intellectual patterns.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >
>> > Tuukka:
>> > Because the notion of "biological pattern" is an idea? I get that, but
>> what
>> > are you trying to do here? Turn everything into an idea? Remember the
>> hot
>> > stove. That's not an idea.
>>
>> Dan:
>> The hot stove experiment is meant to point to direct experience
>> without intellectual mediation. That chair you stub your toe on while
>> crossing a darkened room isn't an idea at first. It isn't anything.
>> Not until you intellectually realize you just stubbed your toe on it,
>> the chair. Then, it becomes a chair. But the idea comes first. Same
>> thing with the hot stove. Same principle.
>>
>> So no, I am not trying to turn everything into an idea. That response
>> seems a knee-jerk reaction from someone who hasn't a good handle on
>> the MOQ. In my opinion, of course. Which means little. My opinion. It
>> just seems so. To me.
>>
>> Thank you,
>> Dan
>>
>> http://www.danglover.com
>> Moq_Discuss mailing list
>> Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
>> http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
>> Archives:
>> http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
>> http://moq.org/md/archives.html
>>
>
>
>
> --
> parser
>



-- 
parser



More information about the Moq_Discuss mailing list