Mark,

This post seems like philosophical/psychological chum thrown overboard to see what it will attract.  I have no problem with you disagreeing with me, but often I cannot find a precise point of disagreement.  Is there a specific point you'd like to discuss?  


Marsha





On Jun 24, 2012, at 11:55 AM, 118 <ununoctiums@gmai...> wrote:

> Hi Marsha,
> I appreciate the labels that you are giving to DQ.  I think I understand
> where you are coming from.  You present a kind of metaphysical theology.
> There is also another kind of metaphysics, that is one which traces back
> to ultimate principles.  I am' dealing with the latter approach.  It is
> simply two different approaches.  I am sure that your approach brings you
> much fulfillment.
>
> This forum is about the metaphysics of Quality.  That is, it is meant to
> provide a description of Quality in metaphysical terms.  Certainly
> unknowable can be one such description, but I am curious where you take it
> from there.  Is the first principle that it cannot be described?  If so, we
> are speaking of a metaphysics of the indescribable, which is more of a
> Christian approach to reality.  I have no problem with this.
>
> Any metaphysics of Quality comes from one's personal relationship, through
> Quality, with existence.  I fully appreciate that your relationship with
> existence is one of unknowability.  This indeed can be one of wonder, and
> be very fulfilling, and I appreciate you candor in providing this to me.
> That IT is there but that we will never know it.  Thanks for that.  I have
> some more thoughts concerning my approach, which may fall on deaf ears.
>
> On Sun, Jun 24, 2012 at 1:13 AM, MarshaV <valkyr@att....> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Mark,
>>
>> On Jun 23, 2012, at 6:55 PM, 118 <ununoctiums@gmai...> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Mark:
>>> "And what is good, Phaedrus, and what is not good- need we ask anyone to
>>> tell us these things?" ZAMM- quote which leads the book.
>>> Until one grasps this quote, one does not grasp what is being told in
>> ZAMM.
>>> DQ is not unknowable, for we all know it.  We could say that DQ is
>>> indivisible, but then so is Love.  What can the indivisible part tell us?
>>> We can define anything we want, for that is what we do as humans.  Any
>>> definition of anything is insufficient, for that is a property of SQ.  To
>>> say that DQ is undefinable, suggests that we cannot relate it.  But we
>>> relate DQ all the time.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> I do not think Dynamic Quality can be known conceptually (patterned) or
>> perceptually (patterned).  Dynamic Quality is unknowable, indivisible and
>> undefinable.
>>
>
> Mark
> Yes, we can label DQ as you do above.  This is similar to the gnostic
> approach to God.  Indeed, many spiritual teachings work through this
> method.  The Hindu Brahman can also be described as you do DQ.  However,
> there has been much written about such an entity which allows the
> illumination of what these labels mean.  Volumes and volumes of stuff, that
> I am sure you are aware of.  Such volumes often deal with metaphors and
> myths, which allow one to get away from a dead end of unknowable, through
> personally relatable stories.  Perhaps a story of your interaction with DQ
> would further illuminate what you mean.
>
> When I bring in the quote from the beginning of ZAMM, this is also very
> similar to what you are saying.  I provided this to give you a start.
>
>>
>>
>>>> Marsha:
>>>> Experience is recognizing patterns based on the predisposition of our
>>>> perceptual and mental apparatus.  How is it that human beings might have
>>>> access to what is beyond that apparatus?  Mental white noise!
>>>
>>>
>>> Mark:
>>> The intellectual experience is only a small part of human existence.  The
>>> brain is an organ like the heart.  We always have access beyond the
>> brain,
>>> or the heart, or the gut for that matter.  To conceive that we are stuck
>> in
>>> experience (of whatever kind) leaves out a lot of human existence.
>>> Experience is created by our bodies, but just think what lies before and
>>> after that experience.  There is a whole world there.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> I did not confine the statement to "intellectual experience", nor "the
>> brain".  I wrote:  Experience is recognizing (valuing) patterns based on
>> the predisposition of our perceptual and mental apparatus.
>>
>
> Mark
> You seem to draw a distinct line at "patterns".  This is your first
> principle.  We can make the assumption that patterns exist, and use that as
> our starting point.  At times it is sometimes useful to look at what these
> patterns come from.  One could say that we create these patterns as
> experience.  However, you bring in an interesting twist, that being
> "recognizing' patterns.  This would assume that such patterns exist outside
> of our experience.  This could indeed be DQ that you are speaking of.  Is
> this what you mean?
>
>>
>>
>>>> Marsha:
>>>> Static patterns (perceptual and conceptual) are what we know.
>>>
>>>
>>> Mark:
>>> No, we know much more than that.  We know what is before such static
>>> patterns, and what happens when they appear.  Life is not existing in
>>> shadows of two dimensional presentation.  Try to understand Plato's sun.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> Static patterns (perceptual and conceptual) are what we know.  Though
>> Dynamic Quality may be experienced, Dynamic Quality is unknowable,
>> indivisible and undefinable.
>>
>
> Mark
> OK. As I understand what you say: Static patterns are what we know.
> Knowing is static patterns.  I believe we can go beyond such knowing, for
> this approaches DQ.  I do not see the stark line that you are drawing.  For
> this would imply that we are stuck in SQ.  If this were true, how could we
> follow DQ?
>
>>
>>
>>>> Marsha:
>>>> Here is where the idea of evolution _seems_ to add value to our
>>>> understanding, or maybe not.  We don't know what we don't know!
>>>
>>>
>>> Mark:
>>> Here's the deal:
>>> 1.  We know that we know
>>> 2.  We know that we don't know
>>> 3.  We don't know what we don't know
>>> 4.  We don't know what we know (we must never forget this last
>>> configuration).
>>>
>>> There are so many things that we do not know that we know.  One does not
>>> simply stop at a definition of static patterns, one travels beyond that
>> to
>>> know more that we know. Words can get one stuck at what seems to be and
>> end
>>> of knowing.  But such a thing is just an illusion created by believing
>> the
>>> words.  Words are not meant to provide limits to knowledge, they are
>> meant
>>> to continue to extend knowledge, forever.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> If this is your "deal", I am not buying it as a relevant response to my
>> statement.
>>
>
> Mark
> Well, mainly it was to point out that we do not know what we know.  One
> such knowing is DQ, which you can claim does not fall within your patterned
> knowing.  That was the relevance which I was putting in.  It was simply
> a corollary to your "we don't know what we don't know", which was a quote
> from our illustrious secretary of defense under Bush 2, that gave the
> reasoning for invading Iraq.
>
>>
>>
>>>> Marsha:
>>>> And as RMP has advised "To the extent that one's behavior is controlled
>> by
>>>> static patterns of value it is without choice.  But to the extent that
>> one
>>>> follows Dynamic Quality, which is undefinable, one's behavior is free."
>>>
>>> Mark:
>>> Yes, exactly!
>>
>> Marsha:
>> A quote has its advantages.
>>
>>
>>> One is controlled by static patterns if one follows them.
>>> One such following would be to say that DQ is unknowable, indivisible and
>>> undefinable.  One does not need to follow those rules, one can follow DQ.
>>> It is important to not box oneself in with static patterns.  That is what
>>> Pirsig is saying.  The more rigorous MoQ becomes, the less it becomes
>> about
>>> Quality.  It becomes the Metaphysics of MoQ (MoMoQ).  Then one can take
>> it
>>> a step farther and it becomes the MoMoMoQ.  This goes on forever like a
>>> snake eating its own tail.  This is what happens when one follows static
>>> patterns.  One is not free.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> One might say that saying anything at all is static, and here you are
>> having so much to say too.
>>
>
> Mark
> The point was to try to prevent one from being stuck in the static, since
> this is simply an illusion.  By claiming that this is all we can know we
> create a box in which we find ourselves.  The point of enlightenment is to
> open that box.
>
>>
>>
>>>> Marsha:
>>>> Can you attentively detach, for even a few minutes, from the flow of
>>>> patterns?  Maybe slightly dizzy from that merry-go-round is the better
>>>> place to be?  Maybe being slightly dizzy enabled Einstein to visualize
>>>> something that freed him from the past?
>>>>
>>>
>>> Mark:
>>> If one detaches from this flow of patterns, one is no longer the flow of
>>> patterns.  The flow of patterns are something that is happening to one;
>>> just like one is not part of the roller coaster that one is experiencing,
>>> but can say "I am on a roller coaster, I am on it".  As you correctly
>> say,
>>> there is something which can detach.  This is known as the Self.  The
>> Self
>>> is not some logical construct that can be encountered through thinking
>>> about it.  The self is what experiences the thinking. It is the page on
>>> which the words of your life are written.  One can search forever in the
>>> words and never see the page.  It is not part of the words.
>>
>> Marsha:
>> You misrepresented my statement, which was a question (about detaching). -
>> The "self", as an inherently existing, autonomous individual, is an
>> illusion.  Upon investigation I consistently find only a flow of bits and
>> pieces of inorganic, biological, social and intellectual value patterns.
>>
>
> Mark
> Remember, your statement was "Can YOU attentively detach from the flow of
> patterns", not "YOU are these patterns".  I do not think I misrepresented
> your statement.  You speak of a detachment, not of a clinging.  To claim
> that we are patterns is a form of clinging.
>
> The illusion is your creation by claiming that it must be existing in a
> dialectic materialist sense.  If one does not use that approach, then one
> can grasp what is meant.  One cannot deconstruct a page on which words are
> written, only the words can be deconstructed.  Again, we have your first
> principle that begins with "Patterns Exist".  This is a materialist
> approach which claims a truth in such a statement.  I am suggesting that
> this patterns approach only leads to more patterns.
>
> Remember the quote which starts ZAMM.
>
>>
>>
>>> Mark:
>>> It is much more than an opinion, it is a way of life.  It is the Quality
>>> Way.  It is what Pirsig writes about in ZAMM.
>>
>> RMP's opinion:
>> "The MOQ, like the Buddhists and the Determinists (odd bedfellows) says
>> this “autonomous individual” is an illusion."
>>    (RMP, Copleston)
>>
>>
>> Mark
>
>> Yes, but I am not speaking of an autonomous individual, for that is simply
>> using the Patterns first principle that you begin with.  One could say that
>> these patterns are an illusion, and not a good starting point.
>>
>
> Cheers,
> Mark
>
>>
>>
>>
>> Marsha
>>
>>
>> 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
>>
> 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
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