My Morning Jacket, "Golden"

Wilco, "Theologians"

A Question?

A couple weeks ago a good friend of mine sent me a text message, which resulted in a healthy e-mail exchange that's been going on ever since - I'll post that later.

On the ride home from work my cell phone goes of (TEXT MESSAGE), and I get the following:
"Do you have a set of standards that you consciously live by?"

Yeah, some friend huh? Of course, he knew I'd give it some serious thought, and I have. On the face of it, it seems like a rather simple -if not obvious - question. However it soon became obvious that the catch word (perhaps not intended) which would throw me for a loop was, "consciously".

For now, I'm just going to throw this out there and let it gel.

Steven Pinker on Charlie Rose

An interesting discussion with Steven Pinker.

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The Future of Religion

Scott Roberts mentioned this book on Stephen Law's blog the other day, so I picked it up and give it a read this morning.

I loved it - and will have to absord it and make some comments at some point.

FIESTA!

The Transfiguration of Voice

It seems to me a great tragedy had befallen mankind when his voice became lost amidst the beast and fowl. Somewhere, it seems, between the simple name and the mist that obscures all that is beyond the horizon, a song bird sang, and wrapped within itself was a nature that was not unlike the mans. Lacking a sense of anything good or evil, he was, at first, a distant image glimpsed ever so briefly and unassumingly upon a canvas painted for eternity. With every spoken word a brush stroke colored in the landscape, filling the trees with a warm evening wind, painting the sounds of the rain, and dotting the heavens with patterns of thought. Yet somewhere within the land, beyond and within all he could see with his eyes and hear with his ears, was a colorless figure through which everything flowed, and the light of creation could be felt and remain nameless….

Through a reflection given forth from the waters, he looks into its eyes for the first time….

-----

It is a common notion that what we have reflected in the creation myth of Genesis is the voice of God. Furthermore that, as the voice of God brought forth creation, than creation itself must speak a certain language, one that is mans task to decipher. What I’d like to suggest is that this is a gross misinterpretation - so one begins in the middle, which is, to be sure, the beginning:

Genesis 2:19, 20:
19. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto to Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
20. And Adam gave names to the cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field;

It is made implicit here that language is a creation of man, and therefore perspective and interpretation along with it (although creation is a bad word to use here). As well, within the myth, this is the first act of man, the first behavior that we see reflected; man behaving as something which makes noises and marks, something which differentiates, and has a perspective.

Considering this, it’s interesting to note that God first speaks to man prior to his first act by saying, (Genesis 2:16, 17):16.”And the Lord God commanded the man saying, “Of every tree in the garden thou mayest freely eat:
17. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, though shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”

It is, to be sure, a case of hopeless circularity that man would speak and be spoken to in the same voice. Surely it’s an obvious question to ask; did man understand this voice? Or is this implied metaphor for something more fundamental? His speech is prefaced with, “Lord God commanded”, however within the command itself seems to lie something more sinister than mere orders. On the other hand it must be considered that the text itself was written post hoc, and clearly the writer has granted himself some pre-suppositional freedom. He’s granted that prior to man having named everything, that he’d understood language; but, perhaps this assumption wasn’t made at all. Following the text faithfully another point comes to light; prior to eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, it must be assumed (mythically/poetically) that man has no real notion of duality per se, but has a childlike view of indifference towards the world. Which is to say his view is non-discriminate (for the most part) - like a child who sees a certain beauty and curiosity contained in everything. In this way the language he uses to differentiate the world becomes less for the purposes of creating dualities (of separating good and evil), and more for the purposes behavior and interaction. In essence, we’re looking at a child’s mind.

With that in mind I’d merely invite one to consider the first thing that becomes evident to a child’s mind prior to any notion of good or evil. Without knowing any different, what lay before the mind as it views the world in this (mythological) state? I would answer, that it’s contained in the Lord God’s command. “Do not…. Or you will surely…” To do, or not to do, with no real sense of consequence. “Don’t touch the stove, or you’ll surely get burned.” What does that mean, ‘get burned’? What lay before the mind, I’d suggest, is temptation.

Genesis 3 (paraphrase):
The serpent was more crafty than any of the other animals that God had made, and he said to Eve, “Did God really say, ‘you must not eat from any tree of the garden’.”

Hold the show, wait – God never said anything to the woman, God had not yet created Eve when he spoke his command…

Nonetheless Eve responds to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘you must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will surely die.’”

The serpent responds, “You will not surely die, for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

(insert the sound of a scratching record, and rewind)
Didn’t God see that all of his creation was Good? Of course he did, and this is key, but I’ll get back to it.

Anyway, Eve responds quite beautifully, Genesis 3:6-7 goes as follows:When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and at it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

The woman displays the first use of logic in the bible, bravo to the woman. Not to mention that, before even taking a bite or touching the tree, she saw that the tree was Good. What? Didn’t you first have to eat of the tree to have the knowledge of good and evil? Of course not; again, the tree being a metaphor for temptation, one only need yield to the temptation. Furthermore, what opened ones eyes to the knowledge of good and evil wasn’t the apple per se (the metaphor) but the use of logic. The woman went against a dogma and used logic to make a choice, and that choice was relative to her (and her husbands) needs and interests with respect to food and wisdom. That dirty dirty woman... Suddenly then, they find themselves thrust from childhood into adulthood. Temptation, Logic, then shame. Although, I think a better suited word for this occasion is not so much logic as it should be choice.

Let me take a step back to my previous point about God and the nature of his creation, because I believe something more tragic is happening here than meets the eye. It’s important to note that, contrary to the serpents suggestion that eating of the tree would make one like the Gods, the reality is that (as stated throughout creation) God saw everything as GOOD. Or more importantly, mans interpretation of God’s view of creation is one that is Good in every way shape or form, including the serpent. The knowledge of good and evil is a knowledge attributed to mankind and mankind alone; it is the event that plunges man into duality and into his first reaction to that duality, shame. Man can no longer see the good in all of creation because his vision is now forever obscured by his own needs and interests.

To the Transfiguration of Voice:

The point I’d like to make is twofold;
A.) It’s implicit that language is mans own, that it’s part of his character, his behavior.
B.) It is part of mans nature to eventually fall to logic and dualism.

Before man can say anything about God, before he can say that, ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth’, he must realize that these words (and meaning) are a reflection of his own character. In this way, the universe could never have been created by a God who spoke a certain language, whereby it is our duty to decipher that language such that we can know the character of God. Afteral, creation is a human word, and with all our lack of knowledge we attribute it to that which we don’t understand. God didn’t create anything (in any linguistic form) that we didn’t first create in ourselves, that we didn’t first recognize when we looked around and started naming things. To see God, to come to God, is to see past the suffering that is the tragedy of our own nature.

Somewhere along the line man’s voice became the voice of God, and people started chasing down dogmas and swatting at ‘flies’, mixing logic and dialogue with the ultimate source of wisdom. Of course it was just that vary thing that pushed man away from God in the first place.

.....

Differentials, integrals, statistics, oh my,
Differentials, integrals, statistics, oh my….


There’s nothin’ like having to teach yourself calculus all over again. I should have majored in philosophy and got a job in construction….

BACK JUNE 7th

Spending all my philosophical thinking time taking a class and studying for a work related certification.

So, I'll be back in force come June....

Philosophical Isolation

I find that knowledge of philosophical concepts, argumentation, so on, are quite isolating. It’s difficult to engage people in a conversation about, say, religion, when they’re not basing they’re knowledge on anything aside from the bible or they’re fundamental camp.

For example, this happened to me today:
One of the engineers I work with says to me tangentially in a conversation,
“Did you here the latest?”
“No, what?” I respond.
“They say the trees that giraffes eat from are getting taller.”
“Sure” I said, “And thus the giraffes will get taller – evolution at work my friend.”
Then he comes back with, “Well I don’t know about that, I’m not an evolutionist.”
“You’re not one of those who believe the universe is only 6000 years old are you?” (Of course I said this quite jokingly)
He Responds, “Well there’s pretty good evidence for it.”
“Steve” I said, (which isn’t his real name), “You gotta’ be kidding me. You’re an engineer, an analytical minded individual and you seriously think the universe is only 6000 years old.”
“Why not?” He says.

At this point I’m dumbfounded. I left the conversation with, “To each his own I suppose.”

What do you say to this? Here you have an intelligent, middle class, college educated person with an engineering degree. How do you have this conversation with people? Any idea? It truely bothers me, not to mention it's quite isolating.

"Stars of Leo"

I waited a long time for this new release from M. Ward - it oozes into the soul like hot molasses rolling off the end of a leaf...

Condoms and Quality Engineering

WARING: This is a rant, it was a long day, and, well, it was a long day. I plan on making sense of it later.

For one reason or another I’ve been unable to get the Popes condemnation of condoms out of my mind. And since I had a shitty day, I want to rant irrationally about it.

So then, I’d like to start with an analogy from experience in my day to day work on the job. Part of my function as Quality Engineer is to perform D.O.E.’s (design of experiments), which is in short a failure mode analysis of a new product through the design of certain experiments geared towards fleshing out, as stated, particular failure modes. Another function I serve is the statistical analysis of defects, whether it be from the field or suppliers, and implementing SPC (Statistical Process Controls) within our manufacturing processes to prevent defects from occurring in the first place.

What I’d like to talk about here is the formal Corrective and Preventive Action process (CaPA), which is generally related to a specific defect that has been identified internally, from the customer, or the supplier. Later, I’d like to relate my methods and findings in this process to the issue of aids in Africa and teen pregnancy in America.

Let me begin with a simple defect mode wherein we receive a product back from a customer where a wire has come loose from a crimp. In the generic photo below you see a set of wires that have the ends crimped, which will of course be inserted into the connector. So again, the problem is simply that one of the wires has come loose from its crimp.

Upon seeing a number of issues such as these we open up a formal corrective action which contains, but is not limited to, the following elements:

Problem: In this section we state nothing more then what the problem was, “Loose Crimps”, and perhaps what product or customer was involved.

Containment Action:
This is merely a short term corrective action that’s aimed at addressing the effect of the problem – in this case, “Loose Crimps”. Since we don’t yet know the cause of the problem (and assuming we were the ones who performed the crimping), a containment action may involve inspecting inventory of already crimped wires, and verifying that in process procedures and tooling are in place. Essentially, prior to us addressing whatever the problem is - which may take up to 2 months - we need to do some short term things to make sure that no further product leaves the building. Perhaps we do something as simple as implement some short term inspections, or even put the product on hold. The key (again) is that in this process we’re addressing the effects, we don’t know the cause, but we’re going to do whatever is necessary to mitigate the problem.


Root Cause:
This should be obvious enough – what was the cause? Much work may have been done to get to this point, and once we get here it should be understood that all we know is one thing, the “Root Cause”, i.e. no solutions have been formally postulated. So we state simply what we’ve discovered as the root of the problem. Lets suppose we discover that the operator was not using the tooling properly which led to crimps that weren’t tight enough on the wire to sufficiently hold it in place - for the sake of simplicity.

Corrective Action:
Unlike the “Containment Action”, which addressed the effects of the issue, the Corrective Action addresses the “cause” of the issue. Now that we know the issue was improper tool use by the operator we may do a couple things to correct the problem; A.) Insure that the operator has been properly trained on the use of the tool, B.) insure that the operator is familiar with the instructions and is following them accordingly. Once we know these things have been satisfied, even though we still have the human element involved, we can to a certain degree say we’ve corrected the problem, but not yet prevented it.

Preventive Action:
This action is always a little more tricky, but simple for this example. Since we know we have a human being as the sole element of assurance, and we know people make mistakes, the above corrective action is highly insufficient. All we’ve said is, “We’ve addressed the issue with the operator, reviewed our process and procedures, retrained, so on, and now we’re good to go”. But the question the customer will always rightly ask is, “What’s preventing the operator from getting lazy?” So that’s where preventive action comes in. In this case, since we have a human operated process we’ll institute SPC (Statistical Process Control), where we sample wire crimps by performing pull tests. Without getting into the details of how this works, through statistical analysis we’re able to tell if problems are arising in the crimper, operator, wire, so on, by looking at the pull test data over time – it’s highly effective.

Walla! Problem fixed!

To Summarize:
Problem:Statement of the problem

Containment Action:
Address the effect.

Root Cause: Define the cause.

Corrective Action:
Address the cause

Preventive Action: Prevent and monitor the cause.

So what’s all this have to so with condom use, aids in Africa, and teen pregnancy? Well, it all has to do to with “Cause and Effect” and how we as a culture deal with both such cases. It is slowly becoming the case that secular society does less and less to address Root Cause, and simply focuses on Containment activity.

For example; In the case of Africa we have aids, which is the effect. When the Pope arrived and stated that condom use wasn’t the answer, he was merely recognizing the fact that condom use is nothing more than a containment action, a tool that addresses effects, and not the cause – not to mention the fact that sexual activity outside of marriage is a no no for the Pope anyway, which is really the real answer for him. The cause of aids – and / or its spread - while not being necessarily the Root Cause per se, is due to rampant and complete unadulterated sexual promiscuity; whether it’s premarital sex, adultery, what have you (now this is not withstanding the other causes of aids, but it has been identified that the “other causes” are not the main cause). Those who criticize the Pope for his stance are generally those who don’t recognize, or who fail to want to address the human element and consider the Containment Action as the best solution to the problem. But in the long term this is nothing more than a mitigating solution and doesn’t address the main contributing factor – which is personal responsibility.

Let me switch [quick] to teen pregnancy in America as this has been a hot topic for many years. Over the past number of years it’s been the case of the Left that the solution to all our problems is getting condoms in the hands of our children, and the right to abortions. If we can educate our children about safe sex, then we can mitigate pregnancy and lower STD rates. YEAH!. The (helping myself) idea is, kids are going to have sex whether we like it or not, so it should be our job as liberal “friend to your kids” parents, to make sure our kids are safe…. BULLSHIT.

Everyone is far to afraid in our increasingly Leftist Liberal society to address issues of morality and it has become quite fashionable to do whatever it is we can to implement as many Containment / Effect Management issues as possible such that people can simply do and choose as they please. Drawing on the video from Schwartz below, I completely agree that people in the western world have too much choice, and I believe that much of that choice has arisen out of an inability of people to want to deal with others so called rights and moral attitudes. It’s no wonder that the decline of the western moral sense has followed in tail by the decline of the western worlds appeal to religion (there I go helping myself again).

The bottom line is that condoms and abortion are containment actions, both of which I have no serious issues with in and of themselves, but certainly we have to wean ourselves off these things as the crutch for our social problems. So again the issue for me surrounds the fact that our society treats them as corrective and preventative actions, plain and simple. More and more they are both pushed out into the forefront and into our children’s faces, such that, it teaches our children [wrongly] that given these mitigating factors I can behave and act as I choose to. In effect, it gives them license to do as they choose with no real consequences.

Back to my QA example; if I was to tell my customer that I hadn’t addressed the behavior of the operator who was the cause of the problem, but simply mitigated the issue by putting tape on the crimps (which wouldn’t have nearly the pull force and may only help in certain applications), they’d have my balls in a pickle jar to be sure. In the manufacturing industry, especially in the military and aerospace environment I work in, there’s no room for unadulterated liberalism, touchy feely bullshit, and hop skipping around dealing with people. If you can’t do the job, you're river side for sure.

Clearly I’m ranting here, and I’m by no means offering any solutions or in any way advocating a call to religious fundamentalism; but for Christ’s sake, this fundy new wave Liberal environment we’re in these days which continually pokes fun at religion and it’s causes is opening the doors to problems that didn’t exist to such an extreme in years past. Granted the past was sacked with its own problems; with communities in themselves being strong, moral, but extremely racist and ethnocentric where cultures of people suffered off the backs of the so called moral. But today we’re slowly trading that system for one large fucked up culture which is spiritually and emotionally bankrupt and aims at rotting out the cores of everyone equally.

WELL FUCK YOU and all you dick flingin’ son’s a bitches. The next Liberal program will surely be “COMDOMS FOR GUNS”. Don’t kill the bitch, just fuck the crap out of her and make her feel like a dirty whore.

The Return of Religion

The Return of Religion

by Roger Scruton

This has some resonance to it…. Came accross it through Stephen Law and James F. Elliot...

Postmodern Rejection of Absolutism

This was certainly a left-fielder, but was worth the read (if only for a good laugh) - I'll update with my own comments later.

..

(link)

Richard Rorty and the Postmodern Rejection of Absolute Truth

Davidson, Knowing what you believe

First a snip from Davidson's "Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective" (Pg. 26):

"Burge has suggested that there is another way in which external factors enter into the determination of the contents of speech and thought. One of his 'thought experiments' happens pretty well to fit me. Until recently I believed arthritis was an inflammation of the joints caused by calcium deposits; I did not know that any inflammation of the joints, for example gout, also counted as arthritis. So when a doctor told me (falsely as it turned out) that I had gout, I believed I had gout but I did not believe I had arthritis.

At this point Burge asks us to imagine a world in which I was physically the same but in which the word 'arthritis' happened actually to apply only to inflammation of the joints caused by calcium deposits. Then the sentence 'gout is not a form of arthritis' would have been true, not false, and the belief that I expressed by this sentence would not have been the false belief that gout is not a form of arthritis but a true belief about some disease other than arthritis. Yet in the imagined world all my physical states, my 'internal qualitative experiences', my behavior and dispositions to behave, would have been the same as they are in this world. My belief would have changed, but I would have no reason to suppose that it had, and so could not be said to know what I believed."

This sounds quite unsatisfactory to me, as it seems to follow the reasoning that the act of being right or wrong and knowing what one believes is a matter of being accurate with respect to communicating your state of affairs – or representing them properly. But that puts language use on the plane of being a medium, and knowing your beliefs a matter of using the medium correctly and representatively. It also seems to connect and perhaps conflate language with belief, and/or assumes that to hold a language is to necessarily hold beliefs, right or wrong. In another way, that our rightness and wrongness stands either in relation to correct representation, or how ones word meanings connect with the language community at large (coherence).

Without a language do we not hold beliefs? Maybe? I suppose we could say that, just as truth only exists in language, belief also only exists in language. But then what does "knowing what we believe" stand in relation to (representation, coherence, what)? And whether or not I'm correct in accurately verbalizing my state of affairs, am I not correct in believing that my hands hurt like a bitch? Which above Davidson says, yes, that we have the same state of affairs, but in this case we don't know what we "believe". But should we seperate belief and know in this way? Hm

I'll have to read on.....

PS,
of course I'm not talking here about what I assume Davidson to believe.

Quote of the Day

Myths are public dreams,
dreams are private myths.

J.C.

Why are Books better than Movies?

How about some nonesense...?

I think because, in a movie, someone else got to re-create what you once had in your imagination, and those two are never the same. Two people can like a book for the same reasons, and in a discussion talk about it in much the same way, go through the same sequence of events, quote the same lines, reiterate the same feeling of emotion; but what the setting was is alone the individuals. In many ways, then, the story is made personal and movies do nothing more then objectify and destroy it.

Works of art, I think, are completely the opposite. If you read a review of a work of art, it has a tendency of trivializing your own feelings on the matter by objectifying what it believes to be the true feeling ..

Anyway, it gets me to thinking; why do the some “men” who prefer books to movies prefer pornography to romance novels? I don’t partake in either one of course, but I was 21 once.

Quote of the Day

We should not turn metaphors into metaphysics.

~Sam Norton~

Quote of the Day

Every religion is true one way or another. It is true when understood metaphorically. But when it gets stuck in its own metaphors, interpreting them as facts, then you are in trouble.

~Joseph Campbell~

Pagan Angel and a Borrowed Car

The Underdog

Hierarchies of Thought

This is P.6 of "The Two Horns of Reaism and Non-realism"

I'd like to preface this with an exerpt from Robert Pirsig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" (I'll ultimately go another way):

Precision instruments are designed to achieve an idea, dimensional precision, whose perfection is impossible. There is no perfectly shaped part of the motorcycle and never will be, but when you come as close as these instruments take you, remarkable things happen, and you go flying across the countryside under a power that would be called magic if it were not so completely rational in every way. It's the understanding of this rational intellectual idea that's fundamental. John looks at the motorcycle and he sees steel in various shapes and has negative feelings about these steel shapes and turns off the whole thing. I look at the shapes of the steel now and I see ideas. He thinks I'm working on parts. I 'm working on concepts.

I was talking about these concepts yesterday when I said that a motorcycle can be divided according to its components and according to its functions. When I said that suddenly I created a set of boxes with the following arrangement:

And when I said the components may be subdivided into a power assembly and a running assembly, suddenly appear some more little boxes:

And you see that every time I made a further division, up came more boxes based on these divisions until I had a huge pyramid of boxes. Finally you see that while I was splitting the cycle up into finer and finer pieces, I was also building a structure.

This structure of concepts is formally called a hierarchy and since ancient times has been a basic structure for all Western knowledge. Kingdoms, empires, churches, armies have all been structured into hierarchies. Modern businesses are so structured. Tables of contents of reference material are so structured, mechanical assemblies, computer software, all scientific and technical knowledge is so structured...so much so that in some fields such as biology, the hierarchy of kingdom- phylum-class-order-family-genus-species is almost an icon.

The box "motorcycle" contains the boxes "components" and "functions." The box "components" contains the boxes "power assembly" and "running assembly," and so on. There are many other kinds of structures produced by other operators such as "causes" which produce long chain structures of the form, "A causes B which causes C which causes D," and so on. A functional description of the motorcycle uses this structure. The operator's "exists," "equals," and "implies" produce still other structures. These structures are normally interrelated in patterns and paths so complex and so enormous no one person can understand more than a small part of them in his lifetime. The overall name of these interrelated structures, the genus of which the hierarchy of containment and structure of causation are just species, is system. The motorcycle is a system. A real system.

To speak of certain government and establishment institutions as "the system" is to speak correctly, since these organizations are founded upon the same structural conceptual relationships as a motorcycle. They are sustained by structural relationships even when they have lost all other meaning and purpose. People arrive at a factory and perform a totally meaningless task from eight to five without question because the structure demands that it be that way. There's no villain, no "mean guy" who wants them to live meaningless lives, it's just that the structure, the system demands it and no one is willing to take on the formidable task of changing the structure just because it is meaningless.

But to tear down a factory or to revolt against a government or to avoid repair of a motorcycle because it is a system is to attack effects rather than causes; and as long as the attack is upon effects only, no change is possible. The true system, the real system, is our present construction of systematic thought itself, rationality itself, and if a factory is torn down but the rationality which produced it is left standing, then that rationality will simply produce another factory. If a revolution destroys a systematic government, but the systematic patterns of thought that produced that government are left intact, then those patterns will repeat themselves in the succeeding government. There's so much talk about the system. And so little understanding.

That's all the motorcycle is, a system of concepts worked out in steel. There's no part in it, no shape in it, that is not out of someone's mind -- number three tappet is right on too. One more to go. This had better be it -- .I've noticed that people who have never worked with steel have trouble seeing this...that the motorcycle is primarily a mental phenomenon. They associate metal with given shapes...pipes, rods, girders, tools, parts...all of them fixed and inviolable, and think of it as primarily physical. But a person who does machining or foundry work or forge work or welding sees "steel" as having no shape at all. Steel can be any shape you want if you are skilled enough, and any shape but the one you want if you are not. Shapes, like this tappet, are what you arrive at, what you give to the steel. Steel has no more shape than this old pile of dirt on the engine here. These shapes are all out of someone's mind. That's important to see. The steel? Hell, even the steel is out of someone's mind. There's no steel in nature. Anyone from the Bronze Age could have told you that. All nature has is a potential for steel. There's nothing else there. But what's "potential"? That's also in someone's mind! -- Ghosts.

-----

While thinking about my conundrum of representation - at least insofar as communicating it in such a way that finds some agreement - the above passage from Pirsig came to mind. The key notion to consider in dissolving the idea of philosophical representation and/or realism with respect to what Pirsig has said, is the whole idea that what we consider phenomenon, or the objective world is mostly a mental process. In other words what we see when we observe things and what we make of them stands in relation to a hierarchy or paradigm of thought in such a way that to speak of representation – whereas it may make a certain amount of sense within a given hierarchy - it falls apart outside of it, and is circular within it. Not to mention our adaptation of idea is more closely related to functionality then with accurate representation.

What I’d like to do first is recognize, as Pirsig did above, that things like government, motorcycles, map making, religion, physics, so on, are nothing more then systems of rational thought which can be seen as existing within a hierarchy. In other words, individual propositions in a language don’t stand independently in relation to the things they refer to, but rather stand within in a larger context where their truth value is relative to their logical consistency within the hierarchy. That the socialist concept of distributing the wealth is wrong or bad, is really recognition that within the hierarchy of Democratic thinking there is no such concept – which is why when one infers such a state of affairs, we all cry “SOCIALISM”, and not simply, “That sounds really shitty!”. It’s not that socialism is necessarily false, wrong or bad per se, it simply doesn’t fit into the context of our belief/value system – you could see this as a bit of dogmatic thinking, but I’ll get to that later.

That a motorcycle exhaust pipe is exactly that - and not just in statement but as represented on an engineering print – is true relative to the hierarchy of thought about motorcycles. Outside of that, or the hierarchy being unknown, there’s no telling what the piece could be and/or what it could be interpreted as. Perhaps an Australian shaman from the bush stumbles upon it and immediately proclaims it’s a religious symbol of some sort, whereupon all the people of his village bow down once a day to worship it. That sounds pretty wacky to be sure, and no doubt we’d say they were wrong about the odd piece of metal, but that’s simply because the system of thought we’re using to talk about the part is different from theirs. One might make the argument, well, it wasn’t intended to be a religious symbol from its inception and therefore on those grounds the shaman is completely cracked – he’s applying a system of thought to the part that doesn’t belong to it. But who’s to say that our current conception or system of thought about trees is the right one? The point is we’re interpreting an object relative the hierarchy of thought we’re working in, and relative to the use we find for a given object/concept.

In the case of map-making we again have a system of rational thought at work. On the one hand representation is a slick piece of rhetoric to apply to the map relative to what it’s doing – representing the terrain – however we miss the fact that what the terrain is exists within its own mental hierarchy. In this way (philosophically) we simply see the map representing (if anything at all) another hierarchy of thought. It represents, in the form of marks, scribbles, alphanumerics, etc., our very human rational thought process as it goes to work on it’s own needs and interests; it’s a concept worked out in paper, or to put it another way, it’s just more language. Again, as stated above, the map only makes sense within the context of rational thought it was conceived in; give it to the shaman above, and he might tack it up right next to his exhaust pipe and say it’s a picture of the God-head himself – on what grounds do we say he is incorrect. Once again, the idea of representation itself is nothing more then a concept which exists within a larger framework and who’s truth makes sense only within that context. Since the map is really just more language, the realist is stuck with the same problem of showing how language represents anything. Of course one could make the same argument about me, but as a pragmatist I defend my positions, well, pragmatically; if you don’t like them, or find no use for them, neither of us are any worse for ware.

Moving on, one of the road blocks that stand in the way of any two different understandings is generally one of dogma, or so I’ll argue. That a given thing is an exhaust pipe and nothing more, or that the part is a religious icon and nothing more (in statement or belief), is nothing more then a statement of dogmatic thinking. It’s an insistence that our language, along with our needs and interests surrounding the part, correlate; or more extremely (as we’re talking dogma here) that we represent reality as it is, properly. “It’s an exhaust pipe you religious wack-job!” Essentially what you end up with here is one hierarchy/system of thought claiming relevance over another hierarchy/system of thought and in some cases conflating purposes. On the one hand the westerner could assemble the part onto an actual motorcycle and demonstrate it’s use relative to his hierarchy, but on the other hand the shaman could do just the same – so long as both sides are unwilling to step out of they’re dogmatic little hierarchies, no real conclusion on the matter may be reached.

This leads me to another dogma of realism, which is the notion that scientific inquiry makes progress by finding out more and more about the same objects. But once again, this assumes (in true realist form) that we are building upon a system of thought which exists in the form of one big pyramid, as apposed to several competing pyramids, furthermore that the purposes these structures of thought serve are the same. Going back to the exhaust pipe, it’s easy to see from the outside looking in that their difference in opinion exists mainly in the purpose the object serves. Relative to this view point we cannot here make the claim that either side is incorrect, more right or more wrong; we can only say that this side or that sides purpose is meaningless to us.

In the same way we can move to an example given earlier, about where Aristotle’s ideas of motion stand relative to Newton’s. We may be tempted to consider the following statements, “Aristotle said mostly false things about motion”, or “Aristotle said mostly true things about what HE called motion, but we don’t believe there is any such thing.” Or we might want to say, “Here Aristotle goofed, even in his own terms.” Or, “here we have a statement which would be true if anything in Aristotelian physics were, but which, alas, refers to something which does not exist and thus is false.” What we’re trying to accomplish here is to distinguish between Aristotelian falsehoods which are the result of the nonexistence of what he was talking about, and those which result from his misuse of his own theoretical apparatus. However in both cases we’re making a judgment of a particular system of thought relative to the dogma of another system of thought – on the one hand, assuming we’re talking about the same things, he completely misconstrued and/or misrepresented the nature of motion. On the other hand, he was talking about ghosts and fairies that we can’t seem connect with any phenomenon by today’s standards. In both cases we neglect whatever practical purpose his dialogue about motion served at the time and instead substitute it with the practical purposes we have today – thus it is by those standards we make a call. Our current hierarchy of thought isn’t “more true”, it’s simply better suited to our current needs and interests. This is exactly the case between the westerner with the exhaust pipe, and the shaman with the religious icon – each is conceiving of a given thing within a different hierarchy of thought to serve a different need. There is no way of talking about their object that is more true then any other; it’s not more true to call it “A” instead of “B”, nor is it more true that it serves purpose “A” as apposed to purpose “B”. In the same way it isn’t more true to call motion “Aristotelian” as apposed to “Newtonian” (or visa versa), nor is it more true that motion serves an “Aristotelian” purpose as apposed to “Newtonian” purpose. Once again, it would be my argument that a shift in position is a shift in systems of thought relative to the purposes those shifts give us, not their “truthy-ness”.

Representation then, can only take place dogmatically (rhetorically) within a given hierarchy of thought. In other words if two speakers are agreeing to converse within a given context, they can make claims and/or arguments about correct representation only within that context. So you can say, relative to systemic world view “X”, it would be inaccurate to represent reality as containing a God as nowhere within the hierarchy is the logic, reason, or rational to deal with the concept. This of course doesn’t mean that God doesn’t exist anymore then the exhaust pipe may or may not be an exhaust pipe or religious icon for the same reasons. The key point here is, that any idea, whether contained in what we’d call object or in dialogue, makes sense only within the context of the language it takes place within – the same is true for the idea of representation. If one would like to use it, fine, but as we cannot justify it outside of pragmatic grounds, then happy chit-chats to you.

The final matter I’d like to address is the idea of constraint, or being constrained by reality in such a way that this gives us a legitimate claim to realism. Since it’s obvious we bump into a world that seems to hold us back from doing certain things, it follows that there must be a world in itself that we have the capacity to represent. I’m not going to fully tackle this here, but say for the moment that, in much the same way the Buddhists say, “Desire is the cause of all suffering”, and Nirvana is the escape from this suffering, I will say, “Rational thought is the cause of all constraint”. It constrains us in governmental systems, religious systems, subject/object metaphysical systems, and in philosophical systems in general. Whatever our current forms of thought are that we hold dear to within any of those systems are the vary things that constrain us, they are the dogma of our lives. As Pirsig notes, through revolts within governments, scientific revolutions, or shifts in religious perspectives, we never get to the point of releasing ourselves from the real culprit of constraint and suffering, which is systematic reason itself. Our lives through these revolutions seem to have some short term gains, but we quickly fall into the same sorts of depressions that led us into the revolutions in the first place.

I’d like to paraphrase Nietzsche with the following:“When a thing becomes known to us, it ceases to be of a concern.” (he goes on to say from here, “…so what was on the mind of God when he said, ‘know thyself’,”) In other words it (the thing) becomes dogmatic, ordinary, meaningless, and so on. It becomes something that doesn’t quite get at the core of what it was we were trying to say, and as a result we build new systems of thought to deal with that new sense of emptiness we feel; which are interpreted as our new needs and interests.

Quoting Pirsig in ZMM again he states:
“When analytic thought, the knife, is applied to experience, something is always killed in the process. That is fairly well understood, at least in the arts. Mark Twain's experience comes to mind, in which, after he had mastered the analytic knowledge needed to pilot the Mississippi River, he discovered the river had lost its beauty. Something is always killed. But what is less noticed in the arts...something is always created too. And instead of just dwelling on what is killed it's important also to see what's created and to see the process as a kind of death-birth continuity that is neither good nor bad, but just is.”

Comrade Schwartz: The paradox of choice

I don't think I've ever come across commie drivel that was packaged in such a neat and amusing pile of bullshit as this – so I thought I’d post it…

Busy @ Work

Aerospace audit & conformity this week and next... Rest assured, when you hop onto an airplane, the ammount of paperwork that went into qualifying each piece that went into the contruction of it, weigh more than the plane itself - at least that's the joke.

So when a plane leaves the assembly bay, the chances of something going wrong are as close to nothing as one can imagine.

"Hell is Chrome"

I tend to think that, like most of us, he just assumed...

Irony

In the absence of an effective general mythology or religion, each of us has his private, unrecognized, rudimentary, yet secretly potent pantheon of dream. The latest incarnation of Oedipus, the continued romance of Beauty and the Beast, stand this afternoon on the corner of Fourty-second Street and fifth Avenue, waiting for the traffic light to change.

The Knight, the Buddha and the Dragon

Another tale from Campbell:

“…The old English tale of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a famous one. One day a green giant came riding on a great green horse into King Arthur's dining hall. "I challenge anyone here," he cried, "to take this great battle-ax that I carry and cut off my head, and then, one year from today, meet me at the Green Chapel, where I shall cut off his head." The only knight in the hall who had the courage to accept this incongruous invitation was Gawain. He arose from the table, the Green Knight got off his horse, handed Gawain the ax, stuck out his neck, and Gawain with a single stroke chopped off his head. The Green Knight stood up, picked up his head, took back the ax, climbed onto his horse, and as he rode away called back to the astonished Gawain, "I'll see you in a year."

That year everybody was very kind to Gawain. A fortnight or so before the term of the adventure, he rode off to search for the Green Chapel and keep faith with the giant Green Knight. As the date approached, with about three days to go, Gawain found himself before a hunter's cabin, where he asked the way to the Green Chapel. The hunter, a pleasant, genial fellow, met him at the door and replied, "Well, the Chapel is just down the way, a few hundred yards. Why not spend your next three days here with us? We'd love to have you. And when your time comes, your green friend is just down the way." So Gawain says okay. And the hunter that evening says to him, "Now, early tomorrow I'm going off hunting, but I'll be back in the evening, when we shall exchange our winnings of the day. I'll give you everything I get on the hunt, and you give me whatever will have come to you." They laugh, and that was fine with Gawain. So they all retire to bed. In the morning, early, the hunter rides off while Gawain is still asleep. Presently, in comes the hunter's extraordinarily beautiful wife, who tickles Gawain under the chin, and wakes him, and passionately invites him to a morning of love. Well, he is a knight of King Arthur's court, and to betray his host is the last thing such a knight can stoop to, so Gawain sternly resists. However, she is insistent and makes more and more of an issue of this thing, until finally she says to him, "Well then, let me give you just one kiss!" So she gives him one large smack. And that was that. That evening, the hunter arrives with a great haul of all kinds of small game, throws it on the floor, and Gawain gives him one large kiss. They laugh, and that, too, was that. The second morning, the wife again comes into the room, more passionate than ever, and the fruit of that encounter is two kisses. The hunter in the evening returns with about half as much game as before and receives two kisses, and again they laugh. On the third morning, the wife is glorious, and Gawain, a young man about to meet his death, has all he can do to keep his head and retain his knightly honor, with this last gift before him of the luxury of life. This time, he accepts three kisses. And when she has delivered these, she begs him, as a token of her love, to accept her garter. "It is charmed," she says, "and will protect you against every danger." So Gawain accepts the garter. And when the hunter returns with just one silly, smelly fox, which he tosses onto the floor, he receives in exchange three kisses from Gawain -- but no garter.” “Do we not see what the tests are of this young knight Gawain? They are the same as the first two of Buddha. One is of desire, lust. The other is of the fear of death. Gawain had proved courage enough in just keeping his faith with this adventure. However, the garter was just one temptation too many. So when Gawain is approaching the Green Chapel, he hears the Green Knight there, whetting the great ax-whiff, whiff, whiff, whiff. Gawain arrives, and the giant simply says to him, "Stretch your neck out here on this block." Gawain does so, and the Green Knight lifts the ax, but then pauses. "No, stretch it out -- a little more," he says. Gawain does so, and again the giant elevates the great ax. "A little more," he says once again. Gawain does the best he can and then whiffff -- only giving Gawain's neck one little scratch. Then the Green Knight, who is in fact the hunter himself transfigured, explains, "That's for the garter." This, they say, is the origin legend of the order of the Knights of the Garter.”

“The moral, I suppose, would be that the first requirements for a heroic career are the knightly virtues of loyalty, temperance, and courage. The loyalty in this case is of two degrees or commitments: first, to the chosen adventure, but then, also, to the ideals of the order of knighthood. Now, this second commitment seems to put Gawain's way in opposition to the way of the Buddha, who when ordered by the Lord of Duty to perform the social duties proper to his caste, simply ignored the command, and that night achieved illumination as well as release from rebirth. Gawain is a European and, like Odysseus, who remained true to the earth and returned from the Island of the Sun to his marriage with Penelope, he has accepted, as the commitment of his life, not release from but loyalty to the values of life in this world. And yet, as we have just seen, whether following the middle way of the Buddha or the middle way of Gawain, the passage to fulfillment lies between the perils of desire and fear.”

“A third position, closer than Gawain's to that of the Buddha, yet loyal still to the values of life on this earth, is that of Nietzsche, in Thus Spake Zarathustra. In a kind of parable, Nietzsche describes what he calls the three transformations of the spirit. The first is that of the camel, of childhood and youth. The camel gets down on his knees and says, "Put a load on me." This is the season for obedience, receiving instruction and the information your society requires of you in order to live a responsible life. But when the camel is well loaded, it struggles to its feet and runs out into the desert, where it is transformed into a lion -- the heavier the load that had been carried, the stronger the lion will be. Now, the task of the lion is to kill a dragon, and the name of the dragon is "Thou shalt." On every scale of this scaly beast, a "thou shalt" is imprinted: some from four thousand years ago; others from this morning's headlines. Whereas the camel, the child, had to submit to the "thou shalts," the lion, the youth, is to throw them off and come to his own realization. And so, when the dragon is thoroughly dead, with all its "thou shalts" overcome, the lion is transformed into a child moving out of its own nature, like a wheel impelled from its own hub. No more rules to obey. No more rules derived from the historical needs and tasks of the local society, but the pure impulse to living of a life in flower.”

Saying "YES" to Life

The following is a clip from Joseph Campbell's, "The Power of Myth":

.. So Jesus says, "Judge not that you may not be judged." That is to say, put yourself back in the position of Paradise before you thought in terms of good and evil. You don't hear this much from the pulpits. But one of the great challenges of life is to say "yea" to that person or that act or that condition which in your mind is most abominable.

… There are two aspects to a thing of this kind. One is your judgment in the field of action, and the other is your judgment as a metaphysical observer. You can't say there shouldn't be poisonous serpents -- that's the way life is. But in the field of action, if you see a poisonous serpent about to bite somebody, you kill it. That's not saying no to the serpent, that's saying no to that situation.

There's a wonderful verse in the Rig Veda that says, "On the tree" -- that's the tree of life, the tree of your own life -- "there are two birds, fast friends. One eats the fruit of the tree, and the other, not eating, watches." Now, the one eating the fruit of the tree is killing the fruit. Life lives on life, that's what it's all about. A little myth from India tells the story of the great god Shiva, the lord whose dance is the universe. He had as his consort the goddess Parvathi, daughter of the mountain king. A monster came to him and said, "I want your wife as my mistress.'' Shiva was indignant, so he simply opened his third eye, and lightning bolts struck the earth, there was smoke and fire, and when the smoke cleared, there was another monster, lean, with hair like the hair of a lion flying to the four directions. The first monster saw that the lean monster was about to eat him up. Now, what do you do when you're in a situation like that? Traditional advice says to throw yourself on the mercy of the deity. So the monster said, "Shiva, I throw myself on your mercy." Now, there are rules for this god game. When someone throws himself on your mercy, then you yield mercy. So Shiva said, "I yield my mercy. Lean monster, don't eat him." "Well," said the lean monster, "what do I do? I'm hungry. You made me hungry, to eat this guy up." "Well," said Shiva, "eat yourself." So the lean monster started on his feet and came chomping up, chomping up -- this is an image of life living on life. Finally, there was nothing left of the lean monster but a face. Shiva looked at the face and said, "I've never seen a greater demonstration of what life's all about than this. I will call you Kirtimukha -- face of glory." And you will see that mask, that face of glory, at the portals to Shiva shrines and also to Buddha shrines. Shiva said to the face, "He who will not bow to you is unworthy to come to me." You've got to say yes to this miracle of life as it is, not on the condition that it follow your rules. Otherwise, you'll never get through to the metaphysical dimension.

Once in India I thought I would like to meet a major guru or teacher face to face. So I went to see a celebrated teacher named Sri Krishna Menon, and the first thing he said to me was, "Do you have a question?" The teacher in this tradition always answers questions. He doesn't tell you anything you are not yet ready to hear. So I said, "Yes, I have a question. Since in Hindu thinking everything in the universe is a manifestation of divinity itself, how should we say no to anything in the world? How should we say no to brutality, to stupidity, to vulgarity, to thoughtlessness?" And he answered, "For you and for me -- the way is to say yes." We then had a wonderful talk on this theme of the affirmation of all things. And it confirmed me in the feeling I had had that who are we to judge? It seems to me that this is one of the great teachings, also, of Jesus.

Hand Puppets

From Mother Goose and Grimm

"Busted"

Don't Major in Philosophy

Fome the comic strip F Minus

"Ragged Wood"

"Oh No"

Maya / Sunyata

Somewhere along the line I had stated that I would post something on the Maya concept, which I aim to do here by making a comparison, and talking more directly about the Zen Buddhist concept of Sunyata. Whereas these two concepts are derived from different schools of thought, one Hindu, the other again Buddhism, I believe most certainly that both share the same underlying essence and use and thus I will talk about the one and infer onto the other – not to mention I’m no follower of Hindu.

The school of Buddhism associated with Zen was derived quite simply for the purposes of experiencing the enlightenment of Sakyamuni; which is in turn expressed through the doctrine of Sunyata. Of course the term Sunyata being one of those wonderful oriental terms that’s difficult to translate into English, it can be said to mean something along the lines of “emptiness”, or “void”, and directs ones attention to the essential character of being. By doing this though, it gives sunyata somewhat of a negative character, and thus a sense that it exists within the usual dualistic concepts of mind, where further we have the ability to apply our logic and generalizations over it, and/or the notion that it arises as a result of these tools. It should not be looked at then, as something one asserts, or as something that one has/had once asserted. Certainly it could be argued that no doubt the term was brought into light through human utterance, however it should not be considered that through this utterance a form of inquiry was born into the spirits of mans intellect, or that attention to some empirical insight was born such that through a philosophical dialogue we could come to know something once hidden behind a veil.

Sunyata, we can say, is simply that which makes everything possible, but it is not once a pre-supposition, or a fairy we can discover buzzing around the lilies; quite simply put, it has no individual existence, and/or should hold within the mind no conception of a dualistic existence whereby on the one hand it is this, while on the other it is that. To have a dialogue on the matter, to bring sunyata into the world of philosophical discourse and thus apply the forms of logic and analytic upon it is to then cease to talk about it, or anything at all. The doctrine of sunyata, again, is the means through which we experience enlightenment of Sakyamuni. To make a simple comparison, surely one can speak and talk of love, even apply logic to the experience, but within this dialogue we cannot at once capture the essence of what love is – one must experience it for himself, thus at this point the dialogue becomes meaningless and it is well understood by those who are in love that no such dialogue can ever hope to pass on meaning and understanding to those who have not experience being in love.

We should then consider sunyata as enveloping the world of dualism, of subjects and objects; it is both immanent, and transcendent, non-contradictory and absolutely one. For Zen then, to know sunyata is to experience it, as once it is conceptualized it is lost. Like love, to experience love is to know it and/or be aware of it; however in the case of sunyata, we are not to be seen as becoming aware of the world of sensation and intellection. Again, the world of sense and intellect is a world which pits a dichotomy between subject and object – of a subject at first sensing, an object being sensed, and then the subject creating differentiations between object X and object Y vs. subject A. Transcendence of this dualism then, is to have awareness of sunyata – this is the essence of Zen and Zen practice.

Sunyata then, is experienced only as both subject and object and is not felt within the world of everyday experience. This is because our experience of the everyday is a conceptualized experience, one where we apply the forms of our thought through a reconstruction of reality; in some cases a reality that is said to be that which is in itself, others simply the forms and tools of thought to serve needs and interests. In either case there is a clear sense of dualism which takes either a classic form, or a binary form. In a philosophical sense we aim to reconstruct the world via a starting point from empiricism (for example), thus creating a dualism which destroys the concept of sunyata. Certainly mans power of reason is a wonderful tool at predicting and controlling phenomenon, and improving the quality of life, however the foundation of sunyata is not this sort of cold hard intellection, but an experience in and of itself. One must cast aside his reason, and his desire to differentiate to first begin to enter into such an experience.

It is said that “Knowing and seeing” sunyata is sunyata knowing and seeing itself – in other words there is no outside knower, no man at the machine, it is its own knower and it’s own seer. Although our experience is condition and relative to certain contingencies, it should be seen that WE ARE sunyata; our capacity to reason arises out of it, however is not the path that leads back to it. As sunyata is part of reason itself and leaves its mark in the wake of reason, to all together engulf oneself in the enterprise of reason in an effort to discover truth is akin to rigorously applying geology to discover the secrets of the objective world.

The essence of Zen, of sunyata, of maya, is the unconditioned experienced of life itself – it’s the zone of the athlete, the middle stage of the act of shoveling ones driveway, being in the midst of battle with the enemy, or being within the act of a crime. It knows no morally right or wrong, evils or goodness, it is not held high and felt only by the righteous, but is woven into the lives of everyone; it permeates, it is here, it is not here, it is everywhere, it is everything, it is….

Afterwards:
There is the idea that maya simply means illusion, and directs ones attention to the idea that the world of dualism we live in is unreal, that (for example, as in ZMM) the millions of people who perished as a result of the Hiroshima bomb, was merely illusory. But this represents a certain shallowness to the idea of maya. To see maya as an illusion is not to disregard life per se, be to direct one to a path of enlightenment which circumvents the use of reasoning for such a task.

From Pirsig’s ZMM:
“In all of the Oriental religions great value is placed on the Sanskrit doctrine of Tat tvam asi, "Thou art that," which asserts that everything you think you are and everything you think you perceive are undivided. To realize fully this lack of division is to become enlightened.

Logic presumes a separation of subject from object; therefore logic is not final wisdom. The illusion of separation of subject from object is best removed by the elimination of physical activity, mental activity and emotional activity. There are many disciplines for this. One of the most important is the Sanskrit dhyna, mispronounced in Chinese as "Chan" and again mispronounced in Japanese as "Zen." (there’s a bit of ignorance in this statement I won’t here point out, but the inference is clear enough) Phædrus never got involved in meditation because it made no sense to him. In his entire time in India "sense" was always logical consistency and he couldn't find any honest way to abandon this belief. That, I think, was creditable on his part.

But one day in the classroom the professor of philosophy was blithely expounding on the illusory nature of the world for what seemed the fiftieth time and Phædrus raised his hand and asked coldly if it was believed that the atomic bombs that had dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were illusory. The professor smiled and said yes. That was the end of the exchange.

Within the traditions of Indian philosophy that answer may have been correct, but for Phædrus and for anyone else who reads newspapers regularly and is concerned with such things as mass destruction of human beings that answer was hopelessly inadequate. He left the classroom, left India and gave up.”

It’s obvious from this passage that Pirsig was looking for the sort of enlightenment found through connection with the universe by means of pure reason (he was a Kantian slob was he not), and as a result failed to see the point of what was being conveyed, which resulted in years later going nuts. I suppose it’s difficult to get away from the idea that one can paste they’re conditioned forms and ideas onto the world, call it what it is and move on. That the world is illusion is not a plea to see it as such, and thus ignore it, it is nothing more then a warning of the ills which arise when applying logic to its discovery as a means of ultimate Truth - it is forever an empty cup. Could one live life with only the reasoning of love, and not love itself? If we once called love an illusion, does this negate what one reads in the paper or sees on the street? No – it says that love on sight, sound and intellect is an illusion as there is no experience there to be had, only the illusion of an experience that is not understood; one could at first be pretending, could be acting, so on. Is the love one is seeing between two people on a street corner illusory? Yes, and in the same way the Hiroshima bomb was.

The illusion of these concepts arises as the result of a particular form of inquiry that would limit them to the world of site, or of sense in general – that is the illusion…

A redundant after-thought:
The Illusion, Maya, and love is like a card trick. What makes the card trick illusiory is the fact that within the experience of the trick an essential component is missing, and thus an experience of illusion is had, which of course we call magic. What one sees when he uses reason to contemplate maya, or views love from a coffee shop window, is an illusion in the same way as an essential component of the experience is missing, and that is of course, the experience itself. Only upon plunging oneself into the act of living can he grasp what he sees, and only in this instance do the words he speaks make any sense. Once the illusion of the card trick is revealed, and one can directly experience the slight of hand, does one understand that through the illusion there is really no illusion at all…

Hate Mail

MARGIE vs. HERBERT (Fargo/Deliverance)

Ok, this is great. Back on November 26th Stephen put up THIS POST on Toby Keith.

Off the cuff, I made the following comment:
“Stephen,don't judge Americans based on the red neck SOB's that lost the civil war.... Those are the people who listen to Toby Keith.:”

Of course for those who know me, Stephen’s blog, my Blog, understand the nature of this comment. Anyway, evidently some lone sole was surfing the internet, likely Googling “Toby Keith”, and stumbled upon Stephen’s Blog. As a result I get the following e-mail this morning from southern belle Audrey Hopper:
“ im responding to a post about toby keith written by andrew louis.im not a big toby fan but i am one of those so called rednecks & damn proud to be from the south! you need to shut your mouth about people &cultures you know nothing about.we have a good life down here.we are not the toothless ,barefoot,racist that you cocky ass yankees try to make us out to be & your comments just prove how ignorant you really are. please do us a favor & never bring your stupid ignorant ass to the south because we dont want you or your kind here to demoralize & destroy our beautiful states.dont even vacation here.oh ,one question please, If the south and all us ignorant rednecks are so ignorant then please tell me why your kind of people keep moving down here to retire or escape your filthy crime ridden states.by the way even if we were as dumb as you say,then thats ok because you couldnt last 5 minutes up against these southern men. we are survivors which is something you yankees know nothing about
screw you sincerely,
proud southern belle!"

So I’m thinking, “WHAT”??? Of course I realize these blog conversations aren’t private, but come on - you don't need a keyboard to surf the internet. So I responded as such:
“We were being satirical, but it seems that fact was somehow lost on you.

I do find it interesting that you would feel the need to shoot someone an e-mail regarding a thread on a blog from so long ago. Do you make it a habit of going around the internet fighting perceived southern discrimination? Perhaps if you took the time to understand Stephen's blog, it's content and what he talks about you'd understand. Or even better, stop by, read and understand my blog and understand me. Evidently (I'm guessing) you googled "Toby Kieth" and came upon Stephen's blog, then immediately overreacted. Again, that's unfortunate.

I’d here apologize, but I find no real need to – with your e-mail to me, you seem to be merely feeding into the very stereotype you’re fighting against. Sort of ironic isn’t it…?"

I'll update with her response if there is one.... Or perhaps she'll stumble on by and speak for herself - that would be nice.

P.5 The Two Horns of Realism and Non-realism

Because I’m often obsessive and just can’t help myself, let me have one last go at this…

First, what am I talking about when I say representation?
This is simple; what I’m rejecting is the idea that the mind is a mirror, or a reflection of objective reality and that in some manner or another our words get us closer to that reflection. Furthermore I reject the idea that through science, metaphysics, logic (whathaveyou) we are brought closer to a commensurable dialogue through which to communicate and know things. Along with this realist view is also the idea that we can be in come manner or another certain of the notion we’re representing, certain that we’re closer to truth, so on and so forth, even though it’s generally agreed upon that such a certainty cannot be maintained outside of a circular argument.

The map analogy has been often appealed to in this conversation, however there’s a problem I see in that. First off, I don’t reject the sort of rhetorical language that likes to say this squiggly line and this box represents this and that particular thing as in these instances we’re not talking about philosophical matters, we’re merely navigating the world and behaving as humans behave. In a better way, we’re merely being metaphorical; we’re being intelligent tool users.

Here-in lies the problem - and I think it’s pretty simple:
A representational / correspondence theory of truth is being maintained, however, a pragmatic / utilitarian justification for that position is being used. Now, more then a mere contradiction, the justification raises the anti and/or trumps the held position as it reduces the position to the state of affairs of the justification.
You said the following on your blog:
“There is no contradiction in saying that to discard representation is incorrect, yet at the same time no map can be the 'correct' one.”

In other words your justification is that, whereas there are no correct maps, we know that some maps work better then others – which isn’t a justification of representation at all. Let me put this in a simpler way; a realist position is one that says quite clearly, idea X is better then idea Y because it better represents phenomenon Z. However that’s not your argument at all, your argument is; idea X is better then idea Y because it better suits our needs and interest with respect to phenomenon Z.

If this is your argument/justification (which seems clearly the case), then representation is (like I’ve said) merely rhetorical and/or simply a nice way of talking about things. Your contradiction is simply that you’re not arguing for the ontological reality of your position, but merely trying to justify talking in a certain way. Since this is all your doing, and I have no problem whatsoever with the tool like use of saying that formula X represents phenomenon Y, then it’s really unclear that your even arguing a realist position at all. In other words if I assert “GOD”, the realist position would argue for the grounds at which God is represented in reality – but you, relative to your justification, would look for in what way making that assertion “WORKS”. If you took the realist horn however, I would simply forfeit my response and ask that you prove your representational position, in which case you’d grasp the other horn and we’d never get anywhere. The bottom line is, my justification can merely be that it works to talk about God; furthermore that God, as I’ve said, is metaphorical. Now here you might be tempted to ask, “a metaphor for what” (grasping realism), but then I’d ask, “what are you representing in your position and how do you know?” Which would get us right back to, “IT WORKS”.

Bottom line – you maintain realism, however justify it pragmatically. So you’re suggesting, as William James did, “Truth is what works by way of belief.” Not, truth is a correspondence with reality. But more accurately you seem to being saying; “It’s True that truth is a correspondence to reality as it works by way of belief.” More importantly, your pragmatic justification rendors your position of representation arbitrary.

Can I say, “It’s true that I’m an atheist because God say’s I am.”

A Brief MOQ Rant

I’ve been browsing the MOQ threads for quite some time now – even subscribed – and I find myself a bit, perhaps put off, by a number of conceptual schemes…

I don’t know, take this statement:
“the basic argument in ZAMM is a pre-existing reality before the subject becomes aware of the objective world. Thus the pre-something (now called Quality) must necessarily be the DQ that
spawns static qualities.”

Ahhh, the wonderful effervescence of pre-suppositionalism… We may as well restate this paragraph to say something like; the basic argument of Christianity is a pre-existing reality before man became aware of the objective world. Thus the pre-something (called God) must necessarily be the thing that spawns human awareness… I’ll add to this that God created everything, but he didn’t create objects per se, he created Goodness; he created a man, called him Adam and said he was “Good”. Of course this sort of language being spoken before the time Plato fk’d us all up.

Sprinkling in that bit of dogma suddenly doesn’t make that paragraph sound so great now does it? Now of course, I can almost hear the screams of packeted electrons flowing across wires to servers all over the world. How dare I, you must not understand the MOQ at all…

The problem with Dynamic Quality, like Zen, and like Yahweh before the Christians got a hold of it, is that it’s (should be) well understood that one cannot talk about such things – as soon as it’s uttered it should be immediately discarded. Consider this statement (another quote from the board):
"Therefore, for Pirsig, immediate experience (or Quality) is experience where there is no distinction between what is experienced and the act of experiencing itself."

Yes, great, so what are we talking about again???

Here’s the deal; Rorty was, for me, always one small phrase/word away from mysticism – in practice his philosophy (as I’ll argue later) is the final act of a Buddhist play. You find Pirsig in the religious/Buddhist sections of book stores (as apposed to philosophy sections) because his language is necessarily mystical. He wants to be fully pragmatic on the one hand (and oh so Zen), while on the other hand he wants to be fully Kantian. People (it seems to me) who are drawn to his philosophy as apposed to his mysticism are those who want a “theory of everything”, a language within which we can capture the essence of all things; and this leads to the sort of pre-suppostional talk I seem to see here and there. Those who are attracted to his mysticism probably don’t do a whole lot of talking about it – although I’m probably wrong about that.

My bet is that Pirsig will forever remain a cult figure as apposed to a respected philosopher – and this is the way it should be. Dynamic Quality, as a philosophy, simply isn’t intellectually honest and shouldn’t be discussed in philosophy classes. If it ever came to pass that it was, then bring on Zen and bring on God…

What is the context under which we should discuss Pirsig and Dynamic Quality?
If we maintain a philosophical discourse, then what ground are we picking up? Why should I include Dynamic Quality in my philosophical language any more then I should include God or Zen?
It’s question begging, and it’s mysticism – why not leave it at that? Certainly his metaphysic makes sense within the context of the game he’s playing, but outside that why have a public discourse on Quality? Not that we are, or that someone is suggesting we should, but certainly as many would like to see Pirsig get his due it would suggest to me that we bring him into the world of philosophy.

Bah…

Rorty, Buddhism, and the Liberal Ironist

P.4 The Two Horns of Realism and Non-realism

Of course “in front of me right now is a computer monitor”; which of course I’m eyeing to a greater degree as I type…

However, outside of a certain behavior which includes making marks and noises, this statement really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. In the same way, outside of a system of communication which includes speaking, marking, making symbols, systems of arithmetic, logic, etc. a map makes no sense at all either.

As the example goes, the map is a representation of the terrain; it corresponds to certain objective/material aspects of it – dark lines with perpendicular hashes are railroads, blue squiggly lines are streams and rivers, while blue patches are lakes – green patches are parks and forested areas, with broad circles and numbers representing altitudes – then there’s those little blue boxes with the tent, those are camping areas, or perhaps a wayside rest, with little black lines paving they’re way adjacent to them, through the cities and past my house… This, it’s supposed to be believed, represents the land.

Direct intuition seems to suggest quite clearly that such is the case, to the point that no-one outright would have a problem accepting it – however I find it highly problematic. Certainly before a squiggly line can be conceived of as representing a river, it has to be understood the enormous amount of contingencies that lead to that particular symbol being coherent in the first place. Looking at it just by itself we say, “this line stands for the river.” Is it the representative character of that statement that allows me understand what you’re saying, or is it rather your behavior as a whole that allows me to understand it? In another way, to say that words and marks represent and correspond is to suggest (or so I take it as suggesting) that outside of human contingencies these words and marks still hold a certain truth in and of themselves – it’s the old, “the universe speaks a certain language” bit. Which is for me to suggest that languages are not elements of human behavior, but elements of the way things are in themselves – and this seems to lead somewhat dubiously to the thought that speaking (in the form of representing) is really a third person enterprise with my hands firmly grasping the controls of a mysterious chimera inside the skull of meat puppet.

As elements of the way things are in themselves it suggests to me that, outside of human needs and interests there are still “blue squiggly lines and green patches”, but then I’m confused because, where are those blue squiggly lines and green patches? In other words, maps (if I can loosely use “represent” without being attacked) are at best representations of human behavior, not land masses. They represent certain contingencies which are always relative to ourselves.

I can’t escape the idea that behind any realist worldview is the idea of some sort of absolute – which either exists in a certain sort of commensurate lingo, or an all powerful all knowing God. How can you be certain that you’ve represented reality? In what way is the manner of my speak incorrect? You see, the only way to validate a strict realist, representative circular worldview is [again] to appeal to a ghost in the machine (a third person perspective), which ultimately validates the claim. A view of language (on the other hand) which is more tool-like and behavioral, has no requirement for ultimate justification or circular reasoning as what I’m saying has no ultimate relation to things in themselves, but only relates (once again) to behavior.

One of the reasons why I bring up democracy over and over (to which I haven’t received a response on the matter), is if language represents the terrain, then what is the terrain of Democracy? Where do we see Democracy? Where do we bump into it and how is this bumping into any different from bumping into the so-called terrain? This is why I infer that the answer is naturally, that “Democracy is merely a creation of the human spirit.” But if that’s the case, what’s it representative of (what’s spirit, or whatever word one would insert here)? Is Democracy real? Is it a fairy? The realist perspective fails to account for such phenomenon’s – of which we could include religion, love, goodness, and countless other human institutions. However, looked at from a behavioral point of view, the line between the terrain and human institution is blurred to a point that it makes no sense to conceive of such distinctions; that anything and everything from rocks to God, to love, to physics, are nothing more then human conventions based on certain contingencies that arose in our effort to thrive, survive, be happy and procreate.

I’m thinking to myself that this sounds like a sort of reductionism of God and religion, however I must remind myself that at this point in the string of this talk on Realism vs Non-realism, I’ve merely been talking about God as it pertains to a behavioral perspective… I think after this post I’d like to move on and get back to some thoughts I’ve been having on Rorty and Buddhism – as Buddhism is my secret love, and this whole liberal ironist thing is really eatin’ a hole through me…..

P.S.
Psiomniac, I’m not really sure where to go… And I’m really bothered by the fact that maybe I’m severely misunderstanding your point of view – it could be because I’m too much of a novice, or that I’m being too forceful with my own thoughts, I’m not sure. Perhaps you could draft a post on your blog that elucidates your major points??? Cuz I can be a little slow and stuff.

Chinese Translation

This was posted in my side bar for quite some time... It's one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite artists, and I suppose it sums up my current mode... I'm still a bit flustered and searching for a clear thought...

...So mix yourself a drink three fingers deep, listen to the guitar at the end of this song, and be convinced you don't know shit about nothin'... Like the Oracle said, "...By the time you get done, you'll be as right as rain..." [tear]

Hashi's

Excuses-excuses:

Winter time is always a bit slow for me as I have the thyroid of a 70 year old woman. I have what’s called Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis, which pretty much means my body has gone medieval on my thyroid gland to a degree that it basically doesn’t function at all – well, I suppose it does a little. As a result I take hormone everyday to compensate. In the winter time it’s natural for peoples metabolism to slow down, which is a result of slowed thyroid function of course, but in my case (since it doesn’t really do much) it means I need more hormone, otherwise I get tired, sluggish, and my mind gets foggy and depressive. There as well I usually take 2 months off in the winter from my weight training – yeah, I’m an f’n muscle head with a buzz cut and tatoos, what are you gonna do – and now that I’ve started back up again it’s put an additional drain on my metabolism. Time to up the dose and get my mind working again……