Sorry - I accidentally sent my last message before it was complete - it
should have ended as follows:
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Marty Jorgensen
Sent: Friday, May 04, 2001 10:44 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: MD Consciousness/Awareness/the property market in London
Elephant:
Now this is where it gets interesting;
You said:
>
> Elephant said:
> Persons, Consciousnesses - these are different concepts. Compare 'person'
> and
> 'soul'. My personality can have a bearing on the fate of my eternal soul,
> but this fate needn't be shared with the fate of the personality. It
might
> be that the personality dies for the soul to live. Likewise with
> individuated consciousness: the fact that personal identity ('elephant')
is
> so fragile doesn't make the distinction between this consciousness and
that
> one any the less distinct. Consciousness and personality are not the
same.
I replied:
MARTY:
> Me: No, consciousness and personality are NOT the same, but the way I
look
> at consciousness, you seem to be mixing the two up. Your personality,
your
> 'me', is your creation. It is created when you (we) begin to
differentiate,
> name and objectify. There is no 'you' other than your consciousness,
which
> we often refer to as 'experience' or 'perception' - there's nothing else
> there.
And you replied to that:
ELEPHANT:
I'll explain (because you've missed my point entirely). I am am trying to
show that we individuate consciousnesses for reasons entirely unconnected
with personality. Hence the contrast between souls and persons. Your
argument seems to be that insofar as we transcend personality, we cease to
be distinct individuals. That assertion is false.
Person and consciousness are not the same. Contrary to what you say there
*is* a 'you' other than your consciousness and the name for that other you
is the *person*. It's the *person* which must be transcended, indeed got
rid of. Consider 'selfless'. *What* is 'selfless' an attribute of? A
consciousness.
Then I say: I may have missed the point; I was trying to avoid speaking
about 'souls' and how this differs from the personality, but I see now that
this is the important part. Who, or what, HAS this soul? In the DQ, as I
read it, there is DQ as the ultimate, only reality - everything else is a
pattern, static or dynamic, of Quality. Are you now saying that there are
TWO things that comprise reality, Quality and souls? In order for there to
be distinct individuals, outside or beyond static/dynamic patterns, there
must be distinct stuff other than Quality. This seems to go against
Pirsig's whole point. As far as 'selfless' goes, that is a stated
characteristic of the static pattern I refer to as 'me'. The soul seems to
me to be just a step back from 'me' - a deeper version of the ego.
Elephant said:
It is true that in so far as we transcend personality we cease to have
distinct *goals*, private fantasies, self-serving histories e.g... But a
man who has transcended personality and become both enlightened and
compassionate (for the two are one) does not thereby destroy the
individuation of his consciousness. It is *his* consciousness which is
enlightened, it is *he* who is compassionate, it is *other souls* to whom he
is compassionate. Do you follow?
Me: First of all, I don't see enlightenment and compassion as the same
thing; I see it as enlightenment LEADING TO compassion, for once you see
reality as it is, compassion is the only thing that makes sense.
I don't see it as "his' compassion or 'his' enlightenment, it is simply
compassion and enlightenment. Where is the 'his'? If I help someone who
needs it, the help I give is dynamic quality. I may try to describe it and
call it 'compassion', but the act itself is simply dynamic quality in
action. I don't see the 'he' behind it, other than the static image. There
is only the experience, the quality itself. So I guess I don't follow.
When I look for 'me'
The soul I see
is Quality
defined
marty j
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
