Never mind that you clearly don't understand Plato and in the context of your system translate ἀρετή ("arête") badly as 'quality', since the usual word translated into Latin (by Cicero as qualitas) and then into English  as 'quality' is 'ποιότης'.

Quality, both in Latin and English means to indicate some what-ness or property. Cicero coined qualitas to translate ποιότης from qualis which is an adjective for some-"what-sort/thus" of a thing. 

ποιότης is Plato's coinage, and it's one of Aristotle's key technical words (one of the categories). It's usually translated as 'quality', in the sense meant when talking about properties (property isn't a great word for this, since that's a Latin traslaiton of ἰδίωμα, but properties are qualities and are the formost cases). One way to think about it more directly in English would be to translate it as 'certain-sort-ness' or 'certain-kind-ness'. Think about that this way:

These are apples.
This one is red and this one is yellow.
What are red and yellow with respect to the apples?
They are "sorts" or "kinds" of apples: a red apple is a sort of apple.
Red-sort and yellow-sort are certain sorts.
What is certain sort as such?
Certain sort-ness.

If you think like a Latin it would go.
What kind (qualis) of apples are those?
Red and yellow.
What are 'red' and 'yellow' with respect to apples?
Answers to 'the what are question': qualis.
And what is being qualis as such?
Qualitas, which comes to us into English via old-French 'qualite' as 'quality'. 

This is why I say your use of 'quality' is eccentric and unintelligible to me except ambiguously. It makes no sense to say that physical things are static-sortness and that the foundation of things is dynamic-sortness. When I confront you about this you become utterly confused because you clearly associate 'quality' with more blaitently normative English senses of the word like 'the quality of beef' or 'this is a man of quality'. That's fine but you need to know you're doing that, especially in an educated philosophical context. You could have learned that by consulting absolutly any basic philosophical dictionary.

See:

http://www.philosophypages.com/dy/q.htm#qual

qualities
The properties or features of things, whether they are intrinsic or extrinsic to the thing itself. 

https://books.google.com/books?id=5wTQtwB1NdgC&pg=PA73&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=3#v=onepage&q=quality&f=false

Qualities
See PROPERTIES

etc etc etc

Your understanding of ἀρετή as hard to translate is specious. Here is the Liddell Scott Entry on the word:

A.goodness, excellence, of any kind, in Hom. esp. of manly qualities, “ποδῶν ἀρετὴν ἀναφαίνων” Il.20.411; “ἀμείνων παντοίας ἀρετὰς ἠμὲν πόδας ἠδὲ μάχεσθαι καὶ νόον” 15.642; so of the gods, “τῶν περ καὶ μείζων ἀ. τιμή τε βίη τε” 9.498; also of women, Od.2.206; ἀ. εἵνεκα for valour, Hdt.8.92: pl., ἀ. ἀπεδείκνυντο displayed brave deeds, Id.1.176, 9.40.
b. later, of the gods, chiefly in pl., glorious deeds, wonders, miracles, SIG1172, Str.17.1.17; “ζῶσαι ἀ.” IG14.966, cf. 1 Ep.Pet.2.9: also in sg., “ὄψιν ἰδοῦσα ἀρετὴν τῆς θεοῦ” IG2.1426b, cf. Isyll. 62, BSA21.169,180.
2. generally, excellence, “ἡ ἀ. τελείωσίς τις” Arist. Metaph.1021b20, cf.EN1106a15, etc.; of persons, “ἄνδρα πὺξ ἀρετὰν εὑρόντα” Pi.O.7.89, cf. P.4.187, B.9.13, etc.; “τὸ φρονεῖν ἀ. μεγίστη” Heraclit. 112: in pl., forms of excellence, “μυρίαι ἀνδρῶν ἀ.” B.13.8, cf. Gorg. Fr.8, etc.; “δικαστοῦ αὕτη ἀ.” Pl.Ap.18a; esp. moral virtue, Democr. 179, 263, al., Gorg.Fr.6; opp. κακία, X.Mem.2.1.21, cf.Pl.R.500d, Lg. 963a, 963c sq., D.60.17, Arist.EN1102a6, Pol.1295a37, etc.; good nature, kindness, etc., E.Fr.163.
b. of animals, things, as land, Hdt.4.198, 7.5, Th.1.2; ἡ ἐν ἀρετῇ κειμένη γῆ productive land, PTeb.5.165 (ii B. C.); “ἵππου” Hdt.3.88; κυνῶν, ἵππων, Pl.R.335b; σκεύους ib.601d; [ἀστακοῦ] Archestr.Fr.24; “ἀ. βίου” Pl.R.618c; “πολιτείας” Lg.886b, etc.
3. prosperity, Od.13.45.
II. ἀ. εἴς τινα active merit, good service done him, “ἐς τοὺς Ἕλληνας” Th.3.58, cf. 2.40; “ἀ. περί τινα” X. An.1.4.8; “ἀνταποδοῦναι ἀ.” Th.4.19; “ἀρετὰς παρασχέσθαι ὑπέρ τινος” D.19.312; ἀρετῆς ἕνεκα, freq. in honorary Inscrr., IG22.107.14, etc.
III. reward of excellence, distinction, fame, “πλούτῳ δ᾽ ἀρετὴ καὶ κῦδος ὀπηδεῖ” Hes.Op.313, cf. Sapph.80, Pi.N.5.53, al.; “ἀθάνατος ἀ.” S.Ph.1420, Pl.Smp.208d; “ἃ ἆθλα τοῦ πολέμου τοῖς ἀνδράσιν ἐστίν, ἐλευθερία καὶ ἀ.” Lycurg.49; of God, “δόξα καὶ ἀ.” 2 Ep.Pet.1.3: in pl., glories, Thgn.30, Pi.N.10.2, al.; “πλοῦτος ἀρεταῖς δεδαιδαλμένος” Id.O. 2.53; “γενναίων ἀ. πόνων” E.HF357 (lyr.), cf. Lys.2.26; “προγόνων ἀ.” Pl.R.618b; in LXX freq. of the praises of God, Is.42.8, al.
IV. Ἀρετή personified, Prodic.1, Arist.Fr.675, Callix.2, CIG2786, SIG 985.10, etc.
V. ἡ ἀ. σου as a title, Your worship, PLips.13 ii 20, etc.
VI. an engine of war, Ath.Mech.38.11.
VII. a plaster, Androm. ap. Gal.13.531

You also mistakenly conflate ἀρετή with ἀγαθός when you speak of Plato's Form/Idea of the good (ἡ τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ ἰδέα), likely because you seem to know no Greek, which looks bad when you're throwing Greek around, but in any case, your narrative of Aristotle destroying the Form of the Good's place in philosophy is simply false. The Platonists generally and successfully moderated these aspects of Aristotle's corpus for nearly 800 years or so, often claiming that Aristotle is simply focusing on the natural world, rather than truly dismissing the realm of the Ideas. This neoplatonic moderation survived well past the middle ages in the place of God in metaphysics, since goodness in Christian metaphysics becomes a fundamental aspect of God's being and God become the source and sustainer of all being, which is the basic place given to the Form of the Good in Plato and those who follow him. Now, unlike you, I'm willing to admit that's a modest simplification, but it's far more accurate a narratice than the near fiction you're peddling.

Excepting the fact that your account is historically misleading, the idea that Aristotle objected to Plato in the name of the subject-object division (let alone your very particular understanding of this division) is laughably anachronistic. Aristotle did not explicitly operate with any such division, and this is well known. The thought that he did comes from a massive but common misunderstanding of the Platonic Ideas (which Aristotle is said to reject, even though he doesn't) as like mental/psychological items, i.e. of the subject. No thinker in the Platonic tradition, including Aristotle, would ever be so ridiculous as to think the είδη(eide)/ιδέες(idées) are ideas in our sense: notions, mental pictures. The Greek roughly for that is ἔννοια- an act of thought -and it's very clearly distinct in usage from 'είδος'. Aristotle uses it once to refer to the sort of thing we do in math when we say 'There are 5 apples and you take 2 away.' to talk about subtraction. With respect to the είδος of subtraction, apples, "taking away", and even the particular quantities of 5 and 2 are ἔννοια, which is to say, some kind of personal image/notion in this case to aid in grasping the true είδος of subtraction. The formal division of subject and object isn't even that old. There is something in Plato corresponding roughly to the question of what do we know truly, and this centers in Plato around the difference between knowledge and opinion, but by no means does Plato attribute falsity to "the subjective". He tends to think the world has an inherently misleading character which has to be guarded against, and this is because of change. Even in Aristotle, there is something of a risk inherent in the particularity of things. Knowledge proper, science, is of universals for Aristotle. This is not a subjective, in our sense, problem.

As for your http://www.som.is/ :

You quote/paraphrase Kant as saying "Everything is an idea.". This is plainly false. I don't know where you got this notion. I mean, just go read, I don't know, any Kant or any competent introduction to Kant. I know of no philosopher in history who holds this in the way you mean it, i.e. 'everything is a subjective notion'. Even in Schopenhauer's characterization of "The World as Will and Representation/Idea" it only takes a tiny amount of reading the book to understand  that by Idea he simply does not mean a "subjective idea" in the common sense. It is, indeed, related to the subject, but this has very little relation to the common understanding of something "being subjective".

Descartes never claims our will "transcends the laws of science". That is such a silly, decontextualized, and anachronistic reading that I find it hard to believe you have read Descartes. Our wills in Descartes are not extended substances, so they cannot be acted upon by the motion of extended substances. Whatever the account of natural motion- and Descartes had a modestly groundbreaking account -it simply doesn't apply to the will. This would have been true of the Scholastics as well, by the way.

I'm also pretty sure that your claim about Bohr is wrong. It's so paraphrasey that you could never find a direct contradiction to it, I'm sure, but it's not what he means.

The basic error you're committing is believing bad reductionist accounts of traditional thinkers who might be called "Idealist" or "rationalist", paraphrasing this as in some sense meaning 'the world is subjective' in the vulgar sense, then proposing an eccentricly phrased view which- apart from your bizarre and incoherent love of talking about the inscrutable -bears a hell of a lot of resemblance to the traditional Western style of metaphysics. It would, of course, be easier to tell if you didn't require me to impressionistically try and piece together your view from your vague and eccentric language or refer me to you beautiful but patently false and simplistic websites despite the fact that I have you right here with me but so be it.

Also, please, go on and tell me how the inscrutable is supposed to preserve human meaning and morality. If I can't define it in any way it's hard to see how I have knowledge of it, and if I can't know meaning (even if it's real) life is practically meaningless. Pointing won't help you here, since what one can point to can be named and can then be said. Quoting the tao will really not help you. Perhaps you have conflated two different kinds of definition. It is obvious to everyone that one cannot, for instance, give an exausive discourse about what it mean to ride a bike, but this is simply not the same as somingthing being undefinable simpliciter.

Dennis wrote:

This is still incomplete and needs to be explained. Inanimate objects are incapable of making decisions. Decisions are activations of rational choice (though not always). What sense does it make to say that inanimate things and the quantum level residents make decisions?

See below..

Dennis wrote:

I know your story about the metaphysics, no offense, but that story is little to nothing when it comes to comparing the coherency of the claims, I consider it mostly to be rhetoric of sorts rather than explanation, or a brief summary of ones book (if you're going to write on where you expand on it, let me know).

It has been expanded by Robert Pirsig in his two books Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Lila.  I recommend!  I take no offence as I understand the origin of the 'rhetoric' slander(Socrates).  There is good and bad rhetoric and this is directly related to the coherency of the claims.

Dennis wrote:

If you would've said that, things could've been so much easier. Why couldn't you just say that? Quality is basically something akin to the elements of experience, something like Phenomenology? Most realist metaphysics accepts them, they don't consider them undefinable. Things like the topic of Universals are based on fully accepting things as how they are, and people argue for Moorean Truths (things that not even philosophers shouldn't deny). No one here is going to discard that experience of things, the qualitative experiences are basic, and in fact, necessary to any kind of investigation which leads to richer philosophical premises and conclusions. Your metaphysic doesn't seem to have an edge on anything, if you think these things are defined. But just to be sure, as how you have made it synonymous with qualitative experience, I see no reason to deny it, but then no reason to accept your metaphysic either. I would argue that this is purely basic, and if I'm right, the study of Phenomenology rightly delves into it.

The MOQ is not phenomenology. Phenomenology with its pre-existing subjects and objects isn't supported by the evidence. The MOQ provides a much better, more accurate, understanding of experience and starts with the undefined betterness and proceeds from there.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

Now who's being inaccurate?  You're claiming above that I'm 'unwilling' to admit that the Story is a modest simplification. . . . ?

The point is, you need tell us what the stuff is, we are asking you to clarify things for us. You are the acolyte of the Metaphysics of Quality, rather than obscuring things, we want you to explain what's going on.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

It has been expanded by Robert Pirsig in his two books Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Lila.  I recommend!  I take no offence as I understand the origin of the 'rhetoric' slander(Socrates).  There is good and bad rhetoric and this is directly related to the coherency of the claims.

One day, if and when I think you cannot properly explain what needs be explained to me, I'll have to give it a read, myself. I'll read it down the road, anyway. So don't worry about it, but it's a long way down the road.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

The MOQ is not phenomenology. Phenomenology with its pre-existing subjects and objects isn't supported by the evidence. The MOQ provides a much better, more accurate, understanding of experience and starts with the undefined betterness and proceeds from there.

This doesn't seem to be an undefinable thing when you've said that you're using it synonymously with qualitative experiences. I don't bother asking for evidence of you since that's something undefinable while being synonymous with qualitative experience. I maintain, this is incredibly obscure. There's no clarity about it, there's nothing to put to test here.

I think what we're taking an issue with is statements like;

"Phenomenology with its pre-existing subjects and objects isn't supported by the evidence."

But when pressed, we get nothing out of it. Quality is not being. It's qualitative experiences. It's just asserted that it's better, and the counter position is inferior (without evidence too)! What do you regard as evidence for phenomenology here? 

Again, we simply cannot put your metaphysic to the test, because if you're meaning something like qualitative experiences, I'm not sure what you disagree with in Phenomenology.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

The websites are of course simplistic and their intended audience clearly isn't an academic as well read as you. That's not to say I think there's anything in them which is entirely false either (see earlier post about reductionism and a better alternative).

Not only are these websites simplistic, they are wrong. Again, if you want to propose your metaphysic you need properly represent the views of others. If what you've said is downright false (and you know it), I'm not sure why you keep it over on your website when it has the incredibly propensity to mislead others who are equally wanting to give other metaphysics a fair trial. 

Last edited by Dennis (8/01/2016 10:12 am)

goodmetaphysics wrote:

I'll respond here but to be honest I'm not sure why.  I can feel your contempt ooze from just about every sentence you write.

You're not entitled to my respect, and you gained my contempt when you continually danced around direct questions and directed me to a website that cannot answer them because it's full of patent falsehoods.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

I'm just here for a discussion

You cannot discuss when you both don't answer questions and claim your position is inscrutable.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

Arete isn't 'badly' translated as Quality when the wiki of arete clearly states:

Because ἀρετή is about virtue whereas quality is about any kind of sort whatsoever.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

Arete (Greek: ἀρετή), in its basic sense, means "excellence of any kind".[1] The term may also mean "moral virtue".[1] In its earliest appearance in Greek, this notion of excellence was ultimately bound up with the notion of the fulfillment of purpose or function: the act of living up to one's full potential.

That has nothing to do with 'quality' in the philosophical sense. It's merely you and Pirsig's eccentric use of the term.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

It makes sense to me that ἀρετή and ποιότης have different origins and meanings for Quality

Only ποιότης is translated as quality. ἀρετή is not translated as quality.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

It is suspicious to me, however, that Plato himself coined the new term considering his contempt for the Sophists and their beloved ἀρετή.

No he doesn't. Entire dialogues are dedicated to this topic. He has contempt for the sophists because they are hucksters claiming to teach ἀρετή who cannot teach anyone how to be "excellent" because they do not know what it is.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

How is it specious when literally the second word provided is 'goodness', our beloved 'qualities' gets a mention in this first sentence,  and lower down 'virtue' is mentioned as well.  You've made my point for me here..

I said your claim that it's "hard to translate" is specious.

And in the first sentence 'quality' isn't the definition of the word. 'Quality' is just used to refer to excellence. "The quality of excellence."

Is English your first language? Because if it isn't that would explain a great deal.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

Now who's being inaccurate?  You're claiming above that I'm 'unwilling' to admit that the Story is a modest simplification. . . . ?

You claim that your false story about the history of metaphysics is part of the motivation for accepting the MoQ. Since the story is a gross falsification/over simplification, that can't be so.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

I don't think Aristotle objected to Plato in the name of the subject-object division.  Aristotle objected to Plato in the name of Truth. Aristotle ( in your own words) 'thought that the world has an inherently misleading character because of change' and so emphasised forms, and substance specifically, as the solution.

They both think that, but Plato emphasizes it. Aristotle seems more concerned with particularity and conceptual confusion. Aristotle objected to Plato's account because he thought the account wasn't true.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

The websites are of course simplistic and their intended audience clearly isn't an academic as well read as you. That's not to say I think there's anything in them which is entirely false either (see earlier post about reductionism and a better alternative).  

The claims about Kant and Descartes are patently false- outright wrong. You narrative about greek philosophy is false as a whole and either false of grossly simplified in its parts.

goodmetaphysics wrote:

kennen and wissen. The Zen approach reduces Wissenschaft (scholarly knowledge) and thereby improves Kenntnis (recognition without intellectual interposition).'  

'Kennen' is knowledge by acquaintance. I alluded to it in talking about riding a bike. See:

http://www.iep.utm.edu/knowacq/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/knowledge-acquaindescrip/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_by_acquaintance

https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/knowledge-by-acquaintance-and-description

iwpoe wrote:

You're not entitled to my respect, and you gained my contempt when you continually danced around direct questions and directed me to a website that cannot answer them because it's full of patent falsehoods.
You cannot discuss when you both don't answer questions and claim your position is inscrutable.

See responses to Dennis re inscutability.  Inscrutability and mysticism is built into the logical structure of the MOQ.  The undefined Dynamic Quality is the source of all things.  If somethingness doesn't come from the not-somethingness - then where does it come from? 

iwpoe wrote:

Because ἀρετή is about virtue whereas quality is about any kind of sort whatsoever... That has nothing to do with 'quality' in the philosophical sense. It's merely you and Pirsig's eccentric use of the term.  Only ποιότης is translated as quality. ἀρετή is not translated as quality.

What part of ἀρετή isn't translated as Quality?  ποιότης is a *particular* quality.  ἀρετή is virtue/goodness/excellence. What part of that isn't Quality?

iwpoe wrote:

No he doesn't. Entire dialogues are dedicated to this topic. He has contempt for the sophists because they are hucksters claiming to teach ἀρετή who cannot teach anyone how to be "excellent" because they do not know what it is.

ἀρετή all ancient Greeks know. Including Socrates. And they know it not in a scholarly knowledge kind of way but a by-aquaintance kind of way.

Here's a telling quote for you:
"Σωκράτης
τίς οὖν ὁ τρόπος τοῦ καλῶς τε καὶ μὴ γράφειν; δεόμεθά τι, ὦ Φαῖδρε, Λυσίαν τε περὶ τούτων ἐξετάσαι καὶ ἄλλον ὅστις πώποτέ τι γέγραφεν ἢ γράψει, εἴτε πολιτικὸν σύγγραμμα εἴτε ἰδιωτικόν, ἐν μέτρῳ ὡς ποιητὴς ἢ ἄνευ μέτρου ὡς ἰδιώτης;"

Socrates:
"What, then, is the method of writing well or badly? Do we want to question Lysias about this, and anyone else who ever has written or will write anything, whether a public or private document, in verse or in prose, be he poet or ordinary man?'

iwpoe wrote:

I said your claim that it's "hard to translate" is specious. And in the first sentence 'quality' isn't the definition of the word. 'Quality' is just used to refer to excellence. "The quality of excellence."

It is hard to translate unless you call it Quality.  Virtue to me isn't 'excellence'. Unless you're some kind of turn of last Century victorian?

But what part of excellence - isn't Quality?  Quality includes excellence and it includes morality.

iwpoe wrote:

Is English your first language? Because if it isn't that would explain a great deal.

Ad hominem - nice.   

iwpoe wrote:

You claim that your false story about the history of metaphysics is part of the motivation for accepting the MoQ. Since the story is a gross falsification/over simplification, that can't be so.

As mentioned to Dennis - if you're both so strung on logic - I would have thought you'd try to keep to the principle of charity?  Instead I've received little but contempt and a quick(understatement) rush to judgement. 

iwpoe wrote:

They both think that, but Plato emphasizes it. Aristotle seems more concerned with particularity and conceptual confusion. Aristotle objected to Plato's account because he thought the account wasn't true.

Ah we agree on something. 

iwpoe wrote:

The claims about Kant and Descartes are patently false- outright wrong. You narrative about greek philosophy is false as a whole and either false of grossly simplified in its parts.

The reductionism was intentional as the MOQ shows there is something beyond both subjects and objects which actually creates them. It is in your earlier words a 'modest simplification'.

iwpoe wrote:

'Kennen' is knowledge by acquaintance. I alluded to it in talking about riding a bike. See:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/knowacq/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/knowledge-acquaindescrip/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_by_acquaintance
https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/knowledge-by-acquaintance-and-description

Interesting - further agreement and thanks for the share - I enjoyed the references to William James in the wiki link.  William James is a very close philosopher to Robert Pirsig and they both have strong parallels in what they are saying.  I'd be interested to know your opinion of him.