From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Jan 23 2005 - 02:56:13 GMT
Matt, Marsha & all MOQers:
Marsha said:
Isn't it speculated today that our world, including the philosophic realm,
is 'word-built'? If this is true, then might it be that our Western habit of
thought and language does not accommodate describing Dynamic quality, though
it may in the future. And to stay inside your present box of knowledge will
only keep us inside your box of knowledge.
Matt replied:
Sure, but I don't think there is any neutral way to adjudicate between your
claim that I'm keeping us in my box of knowledge and my claim that you're
keeping us in your box of knowledge. ..The only way to figure out if my box
of knowledge does not accommodate describing DQ is to compare our different
"boxes of knowledge."
dmb chimes in:
While I'd agree that there is no great box judge in the sky, it seems pretty
clear that Pirsig is including some things that don't work in Matt's box. If
we can say that Matt's parameters run through the West from Plato to Rorty,
then we can say that Pirsig's box includes that, goes back a little further
into the pre-Socratics, goes east to Zen, to Sanskrit, the Vedas, American
Indian mysticism, philosophical mysiticsm and the perennial philosophy which
roughly includes all that, it seems clear that Matt has a relatively small
box. To make matters worse, in the broader perspective, he's coming from the
box that is worst for accomodating Dynamic Quality...
Matt explained his box to Marsha:
For instance, you are right, much contemporary thought in the West is
infected with the idea that "everything is a social construction" (a
Foucaultian idea) or "all awareness is linguistic" (Wilfrid Sellars'
formulation of the same thing). Many would claim that such philosophies
block out the possibility of DQ. I have spent a lot of time claiming that,
not only does it not, but that the way I describe DQ is better than the way,
say, the traditional, mainline Pirsigian does....
dmb interjects:
I think your description of DQ has very little to do with what Pirsig is
saying, and I suppose its because you have a very tight box. I guess it
seems better to you because it fits into some ideas you already have, but
how "the undifferentiated aesthetic continuum" or the "undivided,
pre-intellectual reality" becomes, in your pragmatic hands, "a compliment
after the fact" must be one of the most profound mysteries I've ever
encountered. On this point, I think you may be guilty of intellectual
vandalism. You've taken the carborator out of Pirsig's bike, smashed it into
the shape exhaust pipe and called it an improvement. I'm not saying this is
part of an insurance scam. I'm just saying that it looks to me like you're
handling the parts in a way that reveals your misconceptions and those lead
to "improvements" that just don't work. And I think Marsh is quite right.
They can't work within your box. Pirsig's inclusion of non-Western sources
was a necessity.
Matt continued: .................................For one thing, I think
Pirsig's claim about DQ is that everyone already has a connection with it,
that there is no way to really "block" it out. I think the distinction
between "blocking" DQ and being open to it really just pans out to people
who are not open to change in their beliefs on the one side and people who
are on the other. As long as you are open and inquisitive, I don't see how
one could be blocked from Dynamic Quality. And really, that's the most
important part, isn't it?
dmb disagrees:
This is what I'm talking about. You've reduced the primary empirical reality
to openmindedness. That's just not it, Matt. Its simply the wrong idea and
its the wrong idea about the MOQ's most central idea. You really gotta put
some hinges on that box, mabye even take a wall out. DQ is to be indentified
with religious mysticism, not curiosity or positive assessments or anything
so obvious to common sense. We don't have to try to "Block" DQ. We do that
so habitually and so automatically that it can take years of practice just
to stop doing it. That's what meditatiion is all about, making the mind
quiet in order to experience a different type of consciousness, one where
the distinctions between subject and object, mind and matter etc, do not
exist. See, undivided and pre-intellectual mean the same thing. That's what
unmediated refers to as well. Pirsig and other describe it a million
different ways, but it all boils down to no-mind. I'm all for
openmindedness. It just happens to have nothing to do with DQ, you parts
smasher you.
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