From: Rebecca Temmer (ratemmer.lists@gmail.com)
Date: Tue Dec 06 2005 - 20:53:11 GMT
Hi Bo.
You said:
Aretê is Quality as it manifests at the social level, that's correct
enough, but it sounds like Paul sees Aretê as intellectual too. But
why are things described as if the intellectuals (dialecticians)
were the enemies of Aretê. That's your question.
Rebecca:
That wasn't my question at all. What I wanted to know was whether, in Paul's
view, Arete and DQ were the same things.
I have not come to any firm conclusions about the social and intellectual
levels. I'm willing to postulate, however, that Arete can be both social
and intellectual.
Bo:
It sounds like mastering something - whatever - is Aretê to Paul.
Showing great skills on the battlefield is the same as coming up
with great theories. This muddles things up completely
Rebecca:
This doesn't muddle anything for me. Dharma and Arete are not about
mastering anything - that is merely the allusion the Greeks used in order to
convey the idea of Arete. They needed metaphor to explain to what it was;
it need not be only in battle that one can attain the good.
Bo:
Look! In the "Romantic/Classic" metaphysics the transition from
Aretê to Intellect is described as
"...it's here that the classic mind for the first time took
leave of its romantic origin...(page 366)
Rebecca:
I was under the impression that Pirsig rejected the romantic/classic split
that he first came up with in ZMM in favour of DQ/SQ in Lila because the
Quality divide, which he says is more fundamental, is what the MOQ is based
on.
Bo:
Thus it's plain that (in a MOQ retrospect) Aretê or Romantic
correspond to the social level while Dialectics or Classic
correspond to the intellectual and what is described the latter
breaking loose from the former.
Rebecca:
That's downright convoluted. Firstlyyou're committing a category error by
comparing Arete and Dialectics. If ANYTHING, the Classic/Romantic split
seems to come from Pirsig's social conceptions of the two and that
they correspond to SQ and DQ (respectively). They don't equate to SQ and
DQ, but Classical movements more toward static quality patterns whereas the
Romantic movements are characterized by a greater level of dynamic quality.
Bo:
Conclusion:
Aretê is social all right, but static social value had a dynamic
"pre-social" component; something about Aretê that always
eluded the Ancients. Nowadays the 4th. level has its pre-
intellectual "something" that constantly eludes us and my
"warning" is that we must limit the fourth level to its obvious static
value, the S/O one and see its dynamism as what urged Pirsig to
create the Quality perspective.
Rebecca:
Why is it that every argument that is made on this discussion group must
somehow be twisted and contorted to fit your theory? You misconstrued my
question to begin with. Perhaps you didn't understand what I was trying to
get at. Now I've given you my impressions of the situation and you should
understand that in no way do I agree with your assertions of Subject/Object
Logic being the fourth level.
Regards,
Rebecca
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