From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sat Sep 06 2003 - 20:48:59 BST
Matt and all:
Thanks for the posts. I edited out most comments and tried to focus on what
seems most central... And I changed the thread name.
DMB had said:
Again, I would only point out that you are not talking about anything other
than the various forms of SOM and it would be very helpful if simply called
it that. Not because it is the only term, but simply because it is a term we
Pirsig readers all have in common.
Matt replied:
Right, various forms of SOM. Except that I've never been satisfied with the
explications of what SOM is and I haven't given it my attention yet (besides
that earlier attempt from October). Maybe the apperance/reality distinction
is the exact same thing that Pirsig calls "SOM", but I don't think so. I
think there are a bundle of enemies that Pirsig packages into "SOM" and I'm
not so sure that the conflation helps. Given that, I feel the need to
continue with someone else's vocabulary to get a handle on Pirsig's.
dmb says:
There is no reason why one couldn't use both vocabularies. SOM is not
EXACTLY the same as the appearance/reality distinction, but that's only
because Rorty and Pirsig looking at the same problem from different
perspectives. I think there are many ways of addressing the problems of
modernity. Ken Wilber finds the most distressing thing about modernity is
the loss of spirituality and depth and so "flatland" is his term for
scientific materialism. The fundamentalists and neo-conservatives see
modernity as the loss of God and tradition and so we get terms like "secular
humanism" or "godless communism". Obviously, the difference between
postmodern and premodern critics of modernity are huge and many. And yet we
can see that they are all talking about the same thing; modernity and its
effects. (I know we can trace SOM and such back to Plato, but let me keep it
clean and simple for now.) I don't mean to change the subject or even to
broaden it. I'm just saying that once one gets a picture of the idea, the
various terms become transparent and interchangable. And I sincerely believe
that you should give this some attention because when the two sets of terms
click, Pirsig's and Rorty's, it might be big. Plus you'll be able to speak
to Pirsig reader much better.
Matt also said:
..., but it isn't necessarily un-Pirsigian. Rorty identifies one of the
things we do as leading to "one true intellectual construction of things" as
the idea that language is a mirror that we hold up to the world.
Transposing that to Pirsig, then, doesn't seem that far a leap given their
common enemy.
dmb says:
Not much of a leap at all. In fact, Pirsig uses the mirror metaphor in a
very interesting way. You may recall he uses it to talk about the perfection
of representational language, but as a function of social values - in
conjunction with celebrity and Zen hell and all that. You might find it
interesting to explore those pages, but that's really a different topic. The
"mirror" that you're talking about certainly does seem to match Pirsig's
complaints about SOM, which only allows one construction of truth, the one
that corresponds to objective reality, to nature and its laws. And when we
see that they are addressing the same issue we can see how radically
different they treat that issue. Pirsig is reviving metaphysics and Rorty
wants it dead. Pirsig wants to overthrow substance. Rorty is a
"physicalist". The differences are so huge that in some ways Rorty seems to
be cranking up the volume exactly where Pirsig would like silence. But this
is where the interesting conversations lie, I think.
DMB said:
Again, these are the problems that Pirsig addresses but your jargon has
hidden that fact from me until now.
Matt replied:
Right, right, sorry. I'll add a post-it to my computer to remind me to
explain things so that you can understand them.
dmb says:
C'mon, Matt. Think about it. This is MOQ.org. We're here to discuss Pirsig's
books. Reading his work is the only requirement. Do you really imagine that
I'm asking for something extraordinary here? I'm only asking you to be
clear. Imagine if I were at a Rorty site to champion the revival of
metaphysics and not only insisted on using Pirsigian terms, but insulted
those who asked for explanations. How do you suppose they'd like that? I'm
not asking you to give up the jargon, just to translate it properly. This is
reasonable, no?
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