Doug Renselle (renselle@on-net.net)
Mon, 29 Sep 1997 14:45:09 +0100
Platt Holden wrote:
> Diana is correct in asserting that Pirsig's four levels of value
> patterns
> cannot be explained intellectually.
>
> So what are we to do? How can we possible get someone to understand us
> by
> directly experiencing the four value patterns?
>
> I used the high school curricula to define the four levels because 1)
> most
> people have had the high school experience, and 2) while in high
> school
> have sprinkled iron filings over a magnet, viewed pond water through a
>
> microscope, touched a cultural artifact, written a book report and
> solved a
> problem in plane geometry. The distinctions between those kinds of
> experience are clear even though we can never know what it's really
> like to
> be an iron filing, a little critter swimming in pond scum or Buddhist
> monk
> living in Hong Kong.
>
> So when sitting around discussing the MOQ with friends and someone
> asks me
> to define an inorganic value pattern I say, "In high school physics
> class
> did you ever sprinkle iron filings on a magnet and see the filings
> cluster
> around the poles? Well, that's an inorganic value pattern."
>
> The challenge for me has always been to find ways to explain the MOQ
> to
> people who have no interest in philosophy and/or are so set in the
> static
> pattern of subject/object that to say the world is values engenders
> either
> an incredulous stare, a patronizing smile or an gently phrased retort
> like
> "Are you nuts?" As Pirsig says in Chapter 9, "If you're going to talk
>
> about Quality at all you have to be ready to answer someone like
> Rigel. You
> have to have a ready-made Metaphysics of Quality that you can snap at
> him
> like some catechism. Phaedrus didn't have a Catechism of Quality and
> that's
> why he got hit."
>
> >From now on I'm going to keep a chocolate bar handy so when someone
> asks,
> "What's an organic value pattern?" I'll answer, "Eat this."
>
> --
> post message - mailto:skwok@spark.net.hk
> unsubscribe/queries - mailto:diana@asiantravel.com
> homepage - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/4670
>
Lila Squad,
TO DEFINE, OR NOT TO DEFINE…
On definition and whether to define or not define, can we return to the
words of the great author?
I decided to look at some of the many places where he considered the
issue, ‘to define, or not to define.’ The truth is, he sounds just like
us. We are experiencing the same throes and anguish, all of what Bo
calls the ugliness. I think he needed (and so do we) to do it. In ZMM,
he (apparently) goes insane doing it.
If you recall in ZMM, he decided that Quality was undefinable. But in
Lila he decided that, regardless how large and difficult the task, he
must define Quality. Here you can see him arguing with himself about
proceeding (this reminds me of the discussions we have seen the past few
weeks on TLS).
"Since metaphysics is essentially a kind of dialectical definition and
since Quality is essentially outside definition, this means that
‘Metaphysics of Quality’ is essentially a contradiction in terms, a
logical absurdity." Page 73, Lila.
Phaedrus says to himself, "Don’t do it [i.e., define Quality]. You’ll
get into nothing but trouble. You’re just going to start up a thousand
dumb arguments about something that was perfectly clear until you came
along…" Page 74, Lila.
"The trouble was, this was only one part of himself talking. There was
another part that kept saying, ‘Ahh, do it anyway. It’s interesting.’
This was the intellectual part that didn’t like undefined things, and
telling it not to define Quality was like telling a fat man to stay out
of the refrigerator, or an alcoholic to say out of bars…" Page 74,
Lila.
As you can see, right here in Lila he decides to go ahead and do it,
fusing the SO mind-body dichotomy with the two intermediate static
levels: social and biological. And further fusing the four static
levels and DQ with DQ’s evolutionary tension constantly applied to the
four levels, and finally establishing the five moral codes. I think he
set an example for us, here. He would, IMhO, suggest that we define the
‘Architecture’ of the four static levels, not the infrastructure, but
the Architecture.
In SODV, he explains the above further:
"I will point out to you that for centuries rhetoric instructors in our
culture have been paid to pass and fail students on the quality of their
writing without ever having any viable definition of what that quality
is or even if there is such a thing at all. That is a bizarre practice
that I tried to end." Page 11, SODV.
"Quality is real even though it cannot be defined." Page 12, SODV.
It sounds as though he is waffling here, but if you read the surrounding
text you will see he is not. He says quality may be derived from S and
O and their interrelationships: the quantized QEs that occur when S
becomes aware of O.
"The bottom box shows inorganic patterns. The Metaphysics of Quality
says objects are composed of ‘substance’ but it says that this substance
can be defined more precisely as ‘stable inorganic patterns of value.’
This added definition makes substance sound more ephemeral than
previously but it is not. The objects look and smell and feel the same
either way." Page 14, SODV.
"The fifth evidence of similarity is that probability itself may be
expressed as value, so that "a static pattern of inorganic values,"
which is a definition the Metaphysics of Quality gives to ‘substance,’
is the same as ‘a pattern of probabilities,’ which is a definition
quantum theory gives to substance. If the atomic world is composed of
probability waves and if probability is equal to value then it follows
logically that the atomic world is composed of value." Page 16, SODV.
Here we can see him, in ZMM, going through Bo’s ugliness and concluding
that Quality cannot be defined:
"I’ve been going into all this business of analyses and definitions and
hierarchies not for their own sake but to lay the groundwork for an
understanding of the direction in which Phædrus went." Page 71, ZMM.
"In the first phase he made no attempt at a rigid, systematic definition
of what he was talking about. This was a happy, fulfilling and creative
phase. It lasted most of the time he taught at the school back in the
valley behind us.
"The second phase emerged as a result of normal intellectual criticism
of his lack of definition of what he was talking about. In this phase he
made systematic, rigid statements about what Quality is, and worked out
an enormous hierarchic structure of thought to support them. He
literally had to move heaven and earth to arrive at this systematic
understanding and when he was done felt he’d achieved an explanation of
existence and our consciousness of it better than any that had existed
before." Page 168, ZMM.
"But of course, without the top you can’t have any sides. It’s the top
that defines the sides. So on we go -- we have a long way -- no hurry --
just one step after the next -- with a little Chautauqua for
entertainment -- .Mental reflection is so much more interesting than TV
it’s a shame more people don’t switch over to it. They probably think
what they hear is unimportant but it never is.
"There’s a large fragment concerning Phædrus’ first class after he gave
that assignment on ‘What is quality in thought and statement?’ The
atmosphere was explosive. Almost everyone seemed as frustrated and
angered as he had been by the question.
"‘How are we supposed to know what quality is?’ they said. ‘You’re
supposed to tell us!’" Page 183, ZMM.
"’But what do you think?’
"He paused for a long time. ‘I think there is such a thing as Quality,
but that as soon as you try to define it, something goes haywire. You
can’t do it.’
"Murmurs of agreement.
"He continued, ‘Why this is, I don’t know. I thought maybe I’d get some
ideas from your paper. I just don’t know.’
"This time the class was silent.
"In subsequent classes that day there was some of the same commotion,
but a number of students in each class volunteered friendly answers that
told him the first class had been discussed during lunch.
"A few days later he worked up a definition of his own and put it on the
blackboard to be copied for posterity. The definition was: ‘Quality is a
characteristic of thought and statement that is recognized by a
non-thinking process. Because definitions are a product of rigid, formal
thinking, quality cannot be defined.’
"The fact that this ‘definition’ was actually a refusal to define did
not draw comment. The students had no formal training that would have
told them his statement was, in a formal sense, completely irrational.
If you can’t define something you have no formal rational way of knowing
that it exists. Neither can you really tell anyone else what it is.
There is, in fact, no formal difference between inability to define and
stupidity. When I say, ‘Quality cannot be defined,’ I’m really saying
formally, ‘I’m stupid about Quality.’
"Fortunately the students didn’t know this. If they’d come up with these
objections he wouldn’t have been able to answer them at the time.
"But then, below the definition on the blackboard, he wrote, ‘But even
though Quality cannot be defined, you know what Quality is!’ and the
storm started all over again…
"This was just intellectually outrageous, and he knew it. He wasn’t
teaching anymore, he was indoctrinating. He had erected an imaginary
entity, defined it as incapable of definition, told the students over
their own protests that they knew what it was, and demonstrated this by
a technique that was as confusing logically as the term itself. He was
able to get away with this because logical refutation required more
talent than any of the students had. In subsequent days he continually
invited their refutations, but none came. He improvised further." Pages
184-5, ZMM.
"Now, as the first step of the crystallization process, he saw that when
Quality is kept undefined by definition, the entire field called
esthetics is wiped out -- completely disenfranchised -- kaput. By
refusing to define Quality he had placed it entirely outside the
analytic process. If you can’t define Quality, there’s no way you can
subordinate it to any intellectual rule. The estheticians can have
nothing more to say. Their whole field, definition of Quality, is gone.
"The thought of this completely thrilled him. It was like discovering a
cancer cure. No more explanations of what art is. No more wonderful
critical schools of experts to determine rationally where each composer
had succeeded or failed. All of them, every last one of those
know-it-alls, would finally have to shut up. This was no longer just an
interesting idea. This was a dream.
"I don’t think anyone really saw what he was up to at first. They saw an
intellectual delivering a message that had all the trappings of a
rational analysis of a teaching situation. They didn’t see he had a
purpose completely opposite to any they were used to. He wasn’t
furthering rational analysis. He was blocking it. He was turning the
method of rationality against itself, turning it against his own kind,
in defense of an irrational concept, an undefined entity called Quality.
"He wrote: ‘(1) Every instructor of English composition knows what
quality is. (Any instructor who does not should keep this fact carefully
concealed, for this would certainly constitute proof of incompetence.)
(2) Any instructor who thinks quality of writing can and should be
defined before teaching it can and should go ahead and define it. (3)
All those who feel that quality of writing does exist but cannot be
defined, but that quality should be taught anyway, can benefit by the
following method of teaching pure quality in writing without defining
it.’" Page 191, ZMM.
I think we see him here, feeling total euphoria over his success in
devastating the Aristotelians who had subordinated Quality to SOM.
Imagine the mental reversal he underwent in Lila to reverse this
position and decide to define Quality. To me, it feels like what TLS
experiences now. As we know, he paid dearly for this temporary
intellectual breakthrough. I want to make another (I think significant)
point here: the great author is being Aristotelian! ZMM and Lila were
written by an Aristotelian! And we, whether we like it or not, when we
use language and our left brains, are being Aristotelian!!
"I was talking about the first wave of crystallization outside of
rhetoric that resulted from Phædrus’ refusal to define Quality. He had
to answer the question, If you can’t define it, what makes you think it
exists?
"His answer was an old one belonging to a philosophic school that called
itself realism. ‘A thing exists,’ he said, ‘if a world without it can’t
function normally. If we can show that a world without Quality functions
abnormally, then we have shown that Quality exists, whether it’s defined
or not.’ He thereupon proceeded to subtract Quality from a description
of the world as we know it." Page 193, ZMM
Note that he uses this argument, rationally, to defeat the SOM. If you
read Lila carefully, this becomes apparent. He concludes that SOM says
if you cannot define something, it does not exist. He uses that
technique to prove that SOM is flawed.
Here is where he admits that he gets into trouble:
"…A third rhetorical alternative to the dilemma, and the best one in my
opinion, was to refuse to enter the arena. Phædrus could simply have
said, ‘The attempt to classify Quality as subjective or objective is an
attempt to define it. I have already said it is undefinable ,’ and left
it at that. I believe DeWeese actually counseled him to do this at the
time.
"Why he chose to disregard this advice and chose to respond to this
dilemma logically and dialectically rather than take the easy escape of
mysticism, I don’t know. But I can guess. I think first of all that he
felt the whole Church of Reason was irreversibly in the arena of logic,
that when one put oneself outside logical disputation, one put oneself
outside any academic consideration whatsoever. Philosophical mysticism,
the idea that truth is indefinable and can be apprehended only by
non-rational means, has been with us since the beginning of history.
It’s the basis of Zen practice. But it’s not an academic subject. The
academy, the Church of Reason, is concerned exclusively with those
things that can be defined, and if one wants to be a mystic, his place
is in a monastery, not a University. Universities are places where
things should be spelled out.
"I think a second reason for his decision to enter the arena was an
egoistic one. He knew himself to be a pretty sharp logician and
dialectician, took pride in this and looked upon this present dilemma as
a challenge to his skill. I think now that trace of egotism may have
been the beginning of all his troubles." Page 207, ZMM.
"…This was the question, If everyone knows what quality is, why is there
such a disagreement about it?
"His casuist answer had been that although pure Quality was the same for
everyone, the objects that people said Quality inhered in varied from
person to person. As long as he left Quality undefined there was no way
to argue with this but he knew and he knew the students knew that it had
the smell of falseness about it. It didn’t really answer the question."
Page 212, ZMM.
"’Now, to take that which has caused us to create the world, and include
it within the world we have created, is clearly impossible. That is why
Quality cannot be defined. If we do define it we are defining something
less than Quality itself.’" Page 225, ZMM.
And, here, my friends is what we see happening in TLS now:
"…You know something and then the Quality stimulus hits and then you try
to define the Quality stimulus, but to define it all you’ve got to work
with is what you know. So your definition is made up of what you know.
It’s an analogue to what you already know. It has to be. It can’t be
anything else. And the mythos grows this way. By analogies to what is
known before. The mythos is a building of analogues upon analogues upon
analogues. These fill the collective consciousness of all communicating
mankind. Every last bit of it. The Quality is the track that directs the
train. What is outside the train, to either side...that is the terra
incognita of the insane. He knew that to understand Quality he would
have to leave the mythos. That’s why he felt that slippage. He knew
something was about to happen." Page 317, ZMM.
An ominous situation, that. But for us, TLS, in Lila he decides to
define Quality.
In spite of what Platt, Diana, et al., say - I still agree with Jason.
Thanks,
Doug Renselle.
-- post message - mailto:skwok@spark.net.hk unsubscribe/queries - mailto:diana@asiantravel.com homepage - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/4670
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