Stephen Wilson (sawilson@worldnet.att.net)
Mon, 26 Jan 1998 10:48:24 +0100
"Sounds" GOOD to me, or should I say, "feels" GOOD to me!
----------
> From: Samuel Palmer <spalmer@fundy.ca>
> To: Multiple recipients of <lilasqd@mail.hkg.com>
> Subject: LS the tower of babble
> Date: Saturday, January 17, 1998 10:21 AM
>
> Dianna and LS,
>
> > 1. Quality.
> > Quality is reality. Quality is the ethical principle of the good. Thus
>
> > reality is a moral order. Quality, like reality, is known to us as
> > awareness. As such, it is impossible to define.
> >
>
> I think I can offer some further simplification.
>
> For what I have observed, Quality is Pirsig's Tower of Balel. He put
> it there because he knew it is the one thing none of us can agree on.
> This may not help us much with definitions but it does tell us some
> essential things - Quality is many things to many people. Quality also
> operates on many different levels, for example on a subjective level,
> Quality is what completes the decision between buying a cinnamon donut
> or a boston creme, or on an objective, political level, Quality is a
> more abstract assembly which drives the decisions made about abortion or
> the arms race.
>
> We may not be able to agree on an answer to the question "What is
> quality", because what we are really asking is "What is good". What we
> can do, however, is see how Quality operates, on all levels - Inorganic,
> Biological, Social, and Intellectual.
>
> When we speak of Quality in terms of it's operation, instead of
> its absolute Intellectual definition (which will be debated for some
> time yet), it becomes much simpler. The Quality we are defining is the
> same Quality that brings about events on the smallest and largest scales
> of Creation. The same Quality that brought about chemical bonding, the
> Quality that cast light out of darkness, and saw that it was good, the
> Quality that led to the concept of taxes (dang that Quality!).
>
> For a simple, stripped-down definition of Quality, I can offer this:
>
>
>
> 1. Quality: An internal, unobservable response that brings about an
> external, observable event.
>
>
>
> Examples - Quality takes place on all levels of creation:
>
> a) Inorganic - Quality is what precedes chemical reactions, for example,
> when we pour vinegar into baking powder, it fizzes up because, on an
> inorganic level, fizzing is fun - or good, if you will.
>
> b) Biological - Quality drives the events that have proliferated life on
> the Biological scale of Creation. For example, plants will turn to the
> sun because, to plants, it's better that way, it's what they "like".
>
> c) Social - Quality is the "Moral Force" that brings about responses on
> a social level, which strengthens and protects the social unit, for
> example Buffalo herds operated almost as a single unit, and many species
> of birds prefer to fly together, because, the more the merrier.
>
> d) Intellectual - Intellectual Quality is a "public forum" which is
> still being chiselled out, but it is an essential evolutionary step
> which serves to bind societies together. A perfect example is the
> proliferation of the Internet, where people from all walks of life get
> to share their thoughts on "what is good, and what is not good"
>
>
> What I like about this definition is that it doesn't really define
> anything, but it does "click" somehow, at all levels. What this suggests
> is that Quality is an event that precedes behavior, whether we're taking
> about the behavior of protons, or the behavior of UN.
> We all are familliar with the process that brings about decisions
> we make for our own personal reasons - but it is never easy to
> understand what ultimately "finalizes" our decisions. There is always an
> internal, unobservable link in the chain of events that brings about our
> responses, and I think we can call that Quality.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
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>
>
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