Re: LS PROGRAM: MOQ Catechism

From: Diana McPartlin (diana@hongkong.com)
Date: Sun Mar 07 1999 - 04:25:45 GMT


Boone, Mary, squad,

>Boone wrote:
>> My second, and more significant, objection is that this explanation
>> employs SOM [sub/obj] to express MoQ -- is this a fundamental
>> contradiction/flaw, an asset due to the fact that the listener employs
>> SOM at the time, or some other problem?

Mary
>I don't know about you, but I had to start inside a framework I knew
>before I could proceed to a framework I didn't. The clearest image
>for me was the analytical knife. That's something I could hold onto -
> the subject/object cut versus the static/dynamic one. And anyway,
>if you subscribe to Bo's SOLAQI then SOM is really all we have to
>work with. You know, like Pirsig said, to attempt to define the MOQ
>at all is immoral - a higher level (DQ) being "captured" by a lower
>level intellect.

Agree that helping people get round the SOM is a tough one. Mainly because
most people don't even realise they're stuck in it. I know that the SOM has
been well and truly trashed by philosophers and scientists for years, but
that really hasn't crept into popular culture. Most people just think the
SOM is the way things are and don't have any idea what you're talking about
when you try to say it's wrong.

After I wrote my post last night I picked up Alan Watts Way of Zen. He
begins by putting everything in the context of Western vs Eastern thought
patterns which I thought was a pretty good beginning. It goes like:

"Much of the difficulty and mystification which Zen presents to the Western
student is the result of his unfamiliarity with Chinese ways of thinking --
ways which differ startlingly from our own and which are, for that very
reason, of special value to us in attaining a critical perspective upon our
own ideas. The problem here is not simply one of mastering different ideas,
differing from our own as, say, the theories of Kant differ from those of
Descartes, or those of Calvinists from Catholics. The problem is to
appreciate differences in the basic premises of though and in the very
methods of thinking."

I think that's quite good because it gives the Western listener a way out.
You are not telling him/her that she hasn't noticed something blatantly
obvious (and is therefore stupid). You're telling her that here is an idea
from another culture that is very interesting. But that has disadvantages
too. People may just classify it as Zen or mysticism and miss the heavy
Western-rational content which is also extremely important.

>Diana wrote:
>> 1. The Quality principle
>> Quality is nature of reality. Quality is morality, goodness,
>> rightness, value, experience, sensation, awareness and consciousness.

Mary:
>I would like to add something about how Quality is on the "N" of Now
>(remember that one? I don't know who said that but it was great!).
>Quality exists before experience. Quality is an inherent part of
>the Universe. Quality is what has made the Universe what it is.
>Quality is not just a subjective assignment we make which is subject
>to refute, but is a recognition of the pre-existing Quality already
>inherent in everything in the Universe.

Well this is a whole topic on it's own. Quality comes before experience,
but it also _is_ experience, there's confusion between Dynamic Quality and
Quality on this point. Also I've never been happy about the word "before",
it implies that everything exists within a framework of linear time ...
let's get into that another time though, it's a massive subject.

>No one can define Quality, but we all know what it is. Or, as Pirsig
>pointed out, we could all define Quality any way we like. It doesn't
>matter how we define it because the Quality inherent in anything is
>not dependent on that definition. Any definition we might make would
>be inadequate - having to be altered to fit some new experience. Any
>attempt to define Quality is ultimately immoral. The intellect is
>not up to the task.

Yes, I believe at one point that principle used to read "Quality is known
to us as awareness and hence is impossible to define". Not sure why that
was taken out. I think I'll put it back in.

>> 4. Static conflict
>> Each static level sees itself as the highest good and tries to
>> dominate the others.

>I think this is key. It was much easier for me to accept the concept
>of DQ once I could see the forces at work between the levels. The
>static conflict is what gives the MOQ it's power, in my opinion, and
>was perhaps the most important addition to William James' philosophy
>that Pirsig made. It made the MOQ real for me - something I could
>use every day to understand what was going on around me. The whole
>concept turns the MOQ into a "tool for living".

Yup, a tool for living. I think I might have been trying to say that in my
essay in some muddled way. You have to show that it will benefit people in
some way if they study it. Otherwise it's dry and pointless.

Diana

MOQ Online - http://www.moq.org



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