Dear Platt,
Although your response below was addressed to Rog, I am so disturbed by your
conclusions that I feel that I must respond. Regarding the individual's role
in Dynamic change, Pirsig uses the dialectic to examine all sides of the
issue, often deliberately contradicting earlier conclusions. I must
apologize for not being able to quote the author accurately as I have loaned
out my copy of LILA, but in the final chapters of the book, he concludes
that when one individual acts in an unrecognizable way, society deems
him/her insane. However when two or more behave in this fashion, they are
often collectively referred to as a religion or a societal/political
movement (please pardon the paraphrasing). The importance of the society vs.
the individual is that the individual may indeed be the catalyst ( or even
the leader of change), but without a coalition of similar believers, nothing
ever changes. In a harmonic, synchronistic model of the Universe, the
individual is the messenger, who because of his receptiveness at a given
moment in time, perceives the kernel of a universal truth. If it hadn't been
that individual, it would have been another in another place and time. We
know from history that revolutionary ideas are often perceived by various
individuals across the globe relatively simultaneously without any apparent
connection between those individuals. The messenger is very important. But
if he/she proceeds alone, that kernel of truth will be dismissed and no one
will be the better for it until another messenger who seeks the affirmation
of others emerges.
Regarding the quote from chapter 24, the conclusion that you make conjures
up images from Thomas Hobbs' Leviathan. I seriously doubt that this is
Pirsig's view of human nature. IMHO, this is just part of the dialectic
process. Pirsig is very careful to insert the words "twentieth century
intellectual" before the word faith to demonstrate that coercion is
necessary in a society that has become conditioned intellectually to
distrust the natural goodness of the collective soul. Again, IMHO, distrust
and the need for coercion are not natural in society, but only deemed
necessary because of centuries of unnatural conditioning.
As always, your post was stimulating and thought provoking.
Regards,
The Bard
----- Original Message -----
From: Platt Holden <pholden@sc.rr.com>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2002 8:25 AM
Subject: Re: MD Overdoing the Dynamic Monthly Summary
> Hi Rog:
>
> Just a couple of thoughts:
>
> > PLATT:
> > I agree with John that Roger's summary is bland and necessarily so.
> > Nothing but blandness ever comes out of committees, unless it's a
> > camel. To believe we can come up with an extension of the MOQ by
> > attempting to mediate all views is a Utopian dream based on the
> > mistaken assumption that ten minds are better than one.
>
> > ROG:
> > But 10 minds can be better than one. That is why societies are so much
> > more productive and creative than lone feral individuals. That is why we
> > communicate in this forum.
>
> What I had in mind was the following from LILA, Chap.13:
>
> "And beyond that is an even more compelling reason; societies and
> thoughts and principles themselves are no more than sets of static
> patterns. These patterns can't by themselves perceive or adjust to
> Dynamic Quality. Only a living being can do that. The strongest moral
> argument against capital punishment is that it weakens a society's
> Dynamic capability-its capability for change and evolution."
>
> And this from Chap. 9:
>
> "A tribe can change its values only person by person and someone
> has to be first. Whoever is first obviously is going to be in conflict
with
> everybody else."
>
> My point being that it is an individual responding intuitively to DQ that
> determines potentially useful higher patterns of quality rather than a
> group. Thus, those who emphasized a personal PATH to address the
> issue seemed to me more in line with the MOQ than solutions
> involving some form of static intellectual criteria.
>
> Secondly, your emphasis on "harmony" reminded me of the following
> from Chap. 24:
>
> "What the Metaphysics of Quality indicates is that the twentieth-century
> intellectual faith in man's basic goodness as spontaneous and natural
> is disastrously naive. The ideal of a harmonious society in which
> everyone without coercion cooperates happily with everyone else for
> the mutual good of all is a devastating fiction."
>
> It's that little word "coercion" that suggests that harmony across levels
> is difficult to achieve without using some form of coercion to keep the
> competing forces from overwheleming one another. The current "war
> on terrorism" is perhaps a good example.
>
> Having said that, the term "harmony" is indeed central to my
> understanding of the MOQ, but from an aesthetic rather than a
> cooperative point of view.
>
> Platt
>
> P.S. Your revised SUMMARY passes the Nazi test with flying colors.
>
>
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>
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