Jonathan B. Marder wrote on Mon, 9 Nov 1998 :
> I'm glad that we partly agree, but I don't quite agree on the
> sufficiency of SO-ethics, because I don't think there is really such a
> thing. Pirsig discussed the divorce of Ethics from Reason in ZAMM, and
> traced it back to Aristotle.
> A major point of the MoQ is to reverse this split. To call it "too
> general" is to say that ethics is peripheral. Please Bodvar, don't do
> that!
Jonathan and group.
I do have problems with what you mean by the above "warning". The
Quality idea is that existence is a moral evolution and that each
moral plateau has its own good/bad scale, but your ethics sounds like
a detailed prescription of what is good in a society at all times
and under all conditions, an impossible task using the MOQ.
It merely states that Social value is for the individual to live for
the good of all. This value is terribly general and was established
long before modern man, the myriad of moral codes that later sprang
from it is impossible to keep track of. Hamurabi's, the Mosaic law,
the Koran, the Norse "ting"s, the.....An unending succession
of law collections, of old full of stoning, burning and other good
social countermeasurements, but more and more influenced by
Intellect's ethics of individual worth.
The development described in ZMM was 'the divorce of ethics from
reason' all right, but remember that Pirsig had not conceived
the MOQ when writing ZMM. Intellect took leave of its social bounds
which up to then had been the ruling ethics. As you will know do I
claim that this development also can be seen as the birth of SO
thinking which came to be the the new morals that everything
was judged from. That is what I call SO-ethics or morality.
And yes, the MOQ is a reversal of this. Perhaps "reversal" isn't
accurate? There is no going back, only a spiral movement to a higher
perspective. And it is this view that give us the ability to see the
big picture, but to use it as a guide how to be a good member
of this or that particular community is not its mission. It only says
that society is the base for Intellect, and (stretching our tether to
the limit) Intellect may give rise to a new moral/ethics level
...another Bo pet as you know :-).
Seen such it's no wonder why the MOQ seems to be taking society's
side against Intellect. Each value level joins force with the second
one below itself: Intellect with Biology" (which is the only example
in a four-tiered system), not a "reversal" to Social value the way
you seem to see it.
Over to the Inorganic vs Organic theme.
> Inorganic patterns are certainly consistent with life and can even
> promote life. But we go off track when we ask "do they VALUE life?".
> Life is the higher level arbitrator playing the inorganic against the
> inorganic. The most primitive cell membrane is a selection device
> letting in some molecules, excluding others. Once you have that and a
> hereditary mechanism, life is established.
We have a saying about one fool asking more than ten wise may answer
and I'll not play the fool's part :-). What you say is - perhaps -
consistent with the MOQ , I'm not sure. In your reply to Diana it
only sounded as if you said that Pirsig was wrong: there's no
conflict between the two lower levels, and if that fails the whole
logic of the MOQ topples.
I am a little bewildered. I thought that the MOQ basic assertions
were understood and accepted after all your time at the discussion.
Now suddenly to declare the most elementary things as "wrong" is
disappointing .....and exhausting. Perhaps you don't like the
conflict allusion, but it will make a mess of the MOQ to blunt those
concepts.
No bad feelings dear Jonathan, I just had to say this.
Bodvar
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