Lithien and squad,
My view of Dynamic Quality is that it came into existence at the time of
the origin of the universe. The evolution of the universe is the result of
the functioning of Dynamic Quality. As we know from Pirsig's ideas, every
step in the development of the inorganic universe represents Value and
Quality. There is no such thing as good or bad. all is good.
This situation prevailed up until the development of human sentience. In
your terms the expulsion from the Garden of Eden. I lumped the end of this
period into the biological level to avoid long explanations but the dawn of
sentience probably occurred toward the end of the biological level. As I
said, the pre-sentient phase of the evolution of the universe represented
Dynamic Quality continually adding complexity and Value to the physical
structure of the universe. All was good.
Along comes human sentience and the picture changed. With the injection
of human sentience into the picture the operation of Dynamic Quality became
subject to being changed by human sentience. Look at our effect on the
biosphere and non-sentient life on the planet. For the first time DQ
operated not only in the inorganic fashion but also was now filtered
through human sentience. Dynamic Quality now became capable of producing
results which were not good and did not have value. The possibility of evil
was loosed on the world. In a broad sense I would say that evil became
possible with the divergence of Universal Quality and Human Quality. This
is an oversimplification but represents the principle of what I am talking
about.
When I say that evil is relative I will use just a couple of examples to
save words.
I believe Platt says that death represents evil but what would have been
the most moral course of action, to put Pol Pot to death and save a
multitude of lives or to let him live and carry out his own truth? Or, had
we known his plans in advance, would it have been more moral to execute
Timothy McVeigh and save the lives of the 168 people that he killed in the
Murrah Building? Pirsig says that each person has his/her own truth and
that these many truths will gradually gravitate toward a common set of
values. Maybe when this point is reached there will be no evil in the
universe again and we will be back in the Garden of Eden. Ken
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