From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Wed Feb 11 2004 - 09:14:36 GMT
Paul and All
On 9 Feb. you wrote:
> I think he is saying that rhetoric (intellectual patterns) is the
> child of myth and poetry (social patterns), not that it is part of
> mythology. My understanding of rhetoric, when it is not preceded by
> "empty," is that of the method of constructing good arguments.
That Quality (Aretê) in ZMM seems to become social value (in
the MOQ) is clear - look to the passage about Hector - and as the
Sophist were teaching Aretê their method must be part of that
endeavour. This is your fallacy of making any kind of mental
activity "intellectual".
> Good
> arguments are constructed with clarity, precision and coherence and
> use a variety of techniques and proofs. If you study these techniques
> I think you would see that they are a far cry from the simple
> recounting of events you find in Homer. I think Pirsig sees rhetoric
> as every bit as much an intellectual activity as dialectic.
The writings of Homer was "heroic", but if writing can convey
social reality then rhetorics can, neither is "intellectual" per se.
Rhetorics was used to sway public opinion while dialectics was a
method to arrive at Truth and thus intellectual!
PIRSIG:
> "Phædrus guessed that Aristotle's diminution of dialectic, from
> Plato's sole method of arriving at truth to a "counterpart of
> rhetoric," might be as infuriating to modern Platonists as it would
> have been to Plato. Since the Professor of Philosophy didn't know what
> Phædrus' "position" was, this was what was making him edgy. He might
> be afraid that Phædrus the Platonist was going to jump him. If so, he
> certainly had nothing to worry about. Phædrus wasn't insulted that
> dialectic had been brought down to the level of rhetoric. He was
> outraged that rhetoric had been brought down to the level of
> dialectic." [ZMM p.366]
Right, Phaedrus' sympathy was with Rhetorics and the Sophists,
in other words with what became Social Value in the MOQ. This
is the fact that makes your effort to counter Matthew's
"intersubjective" charge impossible ...as long as you see the
MOQ as an intellectual pattern, but you are hell bent on not
understanding.
> Bo said:
> If the Sophists had been the ones that confronted social value THAT
> conflict would have been central in Pirsigs presentation. But - no -
> it was Plato vs Sophism.
> Paul:
> Yes, because Phaedrus believed that..."Plato's hatred of the
> rhetoricians was part of a much larger struggle in which the reality
> of the Good, represented by the Sophists, and the reality of the True,
> represented by the dialecticians, were engaged in a huge struggle for
> the future mind of man." [ZMM p.371] The future mind of man being the
> future of intellectual patterns.
You have come full circle here, and I can only repeat that I agree
with the the picture Pirsig draws, but I can't understand why it is
so important to sweep under the carpet that the Arete=Quality=
Reality is the first postulate of the MOQ and not anything the
Ancient Greeks saw. And here again Pirsig says that this Plato vs
Sophists struggle is the Society-Intellect ...with your approval
even.
> Bo said:
> The Sophists knew as little of the quality context as Plato did.
> Paul:
> I would rephrase that to say that they knew nothing of Robert Pirsig's
> MOQ, but they knew a lot about aretê.
You sound like Mark ;-) I have never questioned the
preponderance of Aretê in Greek history, the point is that when
existence was at the social stage, Aretê WAS social. Thus all
ancient reality was Aretê, I could give you a lot of examples of
this from the Nordic Viking era and I guess we see some of the
the same "social aretê" in the suicide bombers in The Middle
East. This total abadon is completely incomprehensible for
"intellectual aretê"
> Bo said:
> A metaphysics like the MOQ reaches back and rearranges everything in
> its picture. It is from that point of view we see this context. It
> delivers an unpreceded powerful explanation, but to say that the past
> saw things this way is nonsense. A nonsensical is that of Plato
> "confusing" things.
> Paul:
> I think it is redescription, not nonsense. But if it were nonsense to
> describe positions held in the past in MOQ terms then you are equally
> nonsensical to say this:
> "[Plato] represented the intellectual level and that one is supposed
> to be better that the social value of the Sophists"
No, this is me looking back through the MOQ glasses. Plato knew
no intellectual level, but knew that he fought for what he
perceived as good is. And another thing, the "evil" of Plato (in
ZMM) becomes greatly modified by LILA where it seeps through
that this is the emergence of the intellectual level.
> What intellectual level was Plato representing? What social value were
> the Sophists upholding?
Exactly my point. Where were Gravity before Einstein? A
convincing theory reaches back and rearranges the past reality it
pertains; A "good" metaphysics rearranges everything.
IMO
Bo
PS:
You said:
> Nonsense. It would also be nonsense to say
> anything like this:
PIRSIG:
> "The identification of rta and aretê was enormously valuable, Phaedrus
> thought, because it provided a huge historical panorama in which the
> fundamental conflict between static and Dynamic Quality had been
> worked out....The resolution of this conflict in the Buddhist and
> Vedantist philosophies is one of the profound achievements of the
> human mind." [Lila p.347]
> Pirsig isn't saying that a "Quality era" to follow your "intellectual
> era" dawned in the seventies, he is suggesting that thousands of years
> ago, what he calls Quality, the Sophists called arête, the Hindus
> called rta, the Taoists called Tao, the Buddha called nothingness....
Now, this is a difficult point ...for both of us I believe, I'll return to
it soon.
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