From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Mon Apr 19 2004 - 16:26:05 BST
Dear Wim,
> Yes, you did (29 Mar 2004 08:29:39 -0500), but neither in your original
> presentation of your religion (13 Mar 2004 08:59:41 -0500), nor in your
> reply (30 Mar 2004 09:04:19 -0500) to my questions of 29 Mar 2004 23:27:30
> +0200: '-
I thought I did answer your questions. What am I missing?
> You describe yourself as an atheist and defined an atheist as
> "someone [who] doesn't believe in God". What God do you deny?
As I've written, the God of organized religions.
> Given your
> appreciation of DQ, you probably deny the same (interpretation of) God as I
> do. Would you also describe yourself as an atheist when faced with a
> religion that interprets God as DQ?
I know of no such organized religion.
> What are the practical results of
> your "pursuing Dynamic Quality by creating and contemplating art as well as
> by pursuing beauty in all [your] endeavors"? What are the static patterns
> of value left in its wake in your life and/or that of others? Does this
> Dynamic Quality operate on the social and intellectual patterns of value
> you participate in? Does it induce them to "migrate towards DQ"?'
Didn't you ask these questions before, and didn't I answer them?
> Sorry to have overlooked that you DID say a bit more about HOW you pursue
> Dynamic Quality, but it did not answer my questions what are the practical
> results and what static patterns of value are left in the wake of the
> Dynamic Quality you experience.
As written in my post of 3/30/04 addressed to you, the practical result is
that I'm happy, and that I have no idea of what static patterns are left
in the wake of my experience of DQ.
> Do you agree that DQ should leave new static patterns of value in its wake
> to really be DQ?
Yes. When I experience DQ I recommend my experience to my friends. What
effect that has on them I have no idea. I don't know 99 percent of what
goes on in this world, especially in the minds and hearts of others.
> You continued 6 Apr 2004 16:07:14 -0400:
> 'I recognize DQ [as?] has Pirsig described it. I haven't freed any static
> patterns or created any new ones that I know about. Have you?'
>
> No collection of static patterns of value (even if it is receptive of DQ)
> can take credit for the action of DQ. The question should be: have you
> started participating in new patterns of value because of your DQ
> experience? Those new patterns of value come into being because of people
> participate in them, of course, but the typical pattern of value requires
> more than one person participating before it can be recognized as a
> 'pattern' (even if retrospectively one can be credited as originator).
> Being 'original' happens to everyone all the time: it just means deviating
> from an old pattern of value. Patterns can stand lots of unconnected
> deviations before they become unrecognizable and disappear. It is only when
> those deviations connect into a new pattern that DQ becomes recognizable.
> Who was the originator may be less important than who joined in to
> participate.
I think you're saying that static patterns to be static patterns require
recognition by someone other than an individual. Not so. My memories are
static patterns and are recognized by me exclusively. As I'm fond of
saying to illustrate the uniqueness of each individual, "You'll never know
what it's like to be kissed by you."
> What kind of art do you create?
Watercolors.
> Where did you learn the
> techniques and what models did you emulate when learning them?
Too many sources to list.
> Did
> deviations from the models sometimes 'connect' (either with own earlier
> deviations or with deviations by others) and form a new pattern, a new
> latch for the DQ you experienced?
Sorry, don't understand the question.
> You continued:
> 'Me? Create a religion? You give me more credit than I deserve. Even my
> large ego will not admit that I'm the second coming of Christ. Anyway, as a
> pointed out before, I'm not a fan of organized religions.'
>
> But don't be afraid, you don't need to create a religion yourself that
> interprets God as DQ. It already exists and its way of organizing is very
> limited compared to other religions. None of the objections against
> organized religion I read from you until now is valid for Quakers.
Are you claiming that Quakerism isn't an organized religion?
> I did have 'a hidden agenda all along': please show me the light that
> shines through you.
I've tried. Whatever light shines through me is reflected in my pursuit of
beauty which IMO is the 'light.' Of course, I will never fully attain it
except in brief glimpses. The beauty we know here on earth is but a taste
of supernal beauty, a fleeting sight or sound "which cannot have been
unfamiliar to angels." (quote from Edgar Allen Poe)
> You suggested:
> 'All I can suggest is you visit Amsterdam where I believe there are a
> number of paintings by Rembrandt. See if he can't help you make the
> connection you seek.'
>
> The European Cultural Foundation is in Amsterdam. On my way to work I pass
> underneath the 'Rijksmuseum' (with the 'Nachtwacht', the most famous
> painting by Rembrandt) on my bike and cross the 'Museumplein', with the
> 'van Gogh Museum' and the 'Stedelijk Museum'. I have seen all of them from
> the inside at least once in my life. I'm afraid I only experience static
> patterns of value. High-quality ones, for sure, but no DQ.
Different strokes for different folks. Great art for some is boring
although more people visit museums in a year than all sporting events
combined.
> Can anything
> stored in a museum because it is valued by lots of people show more than
> static patterns of value that have been left in the wake of DQ long ago?
I submit that one reason works of art in museums are valued by lots of
people is because they engender for many the experience of DQ.
> In
> a sense the traditions and rituals you criticize in organized religions the
> "museums" of the static patterns of value left in the wake of mystical
> religious experience. Can you understand that I do not expect to experience
> DQ in art museums anymore either?
The traditions and rituals of organized religions do lead some to the DQ
experience. Just as museums don't work for you, sitting around in a circle
waiting for someone to say something doesn't work for me.
> Wouldn't your suggestion to 'arrange
> tours and provide the means for the people to attend concerts and see the
> great churches and museums that exist throughout Europe' imply 'exposure to
> sq' rather than 'exposure to DQ'?
Exposure to SQ, a song patten for example, can provoke the DQ experience,
as Pirsig describes in Chap. 9 of Lila. The Quaker ritual is SQ wouldn't
you say? Does it not lead to the DQ experience for some?
> 'Unity in diversity' is
> very much 'in' these days, especially among the European elite with a far
> enough developed consciousness.
European elites are further along the evolutionary path than stupid non-
European elites? A bit presumptuous wouldn't you say?
> The ECF does 'beg' for money from governments with this
> instrumental value of culture for politics as argument. Usually with little
> success. Nearly all of the money the ECF 'throws at arts' is not tax money
> however. It is money that ordinary people have thrown away lured by
> lotteries promising easy gain and 'if you lose, don't mind, as 60% of it is
> going to good causes anyway'. I try to convince the ECF to become less
> dependent on lottery money, without becoming dependent on government money,
> by developing funding from direct donations/membership fees.
I hope you win your point with the ECF. I wouldn't feel I was contributing
to the betterment of mankind by encouraging gambling.
> By the way,
> why do you consider it wrong to throw tax money at arts (more wrong than
> throwing privately 'earned' money)? All those 'great art centers of Europe'
> owe their existence to tax money. Two of the three museums I ment ioned are
> named after governments: municipal ('stedelijk') and state ('rijks-').
Yes, I consider it wrong to throw tax money at arts. Would you want your
tax dollars used to fund a tour by Britney Spears? Whether the art centers
of Europe would never have arisen without tax dollars is debatable. For
example, the Metropolitan Museum in New York, one of the great museums of
the world, was founded in 1870 by group of businessmen and financiers, not
a bunch of government bureaucrats using money extorted from private
citizens.
Best regards,
Platt
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