Readers and David B.,
David Buchanan wrote:
> I ask you dear re-readers, can there be ANY doubt? The MOQ is an
> intellectual description of this mystical insight, no? Peyote was an
> essentiall component of the vision quest, and that experience shifted
> Pirsig's consciousness in a very profound way. He was integrated with his
> wild half, he was welcomed home for the first time and he was even blessed
> with deep intellectual insights. And all of this is really a single thing, a
> single event that had consequences in the various aspects of his life. In
> telling us about the peyote vision, Pirsig is telling us how "the Great
> Spirit" revealed itself to him and took over his intellectual life, no?
>
> *******************************************
>
> The trays and slips. There are so many interesting things about Pirsig's
> construction method. But I'm still trying to focus on the same issue. I
> mean, that card catalogue represents the building of his metaphysics, no? I
> think so. And that intellectual construct is an attempt to re-capture the
> insights achieved in his peyote vision, no? I think so. And he's not just
> telling how the MOQ was born, he's not just telling us how the book was
> organized and ordered, he's telling about the difference between mystical
> experience and intellectual knowledge. Its about the difference between DQ
> and sQ in real-life terms. It seems important to really zero in on this
> material because it impacts everything that follows. Is this not one of the
> most contentious areas? Don't most of the disagreements really start here?
Well, I don't know about 'contentious', but I'm not convinced the "MOQ is an
intellectual description of this mystical insight". After all, the insight is
that a large part of American values come from Indians. This seems pretty far
afield from the MOQ. If the insight had been to split reality into SQ and DQ,
I'd be more enthusiastic about your idea.
In fact this particular insight does not strike me as all that mystical, either.
I'm not arguing that the peyote didn't help bring on the insight, but having it
under these circumstances does not make it mystical. The insight could have come
to him while smoking a cigarette or taking a shower, and then no one would be
calling it mystical. Not every drug induced thought is mystical, and this
doesn't sound like one. A true mystic experience (as I understand it) is more
emotional than insightful, such as a feeling of oneness with nature. He even
says during his peyote experience that he felt split into two people, one
feeling the trip and the other analyzing it. The analytical one formed the
insight. Maybe you are thinking that an insight is equivalent to a mystic
experience, but I think there is an important distinction. Insights are dynamic
experiences that immediately latch. Mystic experiences are dynamic experiences
that fail to latch.
The card catalog "represents the building of his metaphysics", but the thousand
or so cards that grew out of the peyote experience were for a book about Indians
centered on this insight, not one about MOQ nor even necessarily quality. He
abandons this as the central theme, but decides to tell us about it anyway
because a) he thinks it was a cool insight! and b) it leads into the discussion
later about the problems with anthropology and SOM and sets up his MOQ nicely.
You seem to be building a thesis that MOQ had mystic origins and mysticism is at
the root of Pirsig's beliefs. He tries but I think he is essentially a rational
fellow. I don't think the peyote experience changed him as profoundly as you
suggest. Don't you think a person searching for vision quests would alter his
consciousness (with drugs or meditation) regularly? But we just hear about this
one episode. Perhaps going insane is mind altering enough for one lifetime.
I enjoy your posts, David.
Glennn
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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