My one sentence answer to this month's question would simply be: Dynamic is
not more moral than static. Of course, I suppose it would be best to
elaborate a little bit.
It is my opinion that working in the realm of practice rather than theory is
the best way to proceed on this topic (and most other topics for that
matter), since if the MOQ doesn't have any correspondence to the real world
then it really isn't of much use. Accordingly, I will forward two possible
translations for "Dynamic is more moral than static" from metaphysics to
practical reality: "change is better than consistency" and "freedom is
better than order."
Practical experience, however, seems to dictate that this simply isn't the
case. Constant change for its own sake and unlimited freedom more often
than not result in mere chaos. This isn't to say that the opposite is any
better. When change and freedom are stifled completely, all that results is
stagnation and oppression. The key to achieving quality in any system is
maintaining a balance between the two forces (as the two major political
parties tend to do in this country). Counter-examples in the realm of
politics would be the Soviet Union and other totalitarian regimes of this
century, which were cases where freedom was repressed at the service of
complete order, and post-Communist Russia, where the freedom unleashed on
the country has been so strong that it has nearly destroyed social order all
together.
It is my opinion that Pirsig agreed in this need for balance, although it
may have often seemed that he favored the Dynamic over the static. Perhaps
the prime example would be the literary creation of the character Lila. She
represents a clear case where stable intellectual patterns had been wiped
out. I think at one point Phaedrus comments that what she needs is some
"static latching." For in the realm of the mind, order at the expense of
freedom is close-mindedness, while freedom at the expense of order is
insanity.
In order to explain the reason why balance is so important, I will use the
illustration of Darwin's theory of natural selection. Over the course of
the evolution of life, an innumerable number of evolutionary developments
have been tested by whatever force is driving this evolution (we, of course,
choose to call it Dynamic Quality). Only a small fraction of these
developments, however, have succeeded. The reason is that the changes have
to be tested against reality. The ones that work (sustain life with more
quality) are naturally selected. If evolution simply excepted the
proposition any change is a good change, then it certainly wouldn't serve
the best interests of life.
- Matt
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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