Dear Magnus and Jonathan, All,
A short intervention. Magnus says that a quality "event" corresponds to a
subject - object pairing. Jonathan is, I think, slightly misreading Magnus
(I would guess) if he thinks that Magnus pictures the event as *leading to*
the subject - object pairing, since (atleast this is my way of looking at
it) the Q.Event *is* a subject - object pairing. That is the only way it
can be discriminated as an "event". This is what "event" means. This
interpretation of what Magnus is saying would accord with what Jonathan
draws our attention to, namely that Prisig says something "more general",
such as that subject - object pairs are a consequence of or arise from a
quality event (and, need I add this, it is Static Quality that we are
discussing here - the sort that can be attached to a static four dimensional
picture of reality in which boundaries of "events" can be discriminated).
However, on the other hand, Jonathan is right to complain that if Magnus
is supposing that these discrete Quality-Events are the *basic structure of
reality* or some such (and I'm not sure if he is), then he is ignoring one
of the most perceptive aspects of Pirsig's Philosophy. The most perceptive
aspect of his philosophy, for me, is that there is such a thing as Dynamic
Quality, which one does not experience in events, or sucessfully describe in
subject - object terms, but which is real despite this, in fact all the more
real *because* it's reality does not depend on such descriptions, such
artifice as the subject, the object. This recalls some disagreements I have
had in the past in both focus and discuss. The point I want to make just
now is as follows. If Magnus agrees that subjects and objects *arise from*
or *ammount to* some kind of static quality-event, then he needs to give
some kind of account of the relationship between static quality, events, and
dynamic quality, the continuum.
My point is, Pirsig seems to suppose that we are entitled to use this one
same word 'quality' to describe both, and at the same time that these are
two quite different kettles of fish. So what is there in common between the
two that warrants this carrying over of the word from the one to the other?
I believe that I can offer an explanation, and it is of course the one that
I have always peddled. I have taken Pirsig as saying that static quality is
to dynamic quality as a diary is to a life. The one is an attempt to
describe the other, to put it in words (or into scientific equations - it
comes to the same thing). Well now, something, obviously, is lost. No word
can net in some watery fluid stretch of experience, and no series of events
constitutes a continuum. So, if Magnus thinks that it is the events, the
static side of quality, which constitute true reality, and even if he thinks
that the events constitute an equal reality with the dynamic, he will owe us
an account of the relationship between static quality and dynamic quality.
Without such an account, which I have often tried to give, it will seem that
the appearance of the word 'quality' in both names is entirely random and
unwarranted, and with that seeming, Pirsig's entire philosophy will be at
nought.
So Magnus, do please elaborate, and cure me of the seeming that might be
taken from Jonathan's account of your views.
With all good wishes and apologies for a prelonged absence,
Elephant
> From: "Jonathan B. Marder" <jonathan.marder@newmail.net>
> Reply-To: moq_focus@moq.org
> Date: Thu, 26 Jul 2001 10:03:36 +0300
> To: <moq_focus@moq.org>
> Subject: Re: MF PROGRAM
>
> Hi again Magnus and all,
>
> Magnus, our disagreement is down to this . . .
>
>> JONATHAN
>>> My only problem is your one-to-one mapping between "event" and
> subject-object
>>> pattern.
>>
>
> MAGNUS
>> But that's one of the most basic assumptions of the MoQ, that a
> subject-object
>> pair is created by each quality event.
>>
> This is the Magnus interpretation, that a single discreet quality event leads
> to a single unique object and a single unique subject. Pirsig says something
> more general, that subject-object pairs are a consequence of quality. Magnus,
> do you have a quote to support your interpretation?
>
>> JONATHAN
>>> [Magnus's] seems to be the subject-object view of a reality made of a
>>> number of discreet, absolute events. I think that reality is a continuum
> that
>>> can be carved up in any number of different ways. The events that you
> define
>>> as object + subject are a consequence of the carving up.
>>
>
> MAGNUS
>> But the MoQ says it's the other way around. The events are primary, discreet
>> and unique, the rest is secondary.
>>
>
> Again Magnus, I don't recall Pirsig saying that the primary source of reality
> is discreet "quantum" events. The events and all the SQ patterns that
> characterise them are reality, but not the source of reality.
>
> Jonathan
>
>
> MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
>
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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