Hugo Fjelsted Alroe (alroe@vip.cybercity.dk)
Mon, 23 Mar 1998 18:22:17 +0100
Welcome to the Squad, Struan!
What an entry, reminds me of my brother when he comes visiting - charging
the premises in a loving manner :-)
I am sorry to be brief in the following, I am pressed for time, but I
thought a quick answer was better than none.
I think your main obstacle is the ethical issue. You do talk of the
discarding of dualist metaphysics and determinism, etc., as well, but
hardly in the detailed manner needed for a refusal of MoQ on those grounds.
I am sorry we do not yet have an archieve of the Lila Squad, because these
issues have been discussed in some detail earlier.
I personally find the more metaphysical part of Pirsig's thought to be most
compelling, and I feel most confident arguing the metaphysical questions.
On the ethical issues I am more wary and reluctant. This does not mean that
I find no basis for ethics in the Metaphysics of Quality. Compared to the
other takings on metaphysics that I know of, Pirsig's, and some related
views, are the only ones which bear some vague hope of grounding an ethics.
I think your quotes from Pirsig shows the dangers of answering ethical
questions based on metaphysics in any categorical way. These are immensely
difficult questions which me must remain humble towards, - Metaphysics of
Quality (MoQ) is no magic spell which makes ethics easy, it may be twisted
and misused, just as any other structure of thought. But before we reject
the possibility of MoQ providing some ground for ethics, lets stop and look
at the alternatives. In my eyes we have three basic paths:
-- No grounding, that is, utter relativism (or emotivism as you call it)
-- Dogmatic grounding, which is the same as cultural relativism (if there
is no grounding but dogmatics, there is no basis for a discussion of ethics
across the cultural borders)
-- Some form of naturalism (I consider MoQ a form of naturalism).
The problem with the latter, naturalism, is that history shows how less
than adequate theories of nature gives rise to less than adequate theories
of ethics, social darwinism comes to mind (though the path of influence may
have been the reverse at first, in that case?). Anyway, drawing upon
metaphysics for ethical answers, we should beware that our theories of
nature are fallible, and avoid drawing conclusions beyond the point of
experiental support.
However, Struan, if you have some other grounding of ethics in stock, even
if only the inklings of a hope, please share it with us, we need all the
help we can get on this one.
Regards
Hugo
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hugo Fjelsted Alroe alroe@email.dk alroe@vip.cybercity.dk
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