Jonathan B. Marder (marder@agri.huji.ac.il)
Wed, 1 Jul 1998 18:25:40 +0100
Hi Squad, Platt, Diana, Horse
Platt wrote:
>Bo and Diana have come up with the best explanation of the DQ/SQ split
>yet. Their proposal reads:
>
>The DQ/SQ split is CHANGE FOR THE BETTER versus PERMANENCE.
>
[snip]
This idea went unchallenged for a few days, but I must now take issue
with it. First, for the sake of precision, Diana suggested that DQ
itself (not the split) was change for the better. I see two problems
with this:-
1. To take Pirsig's example, is the experience of sitting on a hot stove
an experience for the better? What about an earthquake?
If DQ is *reality*, it can't exclude any experience.
2. We need a working definition of better.
Horse wrote:
> One final thing that I would bring up is the idea of 'better'. How do
we
> judge when change is better and by reference to what
> criteria is this judgement made? Just a thought!
Diana wrote:
>The only way you can judge an event is by experiencing it, and better
>experiences have an aesthetic quality to them. ...[snip]
>You might be able to offer criteria for having these values.
>But then what are the criteria for the criteria for the values?
>And criteria for the criteria for the criteria for the values?
>Eventually it all comes down to better.
A possible answer is that everything that happens is for the better, but
that is tautological, and of no real use.
Thus I'm going to drag up a suggestion I made previously that DQ itself
has no morality. It's the force that gets things noticed. Evaluation of
DQ is already in some sort of context (SQ pattern) which gives the term
"better" meaning. Furthermore, the same DQ event can be simultaneously
good in one context and bad in another.
As Magnus wrote:
>'The result of change' is SQ, 'change' is DQ. 'The result of
>change' might be better or worse than the original, but the
>MoQ has nothing to say about this if the result belongs to
>the same level.
=============================
Magnus:
>Ahh I see, you seem to think that there
>are such things as eternal static truths.? I think you're in for
>a surprise though. The static in SQ does not mean 'static
>for ever and ever' but 'static between two quality events'.
I don't see why you interpret my views like that. On the contrary, I
have repeatedly stated my opinion that the "truth" one observes is
context dependent. Nor did I ever say that I consider SQ as .
>And DQ is not a thing. Pirsig writes in Lila about the static levels:
>They are exhaustive. ... nothing is left out. No 'thing', that is. Only
>Dynamic Quality, which cannot be described in any encyclopedia, is
>absent.
To call the SQ levels exhaustive is axiomatic. The statement cannot
really be falsified. And whether you decide to call DQ a "thing" or not
is pure semantics.
>I think that 'things that happen' is actually the quality event. It is
>dynamic allright, but it is not DQ.
As soon as you start to describe "things that happen", the description
itself is SQ.
DQ is preintellectual, but can only be described in intellectual (SQ)
terms.
Magnus, please explain the difference between "the quality event" and
DQ.
Jonathan
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