Hi Platt, Brian, Stephen M., Jonathan & all,
a little delay, Platt, sorry. I've been engaged in the Genoa anti-globalization
riots (I'm joking, of course!). Few edits on my sentences.
> Pirsig: It is immoral to make a movie out of a metaphysics.
> Platt: It was immoral to make "The Fountainhead."
Marco: it is immoral to allow the market influence on intellectual patterns.
> Brian: Not immoral if movie was merely inspired by metaphysics.
> Stephen: According to Pirsig it was also immoral to make "The Matrix."
> Jonathan: Pirsig says it is degenerate to write a metaphysics in the first
> place
> Pirsig: It is immoral for a society to restrain truth for its own purposes.
> Platt: Those who restrained the truth about Kennedy's sexual
> escapades acted immorally.
Marco: Agree, with few excpetions. National security can require *a temporary*
restraint of truth. Ex: D-Day.
> Brian: Agrees with Platt.
> Jonathan: Some truths can be perverted and abused.
> Pirsig: It is immoral for children to be dominated by their parents.
> Platt: Disciplining a child is immoral.
> Marco: Teaching is not dominating, not immoral.
> Brian: Discipline is not a form of domination.
> Stephen: Intellectual domination of children required to preserve
> societal values.
> Jonathan: OK to dominate as in lead. Not OK to stifle.
> Pirsig: It is immoral to speak against a people because of their genetic
> characteristics.
> Platt: One should not speak ill of another solely on the basis of his skin
> color.
> Marco: Agrees.
> Brian: Agrees.
> Jonathan: Agrees
> Pirsig: It is not immoral to speak against a person because of his
> cultural characteristics if those cultural characteristics are immoral.
> Platt: One is right to speak out against member of a ghetto gang no
> matter the individual's ethnic background.
> Marco: Agrees. Be careful of accusing police of racial profiling.
> Brian: Agrees.
> Jonathan: Agrees (this has implications for collective punishment)
> Pirsig: It is immoral to put philosophy in the service of any social
> organization or dogma.
> Platt: It was immoral for America's founding fathers to draw upon
> English philosophers for their Declaration of Independence and the
> Constitution.
Marco: To apply a philosophy upon a society is not immoral, as it is a higher
intellectual pattern trying to dominate a lower social pattern.
> Brian: No. We base all actions, social and otherwise, on a philosophy
> of some kind.
> Stephen: Requires qualification. Founding fathers used philosophy
> correctly. Hitler used philosophy to give him legitimacy, but twisted it to
> suit his own ends.
> Jonathan: Philosophy is a product of society and its aspirations.
> Pirsig: It is immoral for truth to be subordinated to social values.
> Platt: Pirsig concludes that the practicality test of truth of William James
> is not only immoral, but dangerous.
Marco: Don't agree with Platt conclusion. Truth is an intellectual pattern,
tested in a social context (agreement). ICBW, but IMHO even the WJ practicality
test is an intellectual pattern, tested in a social context (the common good?)
So, at least, Truth and Practicality are of the same level.
> Brian: Not convinced Pirsig is right.
> Jonathan: Sometimes social needs dictate that some truths must be subordinate
> to others.
> Pirsig: It is immoral for philosophers of science to try to suppress
> Dynamic Quality.
> Platt: Kuhn, Feyerabend and other modern philosophers of science are
> correct in saying that scientific truth, like moral truth, is relative.
> Marco: Pirsig says there are competitive truths. Scientific truth is a
> myth; it's scientism, not science.
> Brian: Agrees with Pirsig.
> Stephen: Agrees with Pirsig. Compares suppression of DQ with Ayn
> Rand's philosophy of Objectivism which cannot explain where new
> ideas comes from.
> Jonathan: They can't anyway, but some try to ignore it.
> Pirsig: It is immoral for sane people to force cultural conformity by
> suppressing the Dynamic drives that produce insanity.
> Platt: The MOQ approves of legalizing drugs.
> Marco: Agrees with Platt, but it is immoral to overuse them. Red wine
> has good social value in Italian culture.
> Brian: Not sure.
> Stephen: Agrees with MOQ. One can move on from the intellectual level
> to the Dynamic level through drugs.
> Jonathan: Society needs to ensure an adequate level of static latching.
> Pirsig: It is immoral to commit suicide.
> Marco: Agrees, but euthanasia is an individual right.
> Brian: Agrees.
> Jonathan: Depends on circumstance.
> Pirsig: It is immoral to "karma dump" on an invented devil group like
> Jews, blacks, whites, capitalists, communists, etc.
> Platt: Hillary Clinton was immoral to blame right wing extremists for her
> husband's infidelity.
Marco: I can have opinions and rightfully blame those against me as group, if
they are a group.
> Brian: Very much agrees with Platt.
> Jonathan: It is wrong to make any false accusations.
> Pirsig: It is immoral to create a metaphysics
> Platt: Pirsig's excuse, "Ahh, do it anyway" is the same excuse he uses
> when he enjoys a fat, juicy steak.
Marco: Every static latch is, to a certain extent, immoral. But static latches
are necessary.
> Stephen: "Yeah, people who want to do that should just go and talk (to)
> a Zen master."
> Jonathan: A philosophy that fully accepts this is a contradiction.
> Platt's Summary: I can't buy Pirsig's moral sanctions completely.
> Marco's Summary: I don't find problems with Pirsig's statements. I find
> problems with "dogmatic" use of moral statements. They should be
> used as guides, not definitive answers.
> Stephen's Summary: Problems with moral sanctions are often caused
> by applying them to the wrong level.
> Jonathan's Summary: Pirsig's examples vary in their quality. They are not
> directives.
>
> PLATT's final
> Comment: It seems among the four of us that Brian and I are the hard
> liners with Stephen middle of the road and Marco the most doubtful of
> Pirsig's sanctions. The point I've been trying to make in this and recent
> posts is the considerable variance in individual understanding of the
> MOQ. Compared to Ayn Rand's or Ken Wilber's writings, Pirsig seems
> to allow for much broader interpretations. Maybe that's deliberate in
> order to allow DQ greater room to roam. The downside is that only a
> very few ideas ever get latched.
About the individual understanding of Pirsig, in the site of an Italian
neofascist group (this is not karma dumping, it is a real group!) I've found
Pirsig mentioned as a philosopher who "restores the morality of the Homeric
hero" in this degenerate world "full of homosexuals" ..... NO COMMENT
Marco
p.s.
> Jonathan: I find myself closest to Marco
According to Platt, "there must be something in the water also in Israel....."
:-)
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