MD progressing towards personal moral authority

hey all,

Platt: "In the MOQ, intellect per se is SOM no matter how many times you say
otherwise--the pattern of amoral objective that has messed up society
by taking biology's side. It's in Chapter 24 of LILA. You really should
read it again sometime."

gav: this is disingenuous at best. SOM is relatively low quality intellect, compared to MOQ and the many thinkers throughout history who have not been total SOMites.

the refinement of intellect is what pirsig is about. period.

now...who has moral authority? well according to the individual DQ, then intellect, then society..... . so who perceives DQ and where do ideas develop? - *individuals* i know this is basic but let's say it anyway: moral authority resides with individuals. this is an existential ethic (matt kundert's essays at moq.org on existentialism and camus are very good on this). briefly, each individual is free and totally responsible for their actions. there is always choice. free will resides in the intellectual level (pirsig's treatment of the free will question is flawed...i think diana covered this some time ago) - it is about being an authentic individual.

now one is not born an individual - a citizen, an ubermensch. indeed the majority never become true individuals in the existentialist sense. growing up is that period when moral authority is external to the individual - parents, teachers, police etc. like dogs in the company of humans, most people remain adolescent for life (only immature dogs bark). this is because they are not given the experiences and education that develops intellectual value - freeing them from conflicting (with intellect) social controls.

but a development period is obviously necessary, even in the best of worlds. moral authority will be external (to some extent) to the young and adolescent. 'coming of age' is that rite of passage, ignored in the west, where moral authority shifts from others to the individual. before this, moral authority should *still* reside with (other) individuals, not  laws or systems (which is very SOM - the abstract over the real). parents, elders and the immediate community are where moral authority should reside for the immature person.

gav