Hi Rog:
> PLATT:
> Yes, but. How do you judge the consequences? On what basis do you
> say a consequence is good or bad, better or worse?
>
> ROG:
> As my boss once said to me at work when I asked this same question "What is
> good, Phaedrus, and what is not good -- need we ask anyone to tell us these
> things?" (pretty cool having a boss that reads Pirsig, huh?)
>
> Quality is experience. If you can experience deficiencies in the current
> situation, then there is greater good to be created. Like Pirsig, I
> totally reject the notion of an idealistic moral goodness that is floating
> off in some higher Platonic realm. Quality is experience, and in living,
> we experience higher and lower quality. The key is for each of us to learn
> how to maximize the goodness of experience, and to extend the experience of
> quality out further and farther, over a wider circle and across a greater
> range of time and predicaments. Life is thus an inquiry.
>
> Or to paraphrase another quote from Pirsig, the goodness of an experience
> is in the harmony which it produces.
What you say is all well and good, an accurate description of Pirsig's
general thoughts. So is it ultimately up to each individual to answer
what constitutes social good? (Recall that my initial question focused
on social morality, not biological or intellectual.) So if I find from my
experience that I can find harmony by cheating on my income tax, it
would be OK? By saving the money that would otherwise go to the
government (and probably wasted), wouldn't I find the "goodness of my
experience" improved, assuming the risk of getting caught didn't bother
me?
What I see in your response is good old relativism wherein what is
right for one person may be wrong for another, i.e., one for all and all
for one and every man for himself. Of course, your explanations of the
virtues of capitalism show you have certain standards of social
morality--health, wealth, democracy, freedom, education, lifespan,
nutrition, safety nets, etc.,etc. All these have some basis for being
"good." My question is, what basis? If these "goods" are self-evident as
you seem to suggest, how come everyone doesn't insist on them?
Goodness knows (pardon the put) there's a wide divergence of views
on what constitutes social good just on this site. Is there a basis on
which these can be resolved?
I don't have the answers. I ask to learn. Tell me to back off if you think
I'm belaboring the question.
Platt
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