i think you are spot on john, and i think pirsig would agree. didn't pirsig
say he wanted to spend the rest of his life being quiet?
the importance of the MOQ lies in how it reshapes and reconnects Reason.
Reason becomes more elegant and less separate from the immediate with an MOQ
understanding.
as for morals and reason....this is the tricky area. if one is directly
invlolved in a morally charged situation the quality of that experience will
dictate the person's response. but if a person is distanced from that
morally charged situation, yet still has an obligation to approve/disapprove
of it (for instance if your country is dropping bombs on some villagers
somewhere), then reason comes into play. the greater the temporal or
physical distance between us and the moral event, the more important becomes
the application of reason in describing and evaluating that event. and this
is where the moq comes in. the moq is a moral hierarchy that allows us to
better explicate the conflicting views and interests in a (rationally
appraised) moral situation. we are better able to understand why diffrent
people will interpret the event differently and we are better able to say
which view or stance is more moral.
the moq must always be seen as an offshoot of zamm in my opinion. zamm is
the more aesthetically powerful ('true') book; lila is about thinking.
because pirsig has reconnected reason with art we are able to better gauge
the merit of competing arguments, where before we were stuck in a relativity
of reason encompassed best perhaps by the word 'postmodernism'.
the best solution to the myriad moral dilemmas that plague our world is to
reduce the need for reason in their explication and rectification; that is
increase the *immediacy* of individual moral responsibility. this is best
achieved through a true democracy - a localized sphere of control and
resonsibility, participated in by all who want to.
cheers
gav
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