Hi Elliott,
I'm not in a position to give a proper post on this yet, but I can at least
outline my area of concern. It is something I touched on around Christmas
time in a post to John B about marriage.
Platt said:
>>>
He [Pirsig] then went on to give the MOQ version of human rights:
"This soup of sentiments about logically nonexistent entities can be
straightened out by the Metaphysics of Quality. It says that what is
meant by "human rights" is usually the moral code of intellect-vs. -
society, the moral right of intellect to be free of social control. Freedom
of speech; freedom of assembly, of travel; trial by jury; habeas corpus;
government by consent-these "human rights" are all intellect-vs.-
society issues. According to the Metaphysics of Quality these "human
rights" have not just a sentimental basis, but a rational, metaphysical
basis."
Do you think Pirsig's list of rights is complete?
>>>
My principal worry is the differentiation between the 'individual' and the
'intellectual'. Pirsig describes the fourth level as the intellectual level,
and his concern for human rights, as above, is to ensure 'the moral right of
intellect to be free of social control'. This makes the rights of
individuals secondary; that is people have value in so far as they are able
to provide intellectual quality. I think people have quality per se, and
thus I would rather the fourth level was described as 'individual' - and
then there would be an apparatus of support for the fourth level that was
geared around the positive goals of full personhood, of full human
flourishing, rather than what I see as the restricted (overly rational) goal
of 'purveyors of intellectual quality'. It's the difference between seeing
human beings as means rather than ends.
I think this is a flaw in the MoQ as presented by Pirsig, although I'd be
happy if someone persuaded me otherwise. But as I say, my thoughts require
more work (and, following Rog et al, "I could be wrong")
Sam
----- Original Message -----
From: <ehallmark@macalester.edu>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 02, 2002 4:50 PM
Subject: MD The Doctrine of Human Rights
> someone needed to start this thread:
>
> sam:
> > I don't agree that "human rights" is equivalent to the intellectual
level
> of
> > the MoQ, but as I said in the original post, "let's call it the doctrine
> of
> > human rights, although in a separate post, if I have time, I'd like to
> > challenge that". I think that there are richer formulations,
incorporating
> > the MoQ, that could be - and indeed, need to be - developed to support
> those
> > high quality moral outcomes (of respect for the person, banning of
torture
> > etc). Hopefully sometime soon I'll be able to offer some more
substantive
> > thoughts.
>
> Elliot:
> I believe pirsig says that human rights are not the equivilant to the
> intellectual level, but the struggle between the social and intellectual.
> Thus it is a compomise, a consession made by the social level to prevent
> the Intellectual level from reducing it to the bare essentials. The term
> "right" illustrates that inherent in "human rights" is society first, then
> individuals later if there is room. So please, sam, offer your
substantial
> thoughts and lets get this topic goin'. I have some thoughts as well, as
> im sure many others do.
>
> Elliot
>
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