Roger Horse Struan and Y'all:
Pirsig says, "The material for the MOQ...has been lying dormant within
the culture for centuries. The best readers will pay...maximal attention
to what I have missed. That's where the excitement is."
Wish I knew where this quote was located. I'd like to see it in context.
In any case, the meaning seems clear enough. Isn't he asking the reader
to discover material that's lying dormant in the culture? Isn't he
asking us to get excited about other thoughts and thinkers that can
color and shape the MOQ? The 99 percent that's missing from Pirsig's
books is whatever material we have bring into the mix. A forum like this
is ideal for preventing intellectual creativity and philosophical
cross-dressing. We have a kind of peer review process that sort of
naturally eliminates anything that's just too wacky.
*Roger: I have to say that your extension and improvement of the MOQ was
neither.
Even if you really had a better model for the basic structure of the
MOQ, this wouldn't be the place for it and it would propably be
something other than the MOQ. It would be the MOR, the Metaphysics of
Roger. Not that Pirsig's word is dogma, but we all have to be talking
about the same metaphysics here. The one we have is contentious enough.
And I already made the case that Pirsig's quote is not a plea to extend
or improve his ideas. The quote is an encouragement to explore ideas
"within the culture" that were the foundation of the MOQ. HE didn't just
pull it out of thin air, like Roger did. :-) *This is intended to be a
little humor in my criticism, not a personal attack.
David B.
MOQ Homepage - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
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