Hi Ken, Fred and Group:
Ken wrote:
> >I think the emphasis on DQ as being unknowable is not justified.
> >My understanding of the MoQ is it is at bottom an empirical means of
> ordering our lives.
> >To me this does not justify admitting mysticism in the MoQ.
Fred replied:
> I respect the right of anyone to have opinions concerning philosophical
> theories,
> but since this is a discussion group about Robert Pirsig's Metaphyisics of
> Quality, I think it's important to distinguish one's personal opinions from
> those proposed by the MoQ and to be accurate with what the MoQ states.
I agree. I pay a lot more attention to contributors who back their
arguments with quotes from Zen or Lila than to those who simply use this
forum to argue their own prejudices.
Not only does the MoQ identify mysticism with Dynamic Quality, it also
identifies mysticism with Ken's empiricism:
"The purpose of mystic meditation is not to remove oneself from
experience but to bring one's self closer to it by eliminating stale,
confusing, static, intellectual attachments of the past." (Lila, Chp. 9)
To accentuate my point about referencing Pirsig, those inclined to extoll
the superiority of socialism might do well to reread Chapter 17 of Lila
wherein the author of the MoQ makes it clear he favors free enterprise:
"What makes the free-enterprise system superior is that the socialists,
reasoning intelligently and objectively, have inadvertently closed the door
to Dynamic Quality in the buying and selling of things. They close it
because the metaphysical structure of their objectivity never told them
Dynamic Quality exists." (Lila, Chp. 17)
As for the efficacy of IQ tests, I don't recall Pirsig saying anything. But I
wonder how well John Wooden Leg would last in one of Struan's
philosophy courses. (-:
Platt
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