Walter,Denis,Glove,Ian,Mark,Struan,Platt,Roger,Mary,Carmen,drose,Bob,Dav
idT and Y'all: I can't express my gratitude emphatically enough. thank
you Thank You THANK YOU! I think we have all of the most relevant
passages right out in front of us and everybody is focused on the same
issues. I think we need help from Risky Roger's Synthesizer Service. I'm
excited at the prospect of actually sorting out the various doubts,
objections and apparent contradictions.
But I have to say that I don't see the problems and contradictions
refered to in the recent posts. My view my not be correct, but it feels
like one big picture to me and, for the most part, I'm pretty
comfortable with it. I mean it seems internally consistant to me and
actually does help in understanding real world events.
In the short time I've been here, about six months, we've been through
two very complex public events, the US President's impeachment and the
war in Kosovo. And because I was here talking with you folks while these
events unfolded, there was ample opportunity to look at them thru MOQ
eyes. I'm hearing frustration and skepticism from so many, but the
explainatory power of the MOQ has been very very good to me. Please
forgive and ignore my arrogance. Its just a matter of attitude and style
anyway and doesn't really effect the substance of my remarks. I'd like
to think I can help. That's all.
Ian, I think glove is correct in both cases. Words and idesas are the
instrument of conversation between the social and intellectual levels,
just as forceful authority is between the biological and social levels.
And the shoes themselves are an artifact of social level values. In 1650
you'd buckle instead of tie and in 1650 B.C. you'd be lucky to have
anything like shoes at all. My background is strange enough to have
included both a life of poverty and welfare and also priviledge and
country clubs. I learned a long time ago that shoes reveal almost
everything you'd ever need to know about a person's social status.
Rappers don't wear golf shoes and CEOs seldom wear sandals to work. You
know. I bet your shoes are designed to walk on the smooth pavements of
civilization and not upon the earth itself. (Unless you live here in
Colorado where we wear hiking boots most of the time.)
I think its safe to say that any human artifact is tied up with social
and/or intellectual level values. Motorcycles are both, aren't they?
There are engineers, mechanics and gangs and roads and styles involved
with bikes. Sure its made of rubber and steel, which are biological and
inorganic value patterns, but there is also physics and status. All our
creations are a product of the human imagination as well as the
"substance" they're made of.
Struan, insisting that "morality has to be looked at from a perspective"
smells to me like you have a foot trapped in SOM thinking. Again, please
forgive my authoritative tone, but I think your problem with the MOQ is
not the fault of any real contradictions, but stems from some
misunderstanding on your part, although I'm not sure I could put my
finger on it. (I hadn't seen your question or Pirsig's reply before.
Thanks for that little gem.)
In the case of the American civil war, I think Pirsig was just pointing
out that Lincoln was acting primary to preserve the whole society and
the country. He freed the slaves not as a John Brown would, but because
the issue was tearing the nation and the society apart for years even
before the first shot was fired. The southern States had been
threatening to leave the Union so they could continue the greedy
exploitation, which were only social level values at most and not very
high quality even there. Their greed was base enough to be considered a
biological level value, like squirrels in late summer.
But it is also true that Lincoln believed in preserving the Union for
principled intellectual reasons and he certainly saw the idea of human
equality as a very basis of that Union. And its also true that the
abolitionists were inspired both by a great religious revival and the
Transcendentalist movement. Add John Brown to this mix and you can see
how the whole situation was ripe with Dynamic potential.
Naturally, that sort of thing is much harder to see until afterwards.
Societies and intellects are always behind that cutting edge of reality,
even if only for a moment. Dynamic Quality is the difference between a
saintly revolutionary and a common thug, but sometimes we just can't
tell until we see the results of their activity in the real world. I
suppose there are cases that involve a little of both.
If all normal and healthy human beings are participants in all four
levels, then one has to examine the values involved in any conflict to
sort it out. People are capable of rape and robbery as well as treason
and genocide. Those are different kinds of crimes at differents levels
of reality. There are cases where all of that is going on at the same
time too. Its rich and complex, but not contradictory.
The restrained prisoner is no longer a threat to society, but if he
lives there's a chance he'll read and write and develop an inner life.
The next religious leader may very well reside in prison right now. Who
knows? That's why capital punishment is immoral. It serves our instincts
for revenge more than our need for security. I've always noticed a
little blood lust in those who are emphatically in favor of the death
penalty, and I suspect anti-porn crusaders are quite the wankers. Ever
notice how hypocracy is kind of funny when its really transparent to
everyone but the hypocrite himself? Its like some kind of slapstick, but
I digress.
The fatwa against Rushdie is immoral because its a case of social level
values trying to restrain the higher intellectual values. But the right
of free speech is also used to protect pornography even though it is so
rarely intellectual in any sense of the word. But we allow it to
proliferate on the premise that we ought not presume nothing dynamic or
intellectual could ever result from such nakeness. There is the Kama
Sutra afterall. And I've heard "Yellow Silk" sells itself as literary
porn. Lots of mystic love poetry is sensual if not erotic. Etc. So who
knows?
I can't help but wonder if the confusion is caused by an inability to
accept the conclusions one would have to arrive at rather than a
misunderstanding of the levels themselves. I mean, if a person comes to
Lila with their cup already full of conservative conclusions about how
the world works I think confusion is nearly inevitable. The MOQ simply
doesn't support every conservative position. One can't start with the
conclusion and work backwards and expect it all to make sense. It may
even be the case that some folks are never going to be able to reconcile
their political views with their metaphysical views and will have to
give up one or the other in order to be consistant. For example, I've
had some trouble accepting the idea that social values are usually
enforced thru physical violence, but then again its hard to deny and so
I have to accept it.
I really hope Roger puts all the relevant quotes into one post. I would
if I knew how, but i'd have to type them all in by hand due to my
cyber-ignorance. If we can't use the MOQ to better evaluate the real
world then its value is in doubt. I can hardly imagine a more worthwhile
topic to discuss here.
"If I had more time this post would have been shorter." : )
David B
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