drose and MD,
Clark writes:
This results in the basis of morality being sentience which results
> in a different MoQ for each sentient being. This is where he switches
> to the idea that there is no single truth but a different
> truth for each sentient individual.
> This human focus on morality
> leads into the heirarchy of the levels and dictates an
> increasing level of morality for each of the four levels. At this point
we
> begin to judge morality from a strictly human standpoint. Morality is no
> longer based on the physical universe, only on the concerns of humanity.
drose writes:
I see this as a shift to a discussion of the moral code I-PoV over
S-PoV. Okay, here is where we can dovetail into the rest of the thread.
If you accept the MoQ as Pirsig presents it, then the reason that
sentience becomes the focus is that once sentience is attained, it has
the potential to substantially alter the course of evolution for itself
and the other levels.
Clark writes:
Drose-the thrust of your above paragraph is exactly the reason that I
disagree with the idea that morality should be judged primarily on the
intellectual level. The fact that sentience does cause us to base morality
on the increasing levels of the MoQ is EXACTLY what fragments it and causes
morality to be divorced from our total situation in the universe. It causes
our concept of morality to be narrowly focused on the concerns of humanity.
A very weak reed which depends on the collective wisdom of each and every
individual in our biosphere. That is the source of my uneasiness with the
MoQ as set forth by Pirsig. Under our current concept our understanding of
our place in the universe is an amalgam of all of the sentient beings in
the biosphere and I can see no possibility of reaching concensus on overall
universal morality.
I would prefer to assign each of the four levels equal weight in
evaluating morality. If we adopted that view then the fact that every
individual in the biosphere wanted a wasteful, high powered car (an
overstatement) would have to be balanced by consideration of the effect it
would have in the biosphere. A situation that does not obtain under our
current concept of the operation of the four levels. As of now the high
powered cars would win every time. It seems a relatively small change in
the operation of the MoQ but would make all the difference in our concept
of morality and value. It would also simplify decisions on which actions
were more moral or had more value. Surely intellect should sometimes bow to
the collective good, or to put it more accurately, should take all aspects
of any decision on morality into consideration. Ken
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