At 2:42 PM +0200 11/11/99, Jonathan Marder wrote:
>How do we define the dynamic choice. I suppose it is the path never taken
>before, but how can that take precedence over the tried and tested?
In my reading of the section in Lila -
> "In general, given a choice of two courses to follow and all other
> things being equal, that choice which is more dynamic, that is, at a
> higher level of evolution is more moral."
- I took it on a very pragmatic level. If I'm playing chess, the moves
that have the most value for my pieces are the ones which offer the most
freedom and mobility. If I'm deciding on which career has the most quality
for me, I consider of higher value those options which let me dress in what
I like, get up when I want, do as much work on whatever interests me at the
moment and wander in unexpected directions. All those considerations seem
to be higher quality indications to me and I believe its because I am moved
toward dynamic freedom instinctually.
The great failure of intellectual rules over the social patterns of value -
I'm talking about Communism here - was the system created ONE static
pattern of intellectual value which now was incapable of evolving
intellectually. That staticicity destroyed all the good ideas at the base
of the political system.
And by contrast, the strength of free democracy is that there is a great
deal of intellectual freedom by leaving intellect out of Government (!)
There's not much social support for some guy to live in his bus and smoke
his bong and think his ideas and read his books, but there's no outright
oppression either. )Thank God) There's a benign form of support which
says, "If you can figure out how to survive and develop your understanding
of new ideas to the point where they are socially useful, then we'll adopt
them and society marches on."
Socially, Pirsig's ideas ARE a success. Which is why I was so fascinated
with Lila. In the years waiting for something new to come from Pirsig, my
unconscious question was what now? You've got less motivation to criticize
the "way things are" when you've got a book on the best seller list than
when you're the barely-tolerated bum on the bus. I knew without
formulating it that celebrity warps intellectual quality and when I read
Lila, even as an exercise in degeneracy it answered all my unspoken
questions and led me much deeper than the original work and it's lone wolf
themes. How the ideas about quality affect us as a society is the question
we're now working on.
>In real life it's all very complicated. I don't see how the MoQ provides a
>compass to navigate, though it seems to agree that we need one.
What is good and what is not good? Need we any system to tell us this?
MoQ simply points us to the compass that is available to us all. You can
argue where it comes from and whether it created the universe or whether
the universe created it but you can't get away from the bare fact of the
direct experience of quality at the basis of one's reality. What more does
one need?
Well, a couple of things.
First, one needs conceptual patterns which can deal with the question. A
language in which to operate.
Second, one must avoid the pattern of degeneracy when you've found a good
intellectual pattern to use, "Philosophy" or "English" for instance, and
you start assuming that the map is the territory. Don't get caught in a
static trap. Here's where the "Z" in "ZAMM" comes in handy.
Third, one needs freedom from preconceptions based upon a faulty
metaphysics. Thank you, SOM for getting us here but since you don't have
anything value-able to say, we'll take it from here.
Fourth, one needs confidence that Quality is real. That in the quietness
of mindlessness the buddha actually does exist. That my choices and
decisions and thoughts are guided by something more than randomn synaptic
clicks and switches.
Fifth, you need patience to work the problem out. The same way a mechanic
resolves stuckness by examining underlying patterns of value, you need to
examine the patterns of value that underlie any particular moral question.
That can take some time. Other people to discuss the problem can help a
lot, but people can also be the biggest hindrances with bad advice,
interruptions, distractions etc. It usually takes a lot longer than we'd
have expected.
When those pieces are in place, then MoQ provides a very useful compass.
That which is good - the only compass there is - and means to resolving any
issue.
Just to bring it all to bear in a concrete example, let's take the question
of capital punishment which I'm told has been around for a while and bring
the MoQ's morale compass to bear on it.
We'll assume I've got the five conditions wrapped up - although you could
probably put a pretty good arguement against number three in my case.
That's the real stickler. But as long as I realize that my "tools" are
just that, I can safely use the ones my society handed me.
What are the tests of quality I use? How do I know I've found the highest
quality solution out of the infinite number of possibilities?
Remembering always postulate #2, I come up with:
Principle of harmony. I expect the highest quality solution to work on all
levels - biological, social and intellectual.
If different levels conflict, then the lower should rule over the higher and...
all other things being equal, make the more dynamic choice.
You can formulate more (in fact, I thought that was sort of what we're all
doing here) but they should do for now.
Now, since I know Quality is accessible to me personally, I ask myself
using these assumptions what I would want to happen to the person who
murders my wife or my children?
Well I would want the person to suffer. This person wronged me deeply and
I want them to feel and share the agony that I feel from their heinous act.
This instinct is based upon self-preservation on every level. My instinct
if I caught them alone, would be to beat and maim and perhaps even kill
them in return. But of course, that doesn't make sense as social policy.
Suppose they are bigger or better armed than me? I'd need society to help
me punish them and I'd need to persuade society that it has an interest in
doing so. Thus, capital punishment.
Trouble is, there's a violation of hierarchies involved. The biological
self-preservation value is ruling over society. That's immoral, according
to MoQ. It also fails to satisfy my deepest desire which is the
perpetrator should equally share the grief he's inflicted on me. What
solace is it to me that this bad person has been put out of his misery
while I suffer on and on?
Society and I do have an interest in common, we both very much desire that
this person is locked up and controlled from here on. Killers are very
destructive to the fabric of society - which is, after all, composed of
living people not dead ones. and we can't allow murderers at large.
Society and Biology can agree, what about intellect?
Pirsig points out that people are patterns of intellectual value, and
should be highly valued as such. Thus eliminating people for purely social
or biological reasons is immoral. When I start thinking what intellectual
value a murder contains this leads me to all sorts of ideas and a clear
hypothesis about what I want to happen to the murderer of my loved one.
I want the person controlled in a safe place and I want him to be forced to
confront what he's done. I want to read him letters from me on the
birthday's of the deceased. Or even better, daily. I want the facts of
the lives that he wasted placed before him constantly until he sees the
clearly the life he destroyed. I want him to be rehabilitated from the
stupid and destructive patterns which led him to commit this act so that he
can experience the true remorse of repentance. I want him to experience
this while knowing that he will be forever locked in this cage - just like
he locked me and my loved ones in a cage that I can never get out of. This
sounds cruel, but I believe it's more than mere retribution.
My deepest desire is that good can come of his life still. That he'll be
trained out of the patterns that led him to this point and that the
horrendous knowledge of his own mistakes and how he came to them will
inspire him to try and rectify the conditions that led him there. That
he'll find the words or ideas in his monastic confinement that will reach
others who are in danger of making the same mistakes. I would try and help
him do this. I could even envision being his friend one day, after all,
we'd be mutually confined to contemplating the life that was lost, bound
together more than anyone else to whom my wife or child had become a mere
distant memory.
Suppose he's unrepentant and defiant? Well then my constant reading to him
of his mistakes and crimes would be a living hell he could never escape.
I'm sorry for him, but its his choice. Perhaps there would come a time
when the prisoner would want to die, just to escape my constant haranguing.
Well when that point comes, I'd be the final arbiter. If I decided that
there was no hope for redemption and I was tired of trying, I might give
permission for him to cease being. But this would be a failure on our
parts and not the high aim I'd work for.
Ok. That's my ideal world there. Would it work? Probably not, but
pragmatism isn't the question here. It's morality. Does MoQ provide a
moral compass in a confusing world, that's the question and I assert that
yes it does. I have a clear idea of what is most moral and I've been
pointed to that idea by MoQ. Now I can test and develop my model and work
toward it, but I've been provided the tools for thinking about the problem
by the MoQ.
A while back, (deep in my in box!) it was commented that MoQ didn't change
anyone's basic thinking about moral questions - Quality was sort of pasted
over and made to rationalize pre-held opinions. Well I fervently
disagree. I had a much different conclusion about the death penalty before
I read Lila. Pirsig changed my opinion because I hadn't contemplated the
importance of considering the value of intellectual patterns when
considering what to do with this person. Now I oppose the death penalty.
Minds are wonderful things because they can change.
Whew! I joined this list a month ago and I'm just catching up on my
reading and enjoying it immensely. I'm going to try and comment some more
about politics and MoQ, but I'm going to finish reading my full mailbox
first,
jc
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