Rich Roger jc Jon and all philosophers: The conversation has been
passionate without turning ugly. That's the best we can hope for. Thanks
to all the posters. Roger, thanks for the invitation to "start a new
dialogue". I have a plan to address the issues surrounding money, and I
would like to take it in a slightly different direction, one that I hope
you find as exciting as I did. But first, here are a few thoughts...
Roger asks what I mean by "unmoderated Social Darwinism". By
"unmoderated" I mean simply unmodified, unmittigated, unaltered or pure.
I mean Social Darwinism just as it is, without any correctives. There
are many thousands of books about Social Darwinism itself, and even more
opinions about it, but I think its safe to say that it is essentially a
combination of the Protestant idea that wealth = virtue and the
Darwinist idea that winners win through ruthless agression. Its the law
of the jungle applied to economics. And it's conception of the jungle's
law is overly influenced by the Victorian values of Darwin's world. A
lot of people don't realize that savage competition in the workplace was
seen as some kind of natural or "divine" order even before his theory of
biological evolution was formulated. Most folks imagine that these
social theories were based on Darwin's discoveries. But its the other
way around. Darwin's data was filtered through his culture and language,
unconsciously and otherwise. Everyone knows what it was like in those
days, thanks to Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo and others. It was a time
of Kings, colonialism and there was only a tiny middle class. Scrooge is
the ultimate Social Darwinist, as in "Tiny Tim should just die and his
father's poverty is due to his moral laxity". Its not the puny wages he
recieves from Scrooge, oh no, it is GOD that has seen fit to impoverish
the family. (Merry Christmas, by the way.) I think historians refer to
it as "prosperity theology".
As Woody Allen says, "It's worse than dog eat dog these days, its dog
doesn't return other dog's phone calls".
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But more to the point about money and the MOQ... In chapter 17, where
Pirsig is talking about the "Giant", which is also described as the
"giant octopus" that he'd seen in his nightmares throughout his life. He
writes...
"He had come to think of dreams as Dynamic perceptions of reality. They
were suppressed and filtered out of consciousness by conventional
patterns of static social and intellectual order but they revealed a
primary truth: a value truth. The static patterns of the dreams were
false but the underlying values that produced the patterns were true.
In static reality there is no octopus coming to squeeze us to death, no
giant that is going to devour us and digest us and turn us into a part
of its own body so that it can grow stronger and stronger while we are
dissolved and lost into nothingness. But in Dynamic reality?"
Forgive my pretentiousness, but I think the assertion that "dreams are
Dynamic perceptions of reality" is extremely profound. I also think its
quite true. Pirsig isn't the only one who has dreamed of giant monsters.
In fact, if Jung and Campbell are right, and I certainly think they are,
we ALL dream this dream one way or another. These dreams are the basis
of our myths and legends, or rather they come from the same place.
Neither dreams nor myths are true in the literal sense, but Dynamically
they are true as true can be. The "truth" of the story of David and
Goliath is a Dynamic one, its not an historical truth. The stories of
knights who slay dragons is another version of the dreams Pirsig had.
And the great political satirist Jonathan Swift captured this truth
beautifully in Gulliver's Travels.
And what does it say in the book of Revelations? No man shall be able to
buy or sell without the mark of the BEAST? Demons, dragons, beasts,
devils, octopi, the clashing rocks, the troll that gaurds the bridge, it
doesn't really matter what form this image takes. The Dynamic truth is
still the same inspite of the various images used to express it. If Jung
and Campbell are right, every person AND EVERY CULTURE has this same
dream. The only difference is the static forms of expression. Slaying
the dragon is just one of the steps one must take to complete the hero's
journey. The murderous "Giant" is really just one part of a much larger
dream, one with a more complete Dynamic truth. You could say that the
hero's journey is THEE dream. It is a Dynamic blueprint for
transcendence, its a Dynamic roadmap of the journey to mysticism and
back again. Not every hero tale ends well. Sometimes the knight is
killed. Sometimes he refuses the call to adventure and never even
confronts the dragon.Sometimes the hero is dragged kicking and
screaming, but manages to succeed anyway. Sometimes the dragon is tamed
instead of killed, or in other versions the dragon is discovered to be
friendly and humane, a misunderstood creature in need of love. In any
cas, it must be faced before the journey can be fulfilled. One can think
of theis hero's journey as a Dynamic version of Maslow's hierarchy of
needs, and the giant monsters represent one of the obstacles to
self-actualization. See?
"Here up in the sky above him right now were the heads of the
copporation that had prompted the chemistry professor to make that talk
to his fraternity brothers so many years ago. (He had scolded them for
selling out.) This was the brain center of that corporate network,
surrounded by other networks: financial networks, information networks,
electronic transmission networks. That's what all those tiny bocies
weere doin up there suspended so many hundreds of feet up in the sky.
Participating in the Giant."
"So Phaedrus had been right in running then. But now - funny thought -
this was actually his home. All his income came form here. His only
fixed address now was right here - his publisher's address on Madison
Avenue. He was as much a part of the Giant as anyone else."
For as long as there have been cities, the world has been run by swords
and money. That's why the dream is so old and pervasive, that's why the
Dynamic truth of our struggle against the Giant is so persistent. This
is a psychological, spiritual, and political struggle all at once. The
successful hero returns home, just as Pirsig does. It is the same world
he left, and yet it is transformed. Now the Giant works for him. He
doesn't work for the Giant. His participation is now conscious and
willful, rather than serving as an unknowing slave. The hero has crossed
the threshold into Dynamic truth and brings it back with him as a gift
and as encouragement for others to preform the same task for themselves.
The mystic abandons all static patterns, but not forever. Once he's
drunk from the holy grail, he sees that returning is the only moral
choice.
The dragon is tamed or mastered, rather than killed.
But what does this have to do with money? I think the properity
theologians are almost totally wrong. Wealth is not a sign of God's
favor. Status, fame, fortune and authority are the Giant's rewards.
There are exceptions, but for the most part riches and treasures are
given to those who best serve the Giant. Camels through the eye of a
needle, turning over the money tables, consider the lillies, the meek
shall inherit the earth, blessed are the poor, blah blah blah. I don't
have to tell anyone these stories. They are in the Bible and in the
Greek and Roman myths, they're in your dreams and in mine too.
You could take the dragon's side in this struggle. But I think that's
exactly what the myth of selling your soul to the devil is all about.
Taking the dragon's side, prior to the journey, is crazy and evil.
Hitler took the dragon's side. From chapter 22...
"This conflict explains the driving force behind Hitler not as an insane
search for power but as an all-consuming glorification of social
authority...."
Godzilla and Puff the magic dragon? Got me there?
DMB
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