RE: MD Pirsig a liberal?

From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sun Jan 05 2003 - 19:07:50 GMT

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    Platt, Matt and all voters:

    Matt said:
    His philosophy isn't designed to only make one political position an option
    (other than things we all already agree about, like democracy). Its designed
    to help us think about Quality. ...

    DMB says:
    Well, nobody is trying to say the MOQ gives us only one political option,
    but he draws some very clear lines. And I'd agree that the MOQ is designed
    to help us think about Quality, but in this case we're talking about static
    Quality. In this case Pirsig draws a distinction between social level
    ideologies, which include everything from Fascism to Capitalism, and the
    intellectual level ideologies like Socialism and Liberalism. Huge portions
    of Lila are dedicated to explaining our recent history in terms of a
    conflict between these two levels. I honestly don't know how anyone can
    understand the MOQ as a whole without understanding this aspect of it first.
    The quotes I provided say it explicitly, but there are dozens of real life
    examples too. At one point he even says that "liberal intellectuals like
    myself" used to think such and such a thing. Anyway,...
     
    Matt said:
    So, the reason DMB and I seem to reach two different answers to "Is Pirsig
    a liberal?" is because I read liberal as ends and your rendering of DMB has
    him reading liberal as means. I've answered what I think about the ends,
    and in this sense we all seem to be in agreement that Pirsig is a good
    liberal. The means-orientated stuff I leave to you and DMB.

    DMB says:
    Ends and means? Huh? I thought we were talking about ideologies, worldviews,
    levels of consciousness. Remember the original assertion and question? Here
    they are...

    DMB wrote:
    As I understand it, Pirsig does say that the more liberal ideologies, that
    one's that would tend to concern themselves with feed and educate the
    poor, are more moral than the one's that don't.

    Matt wrote:
    I agree that Pirsig says liberal ideologies are more moral than others.

    Platt asked:
    Would either of you gentlemen care to back up your assertion with
    evidence? I've looked in Lila and can find none.

    DMB says:
    The claim was that certain ideologies were more moral than others. Platt
    asked for back up. I provided it and as usual, that was lost and the topic
    was shifted so as to ignore the obvious. Here again is the back up...

    Pirsig:
    "From a static point of view socialism is more moral than capitalism. Its a
    higher form of evolution. Its an intellectually guided society, not just a
    society that is guided by mindless traditions." And on the next page he
    reasserts the same idea. The emphasis is Pirsig's...

    Pirsig:
    "It is not that Victorian social economic patterns are more moral than
    socialist intellectual economic patterns. Quite the opposite. They are LESS
    moral as static patterns go."

    Thanks again,
    DMB

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