From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Wed Jan 08 2003 - 12:53:18 GMT
Hi Jonathan, Matt:
Platt:
> > Note Pirsig's endorsement of absolute truth, "good for all people at all
> > times, now and forever." Such endorsement is likely to give apoplexy to
> > some on this site who believe with a kind of religious fanaticism that
> > there are no absolutes, especially moral ones. (-:
> Jonathan says:
>
> Pirsig is doing his cause a disservice by painting things so black and
> white, and Platt exaggerates the problem. Let me borrow Matt's word
> "contextualize". IMO opinion, any "absolute" statement, such as Pirsig's
> one about the doctor can be contextualized so that it or its consequences
> become incorrect.
Now that's an absolute statement if I ever saw one, so not to be believed
because, as you say, it can be contextualized to become incorrect.
I know you recognize the self-contradiction in "There are no absolutes."
We've been around this block before. In truth, the world is full of
absolutes like "There's no way a doctor can bring back to life innocent
victims killed by a terrorist bomber," a horror you have to live with
everyday. Likewise, in most societies a terrorist bomber of innocent
women and children is considered to be absolutely evil. Pirsig has now
given us a rational basis for asserting the absolute evil of such behavior,
a welcome checkmate to postmodern relativism.
Platt
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