MD severe tensions

From: Sam Norton (elizaphanian@kohath.wanadoo.co.uk)
Date: Mon Mar 14 2005 - 19:14:47 GMT

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    Hi Marsha,

    Splitting this off from the other thread, as I want to try and keep that to
    the question of pure experience. You asked "How could one approach
    addressing your "severe tension" without a clear explanation of what you
    mean by "discovered or been taught". What are you comparing?"

    My long term interlocutors (like DMB, Wim and Matt) have, I think, a pretty
    good idea of where I'm coming from. But it's probably not a bad thing to try
    and summarise my view.

    I'd begin by saying that I think Pirsig is great, he's very lucid and
    stimulating to read, and I always feel refreshed whenever I return to what
    he has written (when I've had too much MD that is). I think ZMM is a work of
    genius; Lila I'm not so convinced by. In other words, I think that in Lila
    Pirsig reversed his decision in ZMM and decided to climb up the mountain of
    metaphysics. So you could say that what I have problems with is the
    'metaphysics' part of the MoQ, and not the Quality part. So I think the
    language of Quality, SQ and DQ is tremendously fertile, and, with one more
    or less significant modification (my 'eudaimonic' proposal), I am quite
    comfortable with the different levels and how they inter-relate.

    The severe tensions are really reducible to two.
    Firstly, I think the way that DQ is described within the system of the MoQ
    has great difficulties. I think Pirsig has retained influences from the
    empirical tradition that are no longer sustainable. I think that 'pure
    experience' doesn't do what he wants it to do, and that it is in many ways a
    confused notion in and of itself. The way out of this tension seems to me to
    be something along the lines of Scott's 'contradictory identity' which
    doesn't privilege DQ over SQ, and abandoning the language of empiricism that
    Pirsig has retained.
    Secondly, I think the MoQ is a metaphysical structure that pre-dates
    Wittgenstein. I don't think it's possible to do metaphysics in quite the
    same way once Wittgenstein has been taken on board; it's 'status' is
    different. This is what I'm wanting to pursue with Anthony. In other words,
    I think that - because, so far as I know, he's never read any Wittgenstein -
    Pirsig is still employing some residual Cartesian assumptions about
    'philosophical psychology'. I think that the MoQ can survive the removal of
    these assumptions, I just think that the way the levels are understood will
    be modified (the social level will not be 'subjective' in any sense, for
    example).

    I'm happy to further unpack these if you like.

    Sam

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