From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Sat Jul 30 2005 - 16:15:48 BST
Hi Arlo,
> [Platt]
> I would suggest "high quality" and cultural perspectives do no necessarily
> go together, a less "I" centric Eastern view being a case in point..
>
> [Arlo]
> Why is a less centric "I" a lower Quality perspective?
Because it fails to recognize individual rights which go hand in hand with
the intellectually-based rights Pirsig mentions -- free speech, free
press, freedom of worship, freedom of travel, etc..
> Do you feel that your "high Quality" views are NOT cultural perspectives?
> Wouldn't you say that exposure to "our" cultural perspectives can expose
> other cultures to "high Quality" perspectives they may not have developed?
I like to think, as you do, that views are high quality not because they
come from any particular culture, but because they meet the criteria of
truth at the intellectual level. Those criteria, I submit, are just as
universal as 2+2=4.
> Pirsig had this to say about Western, dialectial reason: "And now he began
> to see for the first time the unbelievable magnitude of what man, when he
> gained power to understand and rule the world in terms of dialectic truths,
> had lost. He had built empires of scientific capability to manipulate the
> phenomena of nature into enormous manifestations of his own dreams of power
> and wealth...but for this he had exchanged an empire of understanding of
> equal magnitude: an understanding of what it is to be a part of the world,
> and not an enemy of it."
>
> I'm assuming Pirsig considers the Eastern perspective more representative
> of being "a part of the world". His entire treatise, ZMM and then the MOQ,
> came directly out of being exposed to another cultural perspective, both
> historically (in the case of Ancient Greek) and personally (in the case of
> his travels East, and studies in India). He may not have agreed with every
> alternate cultural perspective, but exposure to the high Quality ones led
> to ZMM.
What Pirsig found was no so much that we're all one big happy kumbaya
family (a view shouted from the housetops by every environmentalist on the
planet) but that the scientific criteria of truth which, while a very high
quality intellectual pattern, contained a devastating oversight -- no
provision for morals. To see his work otherwise is to degrade its
uniqueness and importance.
> [Platt]
> Seems to me that biological crime is what criminals do.
>
> [Arlo]
> Certainly. But that does not make them nothing more than "biological
> beings".
While doing the act it does, especially when the crime is murder.
> [Platt]
> I hope your not suggesting that the problem of black crime that Pirsig used
> as context was because blacks simply have "biological urges." That goes
> everything you've said about "social causes" of crime.
>
> [Arlo]
> No. That the criminal element in question was not responding to social
> level deterrents of biological behaviors. The criminals valued biological
> Quality over a social Quality they did not invest in. We invested in the
> social Quality, and thus their behavior was a threat.
I don't understand. You mean we shouldn't invest in social quality to
fight crime or that blacks have no social quality because they don't
"invest" in our social quality? Anyway, aren't social values to fight
biological crime universal across all cultures? If not, do you think
Pirsig's levels only apply in some cultures and not in others?
> As Pirsig points out, "everyone" has biological urges. What keeps most of
> us from acting on them is the threat of "the policeman" and a valuation of
> the social fabric. But sometimes, this threat doesn't work. Why? Ignorance?
> Stupidity? A devaluation of the social fabric?
I guess you've opened up the possibility that terrorists are ignorant and
stupid in acting on their biological urge to bed virgins in heaven for
eternity. I agree.
> [Platt]
> So we were wrong to bomb Germany and Japan in WW II?
>
> [Arlo]
> When we targetted non-combattants, we were certainly wrong. Answer me, why
> is killing American citizens revulsive to you, but killing foreign citizens
> perfectly moral?
In war so called non-combatants are potential threats. The entire British
population was prepared to combat the Germans if they had invaded the
Isles. Likewise, the Japanese vs. the Allies.
> [Platt]
> How does it make sense to protect the price of oil by destabilizing the
> region?
>
> [Arlo]
> Because it prevents a strong nationalist state from developing that could
> bump out US oil interests. But even without the oil aspect, our behavior
> was immoral.
The region has always been unstable, so I don't see the connection between
that and the rise of a strong nationalist state. Even so, that state would
have to sell its oil on the world market to derive benefit from it.
> [Platt]
> Your problem is you refuse to believe there's a moral difference between
> fighting to preserve a biological level worldview of force and an
> intellectual level worldview of freedom and individual rights.
>
> [Arlo]
> When the US starts fighting for this reason, let me know. I'd be glad to
> offer my support.
So, getting rid of Saddam and offering Iraq a chance to form a democracy
is not something you support?
Platt
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