From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Sat Oct 22 2005 - 20:17:14 BST
Case:
If you want to bring psychology into a discussion of the MOQ, please do.
But I for one am in way over my head when it comes to such matters so can
contribute little except a lingering suspicion that psychology as a
science leaves much to be desired. Like Pirsig I've had some experience as
a patient with practitioners in that field, and like Pirsig take a rather
dim view of their efficacy as he explains in Chapters 25, 26 and 30 of
Lila. In fact, now that I think about it, the treatment of shock therapy
isn't much different from the effects of taking psychedelics as described
by Rebecca and others here. Both wipe away static patterns.
"For example, doctors know that shock treatment "works," but are fond of
saying that no one knows why. The Metaphysics of Quality offers an
explanation. The value of shock treatment is not that it returns a lunatic
to normal cultural patterns. It certainly does not do that. Its value is
that it destroys all patterns, both cultural and private, and leaves the
patient temporarily in a Dynamic state. All the shock does is duplicate
the effects of hitting the patient over the head with a baseball bat. It
simply knocks him senseless." (Lila, 30)
What do you think?
> [Case]
> I would love to explain how drugs, sex, booze and tobacco are primary
> reinforcers like food, shelter and air. But last time I did you accussed me
> of blathering psychological mumbo jumbo. Nevertheless primary reinforcement
> is exacly what Pirsig is talking about when he refers to "biological
> quality". In his account of his response to the Bozeman faculty Pirsig says
> this:
>
> "The easiest intellectual analogue of pure Quality that people in our
> environment can understand is that `Quality is the response of an organism
> to its environment' (he used this example because his chief questioners
> seemed to see things in terms of stimulus-response behavior theory)."
>
> Here and in much of the discussion surrounding this account he identifys
> Quality with "reinforcement history". I find it ironic that Pirsig is as
> concerned as he is with insanity and the treatment of insanity but he
> ignors psychology almost entirely. There are many areas where psychology
> could play an important role in the MoQ. Reinforcement theory is just one.
> The spit brain studies of Sperry reveal a fundemental division in the
> structure of the brain that sounds an aweful lot like DQ vs SQ. Not to
> mention brain structures that mirror the four levels of SQ (which I still
> disagree with, btw.) Beyond this, drugs, especially psychadelics, produce
> the kind of wiping away of all static patterns the Pirsig talks about in
> connection with mystical states and insanity. He does talk disparagingly of
> their hedonistic use but not of their sacremental use.
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