From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Fri Oct 28 2005 - 01:09:52 BST
[Arlo previously]
Which comes full circle to my original question. What "self-interest" did
Pirsig fulfill by authoring and seeking publication for ZMM?
[Platt]
It pleased him, made him happy, gave him a sense of well-being. I doubt if
he did it to make himself miserable out of some masochistic desire.
[Arlo]
No one said he did not feel pleasure. I asked from where this pleasure (which is
simply a response to Quality) originated. From "profit" or from "doing Good" on
the social and Intellectual levels?
It would be nice if our culture would do a better job promoting the "pleasure"
of "doing social and Intellectual Good", rather than debasing everything to a
biological-level "me is all that matters" morality.
[Arlo previously]
What, then, is "the point of a book like this"?
[Platt]
I'm sure when the money came in he didn't tear up the checks. Anyway, you
imply that's it's immoral to be "in it for the money." Is that your
position?
[Arlo]
And no one, least of all me, said he should not derive compensation for his
efforts. But it is the motivation that interests me, not the after-the-fact
acccolades, which had nothing to do with the impetus to author and publish.
[Platt]
It's in your self-interest to ride your Harley, but hardly for your
survival. To assert otherwise is quite a stretch.
[Arlo]
And no one said self-interest of this sort is categorically "bad". It is only
when it (1) elevated to the supreme human condition, and (2) made to be "all
there is". If all my life was motivated by the accumulation of things (such as
the Harley), I'd be leaving a pretty sorry life. Balance, with an eye towards
"doing Good". That's what it's all about.
[Platt]
Profit is immoral? Self-interest is immoral? Where in the MOQ do you find
support for such a conclusion?
[Arlo]
Profit as you conceptualize it (my self-interest, survival and accumulations are
zenith) is biological-level self-interest. Not immoral, until it is elevated by
some to be a higher self-interest than social or Intellectual interests.
Arlo
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