From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Fri May 02 2003 - 14:03:56 BST
Hi Johnny,
> > If the people in
> >Mascatchooan throw every third baby girl into a bonfire as a cultural
> >rite, there's nothing wrong with that. Who are we to tell them that it's
> >wrong? We must tolerate the customs of other cultures and celebrate the
> >diversity of life. Those values are much higher than what happens to
> >individual human beings within those cultures.
> I would not tolerate those customs if anyone tried to introduce them into
> my own, I would say it is wrong and you should conform to the culture of
> the time and place you live in. Likewise, if I were a Zimbabwean, I would
> not tolerate someone from America practicing their cultural imperialism on
> my culture, or perhaps I would, if I decided I'd rather have a life like
> americans have in the movies.
Let's see. Removing a bloody dictator from Iraq was a case of America
practising cultural imperialism? How about Christian missionaries
working to stop cannibalism in Pango Pango? Are they too moral
imperialists? Is goodness and rightness to be determined by a country's
power elite? Is morality up for grabs?
> We don't need to explicitly say that everything stinks and
> should be cleared of debris, dusted off and scrutinized, and then thrown
> out unless it somehow is able to justify itself, in order for things to
> improve, we can say that things are wonderful and watch things improve
> organically, as they always have.
I'm often in favor of doing nothing because events, guided by DQ, will
sometimes prove beneficial at no cost. On the other hand, if you look
closely at beneficial changes in modern times, you'll find a person or
persons acting in response to DQ. Scientific advances are obvious
examples, but political and social changes toward individual freedom are
also person powered. As Pirsig writes:
"Static morality is full of heroes and villains, loves and hatreds, carrots
and sticks. Its values don't change by themselves. Unless they are
altered by Dynamic Quality they say the same thing year after year." (9)
> Aesthetics (and conceptions of what is DQ) are determined. There is a
> reason why a person feels something is aesthetically beautiful or good, and
> it is based on the very deep cultural education/species memory that they
> are born with and into. Call it innate, that's fine, but I know where
> innateness comes from.
Innateness comes from patterns left in the wake of DQ.
> If we disparage SQ enough, we can damage the
> innateness of aesthetics to the point where it is meaningless, we all will
> just randomly find different things beautiful because there will not be a
> reason for anything to be beautiful.
We find different things to be beautiful because, as you point out, we
have different life histories. But all know the feeling of beauty like they
know the feeling of fear. Neither is in danger of becoming meaningless.
> We'll just throw out the old
> paintings in the musty museums, because there is no point in anyone ever
> looking at a Rembrandt or a Klee again, education is meaningless,
> aesthetics is innate and not learned by seeing what the culture has decided
> is aesthetic.
As I've said before, culture plays a role in what one considers to be beautiful.
But it's not the objects of beauty that matter so much as the "eye" of the
beholder. The "eye" is innate. The "eye" is what responds to DQ.
> >A "self-enlarging static pattern?" What? No cause? I thought you were a
> >determinist. :-)
> Every determinist comes up against the first cause, that's why it has to be
> somehow contained in its own essence.
Which is a belief based on faith, like all presuppositions. The MoQ is no
exception in that respect.
> >Have you been swayed against your will by advertising? I give you
> >more credit than that. :-)
> My will is swayed all the time, and I do what it has me do willingly.
Who is this "I" that bends to your will?
> If it wasn't swayed by one ad, it was because it was swayed by something else
> that was a stronger motive. Cumulatively, advertisments have an effect
> beyond just getting me to buy that specific product or visit that store,
> they also educate me about the cultural mores and build up a vocabulary of
> consumerism and progress that overpower more traditional motives like
> literature and religion.
Literature and religion use the same techniques of persuasion as the
advertiser.
> > > If you think something is moral or cultural, then doing it probably
> > > benefits culture and morality.
> >
> >Like Saddam Hussein? I don't think so.
>
> Don't understand
Saddam thought it was moral and cultural to imprison, torture and kill
his opponents. Did it benefit Iraq's culture and morality?
> >You, as a free individual, can turn to whoever you want for moral advice.
> >That's what I meant by a free market.
>
> And I can advocate that others live by certain standards, even standards
> that I may have difficulty living by myself. The more difficulty I have,
> the more important it is for me that others maintain the standards.
But not outside your own country, right? I mean, you don't want to
become an imperialist do you?
> >But, those who commit crimes
> >are moral transgressors and should be pointed out, punished and in
> >some cases, jailed--all within a judicial system based on a constitution
> >that protects the individual's human, i.e., intellectual rights, such as
> >trial by jury.
> Jail is to get people that commit crimes off the street, and to provide a
> motive to not commit crimes stronger than the motive to commit them. I'm
> talking more about Clinton's type of crime, which wasn't really a crime (it
> wasn't adultery, which requires intercourse). I felt he did the right thing
> lying about it. It was wrong to put it in the spotlight where it suggested
> that everyone is having oral sex these days. (My feeling is that Clinton
> did it purposely though, in order to promote sodomy and get people to start
> mocking the idea that sodomy is not sex. Sodomy is not sex, he really did
> not have sex with that woman.)
No comment.
> >I agree. Let's get rid of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. It's
> >draining lower income people (who don't pay income taxes). By taking some
> >of the money they would get by eliminating those taxes and putting it into
> >private insurance and savings plans, they'll do a lot better in the long
> >run. Being dependent on government for a handout is not the way to
> >freedom, either economic or political.
>
> Yes, I agree, especially about Medicare and Medicaid. Universal Health
> Care really bothers me, as does the stepping stone of "prescription drug
> coverage for seniors", which is nothing but another huge blank check to the
> the drug companies. AIDS funding is also a huge blank check to the drug
> companies, ninety percent of which went to DNA research for genetic
> engineering.
Drug companies have saved my life more than once, so they deserve
every bit of the money they make. The "blank check" I'm against is
giving power over my life to a some government hack who backs up his
edicts regarding my health with a gun.
Platt
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri May 02 2003 - 14:05:25 BST