From: johnny moral (johnnymoral@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon Jun 30 2003 - 05:21:41 BST
HI Platt,
>J:
> > > > Well,
> > > > it rules at the intellectual level too, manipulating intellectual
>ideas
> > > > to foster its growth, but it mainly rules by means of intellectual
> > > > ideas.
>
>P:
> > >I'm not sure about this. Can you give some examples of just how the
>Giant
> > >uses intellect to rule? The only clearly intellectual attempt to
>control
> > >society that I know of was Communism (and early New Dealism). Both were
> > >utter failures.
>
>J:
> > I see the giant as the economy, as the media, as technological growth
>and
> > dominance. It is the marketplace that is not controlled by anyone.
>
>Free markets are praised by Pirsig because they allow for responses to DQ.
>The Giant is the "cohesive force that held all these systems (of a big
>city) together." The Giant is not the same as the marketplace. It's the
>value pattern that integrates and the maintains the physical
>infrastructure of a society by using the biological energy of human
>bodies.
Why do you assume that DQ and the Giant are opposed to each other? A
cohesive force is another name for a static moral pattern, the Giant is an
intellectual level pattern (not merely the conception of it is intellectual,
but it itself is born on top the lower levels). The giant respons to DQ in
however way that strengthens and reinforces it as a pattern. Yes, the Giant
loves free market forces and loves the biological energy of human bodies.
>What you're describing is "consumerism," an anti-capitalists ideology.
Yeah, consumerism is what I'm talking about, sure. How is it
anti-capitalist?
>Pirsig describes the Giant this way:
>"When societies and cultures and cities are seen not as inventions of
>'man' but as higher organisms than biological man, the phenomena of war
>and genocide and all the other forms of human exploitation become more
>intelligible. 'Mankind' has never been interested in getting itself
>killed. But the superorganism, the Giant, who is a pattern of values
>superimposed on top of biological human bodies, doesn't mind losing a few
>bodies to protect his greater interests." (17)
Yeah. I would put "economies" and "technologies" in with societies and
cultures though.
> > The Giant wants us
> > to work for it, and is against us taking Sunday off to rest and single
> > income families, it hates families and nepotism, which are inefficient
> > burdens on its growth and subversive to it. These desires are stirred
>in
> > us by Giant itself, through its marketplace and magazines.
>
>Again, you associate the Giant with consumerism. The Giant is the
>hidden patterns of values that holds a culture together using biological
>energy
>just as a hidden pattern of values holds a glass of water together using
>physical
>energy. Many people know about the "hidden hand" of free market economics.
>But few people have ever heard of the hidden hand of the Giant.
>
> > This reminds me of the current backlash by liberals against the charge
>that
> > the media is liberal. They point to Fox News and other overtly
>patriotic
> > stations, and defend CNN as fair, but it isn't the news that people mean
> > when they say the media is liberal, it is the whole thing, media itself.
> > Its movies and books and advertisements all, by necessity, tap into
> > people's dissatisfaction and get people (inspire them) to want to change
> > things. Conservatives in the truest sense (if there were such people)
> > wouldn't have media at all, there'd be no need for Maybeline or Moby
>Dick
> > or even the Bible, they'd be too busy trying to live life.
>
>Well, I for one do not want to return to cave dwelling and a life of just
>trying to live.
No, neither do I. But I don't want the Giant to turn my children into
manufactured eudaimonic cogs, either. I'm just saying that media is liberal
(and immoral) in general, because only the anomolies and transgressions get
written about.
> > Like say Cuba? I don't think Pirsig means to equate the Giant with
> > totalitarianism. That has its own name already. He heard the Giant in
> > NYC.
>
>The Giant's power is that of totalitarianism, "devouring human bodies."
Not so literally, though, right? It devours by marketing, by turning me
into computer user and consumer. You still haven't explained why in NYC
it's so loud. THere's no totalitarianism there, is there?
> > You really need to explain why the Giant is so loud here then. The most
> > dynamic city on earth, with the most freedom and liberty.
>
>Again, that's capitalism, the free market. Not the Giant.
Didn't Pirsig stand on a balcony and talk about how loud the Giant was in
NYC?
> >The Giant needs
> > us to be free, it can't have us sitting with our family huddled around
>the
> > fireplace waiting for sunup to finish the harvest. It needs us pursuing
> > property and making the most of our liberty and life, without any social
> > contraints, serving ouselves, and by extension, serving it.
>
>The Giant need us to be subservient to its needs and could care less how
>we go about our individual lives.
The giant can't do anything without us doing it for it, agreed. Our freedom
serves its needs. BY giving it a free market and flowing capital, and a
meritocracy and equality and freedom, it grows much faster, like a plant in
a lush rainforest.
> > Are you admitting that there are bogus ideas?
>
>Sure. Do you think all ideas are legitimate?
No, I think most intellectual ideas are bogus, and every idea is a step or
two away from direct experience of truth, of knowing. (An inorganic idea is
one step away from knowing of truth, a biological idea is two steps away, a
social idea at least three, and an intellectual idea at least four)
Johnny
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