From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Fri Sep 19 2003 - 07:50:20 BST
Mark, Gert-Jan and Mankind.
Mark's response was great, but I dare not comment/answer any
(except one!:-) of the points on Gert-Jan's list. Can only muse a little
upon his opening confession
> Sometimes I can't follow the moq threads. They become to complex with to
> many philosophy statements and names a beginner doesn't know. I'm mostly
> reading the beginning of a thread, until my 'learning curve' gets to
> steep. I get blown away by the knowled....etc.
As one of the real ancient ones I understand your frustration, but I
believe this is something inherent to all such internet discussions,
particularly those about one thinker or one direction of thought, the
super- and hyperactive ones grow more and more sophisticated and
"abbreviating". At this forum it has been tried helped by dividing it into
a "Focus" (with some greater requirements) and this general
"MDiscuss" section, but people tend to gather where the noise is
loudest so soon it was all over here. (The Focus is still open I believe).
Why some stay on and develop jargon and abbreviations is a deep
interest in Pirsig's ideas I hope, even if the suspicion that some of us
suffer from a writing itch and only have this forum to see our "work"
published has bothered me.:-) But I have participated at some other
sites and have had plenty opportunity to write, but as I see Pirsig's
ideas light-years ahead of anything else, it became a torture to know
that the riddle is solved and not being able to tell ...without solving a
metaphysical dispute at the end of each sentence..
But maybe your complaint isn't about MOQ jargon and such, but
people who constantly refer to their own favourite thinkers/writers
/ideas? Rorty, Barfield, Peirce, Campbell, .....etc. and/or introducing
obscure "papers" with even obscurer bearings on the MOQ. And then
those with focus on special aspects of the MOQ: SOLAQI,
Eudaimonic and such. This can hardly be avoided, yes, is what keeps
the discussion going IMO. The thing is simply to skip posts and
threads that don't interest you. This will learned by and by.
Then to your question if one should "introduce " the MOQ in general
intercourse and how it answers various problems/issues. This I (for
one) never try because starting along such lines means some strange
"cause" being peddled (to the beer-drinkers) To most people - in this
country at least - philosophy is Socrates & Plato and such ancient
characters, and that the last word was said by Kant. That there should
be a living thinker who says something as ground-shaking like Pirsig
is beyond them.
Even so, to believe that the MOQ - because it says that all existence
is a moral order - can be a day-to-day moral guide is useless, in my
opinion it is better be compared to General Relativity: It predicts the
outcome of experiments/experience at the enormous scale, but can't
tell what one ought to experiment with. Its value is giving us the big
picture, it says - for instance - that "social order" is part of existence's
fabric. It tells a lot more of this gigantic scale stuff, but enough for
now.
Not much help from this quarter dear Gert-Jan (as was the case when
you raised the life-death issue) I can only answer this:
> .8. When did the intellecual level started - The old greek - the renaissance - the sixties ?
I go for # 1, but my opinion is only too well known.
Sincerely
Bo
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