From: InfoPro Consulting: Mark Heyman (markheyman@infoproconsulting.com)
Date: Sat May 08 2004 - 04:38:29 BST
Hi Platt and anyone else along for the ride,
Thanks for the quotes. I'll talk about them in the next post.
First, let me state my understanding of Pirsig's MOQ and its moral
hierarchies. This way, anyone who wants to, can correct, amend, and
embellish my interpretation, with my blessing and appreciation. I
ask only that you provide textual support for your criticism. No
need to paste long passages, just the book, chapter, and first few
words of the relevant passages.
I of course would also welcome any new ideas, (no reason why we can't
try to make the MOQ better); but, first, I want to be sure I
understand the MOQ as presented by Pirsig before I attempt to answer
Platt's question about whether or not I agree with it.
So... here we go:
All of nature consists of four moral levels of SQ patterns or values,
with DQ mixing the pot at all levels. In order of decreasing
morality, along with representative patterns, these moral
levels are:
Intellectual (Ideas)
Social/Cultural (Groups of human beings and their laws)
Biological (Living beings, law of the jungle)
Inorganic (Atoms, molecules... laws of nature)
Pirsig, in LILA-13, says it is "scientifically immoral" (SI) for
values at one level to destroy or suppress values at a higher level.
So, it is SI for a volcano to erupt and kill living beings. It is SI
for a father to destroy his family, as for a citizen to destroy his
city. state, nation, world. It is SI for a family, tribe, city,
state, nation to destroy or suppress IDEAS.
Further, operating within two of the levels, Biological and Social,
there seem to be secondary moral hierarchies at work. At the Bio
level, Pirsig apparently sees Darwinian biological evolution as
another kind of moral hierarchy. So, he says, it is SI for a germ to
destroy a man because the man is at a "higher level of evolution."
(LILA-13). In the same chapter, he states that it is SI for us to
eat the flesh of animals "because animals are at a higher level of
evolution... than are grains and fruits and vegetables."
I have no immediate textual support for this (maybe someone can help
me here), but I believe the Social level of morality also has a
secondary moral hierarchy, according to Pirsig Thus, it is SI for a
family to destroy it's city, or for a city to attack its state, a
state its nation, a nation the world?
Although the four primary moral levels operate more or less
independently, each is supported by the one below it. So, to cop a
phrase, in the beginning, atoms were mixed and matched by DQ and
the laws of nature, giving rise to amino acids, which got DQ-jostled
into living things. Living beings were hammered by DQ and laws of
the jungle till some of them, human beings, developed cultures and
formed societies: families, tribes, nation-states. According to
Pirsig, I believe, we are currently at a point where intellectual
morality, the highest level, is trying to control societies.
So, that's how I understand the MOQ as presented by RMP. Any
constructive feedback on this interpretation will be greatly
appreciated.
Platt, I'll analyze the quotes you offered, and answer your question
in the next post.
Thanks to all.
Mark Steven Heyman
-- InfoPro Consulting - The Professional Information Processors Custom Software Solutions for Windows, PDAs, and the Web Since 1983 Web Site: http://www.infoproconsulting.com "Thought is only a flash between two long nights, but this flash is everything." -- Henri Poincare' 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
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