From: Paul Turner (paul@turnerbc.co.uk)
Date: Fri Jul 23 2004 - 13:21:19 BST
Hi Platt
Platt said:
Perhaps you're right, but I take my notion that the intellectual level
might better be called the individual level from Pirsig's discussion of
insanity in Lila, Chapters 25, 26 and 30. Clearly there's a battle going
on between the ideas of an insane individual vs. his culture.
"When an insane person-or a hypnotized person or a person from a
primitive culture advances some explanation of the universe that is
completely at odds with current scientific reality, we do not have to
believe he has jumped off the end of the empirical world. He is just a
person (individual) who is valuing intellectual patterns that, because
they are outside the range of our own culture (society), we perceive to
have very low quality. Some biological or social or Dynamic force has
altered his judgment of quality. It has caused him (individual) to
filter out what we (society) call normal cultural intellectual patterns
just as ruthlessly as our culture filters out his (individual).
Paul:
I think the conflict described here is between the "normal cultural
intellectual patterns" that are socially endorsed and those intellectual
patterns that are not. I disagree with your assertion that culture is
identical with the social level. In the MOQ, culture is defined as
social *and* intellectual patterns.
"I think a culture should be defined as social patterns plus
intellectual patterns." [Pirsig, LILA'S CHILD Note 47]
Platt said:
"That's what mental hospitals are partly for. And also heresy trials.
They protect the culture (society) from foreign ideas (individual) that
if allowed to grow unchecked could destroy the culture itself." (Lila,
26)
Paul:
Again, as culture is both social *and* intellectual patterns, I think
your interpretation is incorrect.
Platt said:
In Chap. 29, Pirsig further cements this conflict:
"Sometimes the insane and the contrarians and the ones (individuals) who
axe the closest to suicide are the most valuable people society has.
They may be precursors of social change. They've taken the burdens of
the culture onto themselves, and in their struggle to solve their own
problems they're solving problems for the culture as well."
This bolsters Pirsig's view that societies only change one person at a
time and someone has to be first.
Paul:
Yes, but Pirsig's view is that the *source* of change is not a static
force at all. His primary metaphysical division came from the insight
that there has to be another source of change, *outside of* the values
that comprise culture (and "static" individuals), and he identifies this
as Dynamic Quality, not the 4th static level. I said in a previous post
that the qualities of "individuality" belong more to Dynamic Quality
than to static quality.
Platt said:
Your presumption of success being socially determined and material in
nature seems to go against the thrust of the MOQ
Paul:
I *don't* presume that individual success is *only* measurable by
material gain, but I do believe that, in general, and in my experience,
this is how it is measured. For the record, I think that material
success is certainly not an absolutely bad thing. The MOQ may help bring
clarity to the opposing viewpoints on money such as "money makes the
world go round," and "money is the root of all evil." Money can provide
freedom from negative biological quality by providing food and a good
standard of living accommodation. On the other hand, money can limit
intellectual evolution by controlling research and can give social
patterns the upper hand in intellectual-social conflicts such as
democracy e.g. "cash for questions," campaign funding etc.
Platt said:
Individual success might best be thought of as adopting a new
interpretation of reality as described in Pirsig's works.
Paul:
I don't disagree. As I said in a previous post, intellectual success
would be measured by such things as the clarity, precision, magnitude
and elegance of one's ideas - and if that were the dominant measure of
individual success, I suggest we would be living in a very different
world.
Regards
Paul
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