[MD] Metaphysics

[skutvik at online.no]

Andre, Steve, Mati. Matt, All.

5 Jan.:

Steve to Mati I believe:
> > You suppose that metaphysics is a fundamental  intellectual pattern that
> > all other intellectual patterns  depend upon. I don't see it that way. I
> > suppose that "simply thinking" (intellect) must have preceded "thinking 
> > about thinking" (metaphysics). 

Andre: 
> > Agree with Steve here, as Pirsig says...anyone living in an ordered
> > universe cannot escape metaphysics. I think the key word here is
> > 'ordered'. 
 
Jesus, you are an inert mass, only Mati seems to hold the Quality fort, 
and inertia includes Matthew who is the "metaphysics as thinking 
about thinking" creator which is so arch-somish as to be 
embarrassing. When the proverbial Stone Agers gazed out on the sky  
and saw gods and goddesses galore they certainly used their 
intelligence - they were thinking -  but they themselves had no inkling 
of a mental thinking realm different from the objects for thinking.

BTW, this subjective/objective distinction is what the MOQ opposes if 
it hasn't dawned on you yet?       

> Steve:
> I think that this "one cannot escape metaphysics" line may actually be
> the strongest argument for Bo's interpretation of Pirsig's use of
> metaphysics, but I don't think it is the best representation of
> Pirsig's view on the matter.

Steve seems to have had a bright moment, but trust him to turn away 
from it and the "No one can escape metaphysics ..." was Pirsig's 
"bright moment" meaning that since the social level on, or rather,  that 
the social level emerged as the biological pattern we call "Homo 
Sapiens" began to order existence. But also trust Pirsig to undermine 
his own insight by starting about metaphysics in the Aristotelian - 
intellectual - sense where it had become subjective thinking about 
objective reality and even "thinking about thinking" which is just 
another turn of the S/O screw. And from then on Pirsig only sporadic 
rejoined  Quality (in LILA) To him the MOQ is just one possible 
(subjective) ordering of (objective) Quality and SOM prevails.    

Steve:
> As you can see from the above (and Bo should well note), Pirsig's use
> of the term metaphysics is different from Bo's. For Bo, a metaphysics
> is something like a worldview. When he puts the point more strongly Bo
> even says that metaphysics is reality .......

Yes, you bet, metaphysics in the the true MOQ  sense is reality, that's 
the very point!          

> ..... but for Pirsig, metaphysics is just one part of philosophy. It is
> the practice one is engaged in when studying the underlying of
> structure of thought. It is not the intellectual level itself. It is
> not universal. It is just one sort of intellectual activity. His
> description above seems to contradict his claim that metaphysics is
> inescapable. One need not get into this "is reality real or illusory"
> business at all. 

For you Steve academical philosophy may just be a part of "thinking" 
but for the MOQ (that I read from other parts of Pirsigs work) 
philosophic studying of subjective ideas along with the scientific 
studying of objective facts IS the intellectual level as it appears for us 
today, but had its origin in Aristotle who laid down the foundation for 
SOM.    

> Pirsig also goes on to state the mystic's objection to the whole
> practice of metaphysics: "Metaphysics is not reality.  Metaphysics is
> names about reality.  Metaphysics is a restaurant where they give you
> a thirty-thousand page menu and no food." 

Yes, and God how I despise this Pirsig who does his best to 
undermine Phaedrus idea that the Greeks - Socrates, Plato and 
Aristotle -  laid the foundations for SOM, particularly the latter's 
metaphysics" as mere subjective theories about an objective yet 
ineffable reality. Pirsig thought he became a Zen master by these trite 
observations, but ended with perpetuating SOM in a quasi-zenish way, 
now with Quality the objective reality and MOQ a subjective theory. 
Good Grief!!        

> He talks about metaphysics as a degenerate activity that takes one out
> of the mystical reality. 

Oh yes, the "mystic" that became DMB's retreat each time I pointed to 
his anti-moqish conclusions.

> so there is this tension: on the one hand he says one cannot escape
> metaphysics and on the other that metaphysics is an escape from
> reality, but we also cannot escape from reality if reality is Quality.
> All this makes me think that there is a sense of irony about Pirsig's
> use of the term metaphysics that Bo is taking the wrong bits literally.

All who oppose the SOL interpretation must retreat to some sort of 
mysticism, you no exception. 

Bodvar