[MD] The Quality/MOQ meta-metaphysics

[Horse]

Hi Ian

For your intellectual edification regarding Pirsigs rejection of the 
(what is now called) SOL:

 From Lila's Child Chapter 13

Platt:
 From the beginning of the Lila Squad, Bo has maintained that the 
intellectual level is
SOM (rationality, language, science). [129] It's gradually seeped into 
my mind that Bo is
right about this. SOM is the current mental framework and means of 
communication in
which we operate from day to day, enabling us to "make a living" and 
enjoy "the good
life."

Pirsig:
129. I've always thought this is incorrect because many forms of 
intellect do not have a

subject-object construction. These include logic itself, mathematics, 
computer

programming languages, and, I believe some primitive languages (although 
I can't

remember what they are).


Platt:
Far from condemning SOM, the Metaphysics of Quality holds it to be the 
highest level
yet achieved. [131]

Pirsig:

131. Within the intellectual level, mathematics, especially quantum 
mechanics, seems

higher to me.


Platt:
To fill the hole may require a new level above SOM. I'm not sure about 
this. After all,
the MOQ is an SOM document based on SOM reasoning. [132]

Pirsig:

132. It employs SOM reasoning the way SOM reasoning employs social 
structures such

as courts and journals and learned societies to make itself known. SOM 
reasoning is not

subordinate to these social structures, and the MOQ is not subordinate 
to the SOM

structures it employs. Remember that the central reality of the MOQ is 
not an object or a

subject or anything else. It is understood by direct experience only and 
not by reasoning

of any kind. Therefore to say that the MOQ is based on SOM reasoning is 
as useful as

saying that the Ten Commandments are based on SOM reasoning. It doesn't 
tell us

anything about the essence of the Ten Commandments and it doesn't tell 
us anything

about the essence of the MOQ.


Platt:
So, I fully agree with Bo's insight that the SOM and the intellectual 
level are one and the
same. To support it, to protect it, to avoid losing it and sinking back 
to "anything goes"
irrationalism or a "because God says so" mentality, we need to recognize 
its vulnerability
to attacks from academic philosophers, social do-gooders, spiritual 
evangelists, and its
own internal paradoxes. To that end, the MOQ is the best S/O answer I've 
found yet.
[133]

Pirsig:

133. I think this conclusion undermines the MOQ, although that is 
obviously not Platt's

intention. It is like saying that science is really a form of religion. 
There is some truth to

that, but it has the effect dismissing science as really not very 
important. The MOQ is in

opposition to subject-object metaphysics. To say that it is a part of 
that system which it

opposes sounds like a dismissal. I have read that the MOQ is the same as 
Plato, Aristotle,

Plotinus, Hegel, James, Peirce, Nieztsche, Bergson, and many others even 
though these

people are not held to be saying the same as each other. This kind of 
comparison is what I

have meant by the term, "philosophology." It is done by people who are 
not seeking to

understand what is written but only to classify it so that they don't 
have to see it as

anything new. God knows the MOQ has never had two better friends than Bo 
and Platt,

so this is no criticism of their otherwise brilliant thinking. It's just 
that I see a lowering of

the quality of the MOQ itself if you follow this path of subordinating 
it to that which it

opposes.


I'm not how much more confirmation the SOLists require without P. 
knocking on their doors and telling them in person!

Also, I know you were at the 2005 conference but were you sitting with 
Pirsig in the pub the evening before when he was asked what he thought 
about Bo's SOL (or whatever it was called then). His replies were a 
straightforward rejection from my recollection.



Cheers

Horse

-- 

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