[MD] Fw: Is Quality a Value?

[Platt Holden]

Hi Ham, 

[Ham]
> You suggest that Pirsig's Quality is the "transcendent force" behind
> existence.
> 
[Platt]
> > He doesn't reject a transcendent force. It is Quality
> > --the force of goodness.

[Ham] 
> The force of goodness?  I don't mean to be sarcastic, but is there also a
> force of evil?  If so, would that be "minus quality" or simply "low
> quality" like the effect of the hot stove on the sitter?

[Pirsig answers]
"Dynamic Quality is the pre-intellectual cutting edge of realty, the 
source of all things, completely simple and always new. It was the moral 
force that had motivated the brujo in Zuni. It contains no pattern of 
fixed rewards and punishments. Its only perceived good is freedom and its 
only perceived evil is static quality itself-any pattern of one-sided 
fixed values that tries to contain and kill the ongoing free force of 
life." (Lila, 9)

[Ham]
> I can't see that
> a force for goodness has meaning independent of man's sensibility, or that
> it is immanent to man in the way that Value is.

Does anything have meaning "independent of man's sensibility?"

[Ham]
> Your dictionary definition for immanence is: "remaining or operating within
> a domain of reality."  Isn't it true that in Pirsig's MoQ the "domain of
> reality" is really individual Experience?  You yourself have maintained
> that the individual is the "locus" of reality.  If "things" are
> intellectual constructs we create from experience, it makes your argument
> that "immanent means within all things" somewhat ambiguous.

"Things" in the MOQ are patterns of value The names for these patterns are 
intellectual constructs, but they are not the things themselves. It's the 
old story of the difference between a menu at "The Fish Shack" and a plate 
of fried scallops.

[Ham]
> I assume you would agree that such human precepts as Freedom, Love, Honor,
> Morality, Contentment, and Truth are more commonly regarded as values than
> qualities.

Yes, but wouldn't you agree that the  values you mention make up what we 
often refer to as the "quality of life"? 

By the way, are you going to answer my question about where your standards 
of morality come from?  Are they written on a stone tablet, or established 
by polls? Or what?

[Ham]
> When I define Essence as the absolute embodiment of Value, I intend
> "embodiment" in this context to imply sentience (i.e., sensible awareness).
> Do you envision Quality -- your force of goodness -- to be an Absolute
> Source that experiences itself?  Would that not be "sensible awareness" as
> I've applied this faculty to proprietary human experience?

Yes. Quality=morality=value=reality=experience in the MOQ. But the MOQ 
doesn't limit experience, or "sensible awareness" as you call it, to 
humans. My cat gives every evidence that he is aware (conscious) when he's 
not sleeping (unconscious). Awareness is the "within" of all creatures 
great and small, right down to what you call "insensate" atoms. The 
question for you is how awareness "emerges" from things, like atoms, that  
you claim are awareless.

[Ham]
> I also asked you:
> 
> > Which is "more nuts"... to assert that God creates the world?
> > ... or, to assert that things create themselves?
> 
> You replied:
> 
> > Darwinian theory asserts things create themselves.
> > The MOQ rejects the God of religion, but posits
> > a creative force called Dynamic Quality.
> 
> To clarify your thesis, I'd like to know whether you believe DQ actually
> "creates" a physical universe or only the "experience" of a universe, in
> which case Evolution and Newtonian physics operate on their own without a
> primary cause.  (You have previously asserted that "evolution created
> humans and their capacity to think", which suggests that evolution is
> independent of the creative force.)

DQ creates what we deem to be the physical universe, what we deem to have 
created it (the process of evolution)  and the experience of it. DQ, 
together with SQ, accounts for everything. 

[Platt]
> > All I know is that you think your metaphysics is better
> > than Pirsig's while I think the opposite.  It's in the
> > "betterness" that I rest my case.

[Ham] 
> Well, the "betterness" is your subjective judgment, so the verdict you've
> made is a proprietary one.  Or, as Riley used to say, "my head's made up."

I don't know of any philosophy that isn't based on "subjective judgment." 
Do you?

> Sorry I can't penetrate that intellect of yours.  You can settle the score,
> though, by giving me your personal opinion -- or a Pirsig quote -- on what
> distinction there is, if any, between Value and Quality.

To me and to Pirsig there is no distinction. "Quality was value. They were 
the same thing." (Lila, 5)
 
Best,
Platt