[MD] In the drink

[Matt Kundert]

I don't need to mention that I try to stay out of the MD these days.  And I 
doubt I should have to add that I find most of what has gone on, and goes 
on, by me and almost everyone else, to be beneath people who would just like 
to discuss philosophy or ideas, or whatever it is they want to discuss.

Mark, aka Squonk, has accussed Anthony of plagarism, which is about as high 
a charge one can level at a scholar/academic.  I have had unpleasentness 
with both Mark/Squonk and Anthony and in my experience I have found both to 
be less than fun to engage in dialogue with.  I just don't like it, it has 
seemed pointless to me in the past, and it is a big reason I don't frequent 
the MD much anymore.

That being said, if it is true that Anthony has plagarized something of 
Mark's, well, like I said that is a very high charge (though minor compared 
to, ya' know, published essays and books).  But because I have found 
Mark/Squonk's style of engagement deplorable for a scholar/academic for 
years, much worse than Anthony who on the whole tends to keep it on the up 
and up, I would be remiss to remind the MD of this incident from some years 
ago, which, though on the whole even more minor, remains totally 
unexplained, strange, weird, though oddly characteristic of a person who 
never really tried to dialogue with another person.

On Thursday May 31, 2001, in the "Migration towards Dynamic Quality" thread, 
I (under my first moniker "Matt the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat") wrote a 
post containing this:

"The beautiful thing that Pirsig did was make axiology and metaphysics the 
same thing. Value is reality. After that you're just left with epistemology 
which is what was predominately covered in ZAMM. (In fact, in Ch 18 of ZAMM, 
we find Pirsig essentially asking the question How do we know reality has 
value? That was the pinnacle question to establish Quality. Now we need to 
establish the MOQ by answering Why is Dynamic better than static?) So, 
essentially Pirsig reduces axiology into metaphysics, a niffty move if I've 
ever seen one. What that also means is that the (at minimum) three branches 
of axiology (politics, aesthetics, and ethics) become the same thing as his 
metaphysics. Pirsig's metaphysics is his ethics."

On Tuesday March 25, 2003, beginning a new thread entitled "Nifty Move.", 
Squonk (his previous moniker before moving, like myself, to just his name) 
wrote a post containing only this:

-------------------------
Hello All,


A beautiful thing Pirsig did was to make axiology and metaphysics the same.
Value is reality. After that you are left with epistemology which is
predominately covered in ZAMM.
(In Ch. 18 of ZAMM Pirsig essentially asks the question, "How do we know
reality has value?" That was the pinnacle question to establish Quality. We
need to establish the MoQ by asking, "Why is Dynamic better than static?")
So, essentially Pirsig reduces axiology into metaphysics, a nifty move if
I've ever seen one! This also means that three branches of axiology
(politics, aesthetics, and ethics) become the same thing as his metaphysics.
Pirsig's metaphysics is his ethics.


squonk
-------------------------

The same day, back in 2003, I responded, having thought I'd heard those 
lines before, looking for it, and finding my own post.  I said this:

"As far as I can see, the only difference is 16 words, four commas, four 
quotation marks, three paragraph indents, two parentheses, one exclamation 
point, one period, and one correct spelling of 'nifty.' Oh, and a switch to 
the way both Squonk and I (now) prefer to make 'Metaphysics of Quality' into 
an acronym.

...

So, its obvious Squonk did a copy and paste job. And its obvious he isn't 
trying to hide it. The thing that's flabbergasting is, 'Why?' What could 
Squonk possibly be trying to do?"

I even surmised as to why Squonk might copy and paste something I wrote:

"I think Squonk was setting a trap for me. For a while now, Squonk has been 
trying to tag me with this overriding desire for fame, prestige, and glory 
(as if any of that is something one can gain at the MoQ Forum). That I post 
on the MoQ because I'm 'dominated by social patterns of value' and my 
'project is about building coalitions with others to a politically motivated 
agenda.' (Which is funny in itself given the amount I actually talk about 
politics.) So, I think Squonk was baiting me to see if I would speak up. 
That, 'Hey, I wrote that, I should be the one who gets credit for it.' That 
would then be proof positive that I'm dominated by social patterns, that 
anything I say should be disregarded because there's no Quality in it, that 
I should be ostracized for being ... what, human?"

I don't know why Mark did what he did.  He did respond once to my calling 
him out, but it didn't refer at all to the incident, so I'm still left 
guessing.  However, I do know this: whatever "social patterns" are, 
strictures against plagarism are clearly one of them by most people's 
lights.  I don't know whether Squonk thought plagarism was okay then, but 
Mark, having finally written something he's proud of (and seems at first 
glance to be fairly decent), doesn't.  I don't know.

But nobody make any mistake: there's no moral high ground here.  Mark's 
hands are dirty.  If he would like to clean them, I'd be more than happy to 
hear why he "wrote" that strange post.  It certainly does seem like a stupid 
thing to have following you around.

But otherwise, if either Mark or Anthony want to stop this kind of thing 
from happening, its possible they should stop writing vitriolic, pointless 
parodies and accusing people of being alcoholics, which is a base way of 
response.  I think people should just ignore the pointless crap that Mark 
has often posted on the MD, aimed at a myriad of people over the years.

Matt

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