[MD] A Place for the Principled Person

[Platt Holden]

Ant: 

> I hope you found my response useful.  However, (as Arlo implies) you
> have mis-characterized my position to some extent.  In my post I was not
> saying that “the values of a principled person are social concerns” but
> rather I was expanding on Pirsig’s point (in LILA) that the MOQ moves us
> from a single (mono) morality (i.e. the traditional social-biological
> code of the Victorians) to _five_ moral codes (i.e. four static codes:
> inorganic-chaos, biological-inorganic, social-biological,
> intellectual-social and a Dynamic code of Art.

No argument there.

> Hence, when you ask what makes a “principled person” in the MOQ, you
> have to consider which level/s you are going to take into account.  If
> you take account of them all then the person in harmony with the Tao (a
> universal “craftsman” of areté, if you like) comes out at top.  I would
> guess that would be a person who looks after their body (i.e. biological
> quality), has impeccable manners, is thrifty etc (i.e. social quality),
> has intellectual ability and, finally, is open to new ideas/experiences
> (i.e. Dynamic: “breaking with tradition is an artist’s tradition”, 16th
> century Zen master).    Off the top of my head, some of the monks
> described in John Blofeld’s 1973 text “Taoist Mystery & Magic” probably
> come the closest to this ideal.

The ideals expressed in the Boy Scout oath would also qualify on your 
multi--level criteria of a principled person, especially "To keep 
myself physically strong (biological), mentally awake (intellectual) 
and morally straight (social). The Scout motto, "Be prepared" could be 
interpreted to suggest openness to new ideas and experiences. Guess 
those Victorians weren't so "old fashioned" after all. 

> >Ant says the values of a principled person are "social concerns," and
> >introduces something which may come as a surprise, namely, "To be moral
> >in Pirsig's moral hierarchy is primarily to be an artist (of life e.g.
> >craftsmanship.)" 
Pirsig cited craftsmanship as a Victorian virtue, so
> >I'm surprised Ant would chose that as a identifying value of a highly
> >moral individual.
> 
> As I noted above, I’m using a very broad sense of “craftsmanship”
> (whether that’s working on a motorcycle, a fitness regime, a marriage or
> a PhD thesis).

I think Pirsig was using the term to describe Victorians in the same 
"very broad sense" as you meant it. Victorian  PhD theses were as 
carefully crafted as today's, unless academic standards have been 
raised since then which I very much doubt.  As for marriage, the 
divorce rate then was a lot lower than now.

> >He then goes on to mention specific individuals who
> >meet this high standard, Charlie Chaplin, da Vinci, as opposed to
> >"charlatans who go around saying they are 'artists.'" Also I would like
> >to know the criteria for distinguishing a legitimate artist from a
> >charlatan.)
> 
> The short personal answer: does the “artist” represent some form of the
> Godhead in their work (if using the narrow sense of artist)/life (broad
> sense of artist)?  If the answer is no, then, strictly speaking, they
> are a charlatan.  The long answer is found in my MOQ Textbook which
> attempts to answer this issue in more detail.

"Godhead?" Readers might get the idea you are some kind of theist by 
using a word like that. Further, how does one tell when are artist 
succeeds in representing "some form of Godhead in their work?" I wonder 
if my watercolors would qualify. :-)

> Finally, possibly you mis-characterized my position (as well as Case's
> and David H's) because as Steve Peterson correctly noted on July 1st:
> 
> “You are making a huge and fundamental error in thinking of the levels
> as containers for different kinds of people rather than as types of
> patterns of value. A single level doesn't contain a person when each
> person is thought of as a collection of patterns of all four types. You
> can look at what types of patterns dominate a given person, but the idea
> of trying to find a level that contains the pattern of a principled
> person is doomed from the start because that's just not what the levels
> are.”

Pirsig talks about domination throughout the MOQ, the domination of one 
level over the other. Using his approach, it's the domination of 
patterns in a person I'm talking about. I'm sure you like to consider 
yourself, and have others consider you, as occupying the intellectual 
level (and your new artistic level) more often than not. But, I could 
be wrong. :-)

> Moreover, even excepting this error, it appears that (surprize,
> surprize!) it is the traditional social-biological code of the
> Victorians which you trying to shoehorn as the ultimate code for a
> “principled person”.  Again, as I was trying to explain, the morality of
> the principled person in the MOQ is rather a lot broader than the
> morality of the Victorian ladies found in Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance
> of Being Earnest” (see below!).

Do you think you can be a principled person in the MOQ but not have   
any so-called Victorian social-biological codes as part of your 
personal character traits?  Do you think upper levels could survive 
without them? 

Best regards,
Platt