[MD] Social Ants?

[Platt Holden]

Hi SA:

I've been trying to figure out what your point is in the following post 
of yours. Hitler as an individual was dominated by social level values 
as Pirsig explains. Phaedrus, Pirsig's alter ego, was an individual 
dominated by intellectual values.

As others have pointed out, there are individuals at all levels. 

Individuals who use physical force or sex to attain their goals are 
dominated by biological values.

Individuals who look to government and other social institutions to 
cure perceived social ills are dominated by social values.

Individuals who demand free speech, free press, free worship, free 
travel, free entrepeneurship, etc.are dominated by intellectual values. 

Of the three types of individuals, who has the highest moral standing 
as a contributor to the evolution of life? My answer, and I believe 
Pirsig's, is the individual dominated not only by intellectual values 
and desire for individual freedom but who also subscribes to such 
personal values has optimism, craftsmanship, work, thrift, self-
discipline, etc. which Pirsig laments  we are losing as this century 
drifts "toward a dissipation of these values."

These individual types parallel Pirsig's evolutionary levels. Someone  
recently wrote that Pirsig himself characterized Lila as a biological 
level individual (dominated by sex), Rigel as a social level individual 
(dominated by the law and tradition),  and Phaedrus as an intellectual 
level individual (dominated by thinking and the desire to be free.) So 
to relate types of individuals to the levels is not out of bounds at 
all.

Thanks, 
Platt


> Platt, Gene, Steve, and others,
> 
>      Platt, your still saying that, and I'm still
> saying this.
> 
>      Pirsig:  "Phaedrus thought..."
> 
>      Notice Phaedrus THINKING.
> 
>      Pirsig:  "...that no other historical or
> political analysis explains the enormity of these
> forces as clearly as does the Metaphysics of Quality.
> The gigantic power of socialism and fascism, which
> have overwhelmed this century, is explained by a
> conflict of levels of evolution."
> 
>      Notice Phaedrus THOUGHT these levels of conflict.
> 
>      Pirsig:  "This conflict explains THE DRIVING
> FORCE BEHIND HITLER..."
> 
>      Notice Phaedrus THINKING about THE DRIVING FORCE
> BEHIND an individual and this individuals name is
> HITLER.  What is THE DRIVING FORCE Phaedrus THINKS? 
> It is the CONFLICT between levels is the DRIVING
> FORCE.
> 
>      Pirsig:  "...not as an insane search for power
> but as an all-consuming glorification of social
> authority and hatred of intellectualism."
> 
>      So this conflict between levels is glorified,
> expressed, and behind, thus, the motives in an
> INDIVIDUAL named HITLER.  This IDEA of conflict
> between levels, and the levels themselves are as first
> stated, a THOUGHT Phaedrus had to EXPLAIN a motive an
> individual had.  Where did this individual, named
> Hitler, have this motive in conflict?  Within himself,
> thus Hitler, an individual, had conflict in himself
> that Phaedrus best THOUGHT to explain this conflict by
> Phaedrus' IDEA about the levels in conflict. 
> Therefore we notice two individuals here, one named
> Phaedrus and another one named Hitler.
> 
>      Pirsig:  "HIS anti-Semitism was fueled by
> anti-intellectualism.  HIS hatred of communists was
> fueled by anti-intellectualism.  HIS exaltation of the
> German volk was fueled by it.  HIS fanatic persecution
> of any kind of intellectual freedom was driven by it."
> 
> 
>      Notice the individual "HIS" emphasis added, and
> the obvious "HIS" is an individual named Hitler. 
> Notice also we have two individuals.  One individual
> is anti-intellectual and that individual is Hitler. 
> The other individual is intellectual and that
> individual is Phaedrus.  Of these individuals one,
> named Phaedrus, is capable of having an idea about a
> conflict within another individual named Hitler.  
>      That individual, named Hitler, has a conflict
> inside of himself.  A conflict between society and
> intellect all wrapped up together inside of the skin
> of an individual capable of having a social and
> intellectual conflict inside of himself, this one
> person, an individual named Hitler.  That's what
> "Phaedrus thought".
> 
> Thanks,
> SA