[MD] The MoQ.org STRANGLES Creativity

[david buchanan]

Steve, Arlo, Case and all creative stranglers:

Arlo said:
Intellectual patterns versus social patterns is not a matter of "freedom" 
versus "order", it is a battle of morally superior static intellectual 
patterns versus morally inferior static social patterns. Remember that it is 
completely moral, according to the MOQ, for intellectual patterns to 
dominate social patterns. And, if an "idea" destroys a society, then this is 
a moral outcome. It is when biological patterns destroy a society that we 
tread into immorality.

Steve replied:
I think you are referring to Lila, chapter 22: "better for an idea to 
destroy a society... But ..science, the intellectual pattern that has been 
appointed to take over society, has a defect in it.  ...subject-object 
science has no provision for morals."  The MOQ does not give unqualified 
support for every idea over every society.  It does not say that it is 
always moral for an idea to destroy a society. Why would it support a 
defective intellect over a healthy society? Saying that it is better for an 
idea to destroy a society isn't to say that it is always good to do so. 
There are such things as bad ideas, and a bad idea like Communism or Nazism 
can ruin a society...

dmb says:
I'd like to point out that any society weak enough to be "destroyed" by an 
idea probably deserves to be replaced. I'd also point out that Nazism isn't 
an idea so much as a dark, tribal impulse. Its pretty much the opposite of 
an intellectually guided society. Its very much the rejection of an 
intellectually guided society and serves as the prime example of why we need 
intellect to guide society. Don't you think? In Pirsig's description of 
Hitler, just about every feature of the movement is motivated by 
anti-intellectualism. And Stalin was his twin brother, the most powerful 
Czar Russia ever knew. Communism, schmommunism.

But I certainly agree that the MOQ's hierarchy of static values is not 
supposed to be taken as an endorsement for epic vandalism. Its not supposed 
to to be a permission slip for every hair-brained revolutionary or 
foil-hatted utopian that comes along. Of course. In fact, the defect refered 
to in that quote is a problem because it results in intellect taking 
biology's side instead of seeing that most of what social values are 
supposed to do is tame the biological. I forget which poster recently 
pointed this out, but this is where the MOQ should please conservatives 
most. This is where liberals have to concede the point that social level 
morality really does have a point and a purpose. Despite the cruel 
judgements handed out by the Richard Rigels of the world, cheating husbands 
and divorce and not unrelated and nobody thinks broken homes are good. Vice 
really does wreck lives. It was published today in the Journal "DUH!".

And I suppose one of the main reasons that guys like Rigel are so 
disproportionate about violations of these social level moral codes is that 
they take them as God-given and eternal. I think the "forgiveness" they 
handed out is just a detailed example the brittle moral codes, the ones that 
have become hopelessly static and hopelessly stupid, aware of its origins 
and purposes, that Pirsig uses to describe the Victorians. Today's 
neo-Victorians are not different. Not seeing the evolutionary purpose of 
these codes, the prudish attitudes about sex are directly related to an 
increase in AIDS-related deaths in Africa. And abstinence-only, 
re-virgination thing going on in the USA is kinda nuts too. Don't you think?

As I understand it, the MOQ says we gotta get rid of the theism. That's the 
bathwater. This is where the family values crowd goes wrong. We gotta get 
rid of the idea that marriage and all the other sexual moral codes are 
sanctioned by God and replace it with the idea that they serve an 
evolutionary purpose, that they serve life, not God. That's the baby. When 
that distinction and we've dusted off and re-examined these codes in the 
light of a broader evolutionary scheme, then we stand a better chance of 
treating violations with some sense of perspective and proportion. And when 
we see that all human being are also animals with animal appitites, when we 
see that nobody with a body is immune, forgiveness doesn't really enter the 
equation so much as sympathy, eh? yea, people like to have sex, but that's 
certainly no big surprize.

Steve continued:
...However, the above does imply that it is absolutely bad for a society to 
destroy an idea. Society has no right to destroy an idea but intellect does 
have a duty to society because if it destroys society, it destroys itself. 
In short, the MOQ says that bad ideas should be taken down by better ideas 
rather than by society.

dmb says:
Right. Bad ideas can only be defeated by better ideas. And healthy 
intellectual debate depends on social stability as well as freedom from 
social control. But I'd also point out that there is a kind of parallel 
relationship in these seperate codes. I mean, if social level morality is 
supposed to be all about taming the biological impulses, then maybe 
intellectual level morality is supposed to be all about taming the social 
impulses. I think that society will continue to serve the ongoing process of 
life, just as sexual reproduction will keep on doing so. I'm not saying that 
intellectually guided societies are ones in which rationality replaces 
everything else or otherwise negate the lower levels. But there is going to 
be something dangerous about those lower level values from now on. They're 
both going to continue to "feel" any restraints as a threat, will continue 
to assert its own sort of goodness, if you will. Now that the intellect has 
arrived on the scene, its going to have to work out a way to live with them 
without being dominated by them. And there is always the danger of 
regression, degeneration. I think persons given to vice are only one kind of 
destructive degenerate and the neo-Victorian reactionaries are another. You 
have Hitler and Stalin on the one hand and on the other you have Cheech and 
Chong.

Arlo said:
The "freedom" versus "order" battle is fought on all MOQ levels, as DQ and 
SQ seek harmony. Static intellectual patterns can be as restrictive of 
"freedom" on the intellectual level, as static social patterns can be on the 
social level.

dmb says:
Exactly. When freedom and order are seen in terms of the Dynamic/Static 
split then they have an entirely different relationship. I mean, the common 
sense idea that freedom means freedom FROM the social order goes right out 
the window. Not that Pirsig is advocating conformity of course. But the 
DQ/sq split truns the relationship from freedom VERSUS order to a 
relationship where freedom DEPENDS on order. In this view evolution is not a 
definance of the existing order so much as an expansion or additon to it. 
For example, the way the MOQ asks us to dust off the social level codes. And 
just as the human animal had to give up certain things when society came 
along, things like theft, rape and murder, so we have to give up certain 
social level things now that intellect has come along. I mean, things like 
racism, sexism, and all that chosen people kind of stuff is the vestiage of 
our evolutionary history. But shedding some obsolete features is not the 
same as trashing or defying the point and purpose of these lower codes. Its 
just part of the taming, guiding process. Or so it seems to me.

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