[MD] confused

[Squonkonguitar at aol.com]

Mark 25-10-06:
I'm not convinced static and Dynamic are the only  options. I don't find
them satisfactory.
Chaotic behaviour is neither  static nor Dynamic for example.
I think many of us have experienced chaotic  behaviour?

Mark 25-10-06:
I have come to regard the written Tao or the  way as a relationship between  
sq and sq which allows DQ to shine  through.
The 'shine' metaphor is used by Pirsig in Lila. Shine smacks of that  lens  
you mentioned.
The unwritten Tao looks like DQ to  me.

[Case]
Mark you and I are almost always but never quite on the  same page. I have
long suspected that it is just the naming of things that  separates us but as
the Chinese same the beginning of wisdom is calling  things by their proper
names. So let me spell out a few reasons why I think  you are calling the
right ideas by the wrong names.
 
Mark 26-10-06: Hello Case.
I've read this post to it's conclusion, so let's go through  it...

First, Pirsig makes it clear in ZMM that when he talks about  Quality he is
talking about the Tao. This is the undefined center of the MoQ.  It is also
true that he talks about DQ as though it is interchangeable with  Quality in
Lila. Whether this is accidental or reflects his own  misunderstanding of the
Tao I can not say. But by claiming they are the same  he gives us two
undefined terms and that is at least one too many. By naming  his divisions
of Quality static and dynamic he seems to be following a Taoist  metaphysics
which divides the Tao into its active and passive principle. But  saying that
the Tao is about the relationship between SQ and SQ is like  saying the Tao
is only Yin.
 
Mark 26-10-06: First of all, Romantic Quality and Classic Quality are not  
part of the Metaphysics of Quality.
These terms do not appear in the MoQ because they have been abandoned -  they 
formed an early stage in the development of the MoQ.
The relationships between Quality, RQ and CQ do not form part of the  MoQ.
'The quality that can be defined is not the Absolute Quality.
That was  what he had said.
The names that can be given it are not Absolute  names.
It is the origin of heaven and earth.
When named it is the mother  of all things -- .
Exactly.
Quality [romantic Quality] and its  manifestations [classic Quality] are in 
their nature the same. It is given  different names [subjects and objects] when 
it becomes classically  manifest.
Romantic quality and classic quality together may be called the  "mystic."
Reaching from mystery into deeper mystery, it is the gate to the  secret of 
all life.
Quality is all-pervading.
And its use is  inexhaustible!' (ZMM. ch. 20)
 
The MoQ, as outlined in Lila, abandons SOM, and therefore abandons RQ and  
CQ. (Alternatively, one may wish to say the MoQ assimilates SOM into an expanded 
 format.) Rather than divide Quality into Subjects and Objects, as the Tao 
can,  the MoQ divides Quality into a Dynamic aspect and a static aspect. SOM is  
assimilated into purely sq patterns as Inorganic/Biological (Romantic  
quality) and Social/Intellectual (Classic quality).
The passive and active principles you refer to not absolute Tao, and i  don't 
think they equate to DQ/sq. Passive and active principles are named and  
therefore sq.
I hope you are beginning to see that you have made one or two assumptions  
about the MoQ which are not valid Case?
The MoQ does not replicate Tao metaphysics - Quality, RQ and CQ may do, but  
the MoQ does not.
One advantage of moving beyond Tao metaphysics is the MoQ's ability to  
accommodate evolution. There is no room for evolution in Tao metaphysics.
 
Now that has been cleared up, i can progress to sq-sq  relationships without 
fear of clashing with Tao metaphysics.
And even now, because DQ is undefined, we still have the "mystic." Quality  
has not been abandoned, (or assimilated) only RQ and CQ.

Case:
Second, by saying that DQ is an undefined warm fuzzy, you render  it useless.
 
Mark 26-10-06: On the contrary Case. RQ and CQ are a bit useless with  regard 
to evolution.
DQ is central to evolution in two important respects:
1. As that which draws sq forward to better structures.
2. The goal of evolution itself.
 
Case:
It is one thing to say that lightning is a static intellectual  concept and
quite another to say that it is not dynamic in Quality. A bolt of  lightning,
a hurricane, a newborn baby are pure dynamic quality. Our  perception of them
as good or bad, that is, what value we ascribe to them, is  a matter of
Quality but saying that all DQ is good, strips the concept of all  utility
and relevance.
 
Mark 26-10-06: This is plain incorrect Case.
Not only is it not stated in Lila that all DQ is good, it is clearly stated  
that DQ may produce degenerate patterns if they fail to latch.

Case:
Third the idea that SQ is a permanent attribute is likewise  problematic.
Pirsig grudgingly admits at one point that he is not as excited  about SQ as
DQ but his slighting of the concept has resulted in  misunderstanding. Higher
levels of dynamic quality are simply not possible  until lower levels have
achieved some degree of stasis. Biological process  can not take place in the
absence of inorganic stability. Social structure  can not evolve until
biological entities achieve stasis. Intellectual  development is highly
unlikely during times of social upheaval.
 
Mark 26-10-06: Much of what you state here is in agreement with the MoQ as  
stated in Lila.
sq explores what DQ by examining what DQ isn't.
And to that end, sq stability is valued as evolutionary progress.
This is a basic tenet of the MoQ.
 
Case:
The idea that the levels are a war
with each other is simply  nonsensical. If an idea kills a society who is
going to be around to think  it? An idea can change a society. But kill it? I
think not.
 
Mark 26-10-06: This statement is not made in Lila. The MoQ agrees with you:  
Ideas change society.
You may be confusing what is stated about germs? It is stated that it is  
moral for a Doctor to kill germs.
 
Case:
Pirsig's example of the Zuni brujo is particularly inappropriate
in this  regard. The brujo was a drunken quisling not a folk hero.
 
Mark 26-10-06: One central aspect of the Zuni brujo example is the brujo's  
ability to bridge his own culture with a more powerful threatening  culture.
Had the brujo not done this his culture may have been decimated?
 
Case:
How can it
be moral for a society to undermine its biological roots by  changing the
climate, unbalancing ecosystems and willfully driving other  species into
extinction? Sure you can get away with it for a while but to say  that this
is moral?
 
Mark 26-10-06: It's a rapid leap from the brujo example to ecological  
concerns on this scale.
The MoQ clearly defends the maintenance of lower levels for the benefit of  
higher levels.
Ecological damage is madness.

Case:
Fourth, this is bit of a tangent but the claim is being made that  the MoQ is
essentially mystical. I am not saying that it isn't but I am  saying that it
is not necessarily or even primarily so.
 
Mark 26-10-06: A metaphysics which claims ultimate reality is beyond  
intellectual patterning is mystical isn't it?
 
Case:
Back in ZMM when Pirsig talks about
the romantic/scientific split. It  seems to me that it was the romantics who
suffered from a failure of vision.  To regard assembling a barbeque grill as
sculpture is no great leap for the  technologically minded.
 
Mark 26-10-06: But the technologically minded have, as part of their  
evolutionary development, the Romantic.
(If you follow the In/B sq = RQ and S/I sq = CQ assimilation)
 
Case:
Even the idea of
the preintellectual is not a mystical notion. Most of  our awareness is
nonverbal non-rational. The intellectual portions of the  human brain are the
newest parts. They are very important to us but they are  not the whole show.
Getting the ratchet jaw in our head to stop yammering is  no doubt healthy
but I see no need to give it supernatural  significance.
 
Mark 26-10-06: I think you are conflating pre-intellectual with  
non-intellectual here Case.

Case:
Fifth, you frequently get close to the point with your talk of  chaos. I have
said many times that I think the MoQ is a metaphysics of chaos  or of
uncertainty. The only thing that keeps you from seeing that chaos is  both
static and dynamic is, I would suggest, terminological.
 
Mark 26-10-06: This is interesting.
The thing is, when i use the term 'Chaos' i am not talking about chaos  
theory.
When i use the term Chaos i mean no structure at all, not even hidden  
attractors and all that stuff.
 
Case:
Static orderly
patterns arise from chaos. They are opposite sides of the  same coin. When a
chaotic attractor becomes static it has certain self  correcting properties.
It is more likely to remain static because it is  chaotic.
 
Mark 26-10-06: Chaos theory is an Intellectual pattern of sq.
This may be why you feel we are so close but not quite on the same  page?
Chaos, as i use the term, has its ontological basis in the  Metaphysics of 
Quality when sq relationships are meaningless.

Case:
Finally, I would be the first to admit that I have laid out some  shaky
points here. For example, if you are right and we can dispense with the  term
Quality altogether, then what we get is DQ is chaos. Static orderly  pattern
emerge from the background of chaos. Order is a particular  manifestation of
fundamental chaos or SQ is a particular manifestation of DQ.  That would work
but I am still clinging to the Taoist version.

Well,  that was a bit wordy I get the short version is: The Tao, written  and
unwritten, looks like the MoQ to me.
 
Mark 26-10-06: I think you have some interesting ideas which attempt to  
incorporate Chaos theory into Tao metaphysics.
But, i am not sure you succeed in incorporating them into the MoQ?
Love,
Mark