[MD] confused

[Squonkonguitar at aol.com]

[Case]
Thanks for the quick response. Very nice answers too. I disagree  point by
point but I will try cut it short. So to summarize:

Point  one:
[Case]
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:]  
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]
Pirsig inserts  classic and romantic, subject and object into his
paraphrasing of the first  verses of the Tao te Ching but I really missed the
part where he ever claims  to have moved beyond Taoist metaphysics.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: Hello Case.
The MoQ moves beyond Tao metaphysics. RQ and CQ are not part of the  MoQ.
 
Case:
I also
think you have misstated the fundamental idea. Taoism is about  the union of
opposites. It maintains that light is darkness are opposites but  they
compliment each other. They are known by virtue of their relationship  to
each other. It is in this relationship that the Tao is known.  Taoist
metaphysics is not about any single set of distinctions it is about  all such
distinctions. Again I say the MoQ does not move past that. It  borrows from
and restates it.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: Distinctions are sq. Yin and Yang are sq.

There is  no mention of Taoism by name in Lila and Pirsig’s final words on
the subject  in ZMM are:

“First of all I should say that I don't know whether Phædrus'  claim that
Quality is the Tao is true. I don't know of any way of testing it  for truth,
since all he did was simply compare his understanding of one  mystic entity
with another. He certainly thought they were the same, but he  may not have
completely understood what Quality was. Or, more likely, he may  not have
understood the Tao. He certainly was no sage. And there's plenty of  advice
for sages in that book he would have done well to heed. 
I think,  furthermore, that all his metaphysical mountain climbing did
absolutely  nothing to further either our understanding of what Quality is or
of what the  Tao is. Not a thing.” 

But you have not addressed the main point which is  that DQ is an aspect of
Quality and should not be confused with Quality  itself.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: This is because i tend to view DQ and Quality as the same  
thing.

Point Two:
[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]
Pirsig  does talk like this. I will not even speculate whether he does so
just to  make his point or whether he truly does not understand a thing  about
evolution. But this idea that evolution has a goal and that it is  moving in
any particular direction is just not a part of evolutionary theory.  The very
fact that an estimated 3000 species become extinct each year should  lay this
idea to rest.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: I think you are conflating evolution with Human  destruction?
If Humanity damages the Biosphere and eradicates Humanity in the  process 
life will simply replace Humanity with something else.

Point  Three:
[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]
In that passage he says:

“A human being is a  collection of ideas, and these ideas take moral
precedence over a society.  Ideas are patterns of value. They are at a higher
level of evolution than  social patterns of value. Just as it is more moral
for a doctor to kill a  germ than a patient, so it is more moral for an idea
to kill a society than  it is for a society to kill an idea.”

Later on in another context he  says:

“Now, it should be stated at this point that the Metaphysics of  Quality
supports this dominance of intellect over society. It says intellect  is a
higher level of evolution than society; therefore, it is a more moral  level
than society. It is better for an idea to destroy a society than it is  for a
society to destroy an idea.”

I hear a lot of loose talk in this  forum about the moral superiority of one
level of another.

Mark 26b-10-06: I should have been more careful and read up this  section.
You are correct Case.
Remember that society is a collection of imitated behaviours,  rituals and 
celebrities. The Nazi gas chambers could not distinguish  between biological 
entities and imitated behaviour, rituals and celebrities.  B52's can't either.
When the intellectual pattern known as democracy changes rule by celebrity  
monarch or dictator society changes under intellectual  dictate.

[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]
While Pirsig’s version of this story  may have mythic appeal his
interpretation has no basis in the facts of the  incident. He says that the
fellow in question became governor of Zuni. I can  not find this in either
Benedict’s account or Bunzel’s version. Even a casual  review of the various
tribal interactions with white reveals that nothing the  Indians did had much
impact on the fate of the tribes. My guess is that, what  saved the Zuni is
that they lived in the middle of the stinking desert and  nothing they had
was considered worth stealing or wasting ammunition  on.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: I don't know what mythic appeal you are referring to. I  
shall read this section of Lila again.
Shamans are individuals operating outside static structures.
As a Dynamic celebrity organising principle the brujo makes sense to  me.
This accords with the static structure (rituals) and Dynamic function  
(celebrity) found at each level.

Fourth Point: 

[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]
No, dividing by zero is beyond  intellectual patterning but not mystical. An
electron shifting from one shell  to another without passing through the
intervening space is beyond  intellectual patterning but not mystical. It is
1 a.m. or I would think of  more.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: I think you're conflating unknown with can't  know.

--------------------------------------- 
[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]
I am using intellectual in the sense of verbal and  rational. We have several
other ways of knowing things that are neither.  These other ways of knowing
can be verbalized or rationalize with varying  degree of success and in that
sense I would call them pre-intellectual. I  think the mistake the MoQ
mystics make is in thinking that reverting to more  primitive forms of
awareness produces a higher form of consciousness.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: DQ is unknowable.
You will have to take the rest of this up with those who claim to be  mystics 
Case.

Fifth Point;
[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]
The sense you are using makes no sense. It  simply doesn’t exist.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: DQ makes no sense either. If it did we would have sense of  
the unknowable.
As a metaphysical postulation i'm entitled to use chaos as i see fit.
This isn't science case. This is philosophy.
 
Case:
But I
frankly don’t understand why you bother with it. To the extent  that you do,
I agree it has little to relevance to the MoQ or anything else.  This is why
I am talking about nonlinear dynamical systems or deterministic  Chaos which
ARE highly relevant to the MoQ.
 
Mark 26b-10-06: What you say may be so, but you are not helping me by  the 
manner of discourse you have chosen to adopt.
I would love it if you spelled your ideas out in a clear and concise  form.

[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?

[Case]
Crap, I  thought we could just unscramble a few terms an stroll hand in hand
along the  twisty pat that is The Way. I guess not but thanks for the
workout. I knew I  could count on you for that. I apologize for all the
messed up wording,  misspelling and typing errors that I suspect are even
more obvious in the  this stuff than usual but I really do have to shuffle
off to bed right away.  Duty calls early in these parts.

SNOOCHIES BOOCHIES
Case

Mark 26b-10-06: Just to clarify anyway, i think Yin and Yang are both sq. I  
didn't fully appreciate this before so you've done me some good Case.
The Way is found in sq-sq relationships i have called coherence.
DQ would be at the centre of coherence and either side of  it would be Good 
Old Fashioned Chaos and stasis.
It looks like the MoQ assimilates Tao metaphysics in a larger format which  
also includes evolution.
I'm happy to be wrong if that should be the case. (no pun intended).
Love,
Mark