[MD] Pirsig's idea of the individual

[Ant McWatt]

Ian,

>It's good to see these Pirsig passages (also from Arlo and Gav)
>reminding us of the misleading nature of the view of the "individual"
>we normally see in "SOM Fairyland".

Yes, I think the "individual" is one of those crux issues that Zen Buddhist 
influenced philosophies such as the MOQ can help us with.  If you 
misunderstand the true nature of the individual then the quality of your own 
life and the others you interact with, will be lower.  If you're the 
president or prime minister of a country then that becomes rather critical 
due to the relatively high number of people that your misunderstanding will 
effect.

>I think, like you I guess, that we need this more enlightened view of
>the individual in mind before we dive into knottier subjects like
>freedoms and responsibilities "of the individual" and even more
>contentious areas like MOQ politics and governance.

Sounds good.

>In order to build on that, I'd like to ask you two questions.
>
>Do you have the references for "Rahula, Cooper, Scott, Peck and Hagen" ?

In the following are the editions of the the above texts I used:


Cooper, David, E. (2002).  "The Measure of Things", Clarendon Press, Oxford.

Cooper, David, E. (2002).  ‘Emptiness: Interpretation and metaphor’ in 
"Contemporary Buddhism", Vol.3, Issue 1 (May 2002) pp.7-20.

Hagen, Steve (1997).   "Buddhism: Plain & Simple", Tuttle, Boston.

Rahula, Walpola (1959).  "What the Buddha Taught", 1978 Paperback edition, 
The Gordon Fraser Gallery, London & Bedford.

Scott-Peck, M. (1978).  "The Road Less Travelled", 1997 Rider Paperback 
edition, Random House, London.


>If these are in your "MOQ Textbook", could you confirm which version ?

Hagen, Rahula and Scott-Peck should be in all versions.  Cooper was someone 
I quoted for the Ph.D.

>I mentioned earlier not noticing the Mary Parker-Follett reference,
>and was beginning to wonder if there was an unpublished version in
>progress ?

As far as I know the Mary Parker Follett section is also in every version of 
the Textbook.

>If not, I'm going to have to go back and read the original
>more thoroughly first ;-)

If it's not there in the version you have, you can always buy the newest 
version of the Textbook at robertpirsig.org which definitely does have it.  
;-)

Best wishes,

Anthony.


.

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