[MD] Respect for the "Design" (Zen and All That)

[Heather Perella]

Arlo and Platt,

     Arlo, I figured you could answer my questions,
and Platt would avoid them.  I just thought I'd be
fair from the start, see if you could both answer
them, and compare answers, but my gut-feeling was
correct.  Platt would not answer.  Platt avoided these
questions and comments raised by Arlo that I really
wouldn't have minded some comments by Platt.  These
refer to Zen and Amerindians and their necessary MoQ
status.  So, since I looked forward to comments by
Platt to Arlo in these areas, and Platt avoided them
with Arlo, I thought I'd raise them again, to emphasis
what has been seemingly avoided or seen as not very
significant by Platt.  Which even in re-emphasizing
and reinstating these points again, with my own
questions, Arlo has only been able to link the
significance Zen and Amerindians have with the MoQ.
     I waited, and after many posts by Platt that
didn't refer to these questions by Arlo and me, the
significance and meaning of quiet, that Platt
demonstrated for us, comes through loud and clear.


so much might be masked in quiet, 
     yet, quiet is where all breaths,
even a snowflake is heard upon a branch.

thanks.

quiet cold night,
SA

P.S. Arlo, this was a very, very lovely post.


     [Arlo]
> In a previous post, buried in an avalanche of
> exchanged ideas, I had 
> posed this question. It has to do with "design". It
> has to do with 
> the notion that the complexity and beauty of life
> reveal evidence of 
> a "design". Whether that "design" is purposeful,
> intentional or 
> metaphorical, applied after the fact or existed
> since before 
> existence itself, is not really the primary issue.
> 
> The issue is, "if" there is a "design", what does
> that mean about our 
> relation to it?
> 
> [Arlo's question]
> And let me ask you a side question. If all this is a
> preplanned 
> design, what does it mean when we (humans) drive a
> species (flower, 
> whale, bird, whatever) into extinction? Is that,
> too, preplanned? Are 
> we destroying God's design when we do so? Or do the
> other parts of 
> the design exist only to service us?
> 
> I ask this, because it would seem to me, that a
> belief in a 
> preplanned designed would engender more respect for
> the design that 
> it appears to. Religious people should be among the
> most vocal in 
> stewardship and protection of God's design. Why is
> it always the 
> other way around (seemingly)?
> 
> Actually, what's quite telling here, is that Zen
> Buddhism and Native 
> American spirituality, the same ethos that Pirsig
> uses to develop 
> Quality, are also the most protective and respectful
> of "the design". 
> While ethos steeped heavily in S/O dominance tend to
> be the most 
> destructive of "the design". If Pirsig likens
> Quality to the Buddha, 
> the Tao, and finds strong resonance in Native
> American spirituality 
> and life, and these are all ethical systems that
> value respect for 
> "being part of the world", shouldn't this be
> something we consider as 
> quite important?
> 
> I asked, why do those who argue for "design" seem
> the least concerned 
> with protecting and respecting that "design"? If it
> IS all "design", 
> as you yourself claim to believe it to be, then what
> is the morality 
> of not only passively observing parts of that design
> destroyed, but 
> also actively encouraging it? This would seem to me
> to evidence a 
> belief that while it is a "design", we are the only
> part of it that 
> really matter, the rest exists to service us. Is
> that wrong?
> 
> Furthermore, if the primary ethos Pirsig uses to
> descibe Quality, the 
> Zen Buddhist, the Taoist and the Native American,
> are all much more 
> historically respectful of "being part of the
> world", and are non-S/O 
> dominant, isn't this "mystic" appreciation for
> "design", of "being 
> part of the world", of not destroying the patterns
> around us, 
> something to be considered as pretty important?
> 
> [End question]
> 
> Let me know add some specificity to this. Let's take
> roses and 
> platypi. (Assume a metaphorical, non-sectarian read
> to "God")
> 
> The initial question, of course, is to ask whether
> the design 
> intended these things from the beginning, or if they
> were unplanned 
> remnants of a design that otherwise excluded them.
> Or more simply, 
> did God mean to make roses and platypi? Can we infer
> from their 
> existence that God meant to put them here?
> 
> Next question, if God meant to put roses and platypi
> on Earth, what 
> does that say to a human ethical system that would
> destroy them to 
> serve economic needs? Lest you argue that roses and
> platypi are not 
> destined for extinction, let's consider certain
> species of butterfly 
> and flora. Or did God mean to put them here only to
> service our 
> needs? In the "design", are we the only patterns in
> the fabric that matter?
> 
> We know that Pirsig has been highly critical of
> Western culture for 
> its adherence to an S/O foundation. In this S/O
> culture, the 
> predominant view has been that "pretty as these
> patterns may be" they 
> are here for the sole purpose of servicing "humans",
> and can be 
> destroyed, manipulated, trashed and otherwise
> uncared for, especially 
> if doing so produces economic or social gains for
> man. In non-S/O 
> cultures, particularly those Pirsig uses as building
> blocks for 
> Quality, Zen Buddhism, Taoism and Native American,
> the predominant 
> view has been that these patterns deserve respect
> and protection. 
> Perhaps this is so because, as Pirsig reminds us,
> non-S/O cultures 
> are rooted in "being part of the world".
> 
> In ZMM, he tells us specifically that S/O cultures,
> although 
> economically and technologically successful, have
> achieved this end 
> at the expense of a non-S/O understanding of
> wo/man's role in the 
> world. "And now he began to see for the first time
> the unbelievable 
> magnitude of what man, when he gained power to
> understand and rule 
> the world in terms of dialectic truths, had lost. He
> had built 
> empires of scientific capability to manipulate the
> phenomena of 
> nature into enormous manifestations of his own
> dreams of power and 
> wealth...but for this he had exchanged an empire of
> understanding of 
> equal magnitude: an understanding of what it is to
> be a part of the 
> world, and not an enemy of it."
> 
> If we do move towards non-S/O foundations, would not
> this same 
> respect of "being part of the world" be part and
> parcel of this move?
> 
> Marsha's and Mark's recent posts about the Female
> and Male Spirits 
> also could overlap this. In cultures where an
> unbalance of overly 
> Male energies dominant, destructive power seems
> unrestrained. Little 
> attention is paid to the nurturing role of the
> Female energy. Is 
> Shiva that which removes us from the world, and
> Shakti that which 
> returns us to the world?
> 
> Platt's primary response to this was "Not being God
> I cannot tell you 
> whether the design includes those who question and
> want to change it 
> or not. It's possible the design is designed to
> self-destruct."
> 
> This would appear to suggest that even though roses
> and platypi are 
> designed by God, we can do what we want to them
> because the fabric is 
> destined to be destroyed anyway. My question would
> then be, but why 
> does this same nihilism not apply to how we should
> treat other 
> humans? If the world is going to be destroyed, and
> that gives us 
> carte blanche to destroy roses and platypi, why
> should I care about 
> preserving human life?
> 
> Thoughts?
> 
> PS: SA, You had asked "What do you think Zen is and
> how does Zen fit 
> into MoQ? Why do you think Pirsig included
> Amerindians in Lila?"
> 
> 
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