[MD] -elitist ideas

[ARLO J BENSINGER JR]

[Marsha]
Hmmm.  I think Quality (a 'better' word) is amoral.  And rather than a drive
towards "betterness", a drive towards Quality is a drive towards the amoral,
dynamic Quality.  Do you disagree with this statement?

[Arlo]
Yes, I do disagree. Halfway through ZMM Pirsig writes "But some things are
better than others, that is, they have more quality. ... Obviously some things
are better than others—but what's the "betterness"? -- So round and round you
go, spinning mental wheels and nowhere finding anyplace to get traction. What
the hell is Quality? What is it?" (ZMM)

Foreshadowing his later Dynamic/static split, he writes "The reality of the
American government isn't static, he said, it's dynamic. If we don't like it
we'll get something better." (ZMM) The impetus towards Dynamic Quality is an
impetus towards "something better", or "betterness".

As if to drive that home, Pirsig's very next sentence reads, "The key word is
"better"...Quality." (ZMM)

In LILA, Pirsig mentions the Quality-Better pair saying, "One seeks instead the
highest quality intellectual explanation of things with the knowledge that if
the past is any guide to the future this explanation must be taken
provisionally; as useful until something better comes along." Here again we see
movement towards Quality being framed as movement towards "something better".
(LILA)

Again in LILA, talking about evolution, Pirsig states, "The patterns of life are
constantly evolving in response to something "better" than that which these
laws have to offer." (LILA)

And, again as if to really drive this home, Pirsig shortly thereafter says,
"When inorganic patterns of reality create life the Metaphysics of Quality
postulates that they've done so because it's "better" and that this definition
of "betterness" -this beginning response to Dynamic Quality-is an elementary
unit of ethics upon which all right and wrong can be based." (LILA)

I also think its worth noting, even if only for literary analysis, that Pirsig
chooses to end both his books with these statements.

"It's going to get better now." (ZMM)
"Good is a noun. That was it." (LILA)