[MD] What's missing

[Case]

[Bo]
I too regard ZMM the best of Pirsig's works in the "making friends and
influence people." sense but this is irrelevant regarding the MOQ and its
levels.   

[Case]
If what you are actually saying is that in some ways the confusion sparked
by Lila detracts from the significance of ZMM, perhaps we agree. But I doubt
if you would support this inversion.

[Bo] 
I have never understood how Taoism works as a metaphysics, except that of
Tao being its "groundstuff", but then what? This goes for Zen Buddhism too,
why I see the MOQ as an East-West bridge. Have you read Watts on Buddhism? I
did but did not understand until I met with Pirsig's ideas.   

[Case]
First Taoism is a metaphysic in way that Zen and Buddhism are not. Zen is
Buddhism infused with Taoist metaphysics. It makes up for or compliments the
lack of sound metaphysics in the religions of India. It is the Buddhists who
profited from Taoist metaphysics. Taoist gained little from Buddhist
mysticism.

I read Watts even before the class in comparative religions I mentioned in
an earlier post. His volume "The Book" was a profound early influence. But
at least most of the Watts materials I have read or listened to seems more
focused on Taoism than Buddhism. Thomas Merton was a trappist monk also
highly influenced by Taoism.

If you understand Quality as Pirsig lays it out in ZMM that is the Tao. Even
Pirsig says as much in one of his letters to Ant. I see significant
differences in Pirsig's formulation of the Tao from my own but his is much
more influenced by what I consider to be the mystical corruption of Zen.

By using the term Quality and centering on Values Pirsig emphasizes one
aspect of the Tao. What he sees as critical is the perception of rightness
expressed in Lao Tsu. He wants to incorporate this inner sense of rightness
with morality and to identify codes of morality. 

And yet Lao Tsu says morality is just one of the steps on the path that
leads away from the Tao. The Tao is indefinable. It exists in each moment.
For me at least it is better understood using the terms traditionally
assigned to it; The Way. It is the path of virtue. It is a process, a
journey not a set of rules or levels or specific acts. It can only be
perceived and responded to in each moment as it arises. It is ever fresh and
always different.

Lao Tsu speaks of the sage, the wise man attuned to the workings of the Tao.
He is big on formlessness as critical to the understanding of the Tao. For
example he says the Value of a cup is not the cup itself but the empty space
it enfolds. He advises the sage to be like the uncarved block which contains
infinite possible forms that can only be revealed as the carver removes the
excess surrounding it.

Chief among Lao Tsu's images is water. The most yielding of substances, it
can wash away a village in flood. Its power is derived not from its strength
of substances but from its ability to flow and conform to any shape.

Later Taoists made explicit the concepts of Yin/static and Yang/dynamic.
This is the fundamental dualism that arises from the undefined Tao. While
all things are manifestations of, or reveal aspects of, the nature of the
Tao; reality can generally be seen through the workings of pairs of
opposites. Taoism acknowledges the inevitability of such dualism but
understands such dualisms are opposite sides of the same coin. It claims
that light can only be understood with reference to it's opposite. Beauty
can have not meaning if not in contrast to what is ugly.

Opposites are not seeking to annihilate each other; they exist in a constant
tension with one another. Each half of the pair gives context and meaning to
its partner. This idea of balance and harmony are central to Taoism. Please
note that balance does not mean equal measure is means stasis or proper
mixture. Through this tension of opposites the world transforms from light
to darkness and back to light again during the solar cycle.

>From its recognition of the power of fluid dynamics to the central role of
change and chance, Taoism embraces no creed; it sets not rule. It calls for
the wise person to be prepared to change and be formed by the events of the
world. It warns against rigidity of thought and action.

Of all of the metaphysical formulations I have encountered this is the
simplest to understand and the most obvious to see at work in the world. The
2500 years that have followed Lao Tsu's writing have produced nothing but
confirmation of its claims about how things work.

I truly do not understand how Pirsig could have formulated the MoQ in such a
way as to confuse the active principle with the Tao itself. Perhaps that was
not his intent and it is the Buddhist reading of both Lao Tsu and the MoQ
that is the source of this confusion.

> [Case[
> It just seems to me that everywhere I look I see things in terms of
> what it moving and what is still, background and foreground, sunlight
> and shade; what is the same and what is different.

[Bo]
This is the biological level's "sense value", the second stage of 
the value hierarchy.     

[Case]
Biological is the sense that they are perceived by an organism but night and
day, plus and minus, north and south, motion and stillness do their dance
regardless of how they are perceived. The fundamental units of physics are
particles and waves, matter and energy.

> [Case]
> Beyond this any system of you try to impose degenerates quickly into
> legalism. 

[Bo]
"Legalism"? Laws?

[Case]
Yes. Pirsig comments on this when he talks about the mystics' distain for
metaphysics. The moment you start to describe it, you are quantifying it.
You are making up rules. Your struggle to set up a hierarchical structure
and put everything in its proper place is an example of this.

[Bo]
Well, you are not the type to be told anything, but to me the level 
lay-out is a fantastic tool that explains - well - everything. For 
instance what we "bickering" about, namely intellect's impact on 
the social level through the Jesus figure, but you turned a deaf 
ear. And when the same thing manifests through the Islam vs 
West you (all) scoff at that. However, for me, the real gem of 
explanation is the intellect=SOM, but THIS even the "moqists" 
scoff at. Well, no wonder when you refuse to see through the 
MOQ telescope - and (almost) all refuse to see through my 
refined "Hubble" type.  

[Case]
As I have said I see the levels as metaphors that have a great deal of
utility. They are often very useful. But they are only a set of metaphors.
They do not explain everything and there are often other metaphors that work
equality well or better. 
   
[Bo]
Still I regard the level system its heart and soul. Without it what 
have we? Even Taoism has to name some "levels" when its  
purity were "lost"

[Case]
The critical meaning of the term Tao that seems to have been lost through
the adoption of the term Quality is the idea of The Way or path. A path
turns to avoid a log. It twists back and forth through a forest. It runs
straight as an arrow across a plain. Everything in nature follows the path
of least resistance. This is how the Tao works. It does not climb stairs its
weathers them away into a slope. It does not build ladders to winds its way
up hills. The Tao is path that branches and forks and merges. It can always
be known but it can never be defined. Such is The Way of Virtue and of Life.