[MD] Science and the MOQ

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Arlo had said]
Indeed, Pirsig says "subjects are social and intellectual values". 
Read that again. It says EXACTLY what I said.

[Platt]
Read this again about the individual. (Pirsig says "individual," not 
"subjects.")

[Arlo]
And again, you seem to think that the quote your provide denies the 
quote I provide. They don't. I support both quotes. Sadly, you have 
to rely on distorted rhetoric to use one quote to deny another.

I've already provided ample proof, and several key quotes, from 
Pirsig demonstrating that the "self" of the MOQ is "social" and "proprietary".

[Platt]
So much for the value of your leftist agenda.

[Arlo]
Its this kind of moronic bunk that is embarrassing. But if you mean 
"supporting big government programs", again I remind you that Pirsig 
is an avowed "lifelong democrat".

[Platt]
None of your quotes deny the distinction between the individual and 
"big programs of social planning."

[Arlo]
Who's talking about that? I am talking about the collectivist origins 
of mind. The "self" in the MOQ as a point of contact between social 
assimilation and unique bounded experience. Just like Pirsig says...

"The Metaphysics of Quality resolves the relationship between 
intellect and society, subject and object, mind and matter, by 
embedding all of them in a larger system of understanding. Objects 
are inorganic and biological values; subjects are social and 
intellectual values."

[Platt]
Nonsense. Your quotes are irrelevant to the fundamental conflict in the MOQ.

[Arlo]
No, they are irrelevant to YOUR fundamental conflict in the MOQ. They 
are relevant to anyone truly interested in more than using the MOQ as 
an apologist doctrine to wage some moronic war against "collectivism".

[Platt]
Ham made the mistake of relying on your one-sided interpretation of the MOQ.

[Arlo]
No. Ham denies 1/2 of Pirsig. You deny the other 1/2. You both have 
the "one-sided" interpretations. Its actually funny to watch. But 
sad, since you are both so stuck in "proving" something you miss an 
opportunity for true expansion of thought. What's even more funny is 
how you use one quote of Pirsig's to "deny" another quote. I've never 
actually seen anyone do this before, for any author. It's astonishing.

[Platt]
If Descartes had said, "I am because I can respond to DQ" he would 
have been correct.

[Arlo]
At least here you finally break with Pirsig outright. ""If Descartes 
had said, "The seventeenth century French culture exists, therefore I 
think, therefore I am," he would have been correct."(LILA)

[Platt]
The individual "owes" her existence to many things, primarily a 
biological pattern. Culture obviously has an influence on the 
individual's development, but has little effect on her creative, 
Dynamic responses.

[Arlo]
"Our intellectual description of nature is always culturally 
derived." The "self" that is able to respond to DQ on the 
intellectual level, as we know from Pirsig the "self" is an 
intellectual pattern, is able to do so only through the assimilation 
of a collective consciousness. Without that, your "individual" would 
be forever stuck responding to DQ on only the biological and inorganic levels.

As to your little Cartesian "me", Pirsig is quite clear. "This 
Cartesian "Me," this autonomous little homunculus who sits behind our 
eyeballs looking out through them in order to pass judgment on the 
affairs of the world, is just completely ridiculous. This 
self-appointed little editor of reality is just an impossible fiction 
that collapses the moment one examines it." (LILA)