[MD] Re differences between MoQ and SOM

[Platt Holden]

{Andre]
> I realise that this Discuss is one place but ehhh a small instruction
> manual? a sort of a MoQ for dummies like me?

The following goes back 10 years or so, but you may find it of value:

Primer on the Metaphysics of Quality

What is Metaphysics?
A theory of reality.

What is the Metaphysics of Quality?
The theory that reality is awareness, the ultimate good.

Why does Pirsig say reality is awareness?
Because without awareness reality wouldn't exist.

Why does Pirsig say reality is the ultimate good?
Because we can conceive of nothing better than awareness.

What is the Quality Event?
The event that creates our level of reality from awareness.

What is Dynamic Quality?
Pure awareness, uncontaminated by thought.

Is Dynamic Quality another word for God?
If you mean by God the ultimate good, yes.

Then the Bible is right when it says God created Heaven and Earth?
Yes, as long as you think of God not as a captive of any one religion, but 
as the principle of good.

Is the Metaphysics of Quality a religion?
No. Religion is a static pattern of Social Quality. (See below.)

How does morality fit into the Metaphysics of Quality?
Morality is another name for Quality.

Does that mean that reality is moral?
Yes.

Isn't morality about how people behave?
Yes, but also about how everything in the universe behaves.

What is Static Quality?
The evolution of awareness in the universe, stabilized into patterns.

What are the levels of Static Quality?
Inorganic, Biological, Social and Intellectual.

What is Inorganic Quality?
Patterns of physical matter.

What is Biological Quality?
Patterns of life.

What is Social Quality?
Patterns of culture.

What is Intellectual Quality?
Patterns of thought.

Are you saying that patterns of matter are aware?
Yes.

How can anyone believe that?
If humans are aware, and humans are composed of particles, it follows that 
particles are aware too.

What is the evidence?
Quantum physics sees particles as events requiring the presence of 
awareness.

What exactly are values?
Whatever is good.

Who determines what is good?
Each level determines its own good.

What is the highest good?
Freedom from all static patterns.

How do you know that?
Freedom is the driving force of evolution.

How can anyone believe that?
Each evolutionary level contains more freedom of action and greater 
awareness than the level below it.

How do the different levels relate to each other?
They fight each other for dominance.

Why?
Each level considers itself better than other levels.

Are higher levels better than those below it?
Yes.

So it's moral for a higher level to dominate a lower level?
Yes, but in doing so it has to be careful not to weaken or destroy the 
lower level.

Why?
Because a higher level depends on the lower for its existence.

How come different people have different ideas about what is good?
Each person has a different pattern of life history.

Why did Pirsig say Lila had Quality?
He didn't say she had Quality He said Quality had her. Each of us is 
possessed by the patterns of Quality. Your collection of patterns is the 
unique set that defines you.

How is Dynamic Quality expressed in each level?
In the Inorganic level, it's expressed as light, in the Biological level as 
birth, in the Social level as play, in the Intellectual level as art.

What is Subject-Object Metaphysics (SOM)?
The theory that the world contains nothing but subjects (mind) and objects 
(matter).

What is wrong with SOM?
It considers its highest value, objectivity, to be valueless (amoral). 

Why is the MoQ better than SOM?
It explains values and solves the mind-matter problem.

What is the mind-matter problem?
How can matter generate thought.

How does the MoQ solve the mind-matter problem?
Quality, the creative source of all things, is neither mind nor matter but 
a distinct category of its own.

If the world is composed of moral values or goodness why is there so much 
suffering in the world?
Suffering is caused by battles for dominance between and within value 
levels. When someone dies, Biological patterns lose the battle to Inorganic 
patterns. But Biological patterns win in the end because life goes on.

Is Quality the same worldwide and in all cultures?
Yes. Every culture relies on patterns of social quality to survive. The 
patterns themselves, however, are often different from culture to culture.

Is Quality goal seeking?
Yes. Each level has succeeded in attaining more freedom than the previous 
level.

Is Quality purposeful?
Yes. It's purpose is to be free of all static patterns.

Is Quality self-regulating?
Quality is not a "self" -- an object. It is distinct from subjects and 
objects, but not separate. It pervades everything.

Does the level of Quality rise as it raises the level of static quality?
To the degree that each subsequent level has more freedom, it has more 
Quality.

What does the MoQ say about religion?
Religion is a static social value pattern that has no right to dominate the 
higher intellectual pattern.

What does the MoQ say about art?
Art attempts to create aesthetic awareness which comes closer to Quality 
than other kinds of awareness such as Social or Intellectual.

What other philosophies are consistent with the MoQ?
Pirsig credits William James and Alfred North Whitehead as being consistent 
with the MOQ.

What do we need to do to replace SOM with the MOQ?
Nothing. Awareness of the MoQ will evolve because it explains reality 
better than other philosophies.

Note: You'll find other brief descriptions of the MOQ in "Lila's Child."

Platt