[MD] The Quest for Quality

[Ham Priday]

Hi Chris --


[Ham, to Marsha]:
> I never understood why the Pirsigians insist that their fundamental
> reality must be dynamic, while its derived patterns are static. This
> seems illogical to me. Even in the mysticism of the Orientals,
> what is absolute and whole is unchanging, whereas the mind
> interprets it as a flow of > pluralistic events.

[Chris responds]:
> Ah, yes. But no. Dynamic means that it is not static. not that it is
> something roaming around creating things, jumping around and
> inspiring artists and such. It is all ONE, but two and many in one.
> Dynamic Quality is constant, and the static patterns exists in it and
> through it. It is all Quality, only in different forms. So, therefore,
> indeed we interpret the world around us as a "flow of pluralistic
> events", and DQ as something that "hits" -but really it is Quality
> seeing Quality, from a particular, static, point of view. \

Yes, but no?!  Yes, dynamic means not static.  But no, the evolutionary 
world of change and difference is obviously not static, whether its 
"patterns" are static or not.  (I don't see objects and events as patterns. 
I look for symmetry and repetition in existence like you do, and these can 
only appear in a differentiated dynamic universe.)   Whatever your labels, 
everything experienced in our created existence is in constant flux and 
motion -- and, patterned or not, that means DYNAMIC.

But it is unreasonable by Occam's razor, or any other logical principle, to 
assume that ultimate reality, the primary source itself (what I call 
Essence), is multiplistic and subject to a beginning, an end, or the 
fluctuations between.  Religion, mysticism, and philosophy have all posited 
a unitary, immutable Creator as the eternal source.  And I do not have the 
temerity to challenge that concept, even if Mr. Pirsig doesn't acknowledge a 
creator and happens to think DQ is something that "hits" him.

Let's get REAL.

--Ham