[MD] Creativity and Philosophology, 1 (from 2005)

[david buchanan]

Matt said:
... I tried again to put my finger on why Pirsig created the distinction, what people want out of it, and why I continue to suggest that we all drop it.  So, I'm copy-and-pasting it, partly because I don't have too much new and different to say, and... 

dmb says:
The distinction separates imitators from those who can see with fresh, original eyes. It separates the good from the great. Why would you want to drop that distinction? If I were feeling snide, I'd say you're lopping off the top to enhance your position in the middle or killing the tall guy so you don't look so short. 

Matt said to Steve, years ago:
... Sure, I absolutely agree that philosophy is in some respects a personal endeavor in which you struggle with your own inner demons, but in other respects its an interpersonal endeavor in which you try and bring everyone to a higher state of wisdom.  But nobody simply recites somebody  else’s arguments.  A well-worn argument is always being used in a slightly different context, and so will always be a little different.

dmb says:

Yea, there's no escaping the interpersonal nature of the activity and that goes for the philosopher and philosophologist alike. But this fact doesn't undercut the idea that passionate motives and agonizing personal struggles are probably a necessary part of the artists life. In Pirsig's case, he only turned to philosophy when he realized that science couldn't answer the questions he had. He needed the tools philosophy offered but that need originated outside the philosophy classroom. He was like the college drop-out who worked in the mechanic's shop long enough to realize what all those theories in mechanical engineering classes were about and went back to school. I mean, there's nothing wrong with learning those well-worn arguments. The question is: what are you going to do with them, with that big bag of philosophical tricks? What do you care about? I mean, isn't the difference a great thinker and a hack-parrot all about heart, about soul? Don't the great ones have a depth and breath of vision as well as a means to express it?


Matt said:
Why throw out the Wisdom Traditions when some of the stuff is still working?  I mean, Pirsig does it all the time.  Is he a philosophologist?

dmb says:

Right, Pirsig seems to subscribe to the perennial philosophy, which says the Wisdom Traditions express the same basic mystical ideas. But the philosopher is not an amateur in the sense that she's incompetent, unaware of well-worn arguments, ignorant of the history of philosophy or a dismisser of the Wisdom Traditions. Obviously, nobody ever achieved greatness in philosophy by not knowing what the hell they were talking about. You can get those child genius types in music or math but philosophy is definitely a grown-up game. You know, to be a great writer you first have to be a good writer. I don't know if being an academic means you're great, but it probably means you're not too shabby. Maybe it's one of the ways you can make yourself a candidate for the title "real thinker". 

Matt said:
You [Steve] say “it is this internal struggle that generates Quality.”  But I would ask you to reflect on this “internal struggle.” What is it?  In Pirsig’s  terms, it’s the interplay of static patterns.  What we call a “person” is nothing more than an aggregation of static patterns.  These static patterns are  the unconscious history of humanity, as Pirsig calls it in ZMM, “the whole train of collective consciousness of all communicating mankind.” (Ch. 27)  This is Pirsig owning up to the contingency of life.  So when somebody comes at you with a low Quality static pattern/argument, ...

dmb says:
Well, there's where the heart and soul come into it, in "this internal struggle that generates Quality". I think what Pirsig would call responding to Dynamic Quality is something like periodically shedding the old static patterns as they become constrictive and obsolete. That's the struggle. That's the pain by which we gain, our growing pains. And so we see how Pirsig's philosophy was born in the process of struggling through his own issues.  




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