[MD] Overcoming the System

[Matt Kundert]

Hey Ian,

Ian said:
Matt where you say "Pirsig wanted to say ..." 
"Every person needs their own philosophy, because the arc 
of America is our individuality."
Where do you get that from ?

Matt:
It's a melting of things he said: things like the philosophology 
section (where he states the only way to read philosophy is 
to first figure out what you believe) and at the beginning of 
Lila where he says the Metaphysics of Quality already exists.  
And the latter half of the comment is the Emersonian 
connection, which Pirsig, as one example, incarnates in his 
cooptation of Native American culture.

In this particular melting, Pirsig both thinks that philosophy 
is wide and idiosyncratic but also a bit necessary, for it is 
the wisdom we bring to every unique situation we confront 
as individuals--so we _need_ to become more explicit and 
self-comprehending about it.  And in that sense, I don't 
exactly disagree.

Ian said:
The thing you call the weird monster "MoQ created to be 
transcended" Is the thing that make it so attractive - as a 
"universal" framework of evolutionary layers of patterns, (as 
I've said before), it contains the means of its own evolution. 
All its own history as well as its future. Steve clearly sees 
that too - "never ... the final word on reality".

Matt:
Yeah, but it is exactly my contention that we are decieving 
ourselves if we think that _this_, its self-transcending quality, 
is what makes this "system" so attractive--for _what_ 
evolves?  _US!_  _We_ are the ones who evolve, we are 
ideas, but we are ideas in motion, we use them.  
Self-transcendence isn't even new with Pirsig (Hegel?), so 
it makes even less sense to lay our weight on this aspect.

I think it is a "bad faith" aspect--"the Metaphysics of Quality" 
is as much a rhetorical figure as Richard Rorty's infamous 
"we's".  Who are these we's? people ask.  What is this 
Metaphysics of Quality that stands apart from Pirsig?  Both 
of them are rhetorical strategies of invitation to the outside, 
making your thoughts useful to others.  I have no problem 
with that, but to say that the MoQ "contains the means of 
its own evolution" is about as helpful and obvious as saying 
that each person contains the means of their own 
evolution--of course we do, who else would?  Perhaps 
people needed that to be made explicit in "their system," but 
by making a "system" state it explicitly still obfuscates (by 
virtue of the system being the focus of attention) the fact 
of individuals facing life--because every individual facing life 
as an individual facing life _knows_ that they are in constant 
flux and evolvement of the tools of engagement, of their 
ideas, their wisdom.  

Philosophical _systems_ have blotted out life from 
Philosophy's Sight, which is what Pirsig wanted to correct, 
he wanted to bring life back to philosophy, as much as 
philosophy back to life.  It is Steve's circumlocution--that 
saying the MoQ is historical is just to say that Pirsig is a 
finite, historically situated being--that frees us from the 
temptation towards bad faith, by taking the "system" too 
seriously, which is not what Pirsig wanted.  His rhetorical 
structure--his mode of externalizing his ideas for public 
scrutiny and acceptance--forced him into this position, but 
if we read carefully, as I think Steve has, we can avoid 
what just looks like a pratfall.  Like when Kierkegaard said 
of Hegel that if he'd just prefaced his Science of Logic with, 
"This is all just a thought-experiment," he would've been the 
greatest philosopher who ever lived; but as it is, he's just a 
fool.  

If you get hung up on system, you'll begin to think you live 
_inside_ the system, like a box, rather that it just being a 
collection of tools, like the many, many others you use in life 
(though none of them are "systems").  You get inside the box, 
and then wonder how it goes anywhere--well, you're the one 
who got inside the box.  I go wherever I want just 
fine--of course, I'm not in a box.

I don't think Steve sees clearly what you think he does, 
because I think Steve has moved beyond system.  Following 
Steve's circumlocution, when one says, "Pirsig never said the 
MoQ has the final word on reality," we can understand it is the 
truest, obvious wisdom of life, and yet one philosophy needs most: 
no person ever has the final word on reality.

And I never said that the Metaphysics of Quality is "unique and 
personal to Pirsig in its value."  You misunderstood what I was 
saying.

Matt

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