[MD] Wanted: A proper foundation

[X Acto]

Ya know Ham, the more I discover about metaphysics, the more I've begun
to realize, I really don't need one, I mean I have a sort of really loose open
philosphy. But a metaphysic?    just seems to keep getting in the way of
things.
-Ron

hope things are well


 



________________________________
From: Ham Priday <hampday1 at verizon.net>
To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2009 1:30:01 AM
Subject: Re: [MD] Wanted: A proper foundation

Hi Ron --


On 1/28 at 8:37 PM you wrote:

> For someone who really doesn't seem to accept an ontology that
> rejects ontology you have a great grasp at what's at stake, but where
> do you derive the notion of an ultimate source, if not via rationality?
> O' Parmenides! no matter the metaphor used to describe anything
> it does not overcome anything either, whether source nor difference.

For someone who has mastered logic, this complaint is remarkably illogical. To give you the benefit of the doubt, maybe that's on purpose.  For if the ontology that you claim I don't accept is a reference to the MoQ, where is it?  I haven't found it.  In fact, I don't recall Pirsig even mentioning the word.  Yet ontology -- the theory of being which Aristotle considered the First Philosophy and developed as a "science of the essence of things" -- is indispensible to metaphysics, a title by which Pirsig chose to name his philosophy.  Don't you find that rather odd?

The notion of an ultimate source has fueled religion, mysticism, and philosophy for thousands of years.  It reflects the spirituality of man and his need to feel part of a realm that transcends his finite existence. That's not exactly a "rationally derived" conclusion, but it's more reasonable than a life cut off from reality except for  experience and whose only purpose in the world is to survive in relative comfort for an allotted time period.  One of the most intriguing aspects of our existence is that we can neither prove nor disprove the truth about what reality ultimately is. The stakes seem to be equally balanced on the sides of nihilism and belief.. As I see it, theories capable of swinging the balance in the direction of an absolute source are still the exclusive province of metaphysics.

I concluded my website thesis by pointing out that since "cosmological truth is denied us absolutely, life may be viewed as a gamble in which the individual is free to choose.  I leave you with the stakes as Pascal saw them: 'Let us weigh the gain and loss in choosing 'heads' that God is.  Let us weigh the two cases: if you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing.  Wager then unhesitatingly that He is'."  One doesn't have to subscribe to a deity to consider that a reasonable bet.

Best regards,
Ham

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