[MD] What does Pirsig mean by metaphysics?

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Marsha]
I must say it nice to think we agree.

[Arlo]
We do. And me too.

What's interesting to note is that there are two 
key-points in ZMM where Pirsig references 
"self-reference" and the subsequent paradox. 
First is during his early experience in the 
Acadamy, when he pondered on the nature of hypotheses.

"If Phædrus had entered science for ambitious or 
utilitarian purposes it might never have occurred 
to him to ask questions about the nature of a 
scientific hypothesis as an entity in itself. But 
he did ask them, and was unsatisfied with the 
answers.... Phædrus' break occurred when, as a 
result of laboratory experience, he became 
interested in hypotheses as entities in themselves" (ZMM)

Here Pirsig describes the recursive paradox that 
occurs when the scientific method is turned onto 
itself. He comments on Einstein's response to 
this recursive paradox, describing it as such 
"There is no logical path to these laws; only 
intuition, resting on sympathetic understanding 
of experience, can reach them -- ." (ZMM)

Instead of heading Einstein's wisdom, modern 
"science" has simply attempted to sweep the 
paradox under the rug, and this is the first 
glimpse we have of what would become Pirsig's main thesis in ZMM.

"What Phædrus observed on a personal level was a 
phenomenon, profoundly characteristic of the 
history of science, which has been swept under 
the carpet for years. The predicted results of 
scientific enquiry and the actual results of 
scientific enquiry are diametrically opposed 
here, and no one seems to pay too much attention 
to the fact.... The major producer of the social 
chaos, the indeterminacy of thought and values 
that rational knowledge is supposed to eliminate, 
is none other than science itself. And what 
Phædrus saw in the isolation of his own 
laboratory work years ago is now seen everywhere 
in the technological world today. Scientifically 
produced antiscience...chaos." (ZMM)

Pirsig then goes on to relate his reading of 
Poincare, which contains this summation.

"Then, having identified the nature of geometric 
axioms, [Poincare] turned to the question, Is 
Euclidian geometry true or is Riemann geometry 
true? He answered, The question has no meaning." (ZMM)

"The question has no meaning". In other words, "mu".

The second point of self-referential paradox 
occurs in the Chairman's classroom.

"He shouldn't have cut it off, Phædrus thinks to 
himself. Were he a real Truth-seeker and not a 
propagandist for a particular point of view he 
would not. He might learn something. Once it's 
stated that "the dialectic comes before anything 
else," this statement itself becomes a 
dialectical entity, subject to dialectical question." (ZMM)

Here is a clear point where Pirsig describes the 
paradox of self-reference. And this is why Pirsig 
acknowledges that had Socrates NOT said "all this 
is just an analogy", "he wouldn't have been telling the "Truth."" (ZMM).

Nor would Pirsig be.







At 11:47 AM 2/2/2010, you wrote:


>Arlo,
>
>I must say it nice to think we agree.
>
>
>Marsha
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On Feb 2, 2010, at 11:41 AM, Arlo Bensinger wrote:
>
> > [Marsha]
> > I think the MoQ tolerates paradox because...
> >
> > [Arlo]
> > Agree. The passage you refer to is about 
> encoding experience via symbolic meaning. The 
> "analytic knife" passage from ZMM also goes over this ground.
> >
> > "From all this awareness we must select, and 
> what we select and call consciousness is never 
> the same as the awareness because the process of selection mutates it." (ZMM)
> >
> > Pirsig goes on to explain what continues to escapte Platt.
> >
> > "To understand what he was trying to do it's 
> necessary to see that part of the landscape, 
> inseparable from it, which must be understood, 
> is a figure in the middle of it, sorting sand 
> into piles. To see the landscape without seeing 
> this figure is not to see the landscape at all." (ZMM)
> >
> > This sets the stage for his subsequent "All 
> this is just an analogy" statement, indeed, 
> just as he comments on how Socrates would by 
> lying if he hadn't said this previously, so too 
> does this hold true for HIS statements of "truth".
> >
> > This is really not anything new, and was 
> formalized by Godel's Incompleteness Theorums. 
> Language, like "mathematics", is also a 
> formalized symbolic system subject to these 
> same limitations. It is not a failure of 
> language, nor is it "proof" of some absolute, 
> but a mu-recognition that all symbolic systems 
> powerful enough to make meaningful descriptions 
> of reality will always contain the paradoxes of 
> recursion and self-reference. I think that was 
> what Pirsig was talking about in the passage you provided.
> >
> >
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