[MD] atheistic and content

[Ham Priday]

Gav asks:


> How does a concept evolve/grow/extend when it is seen
> in the light of other concepts....?  This is a new type of dialectic,
> in which the goal is not to synthesise or reduce, rather it seeks
> to keep the contrasting elements in a kind of creative tension -
> seeing what new ideas/insights are gained from these interrelations.
> This is *creative philosophy*; philosophy has never really been
> a search for truth, not even science is that (science is more about
> a search for function)...philosophy is about love and wisdom....
> As for the wisdom bit....what is wisdom?  Knowledge of the
> implicate order or tao perhaps? and this is an intuitive knowledge
> - a *knowing* rather than knowledge - knowledge *in action*.
> Creative philosophy - I like that....sounds good.

Marsha says:
> I've always thought of the moq as an atheistic, anti-thesitic place
> where I might be a religious person who doesn't believe in god,
> or better yet, a place without such divisions as I and god.

Gav responds:
> You can't solve religious problems - they are mysteries.
> How do you solve the tao? or the mystery of the cross.
> Pirsig is naive here  Quality is nature; so quality is pantheistic?
> Sounds like Spinoza. Pantheism is a theism.
> Pirsig misconstrues faith; faith is at the heart of everything -
> it is what it means to know oneself.  The delphic maxim and faith
> are identical.  Intellectual truth?  What is that?  Intellectual truth
> is existential truth - truth is not generalisable, truth is a pathless
> land (krishnamurti).  Spirit and faith are existential terms.
> Dropping existential criteria is at odds with an using a radically
> empirical metaphysics.  It is incongruent.  From these annotations
> Pirsig doesn't look much better than Dawkins.

It's sad to see this forum degenerating into a lament for the inadequacies 
of philosophy and transcendentalism.  Nihilism at its best is an expression 
of discontent, of longing for the joy of the believer when holding a belief 
is no longer acceptable.  Instead we dwell on philosophilology -- wondering 
if James can be "reconciled" with Royce, or Hegel with Northrop, or Strawson 
with Pirsig.  Or how the "professionals" are stuck with recursion.  Oh, the 
futility of it all!

Cynicism has never been the heart of philosophy, nor will it satisfy our 
quest for spiritual understanding.  Instead of excoriating theism and 
glorifying atheism, might it not be more productive to explore the reasons 
that mysticism and religion have for thousands of years provided the 
valuistic and moral basis for human civilization?  Indeed, the development 
of philosophy itself owes much to the inspiration of gnostics and monastic 
thinkers.

Actually, Marsha may have unknowingly put her finger on the nature of man's 
discontent when she described her search for a "...place where I might be a 
religious person who doesn't believe in god, or better yet, a place without 
such divisions as I and god."  None of us want to be "religious persons", 
but we all seek to satisfy our spiritual needs.

Why do you suppose we are spiritually unfulfilled?  Marsha has answered 
that, too.  Because we all feel the "division between I and god" as 
estrangement from the source of our existence.  We are, in fact, lacking the 
'essence' of our being.  Just what is that essential source?  Mr. Pirsig has 
contented some by proposing that it's Quality.  But we know Quality as our 
measure of value or goodness.  To evaluate something as good or bad requires 
a cognitive subject, yet Pirsig denies a subjective agent as anything but a 
"pattern of Quality".  Obviously, this is an epistemological paradox, for we 
can't appreciate (have an affinity for) value if it is the very nature of 
our being.

I'll stop here, because I've already made my point, and it's unfortunately 
not a concept of the MoQ.  But just maybe it will inspire others to come out 
of their nihilistic fog long enough to consider the implications of my 
argument.

Essentially yours,
Ham