[MD] DMB and Me

[Steven Peterson]

Hi Matt,

So, among other things, you are taking Putnam's pragmatic attempt to
blur dichotomies into useful distinctions one step further by blurring
the difference between a distinction and a dichotomy?

I started reading reading the Fact/Value Dichotomy essays a few weeks
ago but haven't gotten around to finishing them.

I think the idea of a dichotomy is something like Kants ethical,
aesthetic, and cognitive domains that aren't supposed to have anything
to do with one another but actually do have all sorts of
entanglements. For example, we can reason about values and assertions
of fact presuppose certain values even thought facts are not just
sorts of values and values are not just a sort of fact. There are
distinctions to be made between cognitive and ethical assertions but
they are not parts of separate universes.

They are useful distinctions but the universe does not split cleanly
along the lines Kant drew. The cognitive domain is not a values-free
universe and the ethical domain is not a fact-free universe.

In short, I still think that there is a useful distinction to be made
between distinctions and dichotomies.

Still to follow is distinguishing between enforcing and suggesting...

> Steve said:
> I'm wonderring right now whether Pirsig ended up enforcing
> a dichotomy of his own. Or was he just making a useful
> distinction between primary/secondary experience and
> static/dynamic quality? I'd like to read him as suggesting a
> useful distinction (within metaphysics taken like Kuhnian
> science as philosophical problem solving) rather than
> enforcing a dichotomy (traditional metaphysics).
>
> Matt:
...
> The trick is to think of "distinction" first as a primitive
> term--the act of distinguishing, let us say, is what "thinking"
> is.  The second step is think of "utility" (or "value") as the
> arch-mechanism of making and then keeping a distinction.
> So far, this is all just repetition of Pirsig.


Steve:
Sounds good.



Matt:
> The third step is to see that "enforcing" a distinction is what
> we do to any distinction that is useful and want to pass on
> to our children so that they will also deal well with problems
> we think we've dealt well with.
>
> This third step is why I've begun to move away from
> formulating the problem with Platonism as the difference
> between "suggesting a useful distinction" and "enforcing a
> dichotomy."  This formulation is why it becomes easy to
> see, for example, me as suggesting Platonic dichotomies--I
> want to enforce my distinctions, don't I?  Well, this
> obscures, then, the difference between Platonism and
> Pirsigianism.  And then we have to cast around for a better
> way of stating it (rather than riding out the paradoxicalness,
> which some people are comfortable in doing).

Steve:
I like this analysis, but the moral I draw from it is that it is
important for us to think of the "enforcing/suggesting" thing itself
as a useful distinction rather than as a dichotomy where activities
neatly fall into one of two discrete categories. It is more of a
continuum as a matter of "heavy-handedness" in trying to get others to
use our distinctions or dichotomies.

So it now seems that there are two parts to my earlier question,
(1) Is DQ/sq a distinction or a dichotomy for Pirsig's MOQ?
(2) How heavy-handed was Pirsig trying to be in enforcing/suggesting
this distinction/dichotomy?

With regard to (1) I think there is a lot of support in the texts for
a yin-yang sort of relationship with dynamic-static rather than
separate universes, but there is probably much to point to in the
texts to support a dichotomy such as the mystical Pirsig that DMB
loves most.

With regard to (2), the paintings in a gallery bit supports a
suggestion for a better distinction/dichotomy over an enforced
distinction/dichotomy about the way things really are.

DMB seems to be on the heavy-handed side of the issue, enforcing a
dichotomy between those who correctly subscribe to radical empiricism
and those who just don't get it and reject it. His dichotomy includes
the notion of separate universes of thought for "experience"
philosophers and "language" philosophers, whereas youo see a
difference between the two, yet also see the two as frequently also
doing the same sorts of things from their different sides of the
distinction. You see Putnamesque entanglement and a useful distinction
while DMB sees a Kantian dichotomy. The question remains, who is being
more Pirsigian? Unfortunately, Pirsig has decided to stay silent on
such matters. (I guess that means you both get to be Pirsigian! If he
doesn't care enough to say either way, why should we argue about who
has it right?)

I'll try to come back to the rest of your post about using the notion
of purposes to sort out the Platonism thing.

Best,
Steve