[MD] Know-how - an aside

[Ham Priday]

Hi Platt, Andre, Marsha and All --

[Platt on 5/18]:
> These quotes from ZAMM suggest that Quality is a
> strictly individual event, solely dependent on an individual's
> life experiences.  It's like breathing.
> Everyone knows what breathing is, but each individual
> has a different breathing experience, especially the
> experience of the first and last breaths.
>
> Individual uniqueness is a dominant theme of the MOQ,
> demonstrated by the author's attention to the differences
> that mark the personalities of Phaedrus, Rigel, Lila,
> Dusenberry, John Wooden Leg, and other individuals
> whose understanding of Quality varies mightily.
> That such disparity gives ammunition to Pirsig's critics
> goes without saying.

Yes!  Life is an individual experience. It makes no sense any other way.
Thank you for pointing this out, Platt.  It's one epistemological truth that 
you and I agree on, and I only wish RMP was as explicit about "individual 
uniqueness" as you seem to think he was.

Andre has already dragged out the "Qualigod" label, criticizing you for not 
understanding that "the Lila 'personalities' represent different 
evolutionary levels of value."  He would have us believe that the only 
differences between individuals are their evolutionary "quality levels".  By 
reducing "selfness" to a quality pattern, Pirsig invites the notion of a 
"collective individual" -- universal subjectivity differentiated only by the 
arrangement of these patterns.  The suggestion that Quality is the cognizant 
agent of experiential awareness makes a mockery of epistemology.

And then there's dear Marsha, who has just been praised for musing that "We 
are all children of Quality."  It's a pretty phrase, particularly 
considering today's emphasis on egalitarianism, but it's intended to 
disabuse us of the fact that each and every individual is a unique world 
unto itself.

[Says Marsha]:
> Somewhere RMP states that the only way to change society
> is one individual at a time. ...I agree with Platt's insistence
> on the importance of the individual, and often I want to agree
> with many statements Ham makes too, for the same reason,
> but with Ham self/individual seem to get confused.  I find no
> independent controlling self, only a flow of patterns.

I have no idea how she distinguishes her proprietary 'self' from the 
individual identity she knows as Marsha, but it's another example of the 
conflated reasoning that the Quality hierarchy has fostered.

How can we restore the "individualism" that made this nation great without 
being accused of "right-wing extremism"?  How do we preserve the values of 
individual freedom and personal responsibility that our Founders fought for 
in a culture that has become increasingly collectivist in its worldview?

If you can find an answer to that problem, you've got my full support.

Thanks, Platt.

--Ham