[MD] The Moral Landscape

[david buchanan]

Steve said to dmb:
Harris doesn't think that he is hamstrung in making the case he wants to make. His next TED talk could not possibly be enhanced by including such phrases as "the evolution of static patterns toward dynamic Quality." Am I wrong?



dmb says:

Well, your point is not wrong so much as it is ridiculous. Are we really going to take the term "vocabulary" so literally? Do you honestly think the purpose of explaining the MOQ to Sam would be forcing him to adopt the terms "static" and "Dynamic"? 

C'mon, Steve. Explaining Pirsig's argument against value-free science would be a matter of giving Sam some conceptual tools, not just new terms. What if he could open his next TED talk by saying there is a rational, humanistic, evolutionary basis on which to make claims about human values and human flourishing? MOST intellectuals view facts and values as separate. Most educated Americans think that nothing scientific can be said about morals. The audience at those TED talks, for example. I think we ought not underestimate their capacity to take ideas seriously. On the other hand, the levels of static quality could easily be described in ordinary terms that require no explanation. The biological, social and intellectual levels of quality are just things like health, wealth and truth. These basic hierarchies have already been well established in developmental psychology. 

I guess it doesn't matter. Obviously, you're not interested.