[MD] Idealism

[John Carl]

Greetings Dan, dave, Ian and everyone,

dave challenged my philosophical understanding of the term, idealism - and I
just so happened to stumble across an apropos quotation:

 "in its epistemological sense, idealism involves a theory of the nature of
our human knowledge, and various decidedly different theories are called by
this name in view of one common feature, namely, the stress that they lay
upon the subjectivity of a larger or smaller portion of what pretends to be
our knowledge of things.

But in it's  metaphysical sense, idealism is a theory as to the nature of
the real world, however we may come to know that nature."

Royce, the Spirit of Modern Philosophy

This helped me a lot to see where we might have misunderstandings, and
honestly, if there's any philosophical term which has lots of room for
misunderstanding, it's this one.  Just review the wiki on it and you'll see
it covers a lot of territory.  However, Royce's distinction right here
really helps us clarify what it means for the MoQ to be a "metaphysical
idealism" as opposed to an epistemological one - derived from pre-assumed
subjectivity that amounts to getting gored by one of the horns.  But at the
same time, my continued insistence that Royce was saying something not only
similar, but exactly congruent to what Pirsig was saying is supported by
that last sentence.  "Quality is Reality" is a theory as to the nature of
the real world, however we may come to know that nature.

However, admittedly I'm no philosophical purist in my use of the term. I'm
guilty of using the term ambiguously and while I'm mainly talking about
metaphysical idealism,  I propose it almost as much for rhetorical
reasonings as philosophical ones.  It just sounds so nice, idealism.  Much
of the best of our species I see as  the idealistic part and it's what
attracts me so much about  that whole hippy revolution of the 64-72 that
goes by the moniker "the sixties" - they were idealistic.  Such idealism
seems to have so much power to actually bring about change than the
pragmatic materialism we have inherited.  Idealism is a handle that is easy
to grasp, and potent to wield - just like the quality we use in a butcher's
shop, it comes ready-made for use in the real world.

Furthermore, it's been so out of fashion for so long, that it's quite the
novelty now in philosophic circles - a certain classic feel to go along with
a noveau fascination.

imo.

John