[MD] Freewill

[david buchanan]

Steve said to dmb:
We simply do not need this concept [free will] to talk about morality.


dmb replied:
This is another point that you are pressing against overwhelming evidence. Pirsig makes the linkage between free will and moral responsibility, the Stanford encyclopedia makes this linkage, the dictionary makes this linkage and this linkage is logically necessary, as I've tried to explain several times.

Steve countered:
You seem to have missed where it [Stanford] said "for the most part" and "maybe not exclusively." ... And as above [dictionary definition], pay attention to the qualifier "SOME philosophers." What that means is that your own dictionary says that moral responsibility is not always tied up with the whole free will determinism debate. It actually contradicts what you cited it to support.
And note that you are speaking out of both sides of your mouth. You are complaining that I have a too narrow a notion of free will in mind while simultaneously insisting that any reasonable definition of free will includes the narrow idea that free will is necessary for moral responsibility. (The meta-argument: So much for your overwhelming evidence which I just utterly demolished point by point. ...


dmb says:
Demolished the evidence point by point? As I see it, you have missed the point. It appears to me that you do not even understand the argument that you've supposedly demolished. My point does not depend on this linkage being universally held. So what if Pirsig, the dictionary and the SEP allow some wiggle room? When has there ever been 100% agreement on anything in philosophy? 

The point you keep side stepping is a logical one, and that logical connection is so central that all three sources identify it as part of the most basic description of the issue. All three sources are describing the meaning of free will and in all three cases they think that connection is worth mentioning. You don't find that compelling? To see the same point being made in three very different sources should be telling you something about the importance of that point? And these three sources reflect common usage (dictionary), philosophical usage (SEP), and SEP supports Pirsig's own description of the traditional dilemma. How much more of a consensus can there be about anything? That is some very strong evidence and it supports the logical point I'm making. This is the part you are side-stepping and yet its the main part. How do you get around the LOGIC? That's what these sources are referring to. They all make the same point because the moral implications of determinism are so obvious. 


 dmb said to Steve:
You are answering criticism that says you are compartmentalizing DQ and sq and your reply is to say they are distinct aspects? Saying they are distinct is just another way to say they are in separate compartments. You've not replied to the criticism, Steve. All you did was re-assert the objectionable assertion using a slightly different term. Sorry, but that does not count as a argument even by the loosest standards.


Steve replied:
What I was saying is that I don't see that as a valid criticism that I need to defend against. Of course I'm distinguishing DQ and sq. Why wouldn't I? This debate is about a line from Lila where Pirsig does just that as well.


dmb says:

I already explained why in many different ways but, as is the case right here, it seems you don't want to acknowledge the case I'm making. To put it simply the consequences of your reading - compartmentalizing DQ and sq the way you have - results in a kind of determinism. The result of your interpretation is to deny any meaningful sense of human freedom or agency. And that means morality goes out the window.

If the extent to which we are controlled by static patterns is 100% and following DQ does not entail making choices, then no one is responsible for any of their actions. How could you square this conclusion with the fact that Pirsig has reconstructed all of static reality as a moral hierarchy? How could you square this conclusion with the MOQ emphasis on "spur of the moment decisions" being the engine that drives evolution? I think your conclusion totally cuts against the grain of the MOQ. This is largely a result of the way you read that pithy little reformulation.

I mean, don't forget that he is talking about the extent to which one is free and controlled. Don't forget that this "one" is DQ and sq at the same time, that experience has both elements at the same time, that reality is both of them together, that they are ultimately aspects of one reality. The new song that blows you away the first time you hear it isn't going to have any effect on you whatsoever is you don't also have some static patterns that tell you what music is and you can't spontaneously run down to the records store unless you already know about streets and money and such. I mean, come on. We are talking about the way people live their lives, not the properties of abstract metaphysical entities. That is why we can have so may various example of DQ from so many ordinary situations, like bike repair, jumping off hot stoves, writing essays or philosophical novels. 

Or remember the equation of DQ and "Manitou"? The whites interpreted the latter as "God" but Pirsig points out that the Native Americans had a much broader concept so that Manitou refers to anything out of the ordinary, any auspicious event. Or think about Pirsig's description of DQ as the force that drives the formation of new hypotheses and the ongoing evolution of science itself. There are many ways to put it. The Zen idea that DQ is found by mastering static patterns and the notion that following DQ doesn't mean escaping from the "system" but rather by mastering it and putting it to work. The over-arching idea is to reverse the relationship between DQ and sq, particularly intellectual static patterns. The over=arching idea is to make intellect subordinate to DQ instead of the other way around. The idea is that static patterns are tools that serve human purposes, that serve life. We're not supposed to be controlled by them or determined by them and the subordination of static quality to DQ is supposed to effect a change so that we see sq as a liberating resource rather than a prison to be escaped from. Like Emerson, the main idea here is that we ought not be a slave to tools of our own making. They are supposed to serve us, not the other way around. 

And yes, I'm saying that has to be some kind of human agency for this to make sense. For the MOQ's moral framework to make sense, "one" has to be free to some extent.