[MD] 'WT': idea-lism bested?

[rapsncows at fastmail.fm]

John, dmb,

my heart sank, John!


> [From a conversation between John and dmb]

> dmb says:
> No, actually Pirsig ends up embracing Bradley because Bradley is a
> mystic. Here is Pirsig's statement in a fuller context:
> As was stated in ZMM there was a time many years ago when I looked
> through the pantheon of philosophers for resemblances to the MOQ. Since
> Bradley was always classified as an idealist, it did not seem important
> to investigate him thoroughly because the MOQ rejects the metaphysical
> assertion that the fundamental reality of the world is idea.

[Tim]
this is where my heart sank.  I never got that from either ZAMM of
'Lila'.  dmb, if you can show me the evidence as to where I should have
gotten this I would really appreciate it.

anyway, my heart gets uplifted again.  And I will state up front that
RMP was watching over his own back.  It is one thing to reject idealism.
 I'm not sure RMP has done that.  What he was rejected is an assertion,
a metaphysical assertion.  But I do think that such a distinction turns
out to be sophistry in the end.  Watch:

> [dmb, quoting RMP] But the
> description of Bradley as an idealist is completely incorrect.  Bradley’s
> fundamental assertion is that the reality of the world is intellectually
> unknowable, and that defines him as a mystic.

[Tim]
how are idealism and mystical unknowable-ism not commensurate?  One
might say, I believe that the fundamental reality of the world is idea,
but I assert, metaphysically, that that idea is unknowable.

Seems beautiful to me!  I have said: something is.  I have said that
this is true absolutely.  I have not said - at least I don't recall
saying it, maybe I did though - that I wonder whether it is honest for
me to say I know this.  I don't know that I actually KNOW it.  I believe
it.  But this is insufficient too I think.  I sense it... blah, blah,
blah.  Something is.  This is true.  Absolutely.

for me, and I haven't studied other philosophers really, but this is
idealism.  It seems foolish to dismiss it.  And, who does?  But, at the
same time, it might be unknowable!  I am not totally certain of that
though.  So, at the same time, I would say that it is foolish to assert
that reality is intellectually unknowable.  Pragmatically is seems wise
to have the caveat: my suspicion is that the reality of the world is
intellectually unknowable, but I don't know that for sure.

Just like RMP regains reborn subjects and objects based on Quality, I
don't see why he doesn't regain an idealism clothed in the unknown.

I have said before: amidst the unknown, I am, by faithe, in something
is.  I have also said that I cannot, yet, swallow the pill that Quality
is simple.  The utter present might be simple.

> [Continued: dmb, quoting RMP] So It has really been a
> shock to see how close Bradley is to the MOQ. Both he and the MOQ are
> expressing what Aldous Huxley called "The Perennial Philosophy," which is
> perennial, I believe, because it happens to be true.

[Tim]
it seems that there is something out of the scope of my present
contention, regarding 'true'.  What would he have meant by that I
wonder? "Bradley’s fundamental assertion is that the reality of the
world is intellectually unknowable"!  How do we square 'true' with
'unknowable'?! (Faithe?)

> [Continued: dmb, quoting RMP] Bradley has given an
> excellent description of what the MOQ calls Dynamic Quality and an
> excellent rational justification for its intellectual acceptance.  It and
> the MOQ can be spliced together with no difficulty into a broader
> explanation of the same thing.A singular difference is that the MOQ says
> the Absolute is of value, a point Bradley may have thought so obvious it
> didn't need mentioning. The MOQ says that this value is not a property of
> the Absolute, it is the Absolute itself, and is a much better name for
> the Absolute than "Absolute."  Rhetorically, the word "absolute" conveys
> nothing except rigidity and permanence and authoritarianism and
> remoteness.  "Quality," on the other hand conveys flexibility,
> impermanence, here-and-now-ness and freedom.

[Tim]
amidst the unknown, I am, by faithe, in something is.  I see freedom in
what I offer, if Quality must be simple, I'm not sure that I see freedom
in it.

> [Continued: dmb, quoting RMP] And it is a word everyone
> knows and loves and understands—even butcher shops that take pride in
> their product.   Beyond that the term, “value,” paves the way for an
> explanation of evolution that did not occur to Bradley.  He apparently
> avoided discussing the world of appearances except to emphasize the need
> to transcend it.  The MOQ returns to this world of appearances and shows
> how to understand these appearances in a more constructive way.

[Tim]
regarding the last sentence, it seems it does so because it implies
'idea'.

> 
>dmb continues:See? He's saying he rejects idealism and didn't investigate
> Bradley because he was labeled an idealist.

[Tim]
you two have the background for that term, I don't.  While RMP recovers
reborn subjects and objects under Quality, I don't see why 'idea' need
ever have been disparaged.  It was just that the old idea was too
constrictive.  The boundary of the unknown in which idea is clothed is
moved by the MoM.  Subjects and Objects are not as *simple* as they
appeared.

>[continuing dmb] But Pirsig is surprised to
> find in Copleston's text a description of Bradley's position that makes
> him a mystic who's giving expression to the perennial philosophy. Bradley
> is close to the MOQ but NOT because he is an Absolute Idealist. He
> rejects the notion that the world is idea as well as the rigidity and
> authoritarianism of idealism, but that's not what he finds in Bradley so
> he doesn't see those reasons to reject it.

[Tim]
I don't read it that way.  I see that RMP has rejected the idea that the
world is a knowable idea; but that he has embraced the *idea* that it is
an unknowable one.

Tim
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