[MD] The Meaning of Life

[Matt Kundert]

Hey David,

DMB said:
I thought the classroom scenes and the questioning of the whole 
university grading system would be something that undergrads could 
relate to on a personal level.

Matt:
My impression of undergraduate teaching is that this is very sound 
reasoning, and those chapters might be the best to pick out by 
themselves to start philosophical reflection.  My Phil 101 teacher, 
many years ago, used the entirety of ZMM.  Given its structure, I still 
think this is a great idea for teaching an introduction to philosophy.

DMB said:
Can you imagine how a student new to philosophy will react to these 
chapters without reading the rest of the book? What's a reasonable 
expectation in terms of their comprehension level? What sorts of 
questions will they ask?

Matt:
In my limited experience, apropos "sorts of questions," it's not 
comprehension level that will be your biggest enemy, but interest 
level.  Every class has a different dynamic that it sets for itself in 
relationship to each other and to the instructor, and I don't have 
enough experience to even have a handbag of techniques to get 
students to reliably respond to _me_, let alone the idiosyncratic 
qualities that every instructor has.  But this you will know ahead of 
time: you are an alien to their classroom.  Your presence is a 
disruption of the normal flow.  It's not your fault, and some classes 
respond joyously to everything.  But odds are, because they don't 
know you (given this is actually the case), they won't respond to 
you at all.  It's the first day of class all over again.  So if you 
assume that know one will respond to you, you can prepare 
yourself with Plan Bs.  If you've ever seen a comedian's evolution, 
you'll know what I mean: early in their careers, they aren't getting 
laughs they'll get later after people know them.  (For example, 
compare these two videos of the same Flight of the Conchords song: 
early (http://www.youtube.com/user/FOTC0123?blend=10&ob=5) 
and later (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbbxA8a_M_s).  Watch 
the later one first and you can see how Flight had a Plan B for the 
end of the song when their act typically has "audience participation.")

But just on comprehension, I think Pirsig does nearly all the work for 
you in making it accessible, so I wouldn't worry too much there.  And 
what I do for leading discussions is have a series of passages ready 
to point directly to and leap off of for class.  The technique would 
have three stages: 1) read the passage (have a student do it: even 
just having a student read something out loud can be enough to break 
the frozen ice of student-silence); 2) lead them to figure out what 
_Pirsig_ intends to convey; 3) open up for assessment of what Pirsig 
is saying.  (3) then gets you from ZMM to philosophical issues.  For 
example, one I would pick is this:

"Here, in college, it was more sophisticated, of course; you were 
supposed to imitate the teacher in such a way as to convince the 
teacher you were not imitating, but taking the essence of the 
instruction and going ahead with it on your own.  That got you A's.  
Originality on the other hand could get you anything--from A to F.  
The whole grading system cautioned against it." (193)

You might use the passage to ask why the university system seems 
to behave this way, why does originality get you, not Fs, but a 
continuum.  The way Pirsig states things here is excellent for helping 
bridge from bad, simplistic explanations ("teachers don't want 
originality") to more sophisticated lines of reasoning ("because 
originality doesn't by itself equal excellence"), which is what 
pedagogical discussion is for.  Also, in my experience, if you try and 
start discussion, and you get a sophisticated answer _first_, go 
backward to pick up bad simple answers in order to compare them 
to the sophisticated one.  Undergrads will sometimes recognize that 
a sophisticated answer is better than a simple one, but they often 
won't know why.  Instructors have to build the dialectic for them 
because that's the know-how you're trying to breed: getting from 
worse to better.

DMB said:
On the other hand, the writing lesson is a kind of metaphor for life 
in general. It's about NOT being a slave to the rules. It's about NOT 
imitating or parroting. It's about the dull conformist with the 
thick-lensed glasses who learns to see for herself. It's about being 
soulful and sensitive and caring. It's about NOT being a square.

Matt:
Is it?

You and I might disagree on Pirsig's intentions, or what life is about 
generally, _but_ as for pedagogy, these are nice ways to state the 
interpretation, and then ask, "Isn't it?"  Because then you're asking 
them to flex their refutation skills.  You aren't requiring them to 
agree with you on the philosophical point (as opposed to the textual 
point), which goes along anyways with the tenor of "down with bad 
teachers" of ZMM.  You can even supply them with the first easy 
questions to ask: "what if you _want_ to be a slave to the rules?"  
Make them explicate the reasons for not wanting this or that.  "What 
if you _are_ dull?  Is Pirsig saying we all have a hidden capacity for 
being interesting if we just tried hard enough?  What if you just can't,
 what if you're the girl staring at the brick, and just can't say 
anything?  What if you can only imitate?  How do we judge you now?"  
I would have a series of questions like this in mind, ones that lend 
themselves to different lines of reasoning, even if you don't like all 
the paths, just to get a hook in someone to start a conversation.

Matt