[MD] Taking Words Seriously

[Matt Kundert]

Hey Dan,

Dan quoted Pirsig:
The low value that can be derived from sitting on a hot stove is 
obviously an experience even though it is not an object and even 
though it is not subjective. The low value comes first, then the 
subjective thoughts that include such things as stove and heat and 
pain come second. The value is the reality that brings the thoughts 
to mind.

Dan said:
And I agree there is a subtlety here easily overlooked... the negative 
value of realizing we're sitting on the hot stove comes later... we are 
not yet certain what is creating the negative value... we only know 
that we are indeed in a low quality situation. That much is empirically 
verifiable. The low quality value we experience sitting on a hot stove 
is more real than our sweet ass or the stove. It is that empirical 
reality out of which we intellectually construct the negative notion of 
sitting on a hot stove.

What I sense Steve is doing (and you by backing him up) is assigning 
a negative value to that which gets us off the stove... Dynamic 
Quality. We are indeed in a low quality situation but the subjective 
thought of negative value (of pain) comes later. Pain as a negative 
value is subjective. But what gets us off the stove is between the 
stove and the subjective self, according to Robert Pirsig. Perhaps 
there is a confusion between low value and negative value which is 
being overlooked.

Matt:
I did not realize you were making a distinction between "low value" 
and "negative value."  This I find interesting, and here indeed would 
lie the subtlety.  
Nowhere do I recall Pirsig making a firm distinction 
between "low" and 
"negative."  And it does not appear to me in 
those passages themselves, 
only in a construal of them.  This would 
be an enlightening and subtle 
distinction to bear in mind, one I'd 
need refreshing on.

In doing so, however, I wonder too about what the distinction is 

supposed to separate.  I'm guessing that the 
DQ-low-value/DQ-high-value 
continuum exactly parallels the 
SQ-negative-value/SQ-positive-value 
continuum.  And if that's the 
case, all it does is tell you which 
epithets to use depending on 
whether you are talking about DQ or static 
patterns.  It doesn't, itself, 
tell one whether they are talking about 
DQ or static patterns.  And this 
last ability is one of the central 
issues Steve, Ron, and I were tussling 
with.  And if all the above is 
the case, I would continue to be unclear 
about what is being illuminated
 in that issue by this subtle distinction.



In construing Steve and I, you say we "assign a negative value to that 
which gets us off the 
stove...Dynamic Quality."  The only basis for 
rejecting this formulation is the subtle terminological distinction that, 
I think, you are introducing (and, my present impression is, not Pirsig).  

I'm not against subtle distinctions; I'm not against having carefully 
constructed conceptual boxes that everything needs to be placed in 
correctly; nor am I against innovating on Pirsig's formulations in order 
to dissolve problems.  However, I'm not sure "confusion" is the right 
word for someone who doesn't make a distinction between "low" and 
"negative."  Everything seems to hang on on us not using the right 
word, 
but I'm not sure Steve or I ever made the conceptual slips that 
landed 
us into making that mistake of talking about "subjective 
thoughts."  It seems, at the moment, a willy-nilly 
rendering of what 
we were talking about to assume we were making that 
mistake.  
Perhaps we did: the first step would be to make _that_ mistake
 
clear, not recapitulating the Pirsigian notions we think we are already
 
not flouting.

So I guess the main point is that I do not find an obvious distinction 
between "low" and "negative" in Pirsig's philosophy.  This is a textual 
question that can be cleared up.  If we were wrong on that, then I 
think Pirsig's "affirmative" annotation does take on a slightly different 
color, though it still does look like he's apologizing for a subtlety that 
was perhaps too subtle for his readers.  But even if this is all the 
case, I'm still not clear how this helps with the central issue.

Matt