[MD] Dewey's Zen

[David Harding]

Hi Andre,

Nothing I disagree with here.  Let's leave DQ alone. It did its thing quite happily before we gave a definition for it and will continue to do so after any of us who have ever talked about it are long gone. 

I have read Pirsig somewhere, where he writes about how the reason why he wrote Lila was to answer those Rigel type folks who claimed that ZMM argued people could do 'whatever they want'. Hippies could use it to justify their sexual promiscuity and even a criminal could use it to argue that what he was doing was the right thing 'because everyone knows what's right' so he must too.

Lila was Pirsig's answer to this charge and the result is the greatest Metaphysics ever written.  It gives us an easy way to say to a criminal..

'What you are doing is destroying the quality of the social level. This is bad. Not just for you, but for all things everywhere.'

So there is great value in the static patterns of the MOQ which is entirely different from the value of Dynamic Quality.  We can talk about this static value and nitpick and disagree and it doesn't make a lick of difference to that undefined DQ.  We all know what's good. That was the lesson of ZMM.  Let's leave that alone.  Let's talk about the patterns.  There's so much growth there. And yes, unlike Mark and Marsha appear to argue, it's an entirely different, definable, nitpickable value than Dynamic Quality.

-David.

> David to Ant:
> He wanted to define DQ as little as possible. Everyone knows what DQ is when they experience it. The more we strangle it with static definitions the more it isn't Dynamic Quality. This is why the majority of Lila is spent talking about not Dynamic Quality but static quality.
> 
> Andre:
> Hi David, Anthony,
> I am reasonably okay with what you are arguing David but have my reservations. I have asked this... or rather stated this...many times before. I am so surprised at the attention DQ gets in lieu of sq.
> 
> It seems to me that, when Pirsig reflected upon the success of ZMM, the 'cult' book which 'made everyone feel good in the end' because of the 'happy ending' most posters here on this discuss still want a repeat of that which they haven't found in LILA. They still want a happy goody feely. And I think that that 'happy goody feely' came about because of this mysterious thing called Quality which was left undefined. My point: the happy goody feely was because it was undefined. People could imagine all sorts of things when referring to Quality. They could let their imagination run rampant whether it was on a motorcycle or lying in the sun or having sex or reading a book or just being bored or stuck or fucked up about something. In other words they had a ball... floating three inches above the foot level.
> 
> I must stress that I do not count you amongst "them" but must suggest that LILA brought everyone down to earth. The three inches disappeared and people did not like it. Still high on ZMM there are our Marsha's and Mark's and countless others who have come and gone here on this discuss wanting to make something more of sq because DQ had let something loose in their heads with which sq could not cope or rather which does not reflect sq and cannot be reflected by sq. They really have a very hard time accepting LILA because it does not meet their imaginations (up with the daisies) or expectations (lift me four inches higher above foot level!)
> 
> Hence the silliness that is going on. The non-differentiation of DQ/sq, the incomprehension at need of latching, the comments that Pirsig doesn't know his own metaphysics, that Pirsig doesn't realize the implications of what he has said etc etc.
> 
> I would simply say:... DQ...
> 
> Still pond
> A frog jumps in
> Plop!