[MD] The first cut.

[david buchanan]

Joe said:
There is a logic in quoting words of RMP: "Life can't exist on Dynamic Quality alone.  It has no staying power."....  "Although Dynamic Quality, the quality of freedom, creates the world in which we live, these patterns of static quality, the quality of order, preserve our world.  Neither static nor Dynamic Quality can survive without the other." The question that I have: Are DQ and SQ describing discrete levels in existence, evolutionary levels?

dmb says:
Pirsig divides static quality into discrete evolutionary levels but DQ is not divided at all. In fact, you could think of them as different kinds of experience: undivided and divided or preconceptual and conceptual. Pirsig agrees with James in saying there must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality because concepts are discontinuous (divided or differentiated) while reality (immediate experience) is continuous and flowing.