[MD] kill all intellectual patterns

[ARLO JAMES BENSINGER JR]

[Mark]
Well, I suppose that makes you a skunk!

[Arlo]
They are my daughter's favorite animal, her totem I guess, so I'm okay with that.

I'll try to address what I think are critical points.

[Mark]
No, I mean what MoQ teaches.  

[Arlo]
"The MOQ" is Pirsig's teachings. The phrases "The MOQ teaches..." and "Pirsig teaches..." are the same, Mark. If you want to expand out and use "the MOQ" to refer to a larger field of related theories of which Pirsig is but one voice (e.g. like "pragmatism"), this statement still makes no sense, because at this point what other voices than Pirsig do you refer to when you say "the MOQ teaches"? Do you mean Dan (with LILA's Child)? Ant (with his thesis)? DMB (with his thesis)? Granger (with his book)? DiSanto (with his book)? I'm going to ask for some precision here and ask you to stop using the term "The MOQ" and specifically use the people behind the ideas you are talking about; say "Pirsig's ideas" or "Dan's ideas" or "Ant's ideas", or "my ideas" or "Hagen's ideas"... etc. (E.g., among mathematicians I imagine its common to hear "chaos theory teaches..." but for each point I'm sure they can point out who introduced each specific idea, when it was introduced, and how it has been accepted or argued by others in the field, and the others- by name- who were part of any evolution the idea took.)

[Mark]
I fully understand what Pirsig has said, and I disagree with dmb's claim that Quality cannot be discussed.  Pirsig would disagree too since he discusses Quality in two books.

[Arlo]
I haven't read back through all your exchanges, and DMB can speak for himself, but my guess would be that what 'can't be discussed' is Dynamic Quality, in the sense that it is prior to discussion, prior to intellectual patterns, and (as you yourself said) can only be approached through the use of analogy. By definition, Dynamic Quality is indefinable but known immediately. 

Pirsig's first book talked about Quality, but only to move it from an external object of discussion to the immediate point from where both the subject and the object would emerge. Its an oblique approach, and indeed it has to be, or else it falls apart. Pirsig's second book draws a separation between what is beyond definition (DQ) and what is defined (SQ). "The MOQ", which he calls his ideas, is a discussion of SQ within the larger DQ/SQ metaphysical system. 

In this sense, DQ is not 'part of the discussion', it is what 'guides' or 'informs' or 'structures' or 'moves' the discussion towards 'betterness' or 'excellence'. If you want to make DQ itself an object of discussion, I think your claim to 'fully understand' Pirsig is severely in error. 

[DMB]
dmb's approach to Quality is very strange.  He seems afraid to discuss it, yet he discusses the metaphysics of such as if it is about something else.

[Arlo]
Well given that Pirsig himself acknowledges DMB as someone who strongly understand his ideas, charges like this are just ridiculous. Of course, everything DMB posts here is about 'Quality', and specifically about Pirsig's ideas relating to 'Quality' (his metaphysics). That is, after all, what we are here to discuss. There are other venues to discuss other things.

I'm unsure what value you think would be in setting aside the static intellectual pattern "the MOQ" and instead talking about DQ. What is it that you want to say about DQ? Do you want to talk about which analogies you like (e.g. we should say "process" rather than "force")? And, of course "the MOQ" is an analogy, its not an external object or a fixed reality. But you seem to think this makes coherence, clarity and precision surrounding it somehow unimportant. Just as there is excellence/art in mechanical repair, there is excellence/art in metaphysics. DMB's continuance in bridging Pirsig with James is a part of that overall 'movement' towards that excellence, and as was said, is an excellence Pirsig acknowledges.

[Mark]
I can interpret such quotes in a very different way than dmb, since I come from the viewpoint of Quality.  

[Arlo]
Again, given Pirsig's acknowledgement, I'd say DMB's "interpretations" accurately represent Pirsig. But this grandiose "I come from the viewpoint of Quality", well that's just trolling nonsense.

[DMB]
When dmb interprets MoQ, he does so in a completely literal fashion, which means he has mistaken MoQ for Quality. 

[Arlo]
Let me restate this, "When dmb interprets Pirsig's ideas, he does so in a completely literal fashion, which means he has mistaken Pirsig's ideas for Quality."

I doubt very much anyone would mistake a person's ideas for "Quality". What he appropriately does (IMO) is take Pirsig's ideas for what they are, static intellectual patterns of value, and pursues them with an eye towards what amounts to 'excellence' as applied to intellectual patterns; clarity, cohesion, precision, etc.

[Mark]
MoQ is a presentation of a manner of using Quality to interpret reality. 

[Arlo]
The only response I think I can make to this is "yikes". First (I think), Pirsig is not "using Quality to interpret reality". For Pirsig, Quality IS 'reality'. "Interpretations" come later, in the form of static quality, such as his metaphysics.

[Mark]
But let me ask you, Arlo, how would you describe DQ?  Please be rational in your description.

[Arlo]
DQ is prior to description, it is prior to definition, it is (analogously) something like the immediate moment of experience. Although below, in ZMM, Pirsig uses the words "romantic quality" and "classical quality", and he points out in LILA how those terms do not map directly to "dynamic Quality" and "static quality", I still come back to this passage as a very good analogy for DQ/SQ that, I think, anticipated his latter DQ/SQ distinction.

"Romantic Quality [Dynamic Quality], in terms of this analogy, isn't any "part" of the train. It's the leading edge of the engine, a two-dimensional surface of no real significance unless you understand that the train isn't a static entity at all. A train really isn't a train if it can't go anywhere. In the process of examining the train and subdividing it into parts we've inadvertently stopped it, so that it really isn't a train we are examining. That's why we get stuck.

The real train of knowledge isn't a static entity that can be stopped and subdivided. It's always going somewhere. On a track called Quality. And that engine and all those 120 boxcars [static quality[ are never going anywhere except where the track of Quality takes them; and romantic Quality [dynamic Quality], the leading edge of the engine, takes them along that track." (ZMM, LILA terms added with noted caution)

[Mark]
Please explain to me what you mean by SOM.  So far as I can tell, this is a DQ/SQ analogy.  On one side we have the objective, and on the other side the subjective.  How is the West infected by this?

[Arlo]
Western culture (post Aristotle, according to Pirsig) is a trajectory of oscillating understandings that have considered, for the most part, 'reality' to be something either entirely fixed and independent and 'out-there', something we merely passively respond to, or something entirely fictional, non-existent and 'in-here', something that is entirely mental. These two competing but dialogically-revolving views became, to varying degrees, the 'norm' understanding for people, and as such has been reflected in their activity. 'Scientism' (as I think you call it) is one reflection of the "O" arm in culture, 'relativism' is one reflection of the "S" arm. But this has been, as Pirsig noted, not simply a ephemeral, abstract 'concept' held by people, but it has influenced political, economic, and social practices. "The funeral march" of cars on the highway, mentioned in ZMM, the mechanics with no identity with their trade, the vendors of style, an overall alientation between 'self' and 'world'. 

What Pirig noticed was that these ideas were not just abstract concepts people talked about, but they had real consequences and real effects throughout the entirety of the culture. 

[Mark]
What Pirsig is condemning is the complete objectification of reality. 

[Arlo]
And on the other hand the complete subjectification of 'reality' as well. In fact, his solution was to say that Quality precedes subjects and objects, that it is the ongoing stimulus from which subjects and objects mutually emerge.

[Mark]
If indeed Pirisg valued Ant and dmb's efforts would he not continue to mentor them and assist in their work?  Can it be that he fears that they have misunderstood? 

[Arlo]
I'm sure he does continue to interact with Ant, and probably to an extent with DMB (if DMB would make a request), but he's also made it clear (at least publicly) that he values his solitude, and is more interested in winding down his remaining days with his wife and children. I think giving his endorsement and stepping back is good enough to confidently say he values their efforts. 

[Mark]
Since you seem to know the minds of these guys...

[Arlo]
I greatly respect Ant and DMB, but I don't 'know their minds'. I make no pretense to speak for them.

This is long, I'm ending here and hoping it passes the filters. If you think I skipped a critical point, let me know.