[MD] Words and Metaphysical Mysticism.

[118]

Hi David,

Perhaps our interpretations of Quality are the same thing.  I have provided
a response to that subject in reply to your response to Horse.  Hopefully
this will settle the issue.



Before addressing your comments, let me first say, that I can try to
explain things as patiently as possible, but it may be to no effect.  You
seem resolved to discuss Quality from within the Western paradigm, which is
impossible.  According to the Western paradigm, awareness of existence
through Quality is “insanity”.  Please read Lila for clarification.  So
until you are immersed into an awareness based on Quality and not based on
an SO distinction, you will not understand a thing that I am saying.  MOQ
provides the avenue to switch the paradigm.  Follow the tenants and see
where it gets you.  It is a different form of awareness from the one you
are working from.  This is the purpose of MOQ.

On Tue, Sep 25, 2012 at 2:33 PM, David Harding <davidjharding at gmail.com>
wrote:

Hi Mark,

>
> Mark:  What do you mean Quality is before logic?  As far as I can tell,
> Quality is not some thing.   Quality is where it happens.  As I remember,
> Quality is made of two parts, DQ and SQ.  If Quality = DQ, then where does
> SQ come from?

David:

sq comes from DQ.



Mark: You can say this, but what do you mean?  Can you elaborate on
this?  Depending
on how you present it, I may be in agreement.


> If instead Quality = DQ and SQ = SQ, then what is DQ + SQ.
> Do we have a name for this?

David:

Yes, post Lila we can say that Quality is DQ + SQ.

Mark:

No, technically it would be post 2005, not post Lila, which was published
long before that.  Please see the date on the quote you provide.  I can
easily find DQ and SQ in ZAMM.  Besides this type of clarification is not
necessary if one understands Quality.  It is only necessary for those who
interpret Quality through a literal translation of the words Pirsig is
using.  Pirsig could have used any number of words and examples.  A
metaphysics based on Quality is not ONLY what was written.  No metaphysics
is.  Existentialism is a manner of seeing the world outside what is written.




Again, please remember that Pirsig's clarification is meant for those who
are confused about Quality.  It does not change his idea of Quality as
awareness.  This is the big picture.



David:

Here is the complete Pirsig quote:

"When ZMM was written there was no division between Dynamic Quality and
static quality and the term Quality then meant what is now meant by Dynamic
Quality.  Today I tend to think of Quality as covering both Dynamic and
static quality.  So far no problems have arisen with this confusion of
terms but if they do arise I would guess that they could be eliminated by
refraining from using the term Quality alone." [Pirsig to Turner, November
2005]



Mark:

I am not sure what you are trying to prove with this quote, it still does
not give me any idea what your understanding of Quality is.  You are simply
playing a word replacement game.  I am not confused.  I know what Quality
is.

>  If Pirsig said that DQ is Quality (ZAMM) in
> 2005, what happened between 1992 and 2005?  Was it not the same thing in
> that period?  Pirsig is trying to explain a difficult idea.  He is trying
> to make it easy on us.  I already know what Quality was in the '70s.  I
> read all about it.  Please do not provide quotes as proof of anything
until
> you understand DQ and Quality.
>
> David, I am not sure what you mean by direct experience.  Experience is
> something we create in response to that outside.  There is no "Experience"
> floating around all by itself.  Maybe you are using the term experience in
> a manner I am not used to.  Is there experience before we experience it?
> When we say "I experienced a freezing lake", this means that our bodies
> got cold when we jumped in the lake.  Your "experience" is something else
> all together, as far as I can tell.  Please explain what you mean by
> "direct experience".

"Experience is something we create in response to that outside" -   If by
'outside' you mean DQ, then I agree. Pure experience is DQ.  If I
communicate to you what I mean by it then I will be defining DQ and by
definition this is not something you can do..  All 'definitions' of DQ are
sq. In Lila Pirsig uses a few analogies of DQ such as being whacked on the
head and feeling 'born again' or jumping off a hot stove and then realising
the stove was hot..  But these things are not DQ..



Mark:

Let me try to explain this in a different way.  Experience is what is
created at the interface of us and "outside" (or “other”).  This interface
is like a shoreline which in turn is dependent on the water and the land.
The shoreline does not exist in and of itself, but only as interface.  Pure
experience is that interface prior to the development of SQ.  DQ does not
exist outside of us, we cannot separate ourselves from DQ in that fashion.
There cannot be experience without it being an integral part of us.  Otherwise
it would not be called experience; it would be called “force” or something.
SQ is something we create, as you say, but it based on something.  As such,
definitions are simply representations of that something. If we are to take
your temporal relationship between DQ and SQ, this would be similar to the
creation of a painting of a landscape.  The landscape comes first and then
the painting.**

* *

The point is, that this interface exists in real time, not “before”.  Every
time a sodium atom enters a nerve cell, this interface is present.  Therefore,
our creation of thoughts is this interface.  Therefore DQ is part of our
thoughts.  I am not sure how better to explain this, but I can try if this
does not work for you.



Yes, of course the descriptions are not DQ!!  A book about the French
Revolution is not the French Revolution.  That is all you are saying, there
is nothing special about DQ in this sense.   I am not sure why you would be
worried about writing a book about the French Revolution.  I am not sure
why you are worried about providing descriptions of DQ.  We all know they
are descriptions.


>>> The solution is to say that , "yes, they are exactly the same thing".
 In
>>> this way the dichotomy presented by Pirsig is a false one.  He creates
an
>>> enemy of truth, and does not replace it with anything different.  I have
>> no
>>> problem with this result, since it is we who create distinctions where
no
>>> distinctions exist.  Such distinctions are made simply for rhetorical
>>> purposes and fall apart on logical examination.
>>
>> I disagree.   Pirsig does replace truth with something different.  He
>> replaces truth with Quality.  Once one does this, things become
fabulously
>> more coherent than they previously were..
>
> No, David, Truth and Quality are two different conceptual beginings.  We
> cannot replace one with the other.  When somebody is coming from the
> paradigm of Quality he can place Truth within Quality.  If somebody is
> coming from the Truth perspective, he can place Quality within truth.  To
> somebody embedded in Truth, Quality is just an attribute.  The question
is,
> which is the better perspective for you?  I choose Quality.

David:

I agree.. What I mean to say is that Pirsig replaces truth with quality in
the metaphysical structure of things.  Quality first, truth second..



Mark

Yes, Quality creates a Truth which is a subset of Quality.  This is not the
same Truth in which Quality is created as a subset of Truth.  Apples and
Oranges.  Quality and Truth are two perspectives.  People can have
different perspectives and not be first or second…

>> I disagree.  It is better to create two 'universes' of Quality than one.
>> It is better to say that Dynamic Quality is before all things and cannot
>> be defined, while all our definitions and attempted definitions of DQ are
>> sq.  The reason why it is better to create these two universes is because
>> of how beautifully such a description describes our experience.  The
>> emphasis here is on the beauty.  Where does that beauty come from? It is
>> not mine any more than it is yours.  It is before all things.. It comes
>> from DQ, like all things..
>>
> David, I am not sure what you mean by "defined".  When you say that DQ is
> before all things, that IS a definition.  We have to define things in
order
> to talk about them.  If it is undefined then it could be before, after,
> between, above, below, and all of the above all at the same time.  You are
> defining DQ specifically as being before all things.  If it were undefined
> you would not say that.

David:

That's right. We cannot help but ruin the undefined source of all things by
chattering about and existing statically.



Mark:

There is no ruining going on; there is only Creation, so far as I can tell.
How can we ruin your undefined source?  It is only ruined for the person
who thinks definitions mean more than they do.  This may be you, and if so,
you have not read Lila correctly.  Let’s stop being so paranoid about
definitions, they cannot harm anything; they are simply used to be able to
converse.  Surely you do not think that a conversation is on the road to
ruin.  If so, we are all sinners and need to atone.

> With SQ (some thing) coming after DQ (no thing), you are saying that
> something comes from nothing.  I am fine with this and ask you, how do you
> propose this happens?

David: If something did not come from nothing then new things would never
be created.  Nothing has to be the starting point or else you haven't found
the starting point..



Mark:

What I was pointing out was the confusion that results from you trying to
apply Western cause and effect analogies to DQ and SQ.  It ends up in the
many paradoxes which you create.  DQ and SQ cannot simply be inserted into
a cause effect paradigm.  To do so is completely misleading.  SQ can affect
DQ.

"Since experience is the starting point, it doesn’t arise from a lower
level of no experience. Logically speaking, a starting point that arises
from something else is no longer a starting point." - Lila's Child.



Mark:
Experience is something we co-create.  As such, we create this starting
point.  It does not exist outside of us, or else it would not be called
experience, right?  If DQ, for you, is the place in which experience is
created (which I have no problem with), then this experience is being
created at every instance of every moment.  It does not exist before,
after, above, below, none of those things.  To say so, just does not make
sense in terms of Quality, in my opinion.

> More on your thoughtful responses, tomorrow.

David:
I look forward to it.

Still getting to the rest…  So many posts, so little time…



Cheers,

Mark

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