[MD] Really? Is that all there is?

[MarshaV]

On Mar 5, 2013, at 12:08 PM, david buchanan <dmbuchanan at hotmail.com> wrote:

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> As I read Krimel and Marsha, they're saying, "You orthodox pedants should keep an open mind and listen while I tell you about the contradictory nonsense that I've been so tenaciously clinging to for years, in spite of the all criticism and evidence against it." All I can do is cringe and bang my head on the desk.
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> Here's a good one. On a scale from one to ten, how obvious is my point and how bad is Marsha's reponse?
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> dmb said:
> ...But a metaphysical system is going to be nothing but concepts and definitions, so we are talking about the distinctions, definitions and ideas presented in Pirsig's books, not the primary empirical reality itself, not Dynamic Quality itself. And this point is very much part of the distinction. Static quality is supposed to be definable and we want to be able to distinguish one idea from another. This is not a matter of dogmatism or rigidity but simply a matter of clarity and accuracy about what these books say and don't say. It's not that fancy.
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> Marsha replied:
> Oh, don't in practice you mean RMP's books, and James's books and those books you've read, by other authors, who interpret James? (Charlene says...) And I suppose also books on American Pragmatism that you deem important? Whatever suits your agenda? Give it up shortcake. You are at the very least a hypocrite.

To claim you are concerned with RMP's distinctions, definitions and ideas when you can hardly write 'Pirsig' without adding 'and James'.  That's your interest.  So what, but don't claim some pure interest in representing RMP's words.  It just ain't so. 


> dmb says:
> See what she did there? Marsha's contention is that comparing the MOQ with James's work and identifying it as a form of mainstream American pragmatism is just something that suits my agenda and has nothing to do with RMP's books. This is just another instance wherein the textual evidence is willfully ignored. Doesn't everyone know by now that this comparison and identification is justified by Pirsig himself? I've posted this evidence many times. I wasn't really interested in James or pragmatism but once I started following up on Pirsig's comments in Lila, particularly the last few pages of chapter 29, it became increasingly clear how illuminating the comparison actually is. At first I felt dread because I had the impression that it was trivial and boring but, as it turned out, I was able to produce 60 pages of parallel quotes.

Parallel within your self-interested perspective, or do you have some verification from RMP that you are absolutely correct in your interpretation?  

"I also have a concern of my own. This is the concern that philosophers, instead of coming to grips with the philosophy at hand, sometimes dismiss it by saying, “Oh he is saying the same as someone else,” or “someone else has said it much better.” This is the latter half of the well known conservative argument that some new idea is (a) no good because it hasn't been heard it before or (b) it is no good because it has been heard before. If, as has been noted by R.C. Zaehner, once the Oxford University Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics, I am saying the same thing as Aristotle; and if, as has been noted in the Harvard Educational Review, I am saying the same thing as William James; and if as has been noted now that I may be saying the same thing as Spinoza: then why has no one ever noticed that Aristotle and Spinoza and William James are all saying the same thing?"
          (RMP, 'A brief summary of the Metaphysics of Quality, October 2005). 

Study and research what you like, but don't act as if it is RMP's preference and the law of the land.


> More than half of my Masters thesis consists in simply showing all the many ways they are saying the same thing.

So what!  Does that make you a Nobel Prize winner in the Quality category?   A renowned scholar?  A respected academic philosopher?   


> And that doesn't even include Lila, for the most part. Pirsig was already a pragmatist and a radical empiricist back in ZAMM, before he even thought to identify with James or pragmatism. It's really quite astonishing and illuminating. You get to see the same ideas but they are articulated in a different style and sometimes in different terms. But then sometimes the terms are exactly the same too, especially the central terms, which just happen to be the ones in contention at the moment. And yet Marsha wants to suggest this is not legit and it's not supported by the text either.

I claim that it's your perspective not RMP's.  You like the James-Pirsig connection, good for you, but others may not care.  I don't, and for not caring you actually called me a 'James hater'.  Andrew Sneddon makes comparisons with Whitehead, and you makes statements as if James's influence on Whitehead makes Whitehead a Jamesian acolyte.   RMP in recommending Steve Hagen's book makes a comparison between the MoQ and Buddhism, and you drag forward a comment by one single Buddhist scholar who suggested that the Buddha was an Pragmatist and Radical Empiricist, and you act as that validates Buddha being Jamesian.  The fact is that Buddha was teaching 2500 years before James was born.  Also I have pointed out to you many times that James was more likely influenced early in his career by reading books of Buddhism.  


> That's just about as wrong as a person can be. It's spectacularly wrong. I've presented the evidence for this directly to Marsha, this is a copy of one such case from a little over two years ago, although it was far from being the first time...

Evidence validated by you.


> "...But to Phaedrus it seemed that James's generalizations were heading toward something very similar to the Metaphysics of Quality. This could, of course, be the 'Cleveland Harbor Effect', where Phaedrus' own intellectual immune system was selecting those aspects of James' philosophy that fit the MOQ and ignoring those that didn't. But he didn't think so. Everywhere he read it seemed as though he was seeing fits and matches that not amount of selective reading could contrive." (p. 363)
> "James said, 'Truth is one species of good, and not, as is usually supposed, a category distinct from good, and coordinate with it.' He said, 'The true is the name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief.' TRUTH IS A SPECIES OF GOOD. That was right on. That was EXACTLY what is meant by the MOQ. Truth is a static intellectual pattern WITHIN a larger entity called Quality." (p. 363-4. Emphasis is Pirsig's in the original.)
> "...James had condensed this description [of radical empiricism] to a single sentence. 'There must always be a discrepancy between concepts and reality, because the former are static and discontinuous while the latter is dynamic and flowing.' Here James had chosen exactly the same words Phaedrus had used for the basic subdivision of the Metaphysics of Quality." (p. 365)
> "The Metaphysics of Quality is a continuation of the mainstream of twentieth century American philosophy. It is a form of pragmatism, of instrumentalism, which says the test of the true is the good." (p. 366)


"The Metaphysics of Quality is not intended to be within any philosophic tradition, although obviously it was not written in a vacuum. My first awareness that it resembled James' work came from a magazine review long after “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” was published. The Metaphysics of Quality's central idea that the world is nothing but value is not part of any philosophic tradition that I know of. I have proposed it because it seems to me that when you look into it carefully it makes more sense than all the other things the world is supposed to be composed of. One particular strength lies in its applicability to quantum physics, where substance has been dismissed but nothing except arcane mathematical formulae has really replaced it."
         (RMP, 'A brief summary of the Metaphysics of Quality, October 2005)

And I have many times presented the October 2005 quote as an updated view that RMP does not want the MoQ to fall within any philosophic tradition.  Why?  Because:  1.) "The Metaphysics of Quality's central idea that the world is nothing but value is not part of any philosophic tradition that I know of. "   2.)  "I  have proposed it [Quality] because it seems to me that when you look into it carefully it makes more sense than all the other things the world is supposed to be composed of."  3.) "One particular strength lies in its [Quality] applicability to quantum physics, where substance has been dismissed but nothing except arcane mathematical formulae has really replaced it."  

Quantum Physics, Consciousness and Quantum Consciousness are where the dynamic thinking is taking place, and on a global level, not what on your single perspective.


> How much selective reading would it take to ignore this and construe James's thought as irrelevant or at odds with Pirsig's text? It IS Pirsig's text. How could the similarities between James and Pirsig be any clearer or more straightforward? Is there any reasonable way to disregard or dismiss this evidence? I don't see how. Evade and insult, evade and insult. That's been Marsha's style for a long time now and that's totally bogus, illegitimate and very, very dishonest. Even her insults are predicated on lies. It's disgusting.

William James was an interesting guy, but from my perspective, only from a historical point-of-view.  If serving up radical empiricism on a bed of theoretical pages is what you crave and fetishizing a dead philosopher satisfies your need for ancestor-worship, by all means, stick to your philosophologizing.  If to read what Hildebrand, Granger, Stuhr, Hickman, Anderson, Richardson and 'Charlene' think about what James thought gets you high on life instead of experience, go for it.  But don't suggest that you are looking out for purity of RMP's distinctions, definitions and ideas, because in saying so you are just shoveling more Blarney.


Marsha
 
 
 
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