[MD] Putting SOM back into the MOQ

[Hamilton Priday]

Dear Dr. McWatt --

On Sat. May 04, 2013 at 9:23 PM, Ant McWatt wrote:

> That's all very good Ham but how's the "homework" going?
> Chapter 8 of LILA ring a bell?
>
> I'd like to see a discussion about that - as far as YOU ARE concerned - 
> first.
>
> Thanks anyway,
>
> Ant

Oh yes, "the assignment" you hung on me (on my birthday, actually).  I have 
referred several times to LILA Chpt. 8, but you must realize that I don't 
regard it as my Bible, as most of you folks do.  As a consequence, you won't 
like my critique of this chapter.

The very first sentence is an attempt to sell a premise that makes no sense 
from either a philosophical or an epistemological viewpoint -- "the idea 
that the world is composed of nothing but moral value."  Had Pirsig 
eliminated the first paragraph and started with the second (Phaedrus 
recalling an experiment involving glasses that made everything appear 
upside-down) it would have made more sense, as we might assume he meant that 
creation (existence?) is a valuistic construct.  But "moral value" is man's 
measure of things, a psycho-emotional response to experience which is 
definitely not the stuff of physical reality.

Next he states that "the Metaphysics of Quality subscribes to 
...empiricism"!  Now how does empiricism -- reliance on knowledge derived 
from objective experience -- in any way support Quality as the fundamental 
reality?  The author himself admits "it flies outrageously in the face of 
common experience."   Then he goes on to posit a "second principle":  "A 
thing that has no value does not exist," from which he concludes that "value 
has created the thing", as opposed to the other way around.

Mind you, I happen to agree that value sensibility is what creates (i.e., 
actualizes) our empirical reality.  My criticism here lies in the rhetoric 
by which he argues the case.  He talks about "substance" as a "subspecies of 
value"; yet he offers no epistemology to support this thesis.  It's no 
wonder that the Pirsigians are confused about what SOM means.

The reminder of this 10-page chapter is mostly a play on the "platypus" 
analogy as a means of deriding substance, science, causation, the Big Bang, 
and cultural evolution.

Don't you find it inconsistent that, despite the author's need to denigrate 
these concepts, he fills 24 additional chapters explaining experiential 
reality in terms of "static patterns" while romancing us with a cosmology by 
which Dynamic Quality continually evolves toward moral "betterness"?   Good? 
Bad?  Better?  --all subjective criteria that do not exist in the absence of 
conscious awareness, yet are purported to be that ultimate, essential 
Reality which, the author still insists, is indefinable.

Incidentally, I noted that your response to my Apr 14th message was largely 
a diatribe against my "right wing" views, including the 'Wicked Witch of 
Westminster' quotes and characterization of Ayn Rand as a "hippie".  So, 
perhaps this assignment was directed toward my conservatism as much as it 
was a request to provide a position statement of my  philosophy viz-à-viz 
Pirsig's MOQ.  If you had a metaphysical purpose, however, I'll be most 
happy to elaborate on any aspect of Essentialism you don't understand.

In either case, thanks for your interest, Ant.

Ham

  ----------------------------------------

Ham Priday stated to Arlo et al, May 4th:

> The full heading of this thread is:
> "Putting SOM back into the MOQ by excluding SQ; let's not do that say some
> of us."
>
> It was introduced by David Morey on Apr. 30, who suggested:
> > Let's not divide reality into subjective experience and objective 
> > things,
> > let's see that experience is made up of both static and dynamic quality,
> > that patterns are just part of experience and are not separate objects
> > outside of experience....