[MD] laws of thought

[david buchanan]

dmb said to Marsha:
...But the question remains and the answer is totally obvious; are logical contradictions bad or not? Yes, of course they are. And given the context, your contradictory use of the MOQ's key terms in a MOQ discussion group, that particular contradiction is very, very bad.

Marsha replied:
To David Harding you wrote "logical contradictions", so I thought you were addressing the law of non-contradiction.  But if not, on what basis do you find contradiction?

dmb says:
Logically consistency is not the exclusive property of subject-object metaphysics and one need not subscribe to Plato's or Aristotle's way of thinking either. Even after rejecting SOM and replacing it with a completely different metaphysics, Pirsig still thinks that proper definitions and logical consistency are necessary and important standards for intellectual quality.


Pirsig says in chapter 8 of Lila:"The tests of truth are logical consistency, agreement with experience, and economy of explanation. The MOQ satisfies these." 
At the end of chapter 29 he says:"The MOQ also says that DQ - the value-force that chooses an elegant mathematical solution to a laborious one, or a brilliant experiment of a confusing, inconclusive one - is another matter altogether. ...Dynamic value is an integral part of science. It is the cutting edge of scientific progress itself."

This the second quote also shows that intellectual quality and DQ are NOT mutually exclusive. Pirsig's expansion of rationality incorporates and formally recognizes DQ in the operations of intellect and in the scientific method. That is also what distinguishes dialectic from rhetoric. The dialecticians think they are talking about reality itself and the universal laws of logic which correspond to that determinate reality. The rhetorician knows he's only talking about analogies.

Buddhism is also provides you no excuse to speak so badly and inconsistently. The Buddha himself, apparently, thought words should be tested and examined and the Dali Lama thinks logical inconsistency is downright TABOO!

the Buddha said:"Just as the wise accept gold after testing it by heating, cutting and rubbing it, so are my words to be accepted after examining them, but not out of respect for me."

As the Dali Lama said:"A general stance of Buddhism is that it is inappropriate to hold a view that is logically inconsistent. This is taboo. But even more taboo than holding a view that is logically inconsistent is holding a view that goes against direct experience."

Traleg Rinpoche:
"In the Buddha's early discourses on the Four Noble Truths, the Noble Eightfold Path begins with the cultivation of the correct view...Without a conceptual framework, meditative experiences would be totally incomprehensible. What we experience in meditation has to be properly interpreted, and its significance-or lack thereof-has to be understood. This interpretive act requires appropriate conceptual categories and the correct use of those categories... .While we are often told that meditation is about emptying the mind, that it is the discursive, agitated thoughts of our mind that keeps us trapped in false appearances, meditative experiences are in fact impossible without the use of conceptual formulations... ."

But you've heard all this before. You've this evidence already. 

Shall I expect the same old pattern? You've ask a question and received a serious answer. Isn't this where you declare how much you don't care about the answer or find some way to dismiss it and thereby evade the substance of the matter?