[MD] D i a l e c t i c

[david buchanan]

Socrates favoured _truth_ as the highest value, proposing that it could be discovered through reason and logic in discussion: ergo, dialectic. Socrates valued rationality (appealing to logic, not emotion) as the proper means for persuasion, the discovery of truth, and the determinant for one's actions. To Socrates, _truth_, not _aretē_, was the greater good, and each person should, above all else, seek truth to guide one's life. -- Wiki "dialectics"



dmb says:
Pirsig favors pragmatic truth as a species of value, asserting that they (plural) are invented to serve human purposes. Pirsig values an expanded rationality (appealing to logic and the affective domain) and the art of rhetoric as the proper means of persuasion, excellence in thought and speech. To Pirsig, truth, intellectual quality, is the highest of static values, and is subordinate only to Dynamic Quality itself, which is what guides all static values, including our pragmatic truths.