[MD] Begging the question of what is Quality

John Carl ridgecoyote at gmail.com
Fri Nov 4 12:52:44 PDT 2016


Tuk,



On Sun, Oct 23, 2016 at 2:25 PM, Tuukka Virtaperko <
mail at tuukkavirtaperko.net> wrote:

> All,
>
> According to the MOQ it's at least sometimes moral to beg the question of
> "What is Quality (ie. moral value)?" Pirsig claims to have empirical
> experience that doing so increases our understanding of morality and helps
> us in making moral choices.
>
> Begging the question is an informal fallacy, a form of rhetoric.




jc:

There is something about immediate experience, Tuk, that doesn't beg any
questions.  It's about as empirical as you can get.  But at the same time,
it's not reducible to words or conceptualization because words and concepts
are always just slices - sliced for convenience sake, into bite-size
digestibles.  You know this.

Tuk:


> The MOQ states logic to be the subset of an undefined concept, Quality,
> for which it's moral to beg the question of how to define it. This is not
> intended to disallow logic.
>


Jc:  Right.  Logic has its important place.  I think the most important
thing to remember about Quality, next to the fact that you can't define it
- you KNOW what it is!  That's revolutionary, really.  That right there,
saves the world, if the world would just pay attention.



Tuk:

>
> Logic is about form. But arguments, that are informal fallacies, do not
> have any flaw in their form. Therefore begging the question of how to
> define Quality does not make the MOQ inconsistent or disallow logic.
>
>
Jc:  exactly.

Tuk:


> When Russell applied logic to fictional entities and concluded they don't
> exist, Meinong told him his argument begs the question. In this case,
> nobody assumed that it's moral to beg a question about fictional entities.



Jc:  I think a lot depends upon the personality you're arguing with.
Russell had a certain mindset BEHIND his logic and his categories, whereas
the MoQ is evolved from a certain story - a narrative that makes no
pretension at being other than, "a fictional entity"

TuK:


> Furthermore, Meinong rejected Russell's argument on moral grounds, not
> because there would've been a flaw in its form. If it is permissible to
> reject an argument on moral grounds surely it should be permissible to
> accept an argument on moral grounds, too?
>
>
Jc:  I mean this literally:  Absolutely.  Truth IS a moral order.  It
really can't be grounded any deeper than that.  There is nothing deeper
than that.

Tuk:


> All axioms of logic are chosen on moral grounds since otherwise they'd be
> theorems. For example, it's moral that axioms aren't unnecessarily
> complicated and that it's easy to make relevant proofs with them.
>
>

The value of logic is in construing causation into the abstract to see if
there is possible contradiction.  That's the moral code for intellectual
patterning.  Your good work is appreciated, my friend,


JC



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