Hi Dan, That was a wonderful, sensitive, thoughtful reflection on the MD, philosophy, and voice. I constantly struggle with my voice and presentation and I'm thankful for your treatment. I still remember the conversation we had some time ago about direct and indirect experience. It was then that I realized more clearly than ever before about how much that philosophical distinction rests on its common sense counterpart, and that conversation contributed greatly to the crystallization of some of the ideas I've just been wielding (I believe we were talking about baseball at the time).
I had one comment about something you said: "Be that as it may, I do understand how someone pushing meditation on another could be construed as a type of manipulation and so generate a certain animosity. I sense that undertone in your post, Matt, though you seem to be intellectually rationalizing your distaste into a type of philosophical position (that I do not altogether agree with) and in doing so end up utilizing the very academic tactics that Mr Pirsig upbraids in his work." I found this an interesting comment. The way I've seen my own work is as moving back and forth between philosophical positions and regular, workaday stuff, like common sense and pet peeves. I've tried to heighten sensitivity to the distinction between the two, whereas in some I sense either unselfconscious innocence to such a difference or a self-conscious binding of the two. I think it's important to see the difference, see how we move back and forth, how they interplay, and I think Pirsig was pretty good at it, though sometimes he seems to suggest a tighter connection between the two than I'd prefer. I'm perfectly comfortable with calling a spade a spade, in this case an instinctive bridling by what I see as presumption. But because I think Pirsig has taught us that philosophy flows out of this kind of workaday stuff, and that philosophy can flow back into it, I sometimes call a spade a heart because I sometimes get the sense that the other person sees a heart, too. I can ignore spades, but we are here to talk about hearts, so I often try to make philosophical hay out of what isn't always normally considered philosophical materials. I think Pirsig wanted us to be sensitive to that. Oh, and Dan: you should hold me responsible for my style, though perhaps not others. I try to be a self-conscious stylist, and I happen to like some of the stuff others can't stand, even some of the more prosaic academic writing. Which is fair enough: we all make choices. Matt _________________________________________________________________ Use video conversation to talk face-to-face with Windows Live Messenger. http://www.windowslive.com/messenger/connect_your_way.html?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_Refresh_messenger_video_042008 Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
