[John] Yeah, that runs through my mind sometimes when Pirsig, the greatest teacher of them all attacks academics.
[Arlo] I think Pirsig's criticism reflects the S/O paradigm by which "academics" operate, not with the fundamental existence or value of the "academy". But this criticism he also levels against those who control the modes of production, and those who consume a market that delivers "stylized junk". His same critiques of Dusenberry's contemporaries reflects the same critiques of the "mechanics" who nearly destroyed his bike, and also those who go to a factory and toil in the same repetitive job day in and day out. It's the "death march" of ZMM that maps criticism across the board at modern culture and society, not just that dreadful "academy" and its commie perfessers. If we lose sight of this, and simply regurgitate endless anti-intellectual vomit from talk-radio, we simply play into the hands of those same "right-wing" politicians that branded Pirsig a "radical professor" and sought to have him dismissed from his post. Think about that, if he is the Great Teacher, anti-intellectual right-wing reactionism nearly cost him his job. The academy may have moved slow to adopt his novel ideas (but IS!), but right-wing anti-intellectualism would have silenced him way back in Montana. 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/
