Well, wait a second--what I've always taken Platt to be enunciating is the very real sense in Pirsig of what the mystic traditions articulate most explicitly: that language points away from reality (e.g., the menu analogy). If we bear that one in mind, and read Platt, then I don't think it's a very far jump to read "intellect" as "language" and "beauty" as "reality/Quality."
Platt's thesis has long been something like "beauty is reality," based on an extension of the Quality thesis. And with the idea of "Dynamic Quality [better reality--i.e. more beautiful] is the pre-intellectual cutting edge of reality," I think we can begin to see much better how Platt stands on Pirsig's shoulders. I think Steve's suspicion is right. I think Arlo's counter-evidence is also right, but I think this is a conflict within Pirsig. Matt > Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2010 13:15:30 -0500 > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [MD] Platt's Proverbs On Beauty > > Hi Arlo,m > > Thanks, that makes sense. > > Steve > > On Mon, Jan 4, 2010 at 1:13 PM, Arlo Bensinger <[email protected]> wrote: > > [Steve] > > I was thinking the same thing when I read Platt's post, but I wonder if > > Platt's take on intellect polluting beauty is consistent with some of > > Pirsig's writings nevertheless. > > > > [Arlo] > > Only if Platt had said "S/O Intellect is blind to 'beauty'". If you go back > > to ZMM, I'm sure you can even stretch that complaint to include "pollute", > > but only with the S/O qualifier (pun intended). But "intellect" > > in-and-of-itself? Nope. Intellect is Pirsig's highest order of static value. > > I doubt Pirsig would ever say that "calculus" or "quantum physics" pollutes > > beauty, indeed he'd probably say these, like symphonies, can be very > > beautiful indeed. In fact, it was "intellect" in ZMM that Pirsig was trying > > to show has been blinded by S/O perspectives, but that once those are > > removed, intellect (the assembly of rotisseries) can and SHOULD be an art > > form of the highest order. _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Trusted email with powerful SPAM protection. http://clk.atdmt.com/GBL/go/177141665/direct/01/ 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/
