agree arlo,
i think there is a reductive trend too which runs counter to the spirit of
philosophy; it is more at home in science - but even there - as goethe would
argue - it has to be used with caution.
philosophy - the love of wisdom - is at its best when creating new concepts
which open up new ways of thinking - new directions, new interconnections.
another prob is appeals to a transcendent absolute - god, quality, tao, and
most importantly - truth; the righteousness on this list (me included)
indicates this wrong/right preoccupation (look at the thread on william james);
this is juvenile stuff and dangerous when it tries to pass itself off as
intellectual inquiry. this is how genocide ends up being legitimised.
again - although i seem to be persona non grata here and hence don't seem to
elicit many responses - dawkins heralds a historically resonant and very
disturbing trend - the rational justification of prejudice and hatred,
ironically (and it will always be this way) in the name of identifying hatred
and prejudice. the creation of enemies - adversarial dichothomies - is SOM. i
get upset because there is so much finger pointing here, so much righteousness.
i am beginning to think that pirsig's project may be dangerous. at the start of
lila he is aware of this moral transgression - which is to say danger.... or
perhaps it is more to do with us fools forgetting that we are fools, forgetting
that quality is a fiction amongst a thousand other 'planes of immanence'.
i agree with anais nin; the thing that is lacking most - what is required most
now is faith - faith in ourselves as creative works. there is an air of haughty
melancholy that haunts the intellectual atmosphere of our time - as if nihilism
were the mark of cultural sophistication.
generally we are still focussed on externals; even on this list when appeals
are made to the only true knowledge - personal experience (over abstraction) -
the charge of irrelevance is levelled. this is absurd, esp in the context of
pirsig's work.
pirsig is not the answer, nor is james, rorty, plato, or anyone; we are all
individuals ('i'm not') - and the only legitimate authority we have.
if 'the centre of gravity' is not within - not of the spirit, the soul..then we
have nihilism and despair.....
miller said:
'One has to establish the difference of his own peculiar being and in doing so
establish his kinship with the whole of humanity, even the very lowest.
Acceptance is the key word, but acceptance is precisely the great stumbling
block. It has to be total acceptance not conformity.'
this is faith. to establish your own uniqueness, to stand in it. pirsig, like
any artist or thinker worthy of the name, brings with him the double edged
sword of education and conformity; we must only use him as a bridge to get
closer to ourselves, then we need to respectfully leave him behind
(occasionally popping back into to say hello)
kierkegaard and miller both stressed the importance of the total over the
partial view - peripheral vision over narrow focus. nietzsche proposed we
approach truth as we would woo a woman - respectfully, modestly, reverentially
- in order that we might see behind the veil.
the moq is one tool among many. we do not need a new abstract monotheism (which
ironically is what quality has become here), exclusive of other 'wrong' ones;
we need to anchor our creations in the present, *repeatedly* - in the living
deity that surrounds and informs us, and that has been recognised and loved by
all indigenous cultures.
the mystery and love at the heart of everything is always apparent; we become
blind to it that is all. who has not looked into the face of a baby and felt
the sheer obviousness of this divine, total love?
.....nature is ancient but it surprises us all
miyazaki, more than anyone i know, is building the new mythology, based on
this simple and ineffable relationship of love twixt nature and ourselves -
which is to say for ourselves and each other; ponyo - a g rated film - is more
profound than anything i have seen from avante-garde filmmakers (are there any
left?) lately. society's disintegration mirrors our disconnection from the
natural world. but it is a necessary disintegration....
so what is philosophy's role then? perhaps it is to create the new concepts
that fructify and facilitate the new mythology of (middle) earth. perhaps faith
and spirit are beyond its scope, but ethics isn't! what of the ethical
implications of the radical empiricism that pirsig, james, deleuze etc espouse?
radical empiricism equalises all, since we are all fictions - everything. we
are all mutually interdependent.
further, the very thrust of this eternal process of becoming is difference.
differentiation is key; a happy man is a differentiated man, one who is
completely and utterly himself - unique and therefore authentic and therefore
functionally integrated within the whole of society and the whole of earth and
the whole of cosmos.
so we return to the ethics of permaculture i think. by caring for the planet
(ethic 1)and people (ethic 2), and by providing the fair share (ethic 3) that
is necessary for the process of individuation, we recognise and honour the
essential equality of all life *and* the essential uniqueness of each
particular of this life - a uniqueness that in the human needs to be drawn out
or allowed to unfold according to the immutable laws of the soul.
perhaps the ethics of permaculture will intertwine or fecundate the new
mythologies of earth and cosmos that will ground and orient our rudderless
epoch - perhaps this is another function of philosophy - to catalyse and
inspire these new stories that will rekindle the faith we so sorely lack, and
that finds its lack expressed in this dual denial and irrational irruption of
death that fuels our modern hysterical era.
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