Krimel:
> [Krimel] > My point, restated goes something like this. The MoQ as I read it was never > aimed at a technical audience of any kind. It was a mass marketed attempt > to > raise a few philosophical issues. Turning it into a formal system with > technical jargon seems at odds with that. > > John: I agree completely. > I have repeated complained about, for example, Pirsig's choice of the term > Quality. He uses it to mark the undefined but in so doing he uses a term > loaded with denotations and connotations which we are supposed to set > aside. > But we don't; we can't. So in effect the term has a special technical > meaning within the MoQ but the net effect is mere ambiguity. > > John: I agree again, and wrestling with the issues of ambiguity in the way we use Quality, was a big bug-a-boo of mine for a while. And then I figured it out. (on my own, no thanks to you guys) The only problem with your classification is your pejorative "mere". I'd consider the net effect a GOOD ambiguity. This is a case of a necessary ambiguity that produces meaning - that keep the dialog going and evolving. Ambiguity that creates transcendance - along the lines of the "I AM" forms of labeling/marketing. Where a non-ambiguously defined meaning would lend itself more to that intellectual encapsulation that everybody craves, it would actually be destructive of the central idea of the MoQ, eh? > The term "dynamic" fairs much worse, especially in the hands of many of > Pirsig's interpreters. The whole AWGI school seems to think the term means > something wonderful and magical. It is always something "good" or "better", > something to relish like serendipitous snatches of melody floating through > an open window and arresting our steps. But in common usage "dynamic" means > fluid and changing, something unpredictable and often disastrous. Here I > think the common usage is far more accurate than the imagined technical > meaning. > John: Here I think there is a two-fold path. Subjectively, DQ is usually a bad, a disaster. We get strongly statically attached to what is. But objectively, from a distance or over time, it's seen as good. A flood spreads nutrients and volcanoes bring life and minerals to the soil. It certainly doesn't seem good to a drowned or burned village. The MoQ stresses the positive aspects of DQ - takes the objective side of the debate or dichotomy, because it's plainly GOOD to do so - that is, interpreting DQ as positive, has a pragmatically useful orientation for the subject. Interpreting DQ chaotically, does not. At least that I can see. > > But the larger issue is the problem of developing a metaphysics of the > undefined rooted in precise technical meanings. There is something creepily > oxymoronic in that. > > "There is something profoundly deep in that." Is what I'd say. Do you prefer profound deepness or oxy-moronism? Don't answer. I already know. John 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/md/archives.html
