Marsha, why you feel the need to repeat the same quote yet again is just a display of social patterns involving you and Dave. It takes two, but you can see (even without Horse's hint) that this is tiresome.
Stick to your point : despite the fact that we agree that Pirsig's moq IS a natural extension to mainstream, American, radical empirical, pragmatism, AND it has strong mahajanan Buddhist element, it was NOT Pirsig's original intent for it to be part of any particular philosophic / philosophilogical tradition. Despite it not being his original intent, he and we can all see that it's promotion into current mainstream philosophical academe benefits by association with a credible existing school. YOUR FEAR is that this promotion into the "conventional" mainstream may be at the cost of losing the more dynamic Buddhist elements. You fear moq becoming a static social pattern Sent from my iPhone On 8 Mar 2011, at 07:44, MarshaV <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Mar 7, 2011, at 10:00 PM, david buchanan wrote: > >> >> Marsha said: >> Seems that in October 2005, RMP decided to clarify his position. >> >> dmb says: >> Not at all. Pirsig was summarizing the MOQ in 2005 and the part you posted >> only repeats what he'd already said in the opening pages of chapter 26 in >> Lila. There he explains the similarities between his ideas and James's were >> pointed out by a reviewer only AFTER his first book was published. > >> "A review of his book in the Harvard Educational Review had said that his >> idea of truth was the same as James. The London Times said he was a follower >> of Aristotle. Psychology today said he was a follower of Hegel. If everyone >> was right he had certainly achieved a remarkable synthesis. But the >> comparison with James interested him most because it looked like there might >> be something to it. > >> It was also very good philosophological news. James is usually considered a >> very solid mainstream American philosopher, whereas Phaedrus first book had >> ofter been described as a 'cult' book. He had a feeling that people who used >> that term WISHED it was a cult book and would go away like a cult book, >> perhaps because it was interfering with some philosophological cultism of >> their own. But if philosophologists were willing to accept the idea that the >> MOQ is an offshoot of James' work, then that 'cult' charge was shattered. >> And this was good political news in a field where politics is a big factor. > >> In his undergraduate days Phaedrus had given James very short shrift... " >> (324) > > > Marsha: > > RMP is an American, and a metaphysics is a branch of philosophy, that alone > would make the MoQ "a continuation of the mainstream of twentieth century > American philosophy, ..." I agree that the MoQ is radically empirical and > pragmatic, and that there are many similarities between the MoQ and James's > writing, but so are there also like similarities between the MoQ and Mahayana > Buddhism. I agree that RMP wrote about some of the MoQ's similarities with > James in LILA. My point is that in October 2005, long after the publication > of Lila, in a paper representing a summary of the MoQ, RMP clarified his > position by writing most succinctly that "The Metaphysics of Quality is not > intended to be within any philosophic tradition, ..." Further into the > paragraph he offered his reason: "The Metaphysics of Quality's central idea > that the world is nothing but value is not part of any philosophic tradition, > ..." > > Again I offer RMP's 2005 statement for your consideration: > > "The Metaphysics of Quality is not intended to be within any philosophic > tradition, although obviously it was not written in a vacuum. My first > awareness that it resembled James' work came from a magazine review long > after “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” was published. The > Metaphysics of Quality's central idea that the world is nothing but value is > not part of any philosophic tradition that I know of. I have proposed it > because it seems to me that when you look into it carefully it makes more > sense than all the other things the world is supposed to be composed of. One > particular strength lies in its applicability to quantum physics, where > substance has been dismissed but nothing except arcane mathematical formulae > has really replaced it." > (A brief summary of the Metaphysics of Quality, October 2005) > > > > > > > > > > > ___ > > > 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 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
