Dave T. asked dmb:
A cloud is ever changing but it is stable enough a pattern for most sane people
to acknowledge they're there. Let's try a tree. Even though it is pretty still,
the leaves and branches on one I'm looking at now are gently moving. Would you
please name for me just one of these so called "static patterns" that does not
physically change position moment to moment over time?
dmb says:
Your question assumes that static patterns are not static when they involve
physical movement. But physical motion and Dynamic Quality are not the same
thing. Pirsig pointed that out in response to a question at least once, I'm
sure of it. And it only stands to reason. The earth's rotation and orbit are
both static patterns. Stability does not mean a lack of movement. For
biological creatures, a lack of movement means death. The MOQ is, among other
things, a kind of process philosophy and this is perfectly compatible with
static patterns and stable structures because that's exactly what exists AS a
process. Mountains rise and are worn away. Stars are born and eventually die.
But they will still appear as symbols of solid ground and eternal promise in
our poetry. And rightly so. Millions or billions of years of existence is
enough stability for any human purpose.
Dave T asked:
How is it that "ever-changing" is a such a problem? Oh I know Pirsig
attributes all change to Dynamic Quality: Could it be that he was/is wrong? Not
if you fancy yourself to be a MoQ priest.
dmb says:
Well, yea. That's the problem. Ever-changing is a great term if you're talking
about DQ, but Marsha is using it to describe the opposite term.
I'd guess she means to say that static patterns are "changeable" or "mutable",
not EVER-changing. I'd guess she really just wants to deny that static patterns
are fixed or eternal, that they are subject to change, that they can evolve and
that sort of thing. But this is described as static latching. It's a step by
step, clicking sort of analogy because novel improvements are built on previous
improvements. We need the quality of order and stability to continue ratcheting
up. That's what Pirsig means when he says you can't live on DQ alone. Without
the stability of static patterns, you don't get freedom. You just get chaos and
degeneration.
And Marsha''s definition is not only contradictory, it also turns the stable
half of the MOQ into the ever-changing half. You get DQ on one side and
ever-changing impermanence on the other. And the result is pure chaos. It's
vacuous nihilism.
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
