dmb said to Steve:
...Anyway, ... a reasonable person should conclude that I'm talking about human
morality, and not about rocks or atoms. In effect, you're criticizing my
comments for being limited to the actual topic, namely empathy, the thing that
sociopathic personalities do not have.
Steve replied:
I'm not criticizing your comments at all. When people talk about morality they
generally want to draw a distinction between behavior motivated by empathy and
behavior that is motivated by personal self interest where the former is moral
and the latter is prudence. My point is that the MOQ does not allow for this
usual distinction (or does not make it in the usual way) because _everything_
is moral behavior in the MOQ. What we have are different types of
morality--different sets of moral codes--rather than morality as something
distinct from the lack of morality.
dmb says:
The MOQ doesn't allow for this usual distinction because morality goes all the
way down? Well, if I follow your reasoning, you're saying that empathy can't be
the basis of morality at the inorganic level. You're just saying that empathy
can't be pushed all the way down. Okay, but, again, the topic was anti-social
personality disorders and so, obviously, my claim was made in the context of
discussing human morality and the lack thereof. As you might recall from
previous conversations, we already discussed the capacity to follow DQ, the
capacity to choose, to express preferences, to move toward "betterness" in the
MOQ's larger framework, which does push morality all the way down. As I pointed
out in those posts, Pirsig gives us that full picture right there in the same
passage where we find his reformulation of the free will/determinism dilemma. I
mean, we have talked about that and we can talk about that, but to interject it
at this juncture is really just changing the subject
to something other than abnormal human psychology.
dmb said to Steve:
Yea, let's get rid of all those advocates of natural law and divine command.
They're drowning out the MOQ and they have to be stopped. But seriously,...
Steve replied:
You seem to be getting defensive here for reasons unknown to me.
dmb says:
Defensive? No, I'm just ribbing you because I've never seen any posters
advocating natural law or divine command. It's a pointed joke. I was trying to
use humor to point out that there is no reason to defend the MOQ from such
views.
Steve:
Yes, but the point I was making is that you claimed that empathy is the basis
for morality. I agree (though I think modifiability can also serve as the
starting point for assigning moral responsibility), but the MOQ seems to
disagree. In the MOQ, nothing can be the basis for morality since morality is
the basis of everything.
dmb says:
Again, you have to change the subject and take my claim out of context in order
to disagree with it. That's silly and unreasonable. If the claim is put back
into context and the subject isn't changed to something much larger than
anti-social personalities, then my claim is obvious and you don't even disagree
with it anyway. AND, isn't that last line just the kind of thing that gives
sophistry a bad name? I mean, we are talking about the forms of mental illness
that preclude people from having the capacity to empathize with other people.
To say that empathy is the basis of morality in that context only means that
you can't have human morality without it. But you've expanded the claim beyond
it's context so that it becomes a claim about the basis of everything, about
metaphysical foundations or some such thing. Thus you want me to explain how
empathy can be pushed all the way down at the level of rocks and trees. Again,
my claim was never meant to be that broad, and hopefully y
ou remember that we already covered that larger topic in recent weeks.
I'm thinking that "betterness" is sufficiently vague for the MOQ's morality to
be pushed all the way down to even the inorganic level, and that's exactly what
Pirsig does in concluding the section where he reformulated the old free will
dilemma. But he also makes plenty of distinctions between the levels of
morality, talks quite a lot about how each these levels has it's own version of
what "betterness" can mean, how these levels are even in conflict with each
other. I mean, we can rightly talk about specifically human levels of morality
and the role that empathy plays without undoing or undermining the larger
unifying scheme. There's no contradiction. It's just a matter of being specific
and practical on the one hand (anti-social personality disorders) or broadly
metaphysical and abstract (the MOQ's structure) on the other.
Steve said:
True, [care is an essential ingredient for Pirsig] but Pirsig did not explicate
a place for empathy in the MOQ. It is not a central term in his philosophical
system.
dmb says:
That sort of argument strikes me as wildly disingenuous. If there ever was a
theory of interpretation that said we are limited to the specific terms and
explicit statements, it would have produced some pretty worthless readings. As
if all Pirsig's talk about caring and identifying with one's work couldn't
possibly have anything to do with empathy. Come on, you can't really believe
that. That would take rigid thinking to a whole new level of silly. Like I
said, "I can't even imagine how the MOQ's moral vision could be incompatible
with human empathy. ... It is easy to justify intellectually and all the great
spiritual leaders have held it as centrally important. It reaches across and
transcends the levels. Do unto others. It's the golden rule wherever you go.
Can you think of any GOOD reason why the MOQ would be inconsistent with that?"
Steve replied:
What is interesting to me once again is that despite the fact that "all the
great spiritual leaders have held it as centrally important" in discussing
morality, Pirsig does not talk about empathy, compassion, and love to explain
morality.
dmb says:
That's just because Pirsig is a philosopher and not a writer of Hallmark cards.
Obvious platitudes don't need a metaphysical framework. I mean, Pirsig doesn't
offer any personal hygiene tips either. By your reasoning, the MOQ has no place
for brushing your teeth. Maybe I'm missing your point. But this sort of
criticism seems, um, ...unserious.
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