Hi dmb, Thanks for the exposition, I think I get what you are saying. Marsha likes to set traps, and I enjoy watching you sidestep them. If there was some depth to her comments, then I might find her destructive. As it is, however, those posts are just taunting sound bites laced with cyanide. If she were to present a well thought out rationale for the importance of relativism, perhaps it would be different. All we get are quotes, and something about patterns that everchange. Sounds like the 60's to me.
Yes, as I understand Pirsig's presentation, Plato wanted to have a firm stake in the ground by which everything else could be relatively measured. Personally, I do not think Socrates would have said the things ascribed to him by Plato. Plato used his name to get credibility. Socrates did not write anything. He may have been concerned that his rhetoric would be taken as Truth. Many great philosophers did not write any dogma. Solomon, Buddha, Jesus, for example. This was because provisional rhetoric was more important than the actual words used. The same thing can be said in many ways, and the context is more important than the actual words. Each audience and setting would require different words. I will check Granger out, thanks. Mark On Nov 21, 2011, at 12:59 PM, david buchanan <[email protected]> wrote: > > Mark and all MOQers: > > Mark said to dmb: > I wouldn't take Marsha too seriously. ...Yes, Relativism is akin to Nihilism > the way it is used by some in this forum. It is indeed the antithesis of > Quality. As Marsha implies in her cat and mouse game, Quality must come from > relativism. That is, something must be better than something else. ...To say > that "the Good" is relative creates an absolute truth which must be used to > measure it. Quality itself is not an absolute truth, but an analogy for a > divine ground (no religiosity intended). ...It is hard to escape from the > "linear" relativistic view of the world since our education is based on such > a notion. If one submits Quality to the Western equations of reality, > everything must be compared. > > > > dmb says: > > I don't think there's any danger of taking Marsha too seriously but I do take > the problem of relativism seriously. It's hard to tell what she means by it, > especially since she seems to ascribe it to anyone who uses the word > "relative" or "relatively". Apparently, she thinks relativism is anything > that involves comparisons or relations or any truth that isn't eternally > fixed. It's not clear what she thinks she's defending. It's definitely weird > to treat "relativism" as if it were a good thing or a label to be worn > proudly. > > I want to press the fact that the charge of "relativism" plays a crucial role > in the ancient struggle between Plato and the Sophists. As Pirsig tells the > story, the Sophists were accused of relativism by Plato and Pirsig says this > accusation is just mean and vicious slander. Disputing that charge and > otherwise taking up the long-lost cause of the Sophists is the main point of > this part of the story. Remember when Phaedrus and the other grad students at > the University of Chicago were assigned Plato's Gorgias? > > "Socrates recognizes the potential force of sophistical rhetoric, and he is > concerned that if the goal of rhetoric is simply to persuade people about a > certain vision of 'the good', it might be used to appeal to the emotions > instead of to reason - in a manner that will lead the polis away from 'true > knowledge', rather than toward it. The most powerful element in society would > then be free to control the way the good is defined and embodied in that > society's laws. In short, the sophist's rhetoric could be used to promote the > most robust and destructive sort of relativism, one where the good is > determined by little more than the accidents of power and convention. > Socrates thus finds it necessary to silence Gorgias in short order and, as > 'Phaedrus' saw it, turn Gorgias's rhetorical art into an object that he can > then cut to pieces with his well-honed analytic knife." (David Granger, "John > Dewey, Robert Pirsig and the Art of Living", 46) > > Please notice how Granger is using the word "relativism" here. He's talking > about the kind of relativism with which the Sophists were charged and he > describes it as "the most robust and destructive sort of relativism, one > where the good is determined by little more than the accidents of power and > convention.". Granger is talking about the problem of relativism in ZAMM as > it relates to Plato's vicious slander but we also see very similar complaints > about 20th century relativism in Lila. > > In chapter 22 of Lila, Pirsig tells us about "twentieth century relativists" > like Franz Boas. "Cultural relativists held that it is unscientific to > interpret values" because "cultures are unique historical patterns which > contain their own values and cannot be judged in terms of the values of other > cultures. The cultural relativists, backed by Boas's doctrines of scientific > empiricism", Pirsig says, "became popular because it was a ferocious > instrument for the dominance of intellect over society" and because it was a > good weapon against Victorian prejudice toward other cultures. The problem, > as we all know by now, "is that subject-object science has no provision for > morals. Subject-object science is only concerned with facts. Morals have no > objective reality. ...From the perspective of a subject-object science, the > world is a completely purposeless, valueless place. There is no point in > anything. Nothing is right and nothing is wrong. Everything just functions, > like machine ry > ." > > Now, obviously, Plato and Boas are separated by a language, an ocean and a > couple dozen centuries and yet we find that both of them assert that "the > truth" has nothing to do with people's feelings and opinions. True knowledge > isn't about emotions or the accidents of power and convention, the ancient > dialecticians said. Morals and values have no objective reality, the 20th > century scientists said, they're just unique historical patterns that are > scientifically meaningless and about which we can make no judgements. These > ancients and moderns have very different ideas about truth. They even come > from the two main rival schools in philosophy; rationalism and empiricism. > And yet they both have this idea that the truth is separate from everyday > experience and common sense opinions. They both take the view that reality is > distinct from appearance and can only be accessed by specialists like > themselves. > > > "Universal law would becomes the order of the day, while the claims of > appearance and opinion - issuances from the realm of the Good or the realm of > Quality - would now be treated with great suspicion. It must have been here > then, concluded 'Phaedrus', that 'the classic mind, for the first time, took > leave of its romantic origins and said, 'The Good and the True are not > necessarily the same'. This meant that Quality and the commonplace world > would no longer be trusted as the primary means of establishing the True. The > old mythos was replaced by a new one as the veracity of everyday lived > experience was made dubious and the primacy of abstract universals began to > take root." (David Granger 47) > > "It is not hard to understand why Phaedrus had identified so strongly with > the plight of the sophists. Their defeat at the hands of the dialecticians > was also his own. For they both fought to uphold the idea that truth is a > species of the good, "a static intellectual pattern WITHIN a larger entity > called Quality', as Pirsig puts it (Lila 364). Additionally, they believed > that reason is not 'value free', but rather logically subordinate to the good > as a function of the overarching Quality (ZMM 323)." (Granger 48) > > > Fighting to uphold the idea that truth is an intellectual species of the good > is to fight AGAINST charges of relativism, against Platonism, against > scientific objectivity, against the appearance-reality distinction and > against excessive abstractionism of any kind. To say the MOQ supports > relativism is to repeat Plato's slander or even to take sides with the kind > of value-free objectivity that says morals and values are meaningless > expressions of emotion or mere accidents of history. To say the MOQ is a form > of relativism is to repeat the Absolutist's slander against James too, who > originally said that "truth is a species of the good". Calling Pirsig a > relativist is not only philosophically incorrect and inconsistent with the > drama of the story, it's also kind of insulting. > > > > > 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
