Hi dmb, > David Harding said to Dan: > ...The first thing is that when Pirsig claims that 'freedom doesn't mean > anything' I think that he is merely pointing to the fact that it isn't what > 'light's people's eyes up' when they talk about it. To support this in the > next sentence he writes… "The real reason it's so hallowed is that when > people talk about it they mean Dynamic Quality." So Pirsig is not claiming > that people in the West don't experience Freedom. Or that literally freedom > isn't anything. He is saying that in the West we don't always experience the > DQ that *can* go with freedom. In other words he is pointing out that > freedom and DQ are not the same. > > Dan replied to David Harding: > Interesting. I get the opposite impression. While I am sure Robert Pirsig > doesn't mean to pigeon-hole Dynamic Quality as freedom reading Lila I get the > impression they are analogous. Here are but two quotes: > > "Although Dynamic Quality, the Quality of freedom, creates this world in > which we live, these patterns of static quality, the quality of order, > preserve our world. Neither static nor Dynamic Quality can survive without > the other." "What the Dynamic force had to invent in order to move up the > molecular level and stay there was a carbon molecule that would preserve its > limited Dynamic freedom from inorganic laws and at the same time resist > deterioration back to simple compounds of carbon again." > > > dmb says: > Excuse me for butting in, gents. I realize that your conversation has been > going on for quite a while but I want to comment on this particular part of > your exchange because it seems so crucial. It's a very key point, I think. > > I think it might be useful to think about the distinction between negative > and positive political freedom. John Dewey, who is a pragmatist and a radical > empiricist like Pirsig, employed this distinction but it's widely used. > Negative freedom is basically just freedom from restraint, where you are > "free" to do those things that are not prohibited. You are free in the sense > that nobody will try to stop you. Positive freedom goes well beyond this and > says that real freedom is being the author of your life, of exercising real > options and this is not only an achievement, something hard-won by the person > who achieves it, it also requires a complex social infrastructure. Positive > freedom can only be achieved where there is safety, health, education, and > all the other things that it takes for a person to be prepared for freedom.
There is value in this distinction dmb. However, as you'll agree they are both a static quality cultural distinction. Not only have Dan and I been speaking of being free from some particular type of static quality such as social repression, but also we have been talking about being free from static quality patterns as a whole.. > Nobody is stopping me from writing a novel, for example. There are not laws > that would prohibit me. But am I really free to do so if I don't learn how to > read and write? And realistically, won't I need some higher education well > beyond that? If I were a rare genius with loads of innate talent, maybe I > could write something worthy of the name "novel" without years of training > but, one way or another, it takes a lot of hard work and discipline to be > free in this sense. That's right. What about sitting in a room? There are few places in the world which stop you from spending, 20 minutes each morning, from sitting in a room. Or mastering the work required of you no matter where you are in the world. Through this mastery, an entirely different kind of freedom can be found. One not related to the static patterns of a particular culture but of being free from all static quality patterns.. > And I think Pirsig (and Dewey) is saying that positive freedom is the kind > that's really worth having. Certainly the more freedom a particular culture allows, the better. However I think there is a lot more to what Pirsig says about freedom in Lila than just this point. He claims that true freedom is not to be found by constantly doing something else, or constantly culturally redefining what is required to achieve it.. But through mastery of patterns so they no longer grate.. Here's the quote which you give me below but which we interpret very differently.. "'Zen monks' daily life is nothing but on ritual after another. Hour after hour, day after day, all his life. They don't tell him to shatter those static patterns to discover the unwritten Dharma, they want him to get those patterns perfect. The explanation for this contradiction is the belief that you do not free yourself from static patterns by fighting them with other contrary static patterns. That is sometimes called 'bad karma chasing its tail.' You free yourself from static patterns by putting them to sleep. That is, you MASTER them with such proficiency that they become an unconscious part of your nature. You get so used to them you completely forget them and they are gone. There in the center of the most monotonous boredom of static ritualistic patterns the Dynamic freedom is found." This quote is about mastery not about the dangers of 'killing' static patterns. In fact, I read it that this quote is about actually killing them.. Killing doesn't mean devaluing though. It means 'getting so used to them you completely forget them and they're gone'. This is what Pirsig means where he writes the following: "When early Western investigators first read the Buddhist texts they too interpreted nirvana as some kind of suicide. There's a famous poem that goes: While living, Be a dead man. Be completely dead, And then do as you please. And all will be well. It sounds like something from a Hollywood horror-film but it's about nirvana. The Metaphysics of Quality translates it: While sustaining biological and social patterns Kill all intellectual patterns. Kill them completely And then follow Dynamic Quality And morality will be served." Now how do we 'kill' intellectual patterns? As the quote you provided and I provided above shows, we kill them by "mastering them with such proficiency that they become an unconscious part of your nature. You get so used to them you completely forget them and they are gone. There in the center of the most monotonous boredom of static ritualistic patterns the Dynamic freedom is found." > On this view, we don't want freedom FROM static patterns because they > "preserve our world" and had to be invented "in order to move up". "Neither > static nor Dynamic Quality can survive without the other," Pirsig says. If > Dynamic advances are not latched, preserved as static patterns, that advance > will be lost. If static patterns are so rigid as to preclude further advances > through Dynamic Quality, nothing can change or grow or evolve further. Yes I agree with this. And this is why the culturally determined freedom you describe above is valuable. It prevents a culture from getting 'stuck'. > To reject static patterns as a prison, as something that ought to be > "killed", is to embrace chaos and degeneracy. Couldn't disagree more - as the quotes above explain - killing static quality intellectual patterns is valuable. As the quotes above explain, we can 'kill' those intellectual patterns by mastery.. > "Zen monks' daily life is nothing but on ritual after another. Hour after > hour, day after day, all his life. They don't tell him to shatter those > static patterns to discover the unwritten Dharma, they want him to get those > patterns perfect. The explanation for this contradiction is the belief that > you don't free yourself from static patterns by fighting them with other > contrary static patterns, that is called bad Karma chasing its tail. You free > yourself from static patterns by putting them to sleep. That is you master > them with such proficiency, that they become an unconscious part of your > nature. You get so used to them you completely forget them and they are gone. > There at the center of the most monotonous boredom of static ritualistic > patterns, the dynamic freedom is found." (LILA 385) > > Basically, real freedom or positive freedom entails mastery and proficiency, > like the artful motorcycle mechanic. A creative solution is going to be found > by the ones who've mastered the machine, the tools and the materials, not by > some careless hack with no experience. I agree with that however that is an entirely different kind of freedom than the two types you describe above which are culturally determined.. Thanks dmb, -David. 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
