Ant McWatt said to Mr Thomas & Mr Buchanan:
... Firstly, though Strawson is largely dismissive of LILA and Pirsig ("like
some nut hanging out at your local library..."), he did conclude by saying that
he might be wrong about the MOQ.
Secondly, my own take with Strawson, Dennett, Rorty (RIP) et al is that they
are/were too involved - at their stages of career - with promoting their own
philosophical "rides" / "pet projects". If they admitted the MOQ had value
then - due to the latter's radical differences with Cartesian based Western
philosophy - they would have had to throw out decades worth of work. I could
see only a very open minded, intellectually strong character do that. And,
anyway, I don't think such a change of mind is necessary with these SOM
dinosaurs as younger academics such as Andrew Sneddon or David Granger have
their own ideas which will become established in their own time on the
international "scene".
dmb says:
That's right. Not only are there two Ph.D. dissertations and two Masters theses
specifically about Pirsig's work, there are lots of scholars who fully
appreciate the pragmatism and radical empiricism of William James and John
Dewey. This basically represents agreement with Pirsig by proxy. Daniel Dennett
has adopted James's view of free-will, for example. PF Strawson has adopted
James's view on pan-experientialism. The Dali Lama's former translator is the
biggest William James fan in the world. David Scott points out that the Buddha
himself was a pragmatist and a radical empiricist just like James. Eugene
Taylor, who recently passed away, was a philosopher and an historian of
psychology at Harvard who brilliantly defended James. And I've had
conversations with lots of amateur philosophers and students of philosophy who
are perfectly capable of understanding what the pragmatists and radical
empiricist are saying. To suggest that nobody can understand is just an
ignorant thing
to say. Lots of people get it but not around here, oddly.
And there are lots of academic professionals who think Rorty can't rightly be
called a pragmatist. The pragmatist who supervised my thesis, for example,
wrote a book saying that Rorty "eviscerates" pragmatism. He comes out the
analytic school, which is very, very different in substance, style and
temperament. Ron DiSanto, the co-author of the Guidebook to Zen and the Art had
no trouble understanding Pirsig, obviously, and he had no trouble understanding
my Masters thesis either. Patrick Doorly of Oxford University is about the
publish about the MOQ and art. Michael Sexson and Charlie Pinkava, two of
newest friends, not only arranged the honorary PhD for Pirsig and organized the
Chautauqua 2012 at Montana State University, they also teach classes on
Pirsig's work.
No, the idea that nobody understands Pirsig is demonstrably false. In fact,
it's a ridiculously ignorant thing to say. You're just blaming everyone else
for your own confusion. If you want to understand it, then you have to do the
work. Period. Comprehension is not a divine gift or a raw talent. It takes time
and effort and even then you only have a chance. Without doing the work, either
formally or informally, you have no chance.
C'mon, Dave. Get real.
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