Ron, But the reason (SOMist intellectual artefact) at the start of your piece is a different "reason" entirely from the expanded reason at the end ... despite you (and I) happily using the same word.
Ian On Fri, Mar 8, 2013 at 4:10 PM, X Acto <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > [Robert Pirsig] > I think, furthermore, that all his metaphysical mountain climbing did > absolutely nothing to further either our understanding of what Quality is or > of what the Tao is. Not a thing. > That sounds like an overwhelming rejection of what he thought and said, but > it isn't. I think it's a statement he would have agreed with himself, since > any description of Quality is a kind of definition and must therefore fall > short of its mark. I think he might even have said that statements of the > kind he had made, which fall short of their mark, are even worse than no > statement at all, since they can be easily mistaken for truth and thus > retard an understanding of Quality. > No, he did nothing for Quality or the Tao. What benefited was reason. He > showed a way by which reason may be expanded to include elements that have > previously been unassimilable and thus have been considered irrational. > > [Krimel] > Notice that refrain? Yet some are convinced that after doing nothing for the > Tao in his first book, Pirsig wrote a second to demolish it. > > I think not. I think he proceeds in order to benefit reason, or as James > would put it conceptualization. That is, chopping the world into measurable > parts. But he reiterates in Lila no metaphysics can to anything for the Tao. > Not a thing. > > As he points out we are overwhelmed by "irrational elements crying for > assimilation." This is an important point amplified by Dan Ariely and the > behavioral economists. We are at our core irrational. But irrational does > not mean incoherent or even incorrect. It means other than rational; > nonalgorithic. We do not navigate our lives with reason. Reason itself > emerges as an artifact, as a technique, as a process for assimilating the > irrational. But reason does nothing for the Tao, or for Quality. Not a > thing. > > [Ron sez] > I have to disagree with that and here is why: > Although reason is indeed an artifact and comes posterior in experience it is > also > helpful to see it as an evolutionary extension in the navigation of our > lives. reason > improves our lives, it makes them better. Therefore it most certainly improves > the tao. > Rendering the unintelligible intelligible was considered the operation of the > divine > by the ancient Greeks and infered (to them) a hint at the nature of the > dynamic. > The arguement was not about if something "is" or "is not" but rather what held > the most meaning in experience. > > The question to ask, when we inquire into whether or not reason does anything > for Quality is this: What does it mean to live a "good" life? > > In the end I think this becomes the point and conclusion of Pirsigs aim, he > improves > Quality by expanding and clarifying reason. Or why else get involved. > > > > > .. > 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
