Hello everyone On Tue, Mar 12, 2013 at 3:06 PM, Krimel <[email protected]> wrote: > Dan: > I have no preconception of Dynamic Quality. I think that is the point. > As I said, it seemed as if you were equating irrationality with Dynamic > Quality. Now my hunch is confirmed. Thank you. I don't think that is an > altogether good move but perhaps you have other insights to offer that might > alleviate my concerns. I am open to discussing them if you are. > > How is irrationality the same as pre-intellectual awareness? Isn't > irrationality cognition without rationality? Are you using the term as more > of an intuitive way of thinking? > > [Krimel] > Irrational: > This mean not rational. It comes to mean a process for arriving at answers > that does not employ reason. > The irrational is the continuous flux of sense, emotion, memory, and habit. > It is expressed in our habits, our biases, our default expectations. It is > in the judgments we act on driven by dim apprehensions of we know not what. > It is manifest in what we feel and what we do. It is the primary mode of the > romantic, the artist, the poet, the mystic and the madman.
Dan: I found this in The Guidebook to ZMM; perhaps it might be relevant here: "Two things that intuitionists frequently say about intuition are worth singling out here, because they have special relevance to ZMM's epistemological insights. One is that intuition is a sort of "inside" knowledge, a knowledge had by a sort of sympathetic entry into the thing known rather than by an external examination; a kind of knowledge by identity rather than by confrontation. This is the idea of intuition that you can find in the writings of Henri Bergson (1859-1941), who described intuition with phrases like "intellectual sympathy." It is also the idea of intuition that young Phaedrus encountered in the writings of Albert Einstein, who said that the universal laws of the cosmos could only be reached by "intuition, resting on sympathetic understanding of experience" (quoted in ZMM, p. 99). That idea would be carried forward in the narrator's reflections (undoubtedly inspired by, if not inherited from, Phaedrus) about the relation of Quality to caring (ZMM, pp. 25, 247). "Just as for Einstein the intuition of cosmic laws is rooted in a sympathetic understanding of experience, so for the narrator the intuition of Quality is rooted in caring about what one is seeing and doing. But for the narrator the flow goes both ways. Caring-which, you might care to note, involves both willing and feeling-is reciprocally related to Quality. The more you care in your knowing and doing, the more you see (or intuit) Quality. The more you intuit Quality, the more you care. "A person who sees Quality and feels it as he works is a person who cares. A person who cares about what he sees and does is a person who's bound to have some characteristics of Quality." (ZMM, p. 247)." [Guidebook to ZMM pg 171-172] Dan comments: A couple things stand out here: first, the role of sympathetic entry into the thing known. Dusenberry comes to mind here with his Rocky Boy Indians. Rather than playing the role of an 'objective observer' standing apart, the observer becomes one with the observation in a very real way. Second, there is a reciprocity involved as well. Not only does the observer come to care very deeply about the observation, the reverse is true as well. Remember how the Indians always described Dusenberry as a GOOD man, emphasis on good. I think the artist (and that includes all the arts) delves so deeply into their art that they become the art, that is, if they are GOOD artists. The caring is such that art not only informs them but becomes them: a Van Gogh, for example, or a Cezanne. Picasso's work is instantly recognizable The question then becomes: how does this relate to the MOQ, specifically to Dynamic Quality and static quality? I would say in essence there is no separation between the two. If a person is too static they become stuck. If they are too Dynamic they become lost. By striking a balance, by using not only rationality but intuition as well, a person, especially an artist, can bring into being something new and yet still grounded in the old. I have reservations about intuition as Dynamic Quality, however. Rather, I think it is knowledge outside the bounds of rationality. Does intuition bring us closer to Dynamic Quality? Perhaps it is the first move away from pre-intellectual awareness. David Morey posted a paper that seems pertinent. I don't know if you have seen it: http://www.thersa.org/action-research-centre/social-brain/reports/the-divided-brain David said something like the right side of the brain being Dynamic while the left side is static. I hesitate to say as much. Rather, it would seem intuitive might be a better label to to hang on the right side. >[Krimel] > That's how I put a thread or two over. On reflection I wouldn't make too > much of the word judgment which does seem out of place. But basically > something like that. In fact I could use some assistance in working that > part out. Perhaps habits or drives would be better. Dan: I guess it depends. Habits seems too static unless it has to do with caring. This artistic drive some folk feel is quite likely a response to Dynamic Quality but I don't know if we can say it is Dynamic Quality itself. I think Robert Pirsig says something like some artists have to create art; if they don't they go crazy. In that regard, the drive we feel to create art is a response to something we cannot name, something that is hidden from us and yet is always there pushing us. > > [Krimel] >> Have you defined >> DQ so rigidly that you are certain what is and what is not the proper >> way to speak of it? > > Dan: > I feel I have been consistent over the years with not defining Dynamic > Quality in any way. We can say what it is not, but as soon as we say what it > is, we have effectively encapsulated it into static patterns. > > [Krimel] > Perhaps, but I am not sure how saying what something is not escapes being a > definition. It is about like saying what something is, it just takes longer. > But think of it this way, when Pirsig say that DQ IS the pre-intellectual > cutting edge of reality I don't think he means this as exhaustive account of > what the "pre-intellectual" is. So while I understand your reservations with > identifying DQ with the irrational, I think see fewer problems with claiming > that the pre-intellectual is irrational. Dan: I think he uses terms like 'pre-intellectual' and 'cutting edge of experience' to point to that which cannot be defined. In my opinion, we should take care not to begin intellectualizing Dynamic Quality into something we think it is by defining it. He did so in an effort to point at it, to use experience as the beginning point of the MOQ. In essence, I suppose there isn't really a problem saying Dynamic Quality is irrational. However, some of the negative connotations of irrationality might mislead those who have yet to familiarize themselves with the MOQ. They might think: oh, only mad people and crazy folk can fathom what Robert Pirsig is saying. Or perhaps I am on about nothing. I don't know. Thank you, Dan http://www.danglover.com 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
