djh said to Arlo:
Well I can join you in condemning the 'narrow' point of view that morality is
simply 'rejecting patterns'. There is also a whole other aspect of morality
called 'maintaining patterns'. I disagree with you though that rejection
without creation is immoral. For starters how could anything be moral if an
original rejection (without there yet being any creation) be immoral? Dynamic
Quality which by definition is not static quality, could be described as a
rejection of static patterns. RMP goes so far as to call static quality evil
from a Dynamic morality perspective. I think *both* qualities are necessary.
dmb says:
DQ could be described as a rejection of static patterns?! No, Dave. That's just
another way to express the narrow (and incorrect) view that morality is simply
a matter of rejecting patterns. It totally depends what patterns you're talking
and the reasons for that rejection. Pirsig spends several chapters explaining
how fascism is a rejection of intellectual quality in favor of the
glorification of social values. By your reckoning, this means Hitler was acting
morally. Granted, it's not always easy to distinguish the degenerates from the
agents of evolution but the difference between them could hardly be more
important. That's why it's so crucial to acknowledge the qualification
contained in the quote you're using for support, contained in the quote that
you're using to construe static patterns as evil. Again, it isn't simply that
static patterns are inherently evil or that they always need to be killed. I'd
even go so far as to say that is a rather ham-handed reading. (This w
ill result in Marsha's poisonous type of anti-intellectualism, of course.)
Static pattens are supposed to preserve the evolutionary advances of the past
and we build them up so that each generation doesn't have to begin all over
again as prehistoric cave dwellers. But static patterns CAN become a problem,
do sometimes stand in the way of further evolution or progress. The problem is
not static quality as such but rather, "any pattern of one-sided fixed values
that tries to contain and kill the ongoing free force of life". See what he did
there? There is no evil in stability as such. In fact, stability is "absolutely
essential" to the overall evolutionary process. It makes sense to reject those
"one-sided fixed values" if and when they prevent growth and evolution. That
was the case with the titular mechanic, whose whole operation was shut down by
a torn slot in a screw. Totally stuck. That was the case with the titular crazy
lady too. Lila is quite screwed too and totally stuck. These are the moments
for static pattern killing. This is the kind of s
ituation wherein some emptying out, some meditation, a big vacation makes
sense.
Again, protecting the ongoing evolutionary process is the basic principle
behind all of the MOQ's moral codes. ALL OF THEM. It's a morality that protects
the possibility of betterness at every level. This same evolutionary principle
also demands a balance between order and freedom, between the static and the
Dynamic. The point of all this is to protect "the ongoing free force of life."
There are also situations wherein there is too much freedom, a lack of
stability, and this harms the evolutionary process too. To simply reject static
pattens as evil invites way too much freedom. It is totally degenerate to
reject static values simply because they are static. That's just running away
from the problem. That's just working your way around the problem. It's just an
evasion, a cop out. It's just vandalism, not growth or enlightenment. Criminals
and Saints might look the same from a disenchanted SOM point of view but the
MOQ has a long running theme on the contrarians. This is supp
osed to show WHY both freedom and order are "absolutely essential", see?
Chaos is not the same thing as freedom, of course, and stability is not
equivalent to stagnation. I mean, this evolutionary process is not well served
by neglecting or over-inflating the role of either side. It's a balancing act,
like the pragmatic theory of truth. This is not a fixed and eternal truth or an
exclusive singular Truth. It's just the best intellectual quality until it
isn't anymore. These patterns are supposed to be stable but not permanent or
exclusive. Because pragmatic truth is provisional and open to multiple
perspectives, it's open to improvements and otherwise precludes rigidity. This
is only consistent with the overall evolutionary structure of the MOQ.
"As to which is more important, Dynamic or static, both are absolutely
essential, even when they are in conflict. As stated in LILA, without Dynamic
Quality an organism cannot grow. But without static quality an organism cannot
last. Dynamic liberals and radicals need conservatives to keep them from making
a mess of the world through unneeded change. Conservatives also need liberals
and radicals to keep them from making a mess of the world through unneeded
stagnation. This also holds true for philosophy." -- Robert Pirsig
Pirsig is not simply contradicting himself in the quote you're using for
support, David. The quote above and the quote below both make sense within the
MOQ - so long as you properly acknowledge that qualification at the end...
"Dynamic Quality is the pre-intellectual cutting edge of reality, the source of
all things, completely simple and always new. It was the moral force that had
motivated the brujo in Zuni. It contains no pattern of fixed rewards and
punishments. Its only perceived good is freedom and its only perceived evil is
static quality itself - any pattern of one-sided fixed values that tries to
contain and kill the ongoing free force of life."
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