Hi David B. and Group:
David B: (Post, 24 Oct.):
> In dropping the bomb, Truman failed to weigh those intellectual
> principles and values properly. He ignored the higher values either
> willfully or out of a genuine lack of knowledge. His decision was a case
> of choosing the lower level social values over the intellectual ones,
> which is a violation of Pirsig's 4th moral code.
>
> Dynamic Quality wins over static Quality ONLY when all else is
> equal. That is to say, the fifth moral code doesn't enter into it
> because the 3rd and 4th levels are not equal. But this part is as easy
> as one, two ,three. The only source of confusion on this question has to
> stem from some kind of misunderstanding of the difference between the
> 3rd and 4th levels.
Pirsig (Lila, Chap 24):
"Today we are living in an intellectual and technological paradise
and a moral and social nightmare because the intellectual level of
evolution, in its struggle to become free of the social level, has
ignored the social level's role in keeping the biological level under
control. Intellectuals have failed to understand the ocean of
biological quality that is constantly being suppressed by the social
order."
Comment:
Truman, no intellectual, understood the socio-biological nature of
total war and, contrary to David's assertion, properly weighed the
values involved before authorizing dropping the A-bomb. War is
killing people and breaking things, not an intellectual past time.
Anyone who saw "Saving Private Ryan" understands this.
In the atomic age, the U.S. policy of "mutually assured
destruction" has kept the world free of atomic bomb explosions, an
important human rights freedom if there ever was one. But, that
policy isn't based on intellectual-level rights but on biological-level
fear.
The error intellectuals often make is to believe the intellect can
solve all moral issues. They have a genuine lack of knowledge of
the crucial role played by society to keep biological values under
control, as Pirsig explains in Lila, Chapter 28--the chapter where
the differences between levels 3 and 4 are described and where the
mistaken moral ideas of some intellectuals, especial liberals, are
clearly spelled out.
Platt
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