Hi Danila:
Your wrote:
> Everyone knows that intellect belongs only to humans. That's not the
> problem. The conflict is:
> a) Maximize the number of humans (and thus the potential amount of
> intellectual DQ) BUT at the cost of loss of DQ in the biological level of
> other species--which has many consequences for humans, for example, less
> beauty and vanished historical and scientific information on the
> intellectual level (no wilderness, many extinct species), and weaker
> societies (because there is no reservoir of biological DQ to help
> agriculture). Maximizing the number of humans has negative intellectual and
> social effects.
> b) Control the number of humans in some way, and preserve existing
> species's ability to be biologically dynamic. Can this be justified in
> terms of "higher quality intellectual activity" than would exist in (a)?
You asked:
> I was thinking that MOQ is a human creation and really doesn't address the
> RIGHT of other species to be preserved to achieve DQ in their own way. Do
> we have the right to say that our intellect is more Dynamic than a
> eucalyptus tree (I'm not advocating biocentrism, I'm asking only: Does MOQ
> answer this question?).
Pirsig answers your question, �Do we have the right to say that our
intellect is more Dynamic than a eucalyptus tree?� in Chap. 13 of
Lila:
�A human being is a collection of ideas, and these ideas lake
moral precedence over a society. Ideas are patterns of value. They
are at a higher level of evolution than social patterns of value. Just
as it is more moral for a doctor to kill a germ than a patient, so it is
more moral for an idea to kill a society than it is for a society to kill
an idea.�
So yes. We have the right to say our intellect is more Dynamic
(moral) than a eucalyptus tree since the biological pattern of a tree
is even lower on the MOQ moral scale than society.
Pirsig continues:
�First, there were moral codes that established the supremacy of
biological life over inanimate nature. Second, there were moral
codes that established the supremacy of the social order over
biological life-conventional morals--proscriptions against drugs,
murder, adultery, theft and the like. Third, there were moral codes
that established the supremacy of the intellectual order over the
social order--democracy, trial by jury, freedom of speech, freedom
of the press.�
It follows that intellect (belonging only to humans) has moral
supremacy over other species. Other species have no �rights�
other than those we grant.
Then comes Pirsig�s caveat that I mentioned before and that you
previously cited, �except for the need for social stability.�
�Intellect is going its own way, and in doing so is at war with
society, seeking to subjugate society, to put society under lock and
key. An evolutionary morality says it is moral for intellect to do so,
but it also contains a warning: Just as a society that weakens its
people's physical health endangers its own stability, so does an
intellectual pattern that weakens and destroys the health of its
social base also endanger its own stability.�
So again to answer your question: The MOQ has no qualms,
morally, for human intellect to destroy other species (trees, germs,
flowers, butterflies, dolphin, baby harp seals or whatever) so long
as the levels which support intellect (inorganic, biological, social)
remain stable and viable, i.e., are not weakened in the process.
What you end up with then in the MOQ is a series of trade offs
between the needs of intellect to maximize the number of humans
and the needs of society and biology to remain stable. This is
precisely where we find ourselves today, as environmental
activists remind us constantly.
What�s missing in the MOQ, as I said before, is any
acknowledgment of the morality of preserving social, biological
and inorganic value patterns solely on account of their beauty. Our
sense of beauty doesn�t seem to fit anywhere in Pirsig�s four
levels. That�s why I suspect a fifth level where the �felt� (non-
rational) ideas of beauty, harmony and perfection reside.
All this seems perfectly clear to me, but it also seems obvious
you�re not content with my interpretation of the MOQ. Perhaps
others can more fully understand and address you questions.
That, after all, is what this site is for.
Platt
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