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June 2013 - Robert M. Pirsig: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values

science and rationality "doesn't matter" either but then neither does the romantic view of 'it is what it is' because both are extreme positions.
 
Meadow's comment reminds me of the observation that people in their "cage" cars look depressed. "Who is happy on monday morning?" gave me a good chuckle. Pirsig's comments about time was a subtle, but profound argument. The scene where a mechanic just bangs Pirsig's engine to pieces and horrifies him was a case in point about the importance of time and doing something for the love of doing it. I agree 110% on that, though I have to confess that intrinsic motivation is not my primary mode of operation even as I sit here and type this. I would imagine the argument could be made that our pace of life has even accelerated since the time this book was written, perhaps profoundly.

Occlith- "Side topic" observations, some writers just can't get off that soap box.:devillook
 
Whenever I'm asked to give career advice which happens once in a while, I always tell people to do what you love. If there is one 'truth' to happiness in life it would be to do what you love and love what you do.
 
SFG75 said:
Meadow's comment reminds me of the observation that people in their "cage" cars look depressed. "Who is happy on monday morning?" gave me a good chuckle.
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Makes you wonder why on earth people do it - if you ain't happy at least most of the time (seeing as how happy ALL the time means you ain't all here) then you have to ask WHY??? but no-one seems to, at least not the vast majority.
 
Just read up on Richard Dawkins and our 'need' for moral philosophers. How much impact on our day to day lives do moral philosophers have? Are their writings important? Would civilization have evolved to this point without philosophers and only with scientfic discovery? Or does one influence the other? Just some wonderings on my part. Does navel gazing help anyone but the one who does the gazing? (just looked at the last question and realized that if it brings about a change in a person's behaviour it could benefit others). In relation to ZAMM from what I've read thus far it would seem that the narrator is on a journey of self-discovery and uses John as the 'how not to go about it' example. However, I still have a ways to go!
 
not everyone has the ability to 'see' the bigger picture hence the need for artists, musicians, philosphers etc to see for us and to then interpret to words / pictures / sound so others can also transcend the mundane and experience the profound
 
A huge rift over "truth" and who possesses it rightfully appears to be coming out here. I don't believe anyone would discount the importance of science, but you wouldn't use the scientific method in order to decide to buy food that is "good" for you. Similarly, we can all agree that "good" art exists. Can we prove that definitively?, I would argue "no" but that does not mean that in any way, that good art does not exist. The closest to consensus you could get by method, would be through experience a la Descartes. In the end, there is more than one mode of understanding, or of obtaining truth, and classical reason is not the only one(ducking the tomatoes now) The "knife of Phaedrus" is indeed amazing and it's whittled down any and all comers who attempt to challenge it. If you don't believe me, watch Dawkins's lecture at Lynchburg College on youtube. Pirsig hints at merging the two viewpoints through some consensus and in the forward of the edition I have, he touts some moq.org website.

Canuck-speaking of Dawkins and moral reasoning

 
In posting this, I don't wish to enter the whole theism-atheism fray. I'm only pointing out that Dawkins and classical reasoning operates on a platform and asserting that others who attempt to reason on any other platform than their own, are doomed.

The Dawkins slaughter of Liberty University grad students......


 
Thanks SFG - couldn't get the audio to work on the second video. Dawkins sounds eminently reasonable in his comparison of philosophy and science/
 
Meadow337 said:
I plead the 5th on the topic then because I'm not entirely rational on the subject of Richard Dawkins
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My comments in post #31 point out the concern you are alluding to. The point of the post is to highlight how classical rationalism and other truths have their own platform from which they operate. When you tend to operate on someone else's platform, I would argue you don't get much headway.
 
SFG75 said:
My comments in post #31 point out the concern you are alluding to. The point of the post is to highlight how classical rationalism and other truths have their own platform from which they operate. When you tend to operate on someone else's platform, I would argue you don't get much headway.
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I think that when you stand on any 'extreme' point and try to get the person to see all the way across the vast divide to the opposite point of view you won't have much joy. What there needs (and I see Pirsig as just one attempt at this) to be is a middle ground where both sides can see some familiar territory for comfort while being exposed to a moderate version of the other point of view.

Sort of creating that lukewarm point on the way from cold to boiling for the frog ....
 
I have now gotten to the point in the book where be says that Quality and caring work together, if you care about what you are doing there is Quality to it.

I find that it is very true, if I do not care about what I am painting or taking a photo of it doesn't come out right or good.

I also have to agree with him about the fact that there is nothing truly wrong with technology in itself , rather the fault in the lies in the fact that people don't care about what they are doing or about the consequences.
 
I have always found motorcycles to be particularly "zen". There is something about them that lends itself to having those moments.
 
Quality-you know what it is, yet you don’t know what it is. But that's self-contradictory. But some things are better than others, that is, they have more quality. But when you try to say what the quality is, apart from the things that have it, it all goes poof! There’s nothing to talk about. But if you can't say what Quality is, how do you know what it is, or how do you know that it even exists? If no one knows what it is, then for all practical purposes it doesn't exist at all. But for all practical purposes it really does exist. What else are the grades based on? Why else would people pay fortunes for some things and throw others in the trash pile? Obviously some things are better than others-but what's the “betterness”? - So round and round you go, spinning mental wheels and nowhere finding anyplace to get traction. What the hell is Quality? What is it?
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Questions like "What is art" and "What is poetry" or "What is beauty?" are subsets of this big question but are perhaps more familiar to us than 'what is quality'.

Pirsig then defines quality in this way:

“Quality is a characteristic of thought and statement that is recognized by a nonthinking process. Because definitions are a product of rigid, formal thinking, quality cannot be defined.”
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and goes on to prove quality by its absence ie if you subtract quality from life, life as we know it can not exist without out it. If there is no quality there is no art or music or sports or comedy. A life without quality is life in which there is only rationality and nothing else.

And he concludes:

Since the world obviously doesn't function normally when Quality is subtracted, Quality exists, whether it's defined or not.
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Then he is asked:

“Does this undefined 'quality' of yours exist in the things we observe?” they asked. “Or is it subjective, existing only in the observer?”
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He then goes into a long discourse on whether or not quality exists purely as subjective experience or does it exist as a purely objective (and therefore definable) experience and concludes that:

...although normally you associate Quality with objects, feelings of Quality sometimes occur without any object at all. This is what led him at first to think that maybe Quality is all subjective. But subjective pleasure wasn't what he meant by Quality either. Quality decreases subjectivity. Quality takes you out of yourself, makes you aware of the world around you. Quality is opposed to subjectivity.
I
don't know how much thought passed before he arrived at this, but eventually he saw that Quality couldn't be independently related with either the subject or the object but could be found only in the relationship of the two with each other. It is the point at which subject and object meet.

.....It is the event at which the subject becomes aware of the object.

And because without objects there can be no subject… because the objects create the subject's awareness of himself… Quality is the event at which awareness of both subjects and objects is made possible.
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He then starts talking about the paucity of Quality in technology and says:

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.
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He then starts talking about how you deal with removing a damaged screw from the cover of your motorcycle .... what do you do when you strip the head of the screw? The manual is no help ... your experience is no help .... rationality is no help - all it can give you is the manual. You are STUCK!

It is at this point that Quality is what makes the difference between a good mechanic and a bad one. The creative process of evaluating the facts, thinking of a new solution (other than dropping the bike off the edge of a very high bridge) is a subjective experience of choosing better Quality facts over poorer Quality facts. The difference between a house which is just a box with a roof and beautiful architecture is an appreciation of what is Quality.

Going back to your stuck screw ... a small almost valueless object now has great value because unless you get it out the entire motorcycle is as valueless as the screw. You should not resist being stuck ... it is being stuck that frees your mind from the constraints of the manual and your past experience. It leads you into whole new avenues of knowledge about screws and how to extract them ... it might even lead you into inventing an entirely new way of extracting one that you patent and makes you a millionaire in 5 years.

It is this pursuit of Quality and the process of using Quality in our thought process that leads to all great things in life.
 
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