Pirsig's metaphysics of Quality

Last updated

The Metaphysics of Quality (MoQ) is a theory of reality introduced in Robert Pirsig's philosophical novel, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974) and expanded in Lila: An Inquiry into Morals (1991). The MoQ incorporates facets of Sophism, East Asian philosophy, pragmatism, the work of F. S. C. Northrop, and indigenous American philosophy. Pirsig argues that the MoQ is a better lens through which to view reality than the subjective/objective mindset that Pirsig attributes to Aristotle. The book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance references the Sanskrit doctrine of Tat Tvam Asi or "Thou art that" which asserts an existential monism as opposed to the subject-object dualism [1] .

A theory is a contemplative and rational type of abstract or generalizing thinking, or the results of such thinking. Depending on the context, the results might, for example, include generalized explanations of how nature works. The word has its roots in ancient Greek, but in modern use it has taken on several related meanings.

Reality is the sum or aggregate of all that is real or existent, as opposed to that which is merely imaginary. The term is also used to refer to the ontological status of things, indicating their existence. In physical terms, reality is the totality of the universe, known and unknown. Philosophical questions about the nature of reality or existence or being are considered under the rubric of ontology, which is a major branch of metaphysics in the Western philosophical tradition. Ontological questions also feature in diverse branches of philosophy, including the philosophy of science, philosophy of religion, philosophy of mathematics, and philosophical logic. These include questions about whether only physical objects are real, whether reality is fundamentally immaterial, whether hypothetical unobservable entities posited by scientific theories exist, whether God exists, whether numbers and other abstract objects exist, and whether possible worlds exist.

Robert M. Pirsig American writer and philosopher

Robert Maynard Pirsig was an American writer and philosopher. He was the author of the philosophical novels Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values (1974) and Lila: An Inquiry into Morals (1991).

Contents

Development

The Metaphysics of Quality originated with Pirsig's college studies as a biochemistry student at the University of Minnesota. He describes in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance that as he studied, he found the number of rational hypotheses for any given phenomenon appeared to be unlimited. It seemed to him this would seriously undermine the validity of the scientific method. His studies began to suffer as he pondered the question and eventually he was expelled from the university.

Biochemistry study of chemical processes in living organisms

Biochemistry, sometimes called biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. Biochemical processes give rise to the complexity of life.

University of Minnesota public research university in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States

The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota. The Minneapolis and St. Paul campuses are approximately 3 miles (4.8 km) apart, and the St. Paul campus is actually in neighboring Falcon Heights. It is the oldest and largest campus within the University of Minnesota system and has the sixth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 50,943 students in 2018-19. The university is the flagship institution of the University of Minnesota system, and is organized into 19 colleges and schools, with sister campuses in Crookston, Duluth, Morris, and Rochester.

After spending some time in Korea as a soldier, Pirsig concluded that Oriental philosophy was a better place to search for ultimate answers. On his return home from Korea, Pirsig read F. S. C. Northrop's book The Meeting of East and West which related Western culture to the culture of East Asia in a systematic way. In 1950, Pirsig continued his philosophical studies at Banaras Hindu University, where he came across the Sanskrit doctrine of Tat Tvam Asi  —in his words, "Thou art that, which asserts that everything you think you are (Subjective), and everything you think you perceive (Objective), are undivided. To fully realize this lack of division is to become enlightened." The nature of mystical experience plays an underlying role throughout his work.

Philosophy intellectual and/or logical study of general and fundamental problems

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental questions about existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. The term was probably coined by Pythagoras. Philosophical methods include questioning, critical discussion, rational argument, and systematic presentation. Classic philosophical questions include: Is it possible to know anything and to prove it? What is most real? Philosophers also pose more practical and concrete questions such as: Is there a best way to live? Is it better to be just or unjust? Do humans have free will?

Filmer Stuart Cuckow Northrop was an American philosopher. After receiving a B.A. from Beloit College in 1915, and an MA from Yale University in 1919, he went on to Harvard University where he earned another MA in 1922 and a Ph.D. in 1924. Northrop was an influential comparative philosopher. His most influential work, The Meeting of East and West, was published in 1946 at the aftermath of World War II. Its central thesis is that East and West both must learn something from each other to avoid future conflict and to flourish together.

East Asian cultural sphere Grouping of countries and regions that were historically influenced by the culture of China

The "East Asian cultural sphere" or "Sinosphere" are the countries and regions in East Asia that were historically influenced by the Chinese culture. Other names for the concept include the Sinic world, the Confucian world, the Taoist world, and the Chinese cultural sphere, though the last is also used to refer particularly to the Sinophone world: the areas which speak varieties of Chinese.

In the late 1950s, Pirsig taught rhetoric at Montana State College – Bozeman and, with the encouragement of an older colleague, decided to explore what exactly was meant by the term quality . He assigned his students the task of defining the word. This, coupled with a Native American Church peyote ceremony he attended with an anthropologist friend, James Verne Dusenberry, led Pirsig into what he called "a mushroom cloud of thought."[ citation needed ] Pirsig began developing his ideas about quality in his first book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and expanded and codified his ideas into the MoQ in Lila.

Rhetoric art of discourse

Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. Along with grammar and logic, it is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. Rhetoric aims to study the capacities of writers or speakers needed to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. Aristotle defines rhetoric as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion" and since mastery of the art was necessary for victory in a case at law or for passage of proposals in the assembly or for fame as a speaker in civic ceremonies, calls it "a combination of the science of logic and of the ethical branch of politics". Rhetoric typically provides heuristics for understanding, discovering, and developing arguments for particular situations, such as Aristotle's three persuasive audience appeals: logos, pathos, and ethos. The five canons of rhetoric or phases of developing a persuasive speech were first codified in classical Rome: invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery.

Montana State University

Montana State University (MSU) is a public land-grant research university in Bozeman, Montana. It is the state's largest university and flagship campus of the Montana State University System, which is part of the Montana University System. MSU offers baccalaureate degrees in 51 fields, master's degrees in 41 fields, and doctoral degrees in 18 fields through its nine colleges. The university regularly reports annual research expenditures in excess of $100 million, including a record $130.8 million in 2017.

In philosophy, a quality is an attribute or a property characteristic of an object. In contemporary philosophy the idea of qualities, and especially how to distinguish certain kinds of qualities from one another, remains controversial.

Quality

"Dynamic Quality cannot be defined. It can only be understood intellectually through the use of analogy."

Dan Glover, Lila's Child: An Inquiry Into Quality

"Quality," or "value," as described by Pirsig, cannot be defined because it empirically precedes any intellectual construction of it, namely due to the fact that quality (as Pirsig explicitly defines it) exists always as a perceptual experience before it is ever thought of descriptively or academically. Quality is the "knife-edge" of experience, found only in the present, known or at least potentially accessible to all of "us". (Plato's Phaedrus , 258d). Equating it with the Tao, Pirsig postulates that Quality is the fundamental force in the universe stimulating everything from atoms to animals to evolve and incorporate ever greater levels of Quality. According to the MoQ, everything (including ideas, and matter) is a product and a result of Quality.

Empiricism theory that states that knowledge comes only or primarily from sensory experience

In philosophy, empiricism is a theory that states that knowledge comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views of epistemology, the study of human knowledge, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empiricism emphasises the role of empirical evidence in the formation of ideas, rather than innate ideas or traditions. However, empiricists may argue that traditions arise due to relations of previous sense experiences.

Experience is the knowledge or mastery of an event or subject gained through involvement in or exposure to it. Terms in philosophy such as "empirical knowledge" or "a posteriori knowledge" are used to refer to knowledge based on experience. A person with considerable experience in a specific field can gain a reputation as an expert. The concept of experience generally refers to know-how or procedural knowledge, rather than propositional knowledge: on-the-job training rather than book-learning.

The Phaedrus, written by Plato, is a dialogue between Plato's protagonist, Socrates, and Phaedrus, an interlocutor in several dialogues. The Phaedrus was presumably composed around 370 BC, about the same time as Plato's Republic and Symposium. Although ostensibly about the topic of love, the discussion in the dialogue revolves around the art of rhetoric and how it should be practiced, and dwells on subjects as diverse as metempsychosis and erotic love.

Static quality patterns and dynamic quality

The MoQ maintains that quality itself is undefinable (Tao), but to better understand it, Pirsig breaks quality down into two ("knife-edge") forms: static quality patterns (patterned) and dynamic quality (unpatterned). The four patterns of static value as well as dynamic quality account exhaustively for all of ("knife-edged") reality. As the initial (cutting edge) dynamic quality becomes habituated, it turns into static patterns (viz. data, expectations). It is important to note that Pirsig is not proposing a duality: quality is one, "every last bit of it", yet manifests itself differently. Rather than dualism, this manifestation of quality in terms of dynamic and static aspects represents a dialectical monism.

Tao or DaoDOW; from Chinese: 道; pinyin: Dào(listen)) is a Chinese word signifying 'way', 'path', 'route', 'road' or sometimes more loosely 'doctrine', 'principle' or 'holistic beliefs'. In the context of traditional Chinese philosophy and religion, Tao is the natural order of the universe whose character one’s human intuition must discern in order to realize the potential for individual wisdom. This intuitive knowing of “life” cannot be grasped as a concept; it is known through actual living experience of one’s everyday being.

Data facts represented for handling

Data is a set of values of subjects with respect to qualitative or quantitative variables.

Dialectical monism

Dialectical monism, also known as dualistic monism, is an ontological position that holds that reality is ultimately a unified whole, distinguishing itself from monism by asserting that this whole necessarily expresses itself in dualistic terms. For the dialectical monist, the essential unity is that of complementary polarities, which, while opposed in the realm of experience and perception, are co-substantial in a transcendent sense.

Dynamic quality

Dynamic quality cannot be defined. It can only be understood intellectually through the use of analogy. It can be described as the force of change in the universe; when an aspect of quality becomes habitual or customary, it becomes static. Pirsig calls dynamic quality "the pre-intellectual cutting edge of reality" because it can be recognized before it can be conceptualized. This is why the dynamic beauty of a piece of music can be recognized before a static analysis explaining why the music is beautiful can be constructed.

Static quality patterns

Pirsig defines static quality as everything which can be defined. Everything found in a dictionary, for instance, is static quality. These static forms, if they have enough high or low quality, are given names and are interchanged with other "people", building the base of knowledge for a culture. So some cultures divide between things other cultures perceive as equal (Pirsig gave as example the sounds of the Indian syllables "dha" and "da," which are absolutely equal to western ears), and some cultures haven't any words for a specific meaning at all (for example, Spanish has no word for "accountability"). Pirsig divides static quality into inorganic, biological, social, and intellectual patterns, in ascending order of morality.

Pirsig describes evolution as the moral progression of these patterns of value. For example, a biological pattern overcoming an inorganic pattern (e.g. bird flight which overcomes gravity) is a moral thing because a biological pattern is a higher form of evolution. Likewise, an intellectual pattern of value overcoming a social one (e.g. civil rights) is a moral development because intellect is a higher form of evolution than society. Therefore, decisions about one's conduct during any given day can be made using the Metaphysics of Quality. It is important to note that Pirsig is not proposing criticism or responsibility, but acceptance, and pure absorption:

"When he wrote it he felt momentary fright and was about to strike out the words "All of it. Every last bit of it." Madness there. I think he saw it. But he couldn’t see any logical reason to strike these words out and it was too late now for faintheartedness. He ignored his warning and let the words stand."-ZMM, Ch.20
"Good is a noun. That was it. That was what Phaedrus had been looking for. That was the homer, over the fence, that ended the ball game. Good as a noun rather than as an adjective is all the Metaphysics of Quality is about. Of course, the ultimate Quality isn't a noun or an adjective or anything else definable, but if you had to reduce the whole Metaphysics of Quality to a single sentence, that would be it."-Lila, The End
"The language we've inherited confuses this. We say "my" body and "your" body and "his" body and "her" body, but it isn't that way. … This Cartesian "Me," this autonomous little homunculus who sits behind our eyeballs looking out through them in order to pass judgment on the affairs of the world, is just completely ridiculous. This self-appointed little editor of reality is just an impossible fiction that collapses the moment one examines it."-ZMM, Ch.15
"Another immoral way of killing the static patterns is to pass the patterns to someone else, in what Phaedrus called a 'karma dump.' ... If you take all this karmic garbage and make yourself feel better by passing it on to others that's normal. That's the way the world works. But if you manage to absorb it and not pass [editor's emboldening] it on, that's the highest moral conduct of all."-Lila, Ch.32

See also

Related Research Articles

Aesthetics Branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of art, beauty, and taste

Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of art, beauty and taste and with the creation or appreciation of beauty.

<i>Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance</i> book

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values (ZAMM), by Robert M. Pirsig, is a book that was first published in 1974. It is a work of fictionalized autobiography, and is the first of Pirsig's texts in which he explores his Metaphysics of Quality.

<i>Lila: An Inquiry into Morals</i> philosophical novel by Robert M. Pirsig

Lila: An Inquiry into Morals (1991) is the second philosophical novel by Robert M. Pirsig, who is best known for Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Lila: An Inquiry into Morals was a nominated finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1992. This semi-autobiographical story takes place in the autumn as the author sails his boat down the Hudson River. Phaedrus, the author's alter ego, is jarred out of his solitary routine by an encounter with Lila, a straightforward but troubled woman who is nearing a mental breakdown.

Map–territory relation

The map–territory relation describes the relationship between an object and a representation of that object, as in the relation between a geographical territory and a map of it. Polish-American scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski remarked that "the map is not the territory" and that "the word is not the thing", encapsulating his view that an abstraction derived from something, or a reaction to it, is not the thing itself. Korzybski held that many people do confuse maps with territories, that is, confuse models of reality with reality itself. The relationship has also been expressed in other terms, such as Alan Watts's "The menu is not the meal."

The Japanese and Korean term mu or Chinese wu, meaning "not have; without", is a key word in Buddhism, especially Zen traditions.

<i>Arete</i> Concept

Arete, in its basic sense, means "excellence of any kind". The term may also mean "moral virtue". In its earliest appearance in Greek, this notion of excellence was ultimately bound up with the notion of the fulfillment of purpose or function: the act of living up to one's full potential.

<i>Zen in the Art of Archery</i> book by Eugen Herrigel

Zen in the Art of Archery is a book by German philosophy professor Eugen Herrigel, published in 1948, about his experiences studying Kyūdō, a form of Japanese archery, when he lived in Japan in the 1920s. It is credited with introducing Zen to Western audiences in the late 1940s and 1950s.

The Voyager Company was a pioneer in CD-ROM production in the 1980s and early 1990s. The company published The Criterion Collection, a pioneering home video collection of classic and important contemporary films on Laserdisc. It was founded in 1984 by four partners: Jon Turell, Bill Becker, Aleen Stein and Robert Stein in Santa Monica, California, and later moved to New York City. The firm took its name from the Voyager space craft.

Multiple Registration Protocol (MRP), which replaced Generic Attribute Registration Protocol (GARP), is a generic registration framework defined by the IEEE 802.1ak amendment to the IEEE 802.1Q standard. MRP allows bridges, switches or other similar devices to be able to register and de-register attribute values, such as VLAN identifiers and multicast group membership across a large LAN. MRP operates at the Data Link Layer.

Richard McKeon was an American philosopher and longtime professor at the University of Chicago. His ideas formed the basis for the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Japanese Zen Japanese school of Mahayana Buddhism

Zen is the Japanese variant of Chan Buddhism, a Mahayana school that strongly emphasizes dhyana, the meditative training of awareness and equanimity. This practice, according to Zen proponents, gives insight into one's true nature, or the emptiness of inherent existence, which opens the way to a liberated way of living.

Honda CB77 motorcycle

The Honda CB77, or Super Hawk, was a 305 cc (18.6 cu in) straight-twin motorcycle produced from 1961 until 1967. It is remembered today as Honda's first sport bike. It is a landmark model in Honda's advances in Western motorcycle markets of the 1960s, noted for its speed and power as well as its reliability, and is regarded as one of the bikes that set the standard for modern motorcycles.

A gumption trap is an event or mindset that can cause a person to lose enthusiasm and become discouraged from starting or continuing a project. The word "gumption" denotes a combination of commonsense, shrewdness, and a sense of initiative. Although the last of these traits is the primary victim of the "gumption trap," the first two suffer indirectly in that a reduction in initiative results in a reduction in constructive activity and therefore inhibits one's development of the first two traits. The "trap" portion of the term refers to the positive feedback loop that the event or mindset creates: That the reduction in the person's enthusiasm and initiative decreases both the person's likelihood of success in that project and the degree of success likely. The usual result, whether a mere lack of success or instead an outright failure complete with embarrassment and loss of the resources initially invested, further discourages the person.

In business, engineering, and manufacturing, quality has a pragmatic interpretation as the non-inferiority or superiority of something; it's also defined as being suitable for its intended purpose while satisfying customer expectations. Quality is a perceptual, conditional, and somewhat subjective attribute and may be understood differently by different people. Consumers may focus on the specification quality of a product/service, or how it compares to competitors in the marketplace. Producers might measure the conformance quality, or degree to which the product/service was produced correctly. Support personnel may measure quality in the degree that a product is reliable, maintainable, or sustainable.

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that investigates principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. Cosmology and ontology are traditional branches of metaphysics. It is concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world. Someone who studies metaphysics can be called either a "metaphysician" or a "metaphysicist".

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to metaphysics:

In Philippine Culture, Loob or Kalooban refers to one's inner self, or, more specifically, to the internal dimension of a person's identity. Its external counterpart is labas - the physical, outward appearance. Loob is a core concept in Filipino Psychology, a field which is unthinkable without both the internal and external dimensions, "loob"/"labas".

References

  1. Pirsig, Robert M. Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance: An inquiry into values. Random House, 1999.

Books

moq.org Essays, interviews and reviews pertaining to Pirsig's Metaphysics of Quality