Tag: Quality

On the Road to Oblivion: “Quality, Thy Antonym is Equality!”

By Doug “Uncola” Lynn via TheBurningPlatform.com

 “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”

― C.S. Lewis

On Thanksgiving eve, I was notified of a circumstance which caused me to drive thirteen hours round trip the following weekend.  The event which precipitated my travels is now beside the point, but I will say, given prior commitments and work scheduling, I was compelled to go alone. I didn’t mind. So I booked my hotel located in a major American metropolis, and that Saturday, packed my bag, grabbed my toothbrush and car keys, and bid my bewitching bride fare-thee-well.

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An Inquiry into Values: Men and the Art of Life-Cycle Governance

By Doug “Uncola” Lynn via TheBurningPlatform.com

 

Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water of which it is composed does not. The same particle does not rise from the valley to the ridge. Its unity is only phenomenal.  The persons who make up a nation today, next year die, and their experience dies with them.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance”, paragraph 48.

 

Our current modes of rationality are not moving society forward into a better world. They are taking it further and further from that better world.

Robert M. Pirsig, “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”, Chapter 10

 

A MAN’S JOURNEY

On April 24th, 2017, an author and philosopher by the name of Robert M. Pirsig passed from this world.  Pirsig, born in 1928, was best known for his 1974 book “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” which is a semi-autographical account of his personal philosophical exploration into the concept of “quality”.

At the age of 9, Pirsig’s IQ measured at 170 and, at the age of 15, he enrolled at the University of Minnesota to study biochemistry.  After becoming disillusioned with the validity of the Scientific Method’s ability to genuinely reduce seemingly unlimited numbers of hypotheses, Pirsig’s attention diverted from his studies and, within two years, he was expelled for poor academic performance.  At the age of 18, Pirsig joined the Army and developed an interest in Eastern culture and philosophy while stationed in South Korea.  He eventually returned to college and obtained degrees in chemistry, philosophy, and journalism.  He also studied Oriental philosophy at Benares Hindu University in India.

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