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       Stardate: 20191106.17h51
       Location: Random SBUX
       Input Device: Gemini PDA
       Audio: aNONradio.net - DJ BUTTSTUF
       Visual: Trying to stay focused on the screen...SBUX patio...women.
       Energy: 45%
       Mental: 30%
       Emotional: OK with +10 coffee boost!
       
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       So I was in my garage earlier this afternoon and I was reading the
       book, _Lila: An Inquiry into Morals_ by Robert Pirsig again for  the
       second time.  First time was years ago.  This is the same author who
       wrote _Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance_, which I have read
       so many times I lost track.
       
       I read something that struck a chord with me today.  Here's a quote:
       
       "Within the Hindu tradition dharma is relative and dependent on the
       conditions of society.  It always has a social implication.  It is
       the bond which holds society together.  This is fitting to the ancient
       origins fo the term.  But within modern Buddhist thought dharma
       becomes the phenomenal world - the object of perception, thought or
       understanding.  A chair, for example, is not composed of atoms of
       substance, it is composed of dharmas.
       
       This statement is absolute jabberwocky to a conventional subject-
       object metaphysics.  How can a chair be composed of individual
       little moral orders?  But if one applies the Metaphysics of Quality
       and sees that a chair is an inorganic static pattern and sees that
       all static patterns are composed of value and that value is
       synonymous with morality then it all begins to make sense.
       
       It occurred to Phaedrus that this was one answer, perhaps the basic
       answer, to why workmen in Japan and Taiwan and other areas in the
       Far East are able to maintain quality levels that compare so
       favorably to those in the West.  In the past the mystics'
       traditional low regard for inorganic static patterns, "law of
       nature" has kept the scientifically derived technology of these
       cultures poor, but since Orientals have learned to overcome that
       prejudice times have changed.  If one comes from a cultural tradition
       where an electronic assembly is primarily a moral order rather
       than just a neutral pile of substance, it is easier to feel an ethical
       responsibility for doing good work on it."
       
       There is something here that resonates with me.  I'm not really sure
       how to articulate it, but I feel the need to examine further.  Maybe
       not so much in my own words...maybe in deed or action, maybe in movement
       or song...maybe I just need to sit with it.  So for now, there's just
       the quote.
       
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