Robert M. Pirsig
Robert M. Pirsig
Robert Maynard Pirsigis an American writer and philosopher, and the author of the philosophical novels Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Valuesand Lila: An Inquiry into Morals...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth6 September 1928
CountryUnited States of America
personality flesh statistics
The bones and flesh and legal statistics are the garments worn by the personality, not the other way around.
motorcycle looks sand
There is a perennial classical question that asks which part of the motorcycle, which grain of sand in which pile, is the Buddha. Obviously to ask that question is to look in the wrong direction, for the Buddha is everywhere. But just as obviously to ask the question is to look in the right direction, for the Buddha is everwhere.
pens pencils
The pencil is mightier than the pen.
motorcycle finals maintenance
Logic presumes a separation of subject from object; therefore logic is not final wisdom.This is Zen. This is my motorcycle maintenance.
intellectual social subjects
Objects are inorganic and biological values; subjects are social and intellectual values.
stones tablets bunch
You go up the mountaintop and all you're gonna get is a great big heavy stone tablet handed to you with a bunch of rules on it.
travel want good-times
We want to make good time, but for us now this is measured with the emphasis on "good" rather than on "time"....
intellectual purpose intellectual-freedom
We must understand that when a society undermines intellectual freedom for its own purposes it is absolutely morally bad, but when it represses biological freedom for its own purposes it is absolutely morally good.
confusing deals rationality
Talk about rationality can get very confusing unless the things with which rationality deals are also included.
spinning wheels hell
So round and round you go, spinning mental wheels and nowhere finding anyplace to get traction. What the hell...is it?
substance world patterns
Substance is a subspecies of value. When you reverse the containment process and define substance in terms of value the mystery disappears: substance is a "stable pattern of inorganic values." The problem then disappears. The world of objects and the world of values is unified.
unity adjectives nouns
Good is a noun rather than an adjective.
dharma unpredictable persons
A person who follows the dharma is unpredictable because the dharma is unpredictable.
future mountain sides sustain
To live only for some future goal is shallow. It's the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top.