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Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Book by Robert M. Pirsig · 4 quotes · Morality, Society, Classification

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All Morality Society Classification Cultural Norms Insanity Philosophy Platypus Psychology Zen

Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals Quotes

“But the ones who go posing as moralists are the worst. Cost-free morals. Full of great ways for others to improve without any expense to themselves. There's an ego thing in there, too. They use the morals to make someone else look inferior and that way look better themselves. It doesn't matter what the moral code is -- religious morals, political morals, racist morals, capitalist morals, feminist morals, hippie morals -- they're all the same. The moral codes change but the meanness and the egotism stay the same.”

Philosophy Psychology Morality Zen

Book:Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Source: Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

“If "man" invented societies and cities, why are all societies and cities so repressive of "man"?... ...Sometimes people think there are some evil individual "men" somewhere who are exploiting them....These "men" are supposed to be enemies of "man". It gets confusing, but nobody seems to notice the confusion.... ... When societies and cultures and cities are seen not as inventions of "man" but as higher organisms than biological man, the phenomena of war and genocide and all the other forms of human exploitation become more intelligible. "Mankind" has never been interested in getting itself killed. But the superorganism, the Giant, who is a pattern of values superimposed on top of biological human bodies, doesn't mind losing a few bodies to protect his greater interests.... ...So here was this Giant, this nameless, faceless system reaching for him, ready to devour him and digest him. It would use his energy to grow stronger and stronger throughout his life while he grew older and weaker until, when he was no longer of much use, it would excrete him and find another younger person full of energy to take his place and do the same thing all over again.”

Book:Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Source: Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

“Sometimes the insane and the contrarians and the ones who are the closest to suicide are the most valuable people society has. They may be precursors of social change. They've taken the burdens of the culture onto themselves, and in their struggle to solve their own problems they're solving problems for the culture as well.”

Society Morality Insanity Cultural Norms

Book:Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Source: Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

“...that when the Platypus was discovered, scientists said it was a paradox. But Pirsig’s point was it was never a paradox or an oddity. It didn’t make sense only to the scientists because they viewed the nature of animals according to their own classification, when nature did not have any.”

Classification Platypus

Book:Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Source: Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals