Dialectic, which is the parent of logic, came itself from rhetoric. Rhetoric is in turn the child of the myths and poetry of ancient Greece. That is so historically, and that is so by any application of common sense. The poetry and the myths are the response of a prehistoric people to the universe around them made on the basis of Quality. It is Quality, not dialectic, which is the generator of everything we know.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Logic originates from rhetoric, which stems from myth and poetry; ultimately, Quality—not dialectic—drives knowledge.
- In plain terms
- Quality, not logical argument, is the root of what we know.
- What can you take from it?
- Seek underlying quality rather than just form.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- How does Quality manifest in your field?
Another view
The chain of origins is a broad historical claim that may oversimplify.
More from Robert M. Pirsig
Once it's stated that 'the dialectic comes before anything else,' this statement itself becomes a dialectical entity, subject to dialectical question.
Permalink to quote #66 Quality is better seen up at the timberline than here obscured by smoky windows and oceans of words, and he sees that what he is talking about can never really…
Permalink to quote #68 When a shepherd goes to kill a wolf, and takes his dog to see the sport, he should take care to avoid mistakes. The dog has certain relationships to the wolf t…
Permalink to quote #65
Related quotes
While early American society was an agrarian society, it was fast becoming more commercial, and commercial goals made their way among its agricultural classes …
Richard HofstadterRichard Hofstadter quote #2 Bacchus, n. A convenient deity invented by the ancients as an excuse for getting drunk.
Ambrose BierceAmbrose Bierce quote #13 What then is truth? A movable host of metaphors, metonymies, and anthropomorphisms: in short, a sum of human relations which have been poetically and rhetorica…
Friedrich NietzscheFriedrich Nietzsche quote #18