Quality...Can It Be Measured?

The idea of quality is such an ambiguous description of any object, process, or idea. Can we really define anything as quality? It is extremely easy to call something quality, but do we have any reasoning for that? Quality is strictly dependent upon the "quality" that we define other things around us by, so does this mean that quality is our restraint in defining each other's limits. If it were not for the idea of quality, we would have no bounds and hence we would have no limits in our being. We could constantly expand to new, unexplored areas because the greatest lengths to which we could achieve, simply would not exist.

I believe that Robert Pirsig had this exact idea in mind when he took the approach to destroy and cut through conventional answers. I believe that if you are constantly worrying about what others will think of your response to a question, and question its "quality", then you are only inhibiting your imagination. We need to break out of these typical answers that people continue to give to the typical questions and break through the bounds of what is already considered "high quality". One experiment that would be interesting to employ in classes would be to answer all questions by posing another question. It would open up the realm of conversation to an entirely new level, and raise intellectual conversation to a new "quality."

Pirsig was "interested in science as a goal in itself, rather than as a way to establish a career." I think this is how the dynamic of a college education has shifted so drastically in recent years. Why are we giving up four years of our life to simply get from Point A to Point B? Pirsig realized that if he continued to pursue science and explore its depths to a greater extent, the subject of science would essentially explode into a new dimension. Pirsig realized that several scientists limit themselves through their number of hypotheses, and discovered that for any given experiment there are actually an infinite amount of hypotheses. He even became obsessed with the idea to the extent that he was expelled from the University of Minnesota, but was he expelled simply because his idea of quality didn't meet their grasp on quality?

 

 

This plaque is in our library here at MSU, on the first floor at the entrance to the stair case, and I noticed it shortly after reading the wiki page about Pirsig. It has an interesting quote on it that says, "In the high country of the mind one has to become adjusted to the thinner air of uncertainty..." Pirsig realized that it may be uncomfortable to walk outside the teachings of conventional thought, but it is quite possible. He described his time teaching here at MSC as an "unpleasant experience," due to the teaching philosophy of the college. Maybe it is the universities in this world that are holding back this concept of quality and now we have trapped ourselves within this figurative box.

 

Even with all these realizations of Pirsig's, is it possible to define quality? I think with the answer to this question, I agree with what Brooke stated in her entry. Quality is simply in the eye of the beholder. Everything contains some amount of quality, but the degree of quality will always depend on the individual judging the quality.