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The world comes to us in an endless stream of puzzle pieces that we would like to think all fit together somehow, but that in fact never do.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Robert M. Pirsig
Age: 88 †
Born: 1928
Born: September 6
Died: 2017
Died: April 24
Autobiographer
Novelist
Philosopher
Writer
Minneapolis
Minnesota
Robert Maynard Pirsig
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World
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Puzzles
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More quotes by Robert M. Pirsig
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.
Robert M. Pirsig
The thing to understand is that if you are going to reform society you don't start with cops. And if you are going to reform intellect you don't start with psychiatrists. If you don't like our present social system or intellectual system the best thing you can do with either cops or psychiatrists is stay out of their way. You leave them 'till last.
Robert M. Pirsig
Only social patterns can control biological patterns, and the instrument of conversation between society and biology is not words. The instrument of conversation between society and biology has always been a policeman or a soldier and his gun.
Robert M. Pirsig
every answer one finds leads to ten more questions. The more we learn the less we know.
Robert M. Pirsig
Boredom always precedes a period of great creativity.
Robert M. Pirsig
The more you read, the more you calm down.
Robert M. Pirsig
Mental reflection is so much more interesting than TV it's a shame more people don't switch over to it.
Robert M. Pirsig
Good is a noun rather than an adjective.
Robert M. Pirsig
In the temple of science are many mansions ... and various indeed are they that dwell therein and the motives that have led them thither.
Robert M. Pirsig
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 the shepherd may have forgotten.
Robert M. Pirsig
Civilization, or the system or society or whatever you want to call it, is best served not by mules but by free men.
Robert M. Pirsig
The buddah can reside in the gears of a motorcycle as easily as in a flower on a mountaintop. To believe otherwise is to demean the buddah which is to demean one's self.
Robert M. Pirsig
A motorcycle functions entirely in accordance with the laws of reason, and a study of the art of motorcycle maintenance is really a miniature study of the art of rationality itself.
Robert M. Pirsig
(What makes his world so hard to see clearly is not its strangeness but its usualness).Familiarity can blind you too.
Robert M. Pirsig
The only zen thoughts you can find on a mountain summit are those you brought yourself.
Robert M. Pirsig
Programs of a political nature are important end products of social quality that can be effective only if the underlying structure of social values is right. The social values are right only if the individual values are right. The place to improve the world is first in one's heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.
Robert M. Pirsig
Quality is a direct experience independent of and prior to intellectual abstractions.
Robert M. Pirsig
So round and round you go, spinning mental wheels and nowhere finding anyplace to get traction. What the hell...is it?
Robert M. Pirsig
The funny thing about insane people is that it is kind of the opposite of being a celebrity. Nobody envies you.
Robert M. Pirsig
When you've got a Chautauqua in your head, it's extremely hard not to inflict it on innocent people.
Robert M. Pirsig