MDMD(2): Deflation and Friendship flip-flop

[Greg Montalbano]

The Mighty Andrew writes:


>
>It's not particularly relevant to Pynchon's purpose that certain
>particulars are true or false. What is important is that what can be
>accepted as true^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H . . .  oops, sorry, what can be true
>or false is a consequence of how we choose to cut our conceptual cake,
>and this stands independent of the results of any particular
>observations. Sometimes we choose our concepts carefully on the basis
>of past experience in the hope we get results we like. But we don't
>have to and concepts do often grow after their own bizarre fashion for
>arbitrary reasons.
>
>
> Rather than suggesting we take potty theories seriously as
>theories, he is warning us that we have to be very careful whenever we
>theorize to ensure that we pay attention to the political and moral
>rationale behind our theorizing and that we are flexible enough to
>change our views when we discover that what we have come to believe
>does not produce the consequences we expect or hope for.

All of which casts Slothrop's "disintegration" into a new light, no?
Perhaps what was perceived by a number of readers as a tragic, downward
slide was actually an evolution towards a way of living without a need to
connect to conspiracies, but to life on its own terms...

~G~

(and H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H to you too, buddy.)