I kind of did this already and didn't think much of it when I did it, but I have been reading The Zen Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig and he devotes a few chapters to exploring this topic.--I'm not quite finished with the book, so his argument may persuade me to change my opinion however, let me refer back to the article I wrote just over a year ago: The Quantity of Life
Pirsig poses the question: What is the definition of Quality? How would you define quality?
Pirsig's argument is that there really isn't a way to define quality because the act of defining something is a technical ("classic") approach and the term quality is "romantic" by nature. I was tripped up by this at first: it really is difficult to define quality. --It's easy to make a comparison (this is better than this because of this) but to define quality without already having something in front of you to compare it to is incredibly difficult.
However, in my previous article (which I now remember and am MIFFED! that no one wanted to let me publish it in my college's tabloid), I haphazardly explained quality by opposing it to quantity. In other words, I essentially said what Pirsig said: there is a technical/classical approach where you break things down into component parts and their functions and how they compare to one another, and there is a romanticized approach where you give something an indeterminate value merely by stating it as such. I was speaking of verbs not nouns but now I will attempt to adjust my definitions:
Here is what I wrote: "'To quantify' and idea means to turn that idea into a measurable number value, whereas 'to qualify' an idea means to turn that idea into something competent and authoritative."
To turn them into nouns I would say (starting with the easy one) Quantity is a measurable amount of something that establishes its value. Quality is an immeasurable aspect of something that establishes its value.
Let me make this simple to understand: Quality is established by our own individual tastes and preferences--we establish rules and codes that we understand and we may not have a valid argument to back up our claims regarding it, but by being the first, or by already being predisposed to something--shall we say developing an acquired taste for it--we are thereby able to put it on a pedestal and compare other like-things to it.
Beauty is a field of quality and..."beauty is in the eye of the beholder."
There are parts of the universe that are inherently chaotic, and I think quality is our human approach to understanding that chaos. Eventually, you have to settle on one thing and be happy with that one thing and forevermore declare that it is of the highest quality, because otherwise you'll go mad trying to make sense of it (as Pirsig points out in his book).
I think this is a good topic to explore further, but this is all I want to write about for now.
Future notes for myself:
Quality as it applies to being happy with life the way it is
Aspects of the Universe that are inherently chaotic
"Predisposition" is not born, it's trained
---Ugh...I'm only writing this because I started writing a book and have that bizarre urge to do anything and everything except write.
