The MOQ maintains that Quality itself is undefinable (Tao), but to better understand it, Pirsig breaks quality down into two ("knife-edge") forms: static quality patterns (patterned) and dynamic quality (unpatterned). The four patterns of static value as well as dynamic quality account exhaustively for all of ("knife-edged") reality. As the initial (cutting edge) dynamic quality becomes habituated, it turns into static patterns (viz. data, expectations). Pirsig is not proposing a duality: quality is one, "every last bit of it", yet manifests itself differently. Rather than dualism, this manifestation of quality in terms of Dynamic and static aspects represents a dialectical monism.