It's Elemental

Month: March 2009

  • Conversation, Conversion, and Transdisciplinarity

    Spike NebulaEvery conversation can lead to conversion; to a new context, a different way of perceiving, a step out of habitual patterns of thinking that we unknowingly carry with us or alternately identify as self.  As one who attempts to live with Morin’s “new way of thinking”, one is never converted; one can only be continually in conversion, or rather, in continual oscillation between stasis and motion.  Once we see things from a new vantage point, it is not enough to simply adopt that vantage point, for every vantage point is only a brief resting place from which we cast off again into the unknown.

    ((When I was 12 years old, and lived right at the exact place where the dusky plains of Colorado met the surging foothills in a meeting of two geographical worlds, I would come home from school and occasionally foray into what seemed to be the wilderness to my young mind.  There was one particular mountain, which I dubbed Coyote Mountain for the small coyote den tucked in some rocks at its base, which had been calling out for climbing.  I had spied out my route over the previous hours by looking at its face through my bedroom window.  Once I was on the mountain things were different.  After a steep and breathless climb I sensed I was nearing the summit, as I could see only sky above where the mountain rose in front of me a few hundred yards away.  My focus was increased and I rushed to the top… only to realize that I had only made it halfway up!  The major portion of the mountain lay ahead of me, having been blocked by its lower half; a situation that of course only happens when one is ON the mountain.  From my perch at home it seemed the whole thing was laid out neatly before me, but I was unable to account for what it would really be like once I was actually “in conversation” with the mountain directly, and not surveying it from afar.  Now, I realized that a whole new part of the mountain was available to me, and in a completely new way that reorganized my previous knowledge.  It was possible to see in a new way.))

    But conversion is not linear, it doesn’t proceed nicely.  It retroacts upon itself, so that one’s new perspective modifies the way in which we used to perceive; our perception becomes perceived, and is thus modified in the act.  ((On the mountain I learned something not just about the mountain; I learned something about my perception, and saw the same world in new ways.))

    Not only this, but one does not merely experience conversion passively; for one’s movement is also the movement of the other, i.e. one converts and one is converted, simultaneously.  We cannot escape that our change is also a change in the world, available to the world for new conversation.  And likewise this converting is also retroactive; it too, changes how we perceive our own perception, because we see that our perception is not merely passive, but active as well.  It thus becomes impossible to say what “I” think or perceive (if, following Bohm, thinking is a complex order of perception), because I am in the world, and the world is in me.  To claim that such and such a thought is “mine”, or that “this is MY pain”, is a form of totalitarian hubris, for we do not know very much about what this “I” is, or rather where it has come from or where it is going.  The “I” is constantly stymied by the fact that it cannot find its own boundaries.  All boundaries of the self, when approached by the self, recede as a horizon, a limitless limit.  In George Spencer Brown’s calculus of distinction, the “I” is the space within the mark, which makes the mark in order to be what it is, but in so doing necessitates the space outside the mark, the unmarked, which is to the mark as the horizon to a traveler.  In this case, the unmarked is precisely that which is not available to the “I” – the infinite pleroma.

    There are always more horizons to explore.  We could also say there are more verizons to explore as well, which lead us not outward so much as upward, and from which our perspective of the horizon, as in leaving the Earth, recedes into its own circle.  This circle of the Earth is now perceivable in its entirety as Brown’s mark, but from a new vantage point.  Now, a completely new set of horizons become apparent, of a different order than the initial horizon; yet all horizons are as equally unreachable as they are infinitely approachable.

    All of these are conversations, all are conversions.  Transdisciplinarity is the art of staying in the conversation.  It is the art of living constantly between horizons, as if on the boundary of a fractal.  The fractal is always a temporary horizon, never an absolute place to rest.  It is living always with the question: does this point on which I stand lie inside or outside the form?  This question is never resolved if we stay on the boundary; its solution can only occur if we abandon the never-ending process of iteration, of self-recursion, and then the answer is always trivial.  Just as the answer to Ramana Maharshi’s entreaty to live ever on the boundary through the continual asking of the recursive question “Who am I” is equally trivial: it is “I”.  The point is not to answer the question, but is rather to keep from ever answering it!

    Thus, transdisciplinarity is in the unfortunate position of having been identified as such.  To the extent that this is the case, it has stepped off the boundary.  We see transdisciplinarity outside our window and we survey it, we think we see a path, and we make plans.  Then we step foot on the soil and now we must walk what hitherto we have only thought.  The order of our plan meets the disorder of the real environment; if we have fixed our view of transdisciplinarity, we cannot reach the summit.  Our view of transdisciplinarity, as Morin points out, is “antagonistic, concurrent, and complementary.”  We must continually be able to stay in communication, in a dialogic relationship, so we can continually recontextualize, globalize, and re-globalize again our relationship with transdisciplinarity.

    In this way, our view of transdisciplinarity becomes transdisciplinary.  The cause acts on the effect, and the effect acts on the cause.  Our emergent view continually alters the emergence of our view, which thus emerges anew.  This is transdisciplinarity not squared, but circled.  But the marking of the circle is never permanent.  We must learn both how to make the mark and to unmake it.  This always occurs through the making of a new mark, a new distinction, which itself calls out for unmaking.  Transdisciplinarity is the art of this making and unmaking.

    ((Sitting in my room, I now see the mountain anew.  It is both more and less than before.  I am both more and less than before.  We are both more and less than before.))



  • Goethean Phenomenology, Soul Breathing, and Transformation

    Goethean phenomenology acts as a transformative bridge between the researcher and a topic of inquiry.  The method is unique not in that it attempts to work through the subject/object split, but rather in the WAY it attempts to do this.

    Doing Goethean phenomenological research requires that one be completely open to what presents itself, while at the same time recognizing that one’s perceiving is an active force with regards to the topic of inquiry; the topic changes researcher, and the researcher change the topic.

    The Goethean phenomenological method (GPM) asks that one address the topic in a complex way; it must be approached from many angles in order to gather as much potentially relevant data as possible.  The data are continually taken inward and addressed, particularly with attention to the sequencing, timing, and subtle morphological differences.  The goal is in part to be able to re-create, inwardly, an exact sensory imagination that moves with the same gesture as the phenomenon when observed ‘outwardly’.

    Normally, one takes as an ‘object’ of inquiry some outer phenomenon such as a plant species, a location, or a natural form or process.  This restriction is not required, however addressing the alternative does require the researcher to change somewhat the way in which the method has heretofore been conceptualized and practiced. It is possible to begin with a topic of inquiry that is not phenomenologically perceptible to the outer senses: love, for example, or relations between imaginary numbers.  All the same methods are used to work with the phenomenon, but different challenges arise when taking an ‘inward object’ as the focus of inquiry.

    The primary challenge arises due to the unequal stages of development of our outer and inner organs of perception.  My eyeball provides visual information in a way that is highly correlated with the way in which your eyeball provides you with visual information. Despite the variety of potential sensory differences, on the whole physical human sensory capacities share a high degree of correlation, especially when compared with more subtle (non-physical) senses.

    This is not as problematic as it may seem, because implicit in the GPM is a continual oscillation between the subject and the object, and likewise between conceptual and perceptual experience.  In fact, part of the goal of the GPM is to create the capacity (we could call it what it is: a soul-capacity) that allows our soul to move with the gesture of the unfolding phenomenon, as if from the inside-out… and then to come ‘back’ to oneself in order to become aware of that experience in a way that is not available when you are ‘in it’.  Dennis Klocek, a practitioner of this method, calls this process “soul-breathing.” which is a very accurate description of what is occurring. Indeed, the process of working phenomenologically in this way provides the very training necessary to develop one’s soul-capacities in a way that is commensurate with the phenomenon.  The practice of Goethean phenomenology is thus recursive; its practice changes how one can practice it. This recursivity forms a conceptual and perceptual loop which forms the basis for the development of the soul-organ of perception that is keyed to the particular phenomenon in question.

    Goethean phenomenology, as Goethe himself stated, is “delicate.” because the role of the inquirer is paramount in the endeavor; one cannot simply follow an established external protocol and expect results.  Rather, results arrive through a process of mutual interactivity between one’s own development and the simultaneous ‘unfolding’ of the phenomenon in question.

    This method, in many ways, embodies principles from participative inquiry, in that the method actually takes the ‘object’ as a ‘subject’, and treats it accordingly.  The researcher is not the ultimate authority on the phenomenon, but rather attempts to give the phenomenon voice.  We could actually say that the role of the researcher is to place him or herself in service to the unfolding nature of the phenomenon in all its complexity, so that it can live in an imagination that is exact with respect to the movement, transformation, and unfolding of the phenomenon (which is inseparable from the movement, transformation, and unfolding of the researcher); this allows the researcher to ultimately ‘speak for’ the phenomenon.  In a way, the researcher’s agenda is to give up the agenda in favor of the unfolding of the phenomenon.  This can only happen when the researcher becomes capable of perceiving in a way that is generally opposed to the dictates of normal human day-waking consciousness, which lives primarily in a constructed boundary called the “self” through which all experience is filtered.

    Goethean observation softens this boundary, makes it a semi-permeable membrane, and allows part of our soul to live through its inner movements into the unfolding of the other.  In this way, a real ‘dialogue’ begins to take place between the researcher and the phenomenon (rather than a purely self-relating inner dialogue where two aspects of oneself face each other, i.e. a monologue disguised as a dialogue).  It truly feels like one is dialoguing with the phenomenon, just as one would with another human being, but through an expanded language of gestures, tones, and subtle feeling-movements, rather than explicit words.  This allows for the creation of a shared ‘language’, consisting of inner soul movements that take the form of metamorphosing inner pictures (not simply visual, but tonal, gestural) which are exact analogues to the processes that the chosen ‘object’ of study move through.

    In this way, Goethean phenomenology requires and precipitates the transformation of the researcher. Indeed it is only through transformation that a researcher can learn to hear the continual whispering of what Goethe called nature’s ‘open secrets’.

  • Water through transdisciplinarity and alchemy

    Edgar Morin, who calls for a transdisciplinary way of thinking, wrote an amazing short essay entitled “A New Way of Thinking”. (A New Way of Thinking.pdf)  One of the principles of this new way of thinking involves recognizing that wholes and parts are mutually interactive:  “properties emerge from the organization of a whole and may have a retroactive effect on the parts”  

    Liquid dreamConsider water.  Water is commonly thought to be the simple combination of two hydrogen atoms with an oxygen atom.  We say “H2O” like we know exactly what we mean, and usually what we mean is something like H2O = H + H + O.  

    But this way of thinking is wrong; something fundamental is missing from this thinking.  We cannot conceive of water as a simple addition, because in the process of coming together, the very nature of the individual pieces is changed.  

    A hydrogen atom in a water molecule is NOT THE SAME as a hydrogen atom in isolation.  It’s very structure changes, precisely because it is now in a relationship, or rather, we could say, a continual process of relating, and this relational process has consequences for both the hydrogen and the oxygen (and the other hydrogen!).  

    “Water” is thus a picture of a certain ongoing relationship between hydrogen and oxygen in a complex way.  The emergent properties of water coincidently retroact on the process of this relation.  The properties of water are both more and less than the sum of the individual parts.   

    An alchemical understanding of water jives with this understanding from the realm of transdisciplinarity.  Water, alchemically, can be considered “process”.  It is the substantive manifestation of the principle of relation.  The alchemists understood that relationship always had a transformative effect, whether on a physical substance or a soul-substance.   

    Dissolution was thus a phase of the Great Work; the bringing together of disparate elements via a liquid phase served to lessen the tendency to interpret the individual elements individually, as separate and isolated bits.  This occurs through the careful application of heat.  This ‘phase-transition’ set the stage for a further transformation, in which substances dissolved in solution could be further refined through an additional application of warmth, driving off the more volatile substances that were invisibly suspended in solution, while simultaneously the less volatiles substances precipitated out of solution and became an ash, which itself had to be purified so it could later come back into a completely new relationship with the volitalized elements.  

    Alchemy embodied the holographic principles held as foundations for transdisciplinarity by Morin: the whole in the part, the part in the whole, with retroactive effects and emergent effects as a consequence. 


  • The creative potential of langage — or, attend to your speech, for it creates worlds

    Following on the last posts about language, I’m just going to go way out on a limb here and re-present a picture that Rudolf Steiner gives which, when you really take it in, can transform your whole sense of language.  It is this:

    Steiner points out how at the present time, humanity can only tap into the deep formative forces of creativity in an unconscious way, or in a sort of caricature of what is possible.  So to give birth to another human being requires a certain kind of process in which our consciousness plays only a tiny role — all the ‘work’ of creation is done unconsciously (for US — quite consciously for… other beings).

    Speech in Motion - Eurythmy
    Speech in Motion – Eurythmy





    The place in the human being where we are beginning to find an entry into the realm in which this kind of creation–conscious creation–is possible can be found in the human larynx.  Now, if you have a sense that there is a relationship between creative forces and the motions of the sounds that underlie speech, you begin to see that what speech is primarily today is only the merest possible shell of what is possible with regards to creation.

    The sounds that I produce (or that you implicitly imagine, even unconsciously [MRI studies show this] if you are reading this) are capable of calling up within you an image, a picture… a feeling, evoked by my words.  Not just the structure and grammar and so forth, but the actual sounds themselves are a part of this, and are not arbitrary (as I mentioned in the previous post). 

    Sounds are movement, and the larynx does what it does only as a mobile, dynamic organ of self-transformation.  The larynx is doing a little dance, putting form into movement through time and interval.  Alchemically this is all working with the Air element — reversal/polarity.  The oscillations of the air itself happens through the polarity of compression and rarefaction, but even more: in order for my words to call up an image in you, you cannot remain the same — you must change.  The way that you can allow my words to allow you to experience what lies behind the words — the experience of the one speaking — is only by going through a microcosm of a microcosm of a macrocosm. 

    The macrocosmic level is the process of life–>death–>life (i.e. reincarnation).  The microcosmic process is awake–>sleep–>awake.  The further microcosmic process is speaking—>listening—>speaking.  In this last process, a part of you must go to sleep in order to dream through my words.  Just as the continual process of dreaming is overshadowed by the entrance of day-waking consciousness, so too your ability to meet the images contained within the words of another’s speech is overshadowed by the holding on to and expression of elements of oneself and the temporary identity with one’s own images.

    You must dream into my words as I actively speak them, just as I must do the same if I am to hear you through your words.  Now, that’s all just background.

    The real image is that in the future, rather than reproducing by the unconscious means that are the only ones presently available to humanity, we will learn how to reproduce consciously, and this will take place through the further development of what is now the human larynx, where we have the greatest connection to the creative forces–which now take the form of the ability to call up in another’s soul images that are produced in one’s own.

    I hope the sense of this connection is clear.  I recognize that this probably seems WAY out there, but I’d just like to share that such a way of thinking is possible, and that from a perspective that isn’t forced into materialistic boundaries, but which can consider the movement of processes in a wide variety of scales, such an imagination has considerable import. 

    This is all linked up with morality and how, as Bonnie points out, our speech is, in fact, a creative vehicle by which the world comes into being… So you can imagine that what we are doing right now in the exchange of ideas through words is a kind of proving ground and developmental platform on which we are expanding our ability to tap into something of the radical (root) nature of the creative forces, which are normally relegated to an unconscious realm. 

    One can, if one wishes, find this thread about speech all through the ages, as far back as you want to go.  It is the root of the idea concerning the magical power of words; words as creative actions that are connected with the deepest sources of the universe.

  • Object and Process oriented languages and human development

    (Note, the Blackfoot people have a process-oriented language, which is much more strongly verb-based, while English and most other languages are object/noun based.)

    Blackfoot Indian Brave
    Blackfoot Indian Brave

    A friend of mine asked:

    Do the Blackfoot people go through a phase where they need to have conceptual boxes, and then learn to transcend the need to reify these artificial demarcations, or do they simply use a different process all together from the very start? So much of western development theory assumes that moving beyond nice neat conceptions is a phase that we can move beyond, but assumes it is a necessary phase; perhaps it is only necessary for those who are raised to think in a linear fashion?

    Which prompted the following response:

    I have this feeling that on a macrocosmic scale, humanity does have to “go through” a stage of categorical reification and abstraction in order to develop certain potentials relating to our “task” if you will, of becoming beings of freedom and love.  However, this doesn’t mean that every single human being has to do this, or in the same way (ex: the West has played such a huge role in this particular part of the human drama, while other areas have different things to bring to the play).

    I imagine that it would be possible to ‘use different processes from the start’, and while there will be similarities in developmental stages, these won’t always match up exactly depending upon what is being brought forth by the language, culture, and individual elements, and so forth.  It’s not like a Blackfoot can’t identify ‘a chair’ if they don’t want to… it’s just that doing so is a reduction or rather abstraction from a different way of understanding, just like if I were to reduce you to a particular image I had of you that came from one specific interaction, and then communicated only this aspect of you when I spoke about you to others or thought of you myself.

    Both the ‘objective’ or reified view of we weirdo Westerners, AND the process or time-sensitive view of people like the Blackfoot are ‘correct’.  The question is more, to me, about the overall appropriateness of each view given microcosmic and macrocosmic pictures of individual and collective development.  Sometimes, identifying “this chair” as a completely abstracted and separate, non-evolving object is appropriate.  Sometimes, seeing the flow of events that entwine themselves into the constantly becoming activity and relations that make up the chair through time is more appropriate.

    BUT, the imporant thing is that we develop the capacity to have both these (and other) options open to us, so we aren’t locked in by our habits of perception.  We — humanity as a whole — has won the capacity to objectify the world through a long and arduous and pain-filled path.  It is something that we shouldn’t abandon — rather we need to learn how to use this capacity responsibly, ultimately in service to the development of our freedom to become beings who can love not by virtue of a given nature (this would describe an angel), but through what has come to us only by virtue of the path we have walked, i.e. in freedom.

    Of course, this just a picture, a way to imagine.

  • Universal developmental stages? – A continuation

    A friend continued:

    Does this mean there is no universal developmental stages that we each pass through simply due to the fact that we are all human? What are the underlying strata, the ground upon which both these explicate perspectives emerge? What is the implicate order regarding human development?

    Prompting the response:

    As for universal developmental stages… yes and no.  I guess I would point to the process of recapitulation.  You, as a physical being, go through stages in development which are a unique recapitulation of stages that have individually been achieved over vast timescales.  But, as modern beings, because what was achieved so long ago by (or rather ‘with’ and ‘through’) our ancestors (going ALL the way back, here) no longer requires the same kind of attention that it did when the developments were being worked out, we speed through these stages without any cognizance.  We also don’t have to experience the full drama of the development of those stages; we only get something like the form of an image of those stages, more like a hint or better a ‘gesture’ of those past stages.  The result is that instead of, say, having to develop anew the ability to breath air from scratch, we simply find ourselves with a capacity for breathing.

    The particular capacities we are thus ‘given’ are not “universal” in the absolute sense that ALL beings do this.  But it is close to universal when considering humans.  We are the ongoing unfolding of our past — all of our past.  And some capacities require more of us now than they will in the future, and others require less of us not than they did in the past.  Thus, we are no longer challenged so much by the development of breathing, but have a more difficult time with upright walking.  It is easier to have a mental picture than it is to dissolve a mental picture into nothing.  It is easy to feel rage, but much more attention is required to feel compassion.  These are tracings of past and future capacities, and we’re constantly in the flow of their development (and there is also a process of dissolution of capacities… but we’ll not go into that). 

    Physical Recapitulation
    Physical Recapitulation

    And there are always exceptions.  Some people who are born now are actually working out dramas that the bulk of humanity dealt with eons ago, and others are born who are dealing with developing capacities that the bulk of humanity will likely encounter only in the future.  So it’s not a simple question of everyone being equal.  Diversity is everpresent.

    Additionally, some of the capacities that have been given through our long history are only partially so.  Or rather, their development has only proceeded to a certain stage, beyond which any development or progression depends upon actions taken here and now.  The fulfillment of these capacities is not a given, but requires actual work on our part.  For example the capacity for free ethical action that comes from within the individual; this is not something that just everyone ‘has’ — it requires a certain amount of work.  So too the capacity to perceive accurately in the spiritual worlds requires individual work; it’s not yet capable of being given as an already-developed gift to the whole of humanity (like vision is) because the work required for that is still being done.

    The upshot of all this is that the situation is very complex and intertwined with multiple streams, working from the past and (sorry for sounding weird) from the future.  There is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ when it comes to these things, because we’re constantly dealing with a whole variety of interpenetrating levels and times.  Nevertheless, there are ‘global’ patterns at work, which can be perceived if one knows how to look.  David’s books very directly hint at this.  Also examine Richard Tarnas’ book The Passion of the Western Mind.  These are works in the popular domain which point to the sense of ongoing, non-random, directional development of consciousness and human beings.  (Of course, one could find a much more direct treatment of this aspect if one has the desire to look into more esoteric sources, such as Steiner.)  This is where you start to find a way into the question of the Implicate Order with respect to human development…

  • Evidence, science, and spiritual knowing: developing organs of spiritual perception

    Evidence can be gained through a variety of means.  Just as you would wish to use a sensitive detector of particular frequencies of light if you are doing x-ray crystallography, and not, say, an acoustic detector, so too we need to develop and use detectors that are appropriate to the realm in which we wish to gather evidence if we are to hope to gain any knowledge in that realm. 

    Thus, if we wish to develop knowledge of spiritual realms, we will need to develop organs of perception (for no material ‘device’ can do this for us) which are capable of perceiving in the realm of the spirit.  Not only that, but those organs, like any physical detector, need to be sensitized, tuned, and placed in the proper experimental setup for good evidence gathering to be likely.

    Of course, the basis for the spiritual organs of perception we are talking about here are rooted in our attention: it’s quality and rhythm.  For example, we lay people can only talk about all the fascinating stuff coming out of quantum mechanics in a second-(or third)-hand way, because we have ourselves not done the experiments in question, and our judgments and opinions on the matters are derivative of the interpretations of these experiments by those who have done them and their interpreters.  We would not expect an interested lay person to provide new information about quantum processes ex nihilo, but we can learn to conceptualize and come into closer relationship with those processes by virtue of our studies of what has been communicated about them by relative authorities.

    The exact same holds for spiritual considerations: those that have developed capacities to perceive spiritual realms can interpret and communicate these results to those of us that don’t, and we can study and learn about realms which we may not otherwise have access to as a consequence.  Moreover, just as we might, if we were really interested, take the necessary steps to learn the skills and concepts necessary to do research in quantum mechanics, so too we can take the steps necessary to learn the skills and concepts that allow one to do research in the spiritual worlds.

    Or does all this sound completely far-fetched?

    Unless we are scientific researchers in a particular field, we actually have very little direct evidence for our knowledge about quantum mechanical processes, chaos theory, and so forth; it’s almost completely anecdotal, yet we trust those that have done the research to provide us with a coherent and accurate picture of ‘what it is like’, and primarily on this basis we feel comfortable using the concepts and talking the talk.

    I’m only writing this because I wanted to point out that the scientific method in no way whatsoever excludes the non-physical, and that it is possible to have a clear understanding of how that is so; i.e. such a thing as spiritual science is possible.  Poor research is just as much of a problem in physical science as in spiritual science — and we must either rely upon ‘experts’ to let us know when this is the case or become an expert ourselves.

    Tree of the Wise
    Tree of the Wise