Participatory Spirituality for the 21st Century
The symposium was intense and I think caused a shift in integral thinking. There were integral theorists in one group, Roy Bhaskar and his students of Critical Realism in another group, and Gary Hampson and I played the role of meta-theoretical referees of sorts. I had the benefit of having read just about all of Bhaskar’s work before I went, so the discourse was very rich and meaningful for me, where others seemed to be struggling with basic concepts (on both sides ) I will try to outline some of the main ideas that I took away from it.
Bhaskar talks about philosophy as “under-laboring” different disciplines or fields. Critical Realism’s focus is to under-labor science (physics, biology, sociology)… which means that it can point out the hidden assumptions or embedded frameworks which “under-lay” the science, thereby pointing to inconsistencies or falsities of theories that are created from within that discipline. To this effect, Critical Realism (CR) has a broad criticism of empiricism, which says that within any given empirically-driven theory, there are a set of assumptions outside of which the theory doesn’t work. In other words, all the truths that arise from empirical science is constrained by the framework from which the science is conducted, and therefore the “truths” are relative, not universal. One easy example of this is if you go to an Indian reservation and do “empirical science” you can “prove” that Indians are more lazy, less intelligent, more prone to alcoholism and crime, more degenerate, etc… than the general white population. It is easy to see that these “facts” appear only because an Indian reservation has a history that explains why these are contingencies of that history, not “facts” about native Americans. CR says all empirical science has this kind of blind spot, and that the role of philosophy is to contextualize what is “outside” the purview of the science, and the role of science Is then to advance its theory to include what was previously outside. This is a never-ending process, and puts philosophy right at the side of science (which is very cool I think.)
The method that CR uses is a dialectical method that has 3 major “steps” (there are several more steps in his system, I am generalizing). First there is what he terms “immanent critique”. This is where you critique the system from within the system’s own understanding. An important part of immanent critique is pointing out what is absent from the system/theory. The second step is “explanatory critique” which explains the system’s inconsistencies by pointing to what is left out and explains why the “truths” that arise within the system are merely “apparent truths” when the greater view is taken into account. The third step is an emancipatory “leap” -- which is an axiological step, or relates to values. The emancipatory leap asks what has to be “absented” from this line of reasoning to redress oppression or to transform the system toward greater liberation. This last step relies on principles Bhaskar calls “co-presencing” or “transcendental identification.”
When we applied this type of analysis to Integral Theory (IT) , we got the following key problem areas:
[An interesting aside is that Wilber writes from a spiritual wisdom of the abosolute unity of consciousness, and then goes on to fashion of theory that emphasizes the discordance of the world; whereas Bhaskar tells us how he began with this notion of critical naturalism, and ended up with the philosophy of meta-reality and its spiritual notions of transcendental co-presence. Many of the core constituents of Critical Realism denounce Bhaskar’s spiritual turn, and ridiculed him about attending a symposium with IT.]
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I like to make the distinction between a "natural hierarchy" and a (we could call it a demi-real) one. a "natural hierarchy" is rather trivial, in a sense, and is either derived from "definition" -- you define one set as a set of sub-sets -- or from logical necessity (i.e. single-loop thinking is required before double-loop thinking, before triple-loop, or from Fisher, you have to be able to have representations, before you can have mapping to representations) -- so these are only "hierarchical" in the way the definitions are set up. they have to do with epistemic frame, not with something "out there"... the something "out there" is necessary, but not sufficient to create the hierarchy.
theurj said:
I've also criticized the (invisible) foundations of how higher stages are 'proven' via mathematical sets, e.g., the model of hierarchical complexity. The mathematical basis turns out to have quite a few metaphysical assumptions taken as a 'given.'
I've also criticized the (invisible) foundations of how higher stages are 'proven' via mathematical sets, e.g., the model of hierarchical complexity. The mathematical basis turns out to have quite a few metaphysical assumptions taken as a 'given.'
Bonnie: 1.IT commits the epistemic fallacy: IT confuses the “known world” from the “real world”, resulting in a “many worlds” view. In the symposium we talked a lot about the differences between CR’s one(shared)world versus IT’s many –worlds view. IT describes all these “worlds” that are enacted at different altitudes across different methodologies. This is problematic, because all those worlds are actually world*views – or known worlds. This is the epistemic fallacy. On the other hand, CR must account for separate world*views, and it does this through the notion of the stratification of the actual world. (CR makes a distinction between the actual and the real – the “real world” is a unity of transcendental co-presence, whereas the actual world is stratified by structures that arise from social processes, biological processes, etc…) Whereas IT gives the impression that the transcendentally unified world obtains at the end of a process of greater and greater embrace of “many-worlds” in a single consciousness, CR begins with the unity of the real world, and adopts the role of explaining why the actual world is stratified.
This is a central interest of mine, and one I am in the midst of re-exploring in light of OOO and other views we've recently been discussing on this forum. I also had arrived at a "Many Worlds" interpretation, which I discuss in a paper that will be appearing in an upcoming issue of JITP, although I got there via a different route than Sean. (My influences in this regard are Panikkar, Varela, Ferrer, and Skowlimowski, among others). Although a postmetaphysical, enactive, ontological pluralist view, as I understand it (and as I have developed and embraced in my own thinking), is not subject to the charge of "anthropocentrism" that Bhaskar, Speculative Realists, and OOO philosophers all lay at the feet of correlationists*, I suspect it nevertheless may still be accurately charged with committing at least some level or form of the epistemic fallacy. I say "some level of," because an enactive-pluralist view, as I understand it, does not strictly limit itself to epistemology, recognizing as it does that "world(s)" are not epistemically constructed whole-cloth by individual beings, in that reality also "pushes back" or constrains perspectives, has the capacity to surprise, exceeds any individual's understanding, etc. This view also argues that the "inhabited worlds" of various species are physically transformed by entities' distinction-drawing and modes of embodied engagement in/with their enacted worlds: they don't only come to "see" the world in a particular way, or "carve up" a uniform pre-existing world in a particular species-specific form; their behavior actually feeds back into their world(s) and effects real change, so there is an ongoing evolutionary "looping" between the epistemic and the ontic, both changing and transforming (or ever-re-manifesting in new gestalts).
As Theurj was noting, OOO similarly embraces a "Many Worlds" view, but apparently on ontological grounds rather than merely epistemic ones. The idea here, as I understand it, is that not all "objects" in existence enter into relationships with each other, so there is no single "world" or "environment" in which all objects are unified and in integrated interaction with each other. Worlds, in this view, are not only domains of distinction selected out from a single world to which all beings have access, but are rather ontologically separate conglomerations of objects.
I believe OOO would classify this description of ontologically separate conglomerates as a description of the (transcendentally deduced) Real, rather than the actual worlds of lived experience (using Bhaskar's distinctions), but it sounds like Bhaskar would disagree with this. I don't know Bhaskar well enough, however, to say much beyond this, or really to choose sides (yet) in this debate.
Nice work. My approach would be to say that the "real" is processural (and not get bogged down into the trap of having to decide if a process is a singular or a plural, I would say that those categories themselves are "products" or "structures" or "orders" of onto-genetic (generative) process; and the actual is the realm of multiple orders or structures. The explanatory critique then is to describe (prescribe) the onto-genetic processes of the actual. Every actual occassion subtends those aspects of the real (partial but not wholely) into a new momentary unity (the many become one and are increased by one) -- so in this scenario there is no need to take up a position on the apparent problem of one world/many worlds.
b
Yes, that makes sense. I agree, at least, that committing solely to either the "one world" or "many worlds" thesis may not ultimately be necessary or fruitful. While I have emphasized the "Many Worlds" ontology, especially in my discussion of the emancipatory horizons of various spiritual systems and their soteriological models (i.e., there are multiple forms of realization, spiritual fulfillment, etc, and multiply enacted spiritual "worlds," which I emphasize particularly out of a concern to sidestep the various problems that have attended the various forms of religious inclusivism), I have also been arguing (against OOO) that it does make sense to take a "universe" view, in some circumstances, alongside a "pluriverse" view. I take this view inspired, in part, by Brian Swimme's arguments for the same. But I'm still working out some details.
I used to hold largely to a processural view, and at one point in my youth attempted to create a thoroughly processural language and grammar, but more recently had been convinced by Wilber that "process" is subordinate to "perspective" (being a 3rd person mode). Recent discussions are inspiring me now, though, to adjust my thinking to better integrate the ontic and the epistemic in my thinking (to avoid the epistemic fallacy). To this end, would you accept a phrase such as "onto-epistemo-genetic process"? Or is there a parallel epistemic term that you would hold alongside onto-genetic? Or do you think the ontic should take precedence over the epistemic?
I think your question "reduces" to how do we get beyond the epistemic-ontological dipolarity... and again, I think a process approach can help. One of the key "tools" of a process approach is to see that dipolars are not opposites in the sense of "the more you have of one the less you have of another -- which is conventionally dualistic -- but to see them as asymmetrical, and to discover what makes them asymmertrical. In many cases, it is the arrow of time that accounts for the asymmetry. Another important aspect of onto-logics (my term for thinking in terms of generative or onto-genetic process) is that no starting point is absolute -- so you just have to pick a starting point for your narrative, without prejudicing it as ontically real. what comes first, the chicken or the egg? doesn't matter, you just have to state you are starting from the perspective of the egg, or the perspective of the chicken, and you can cover the entire onto-genetic process either way. you don't have to choose. so that is a metaphor.
now, what comes first? the epistemological or ontological aspect? if we say they "come together" because they are dualistic pairs, then we haven't made any progress. ( this is the end-game of nargajuna's tetralema). if we can see them as asymmetrical, and our narrative starting point as arbitrary, then we can make some progress...
that is the methodology of my onto-logics...
have you seen that paper?
also -- what is your FB name? who are you anyway?
Bonnie
Balder said:
Yes, that makes sense. I agree, at least, that committing solely to either the "one world" or "many worlds" thesis may not ultimately be necessary or fruitful. While I have emphasized the "Many Worlds" ontology, especially in my discussion of the emancipatory horizons of various spiritual systems and their soteriological models (i.e., there are multiple forms of realization, spiritual fulfillment, etc, and multiply enacted spiritual "worlds," which I emphasize particularly out of a concern to sidestep the various problems that have attended the various forms of religious inclusivism), I have also been arguing (against OOO) that it does make sense to take a "universe" view, in some circumstances, alongside a "pluriverse" view. I take this view inspired, in part, by Brian Swimme's arguments for the same. But I'm still working out some details.
I used to hold largely to a processural view, and at one point in my youth attempted to create a thoroughly processural language and grammar, but more recently had been convinced by Wilber that "process" is subordinate to "perspective" (being a 3rd person mode). Recent discussions are inspiring me now, though, to adjust my thinking to better balance the ontic and the epistemic in my thinking (to avoid the epistemic fallacy). To this end, would you accept a phrase such as "onto-epistemo-genetic process"? Or is there a parallel epistemic term that you would hold alongside onto-genetic? Or do you think the ontic should take precedence over the epistemic?
Hi, Bonnie, I'm about to head out the door, so I will return later with a fuller response, but briefly for now:
One, I'm Bruce Alderman. I work at JFKU and have chatted with you briefly several times on FB. (I'm sorry I didn't make this clear; I assumed you already had made the connection, though I don't know why....)
Two, regarding the relation of ontology and epistemology, have you read Joel Morrison's book, SpinbitZ -- particularly his notions of the embryogenesis of the concept, and the complex and asymmetric relations of ontology, epistemology, ontic, and epistemic? I have returned recently to his book, and I've been engaging with it alongside the OOO and SR materials in my current re-tweaking of my thinking in this area.
I am not sure I've read your paper on onto-logics, but would like to see it.
"In other words- without the explanatory critique, the broad empiricism is like a self-fulfilling hall of mirrors."
Gee, where have a read that before?
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