What is post-metaphysical? - Integral Post-Metaphysical Spirituality2024-03-29T15:59:40Zhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/what-is-post-metaphysical?commentId=5301756%3AComment%3A29715&feed=yes&xn_auth=noJust wanted to say I like thi…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-23:5301756:Comment:324042011-10-23T00:45:52.978ZDialhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/Dial
<p>Just wanted to say I like this, too:</p>
<p><em>"It exists on the leading edge of now when all that is within one’s sphere manifests into perception; when everything including the perceiver cascades into a spherical, dimensionless veil of the senses as a perfectly integrated pattern; an instantaneous, seamless legacy of 13.7 billion years (give or take) of uninterrupted cause/effect-cause. That this pattern is tumultuously dynamic does not change the fact that it has total formational…</em></p>
<p>Just wanted to say I like this, too:</p>
<p><em>"It exists on the leading edge of now when all that is within one’s sphere manifests into perception; when everything including the perceiver cascades into a spherical, dimensionless veil of the senses as a perfectly integrated pattern; an instantaneous, seamless legacy of 13.7 billion years (give or take) of uninterrupted cause/effect-cause. That this pattern is tumultuously dynamic does not change the fact that it has total formational integrity. I will call it manifest non-duality in the sense that the non-dual is not a static state but an emergent event. Like Whitehead said, everything is an event. And even though all the events are seamlessly bound and at once both cause and effect, this does not mean there is anything predetermined or intelligently designed in what I have perceived. (Both of those superstitions, I believe, are artifacts from dualistic thought and the desperate safety seeking of anthropomorphic projection.) There is an accidental and random quality to the patterns like the accidental and random quality of colored shards of glass tumbling past the mirrors and prisms of a kaleidoscope.</em></p>
<p><em>When an event cuts one loose from habituated conditioning that lead into a disorienting state, if the instincts for life outweigh the fear of living, the senses and instincts haul the consciousness into a much more complete alignment along the dimensionless front edge of now, manifestation and life. This is the only place I have found that is actual and whole, where integration is so complete that it is no longer of conscious consideration. Then the universe changes because one is no longer drawing back to observe it, but is pegged balanced and upright in one’s tiny, and totally insignificant vessel. That’s integrity."</em></p>
<p> </p> Sorry for the delay, Tom. I'…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-21:5301756:Comment:322012011-10-21T20:51:53.978ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
<p>Sorry for the delay, Tom. I'd promised a follow-up post in my last post, and it has taken me awhile to get back to it.</p>
<p><br></br><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Do you sense a subtlety in what I just said? The idea of context specifies that any emergent must be viewed, if viewed properly, in relation to some or another context, but this specification chases its tail in the absurdity of then directing itself to look for the context that gave birth to the idea of context. It only stops chasing…</em></p>
<p>Sorry for the delay, Tom. I'd promised a follow-up post in my last post, and it has taken me awhile to get back to it.</p>
<p><br/><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Do you sense a subtlety in what I just said? The idea of context specifies that any emergent must be viewed, if viewed properly, in relation to some or another context, but this specification chases its tail in the absurdity of then directing itself to look for the context that gave birth to the idea of context. It only stops chasing the tail when it catches it in finally closing the loop on its own self awareness about what it, as Context, reflexively is.</em></p>
<p><br/>When you put this in terms of a particular context giving birth to the <em>notion</em> of context, this does not strike me as particularly problematic or "absurd." I think we can identify a number of various, particular contexts in which this insight into contextuality was birthed: the linguistic context, as Saussure investigated the structure of language; the quantum experimental context; etc. In other words, we can coherently tell the (genealogical) story of the discovery or birthing of notions such as "context" or "history" or "evolution" or "wholeness" or "The All."</p>
<p><br/>However, I can appreciate the paradoxicality you are pointing at when we rationally fold this notion back on itself. Context, applied to itself, implies its polar opposite, wholeness, a boundless no-context-ful(l)ness.</p>
<p><br/><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>So, all your talk talk above, some of which I agree with, is just some Absolutely Unknowable (being Absolutely Contradictory) _____________, appearance, phenomenon, creation, call it what you will.</em></p>
<p><br/>Yes, I understand. This is the 'wholeness view.' I also think it is valid to enact a part-view, and so would not want to reductively assert that all my 'talk talk' is <em>just</em> such and such.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><strong>Lol:</strong> <em>Today I found the piece, and here is the excerpt that spoke so eloquently to me when I first read it (it still does).</em></p>
<p><br/>Yes, I think this is eloquently written, too, and appreciate it now as I did when I first read it.</p> Hi Thomas, I thought you migh…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-21:5301756:Comment:317052011-10-21T20:09:34.792ZLolhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/marigpa
<p>Hi Thomas, I thought you might appreciate it. I hear you both talking about the same thing here,</p>
<p>"One could say that QM's version of cause is formational cause, that that which is causal is our very form, and what cause refers to is integrity, the root fractal---the formational root-pattern of wholeness. Wholeness is the root nature of form---all form implies wholeness..."</p>
<p>".<em>.everything is an event. And ... all the events are seamlessly bound and at once both cause and…</em></p>
<p>Hi Thomas, I thought you might appreciate it. I hear you both talking about the same thing here,</p>
<p>"One could say that QM's version of cause is formational cause, that that which is causal is our very form, and what cause refers to is integrity, the root fractal---the formational root-pattern of wholeness. Wholeness is the root nature of form---all form implies wholeness..."</p>
<p>".<em>.everything is an event. And ... all the events are seamlessly bound and at once both cause and effect..</em>"</p>
<p> </p> Very much appreciating this c…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-17:5301756:Comment:312482011-10-17T11:20:37.078ZLolhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/marigpa
<p>Very much appreciating this conversation.</p>
<p>Wholeness.</p>
<p>Recently I have found myself trying to bring to mind a piece of writing, another view of wholeness, by our mutual friend (and maybe sometimes nemesis) Steven Nickeson. Today I found the piece, and here is the excerpt that spoke so eloquently to me when I first read it (it still does). The full piece, "Flow: Upright in the Vessel" can be found…</p>
<p>Very much appreciating this conversation.</p>
<p>Wholeness.</p>
<p>Recently I have found myself trying to bring to mind a piece of writing, another view of wholeness, by our mutual friend (and maybe sometimes nemesis) Steven Nickeson. Today I found the piece, and here is the excerpt that spoke so eloquently to me when I first read it (it still does). The full piece, "Flow: Upright in the Vessel" can be found <a href="http://derechosalvaje.wordpress.com/2010/01/" target="_blank">here</a>.</p>
<p>"I am a sensualist and not a thinker, nor a spiritualistic thinker. I do not hold with anything that has to do with any aspect of what could be called Spirit or The Divine or any of the other 10,000 names. I have no superstitions about these nondual suppositions. But I do have a theory. I am sure it is not unique and doubt if any of these conclusions are new and original and I have no authority on which to base them. But they have everything to do with integral, not the academic metaphysical/spiritual integral theories, but that which is material.</p>
<p>Until my participation on that particular internet forum compelled me to research Wilberismo and correlated tangents I had not read much except poetry for years. When I first heard there was a need for an integral philosophy and Mr. Wilber was slaving away, multi-media, to prove there was such a thing, I had to wonder why. Why develop a theory as to everything being integrated when anyone with half a set of senses and a shred of instinct left on how to use them could know for certain that integral reality is plainly, manifestly, there to be known and navigated? It exists on the leading edge of now when all that is within one’s sphere manifests into perception; when everything including the perceiver cascades into a spherical, dimensionless veil of the senses as a perfectly integrated pattern; an instantaneous, seamless legacy of 13.7 billion years (give or take) of uninterrupted cause/effect-cause. That this pattern is tumultuously dynamic does not change the fact that it has total formational integrity. I will call it manifest non-duality in the sense that the non-dual is not a static state but an emergent event. Like Whitehead said, everything is an event. And even though all the events are seamlessly bound and at once both cause and effect, this does not mean there is anything predetermined or intelligently designed in what I have perceived. (Both of those superstitions, I believe, are artifacts from dualistic thought and the desperate safety seeking of anthropomorphic projection.) There is an accidental and random quality to the patterns like the accidental and random quality of colored shards of glass tumbling past the mirrors and prisms of a kaleidoscope.</p>
<p>When an event cuts one loose from habituated conditioning that lead into a disorienting state, if the instincts for life outweigh the fear of living, the senses and instincts haul the consciousness into a much more complete alignment along the dimensionless front edge of now, manifestation and life. This is the only place I have found that is actual and whole, where integration is so complete that it is no longer of conscious consideration. Then the universe changes because one is no longer drawing back to observe it, but is pegged balanced and upright in one’s tiny, and totally insignificant vessel. That’s integrity."</p>
<p><br/> <cite>Thomas said:</cite></p>
<blockquote cite="http://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/what-is-post-metaphysical?page=10&commentId=5301756%3AComment%3A31238&x=1#5301756Comment31504"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><p>Also let me lean in here with a fractal understanding. I said above that wholeness is the one and only all. I can hear a valid response saying, well, a quantum experiment surely isn't the whole planet, let alone the whole universe. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>I understand that. But by saying "quantum experiment," we're abstracting, or relevating, in Bohm's words. That abstraction narrows focus to one manifestation of wholeness: the table-top setup called the quantum measurement situation.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Draw the focus back and one can see that that manifestation exists not without: the scientists, the history of science so-called, all the particles that make up all such, and on and on to the entire universe---all of which is a single happening in which regularities can be abstracted into focused view. Yes, each time-sequence or -appearance in this expanded context is different for every local frame, per Einstein, but each such frame subsists <span style="text-decoration: underline;">now</span> in necessary relation and ordering specified by the Lorenz transformation, which says that my time-difference is related to yours, implying wholeness. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>This is a fractal view of wholeness, which melds consistently with Joel's less-intuitive-forward, more-linear-forward languaging, like self-similar and whatever else he said in his last fantastic post.</p>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote> Slightly less than I am conce…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-16:5301756:Comment:312462011-10-16T22:36:53.894Zehttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/e
Slightly less than I am concerned about the characters in my 2 year old daughter's story books. I brought it up because L&J trace the unconscious foundations of metaphysics to the Folk Theory of Essences. Did you think your absolutist ontology came fully formed in some philosopher/scientist/religious founder’s mind?<br></br>
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<cite>Thomas said:…</cite>
Slightly less than I am concerned about the characters in my 2 year old daughter's story books. I brought it up because L&J trace the unconscious foundations of metaphysics to the Folk Theory of Essences. Did you think your absolutist ontology came fully formed in some philosopher/scientist/religious founder’s mind?<br/>
<br/>
<cite>Thomas said:</cite><br />
<blockquote cite="http://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/what-is-post-metaphysical?commentId=5301756%3AComment%3A30148&xg_source=activity#5301756Comment30507"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><blockquote><p><strong>e</strong>: So what happens to metaphysics when no one has ever seen an essence and is incapable of producing an essence and you therefore don’t believe in essences?</p>
</blockquote>
<p> </p>
<p>E, you're very concerned about essence. That's as I expect.</p>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote> Hi, Tom, I am about to join t…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-15:5301756:Comment:312382011-10-15T04:17:09.869ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
Hi, Tom, I am about to join the family for a Friday night movie, but I wanted to jot down a couple questions first. I'll return with a fuller response later.<br></br>
<br></br>
<br></br>
First, what are your thoughts on what constitutes "measurement" in the conversation between two friends in the coffee shop? What are the measurement acts in that scenario?<br></br>
<br></br>
<br></br>
(FYI, I'm looking in part for what relation there might be between your view and several of Wilber's ideas, such as his mathematical…
Hi, Tom, I am about to join the family for a Friday night movie, but I wanted to jot down a couple questions first. I'll return with a fuller response later.<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
First, what are your thoughts on what constitutes "measurement" in the conversation between two friends in the coffee shop? What are the measurement acts in that scenario?<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
(FYI, I'm looking in part for what relation there might be between your view and several of Wilber's ideas, such as his mathematical symbol of /p or 'stop,' which is an instantaneous act or event, a 'stop' in perspectival flow, in which the AQAL matrix pops into being, whole cloth. When I talk about context, AQAL manifestation, and the 'bootstrapping' nature of appearance, I am thinking -- in part -- of this. I expect his notion of 'perspectival flow' might be problematic, from the point of view you're articulating, but I'd like to hear what your thoughts are anyway. I am also thinking of his use of 'probability space' in his discussion of deep patterns or structures: he says that in AQAL postmetaphysics, structures are not things that abide in time and space, but rather that structure is probability space.)<br/>
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<strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Wholeness being without limit, boundary, beginning or end, it is the one and only unlimited all. There is only one unlimited all? Must be. All would otherwise be limited.</em><br/>
<br/>
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Yes, I understand this argument. I could quibble with it, in that I think infinity or unboundedness is the opposite of number, and therefore 'one' isn't really appropriate. But if you are using it in a 'spiritual' sense (the 'One without a Second,' perhaps), then I can accept it metaphorically. When I have said there is more than one 'All,' I have been speaking about conceptualizations of All, which I believe do vary by context. <br/>
<br/>
<br/>
Anyway, are you familiar with Joel's term, the ONE-ALL? If you are, I'd be interested in your thoughts on his use of that term. I did not like it when I first encountered it, but then it grew on me and I began to appreciate what he is doing.<br/>
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<strong>Tom: </strong> <em>My response is: depends what you mean by development, as the meaning of that word is very different in quantum and pre-quantum contexts.</em><br/>
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What do you mean by development? Very interesting, Tom! At lu…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-15:5301756:Comment:312362011-10-15T00:22:28.398ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
Very interesting, Tom! At lunch today, after having read your remark, I was thinking specifically of Bell and of the EPR experiment in relation to the picture you had presented, and was going to ask if that was the "archetype" for your presentation.
Very interesting, Tom! At lunch today, after having read your remark, I was thinking specifically of Bell and of the EPR experiment in relation to the picture you had presented, and was going to ask if that was the "archetype" for your presentation. Tom: There's no independence…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-12:5301756:Comment:313132011-10-12T17:28:21.310ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
<p><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>There's no independence in all, Bruce. All is all. Nor is there a direct referent. </em></p>
<p><br></br><strong>Tom: </strong> <em>It <strong>indicates</strong> an <strong>experience</strong>, that experience is <strong>an experience of precisely everything <span style="text-decoration: underline;">to which</span> all <span style="text-decoration: underline;">refers</span></strong>, which is all.</em></p>
<p><br></br><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Nor is there a…</em></p>
<p><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>There's no independence in all, Bruce. All is all. Nor is there a direct referent. </em></p>
<p><br/><strong>Tom: </strong> <em>It <strong>indicates</strong> an <strong>experience</strong>, that experience is <strong>an experience of precisely everything <span style="text-decoration: underline;">to which</span> all <span style="text-decoration: underline;">refers</span></strong>, which is all.</em></p>
<p><br/><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Nor is there a speaker. </em></p>
<p><br/><strong>Tom:</strong> <em><span style="text-decoration: underline;">For me</span>, the word includes the infinite...</em></p>
<p><br/>I point out these contradictions in your speech to remind you I'm not the only one using this sort of language -- you are also appealing to speakers, and defining 'all' in terms of a referent. It is convenient and familiar to talk in these terms, even if they don't convey the subtleties of our respective post/metaphysical or epistemological commitments.</p>
<p><br/>I do understand the metaphysical argument that, in the All -- i.e., at the absolute 'scale' or 'scope' -- there's no distinction, no speaker, no history, no particularity, etc (Heart Sutra: there is no form, no feeling, no perception, no name, no concept, no knowledge...). But with no distinction at the absolute scale, there's no (particular) word, "all," either. I'm not saying the entirety of existence -- the infinite -- can be reduced to a particular category: conceptual. That's incoherent, in my view. But the words we use to refer to that entirety -- "All" or "One" or "Being" -- are in my view high-order abstractions, growing out of our embodied experience.</p>
<p><br/>I believe you are saying that "All" is not an understanding growing out of embodied experience, but tacitly underlying it. My take on that is, Yes and No. It seems to me that there are certain conditions for even being able to apprehend or appreciate the sensibility of 'All,' which supports the 'growing out of' perspective. For instance, while the Piraha's non-generalized, always-situation-specific use of the word "big" might be seen, from our vantage, to contain a primitive, dim echo what you or I might mean by "The All" (say, as tacit wholeness or positive infinity), I don't think it makes sense to say that the Piraha's intended meaning of "big" is ultimately the same as "The All." "The All" does not appear in their worldspace.</p>
<p><br/>Now, when our powers of abstraction are sufficient that we can begin to articulate and appreciate a notion like "The All," we might at the same time recognize this presently intuited sensibility (an experience of wholeness or undividedness) as subsisting in our infantile pre-differentiated experience. But here, I follow <a target="_self" href="http://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/david-michael-levin-redux">Levin</a> (whom I quoted to you before), who argues that the 'primordial wholeness' that is recovered through spiritual inquiry and recollection is an echo of what never was. Here's a section of his discussion of this understanding in relation to the recovery of a holistic dimension of our listening or hearing capacity, but he explores this through multiple avenues and 'senses' elsewhere.</p>
<blockquote><p><br/><a target="_self" href="http://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/david-michael-levin-redux">Stage IV</a> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Borrowing a term from Heidegger, we will be calling this stage 'hearkening' (das Horchen). Very few people ever attempt to continue the development of their hearing beyond the kinds of skill belonging to stage III. Even fewer attempt to do the kind of work necessary for the achievement of 'hearkening.' Hearkening requires the disciplined practice of Gelassenheit, i.e. letting-go and letting-be, as a mode or style of listening. In learning Gelassenheit, the art of 'just listening', listening without getting entangled in the ego's stories and preoccupations, one learns a different way of channelling, focusing, attending. There is a restructuring of the figure-ground difference, with an awareness that it manifests the appropriation of the auditory field by the double tonality of the ontological difference. Hearkening makes, or lets, this ontological difference -- the difference between beings and Being -- be manifest, be audible, within the Gestalt of the auditory situation.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The Gestaltung of stage IV is a distinctively spiritual accomplishment. The work of this stage begins with the practice of Gelassenheit and gradually performs an ontological recollection, a recollection of the utterly open dimensionality of the auditory field, as which the sonorous Being of beings manifests for our (properly) listening ears. Though never finished, this recollection realizes and fulfills our potential as human beings in relation to the Question of Being. With the achievement of this ongoing recollection, not as a cognitive operation separate from our listening, we may enjoy an authentically ontological relationship to, and an existentially meaningful understanding of, the Being of beings: in particular, (1) Being as such and (2) the dimensionality, the radical alterity, of other human beings. The pre-ontological relationship and understanding that we once inhabited (during our infancy), and that we subsequently lost touch with in the course of our socialization (our ego-logical development), we begin to retrieve in stage IV, getting it back, this time, in a highly conscious, thoughtful, and articulate experience, meaningfully integrated into the auditory situations of our daily lives.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Our practice at stage IV is a practice that needs to take place under the influence of the feminine archetypes: there must be an appreciation of and a recovery of experiencing modalities that, in our culture, have been traditionally constellated through these archetypes.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>By virtue of our existential work, our channelling is opened up. In this state, it 'invites' a gathering of all sonorous, audible beings from all sonorous dimensions, bringing them into a Gestalt that we will call, again borrowing from Heidegger, das Geviert -- the Fourfold. Whereas, at stage II, the auditory Gestalt is enframing, is a Gestell, here the structure becomes a gathering of sonorous Being: a gathering mindful of its utterly open dimensionality, attentive to the primordial difference by grace of which all auditory structures are possible, and respectful of the incommensurability of the Being of sonorous beings, letting the inaudible be inaudible.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>... The developmental model I am proposing in this study -- and not only the model, but also the design of the table [see below], which cannot accommodate a hermeneutical time-dimension -- will be open to some very destructive misunderstandings unless, anticipating them here, I can successfully ward them off by clarification. That is what I shall now try to do.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>First of all, it is essential to understand that the developmental process is not a straightforwardly linear progression, but rather a dialectic of sublimations and sublations: a dialectic for the evolution of which Hegel introduced the term Aufhebung. In other words, each phase of the process is carried forward: not only transformed, but also preserved, as transformed, by the subsequent stage. Thus, the first stage, Zugehorigkeit, is never entirely left behind, nor is it ever totally split off, when the infant undergoes the process of socialization. To be sure, socialization gradually installs an ego-logically boundaried centre in the 'place' where an ecstatically open centre once functioned; but the auditory body always continues to bear within it some 'traces,' or an echo, of this primal experience with the sonorous dimensionality of Being.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In this regard, it is crucial to keep in mind that the 'primordial relationship with Being' attributed to infancy is a past that has never really been present -- a past that never was what it now, i.e., from the vantage point of stage IV, presents itself as having been. Zugehorigkeit is a projection, a reconstruction, an understanding constituted after the fact, redeeming an experience that 'from the very beginning' fell short of itself; fell short, I mean, of being 'the beginning,' a primordial experience of the pure and total presence of Being...</p>
<p> </p>
<p>...Even though there never was an 'original' experience with Being as absolutely pure and total presence in the first place, the advances of stage II are not achieved without a loss: a loss that we may call, using Heidegger's phrase, a 'loss of Being,' or a loss of contact with ecstasy (ek-stasis) of Being -- 'Being' understood here as the utterly open ek-static dimensionality of the auditory field, the sonorous field. And yet, this loss of contact (which, as noted, never was an experience of pure presence) is not total, and therefore not irrevocable and irremediable: by grace of our embodiment, echoes of our earliest experience with the Being of sonorous field are preserved and continue to resonate, so that, later in life, after the ego is firmly established, it becomes possible to 'return' to these echoes, not only making contact with our bodily felt sense of that pre-ontological openness -- whatever sense of that 'primordial ecstasy' we may now, by virtue of some directed exertion, be able to feel -- but also 'retrieving' it and freeing it for an ongoing integration into present living.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In principle, then, the infant's experience of Zugehorigkeit, a 'primordial' inherence in the openness and wholeness of Being, is always to some degree retrievable. And when it is retrieved, it is always also more than retrieved, as well as less, since it is only nachtraglich, after the fact and belatedly (as Freud would perhaps have wanted to suggest), that this experience, which the infant lived through without (much) consciousness, gets to be recognized for what it was (is) and accordingly comes to be understood as an ontological relationship. The 'retrieval' therefore retrieves in two senses: it brings back what was 'forgotten'; but it also redeems it by 'making' it what it never was.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The recollection of Being -- the very same movement by which we grow beyond our ego-logical identifications -- is a hermeneutical movement: we must first 'go back' to Zugehorigkeit, 'back,' as it were, to the 'beginning,' in order to develop beyond the ego-logical stage of ontological forgetfulness in listening. Or rather, to state this point more accurately, since in truth this 'beginning,' this 'origin,' can never be retrieved now as it actually was then, we must first generate within ourselves a presently felt sense of our 'pre-ontological beginning.' This movement forward, this growth, requires a hermeneutical movement backward: a movement, however, that must not be confused with an infantile or psychotic regression. It is essential to understand the difference between this hermeneutical 'return' and a pathological regression. Regression is a movement in one direction only; it repeats what came earlier instead of redeeming it; and it is always a movement, therefore, that closes the process of personal growth.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>We are always free, of course, to continue living in the stage II reality of anyone-and-everyone (das Man), virtually deaf to the dimensionality of Being that resounds all around us. But after we have achieved the maturity of stage II, we can still continue to grow, committing ourselves to a practice of the Self by virtue of which we begin to grow beyond the ontologically alientated condition of being-an-ego to find ourselves more opened up to this dimensionality of Being and enjoying a spiritual wholeness not otherwise possible. The hearkening of stage IV, a gathering embrace of whatever may be given to our ears for their hearing, is an achievement that brings with it a self-fulfillment altogether different from that which comes at stage III: a self-fulfillment that is not possible at all in stage II." (Levin, 1989, pp. 45-56)</p>
</blockquote>
<p> </p>
<p>Regarding your comment that I deny universals, I disagree. I do accept the existence of universals, where universal indicates a percept, concept, experience, pattern, or form that we can identify as recurrent (not necessarily identically, but homeomorphically) across different 'frames' or worldspaces or stages of development, but which also exhibits some non-negligible particularity in manifestation, expression, conceptualization, etc. Your pointing at the underlying 'sameness' in our meanings is to me an identification of homeomorphic equivalence, which is different than us both consciously intending or "meaning" the exact same thing (to the extent that meaning is understood intentionally as a form of 'understanding' or as involving conceptual distinctions and associations). I don't see my assertion of non-negligible differences in the conscious use and understanding of "all" across worldspaces as a denial of universals, but as an acknowledgement that, simultaneously with the appearance of "sameness," "difference" may also be observed (from my vantage, inseparably). I see "all" as both a tacit, near-universal intuition (given certain facilitative conditions, such as cognitive development -- see the Piraha), and as a "conceptual scope" or perspective that plays a role in the ecology of ideas of a particular worldview.</p>
<p><br/>One of my concerns with the view you are presenting is that, in its emphasis on tacit understanding and inward tracing, it seems (intentionally or by default) to focus almost exclusively on the UL, as if thinking and tracing happens apart from body, culture, etc. Your comment to me about why we might also perceive "all" differently reduced everything ultimately to UL terms. In the post-postmodern recovery of universals, Habermas -- and Levin with him -- argues in part for the recovery of such dialogically, via social engagement and practice. Panikkar's notion of 'homeomorphic equivalence' is a flower of just such engagement. You call it hedging, but I see it as working from more than just the UL.</p> Tom: Yes. It's either that,…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-11:5301756:Comment:313102011-10-11T16:46:40.937ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
<p><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Yes. It's either that, or they're subject to <strong>your version of all</strong>. "There are no universals."</em></p>
<p><br></br>Are you saying that I actually mean something different by "all" than you do?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Are you familiar with the <font face="Tahoma" size="3"><font face="Tahoma" size="3">Pirahã</font></font> people? I <a href="http://integrallife.com/member/balder/blog/three-nows-future-infinitive-and-triple-loop-awareness" target="_blank">blogged…</a></p>
<p><strong>Tom:</strong> <em>Yes. It's either that, or they're subject to <strong>your version of all</strong>. "There are no universals."</em></p>
<p><br/>Are you saying that I actually mean something different by "all" than you do?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Are you familiar with the <font face="Tahoma" size="3"><font face="Tahoma" size="3">Pirahã</font></font> people? I <a target="_blank" href="http://integrallife.com/member/balder/blog/three-nows-future-infinitive-and-triple-loop-awareness">blogged about them</a> a few years ago on Integral Life. They've got a very peculiar language, which lacks numeracy, recursion, most temporal distinctions, etc. Of relevance here is that they lack words for "all" or "every" as well. Here's an excerpt from <a target="_blank" href="http://www.pnglanguages.org/americas/brasil/PUBLCNS/ANTHRO/PHGrCult.pdf">an article</a> on their language and culture.</p>
<p> </p>
<blockquote><p>This study began as a description of the absence of numerals, number, and counting in Pirahã, the only surviving member of the Muran language family. However, after considering the implications of this unusual feature of Pirahã language and culture, I came to the conclusion defended in this paper, namely, that there is an important relation between the absence of number, numerals, and counting, on the one hand, and the striking absence of other forms of precision quantification in Pirahã semantics and culture, on the other. A summary of the surprising facts will include at least the following: Pirahã is the only language known without number, numerals, or a concept of counting. It also <strong>lacks terms for quantification such as "all," "each," "every," "most," and "some."</strong> It is the only language known without color terms. It is the only language known without embedding (putting one phrase inside another of the same type or lower level, e.g., noun phrases in noun phrases, sentences in sentences, etc.). It has the simplest pronoun inventory known, and evidence suggests that its entire pronominal inventory may have been borrowed. It has no perfect tense. It has perhaps the simplest kinship system ever documented. It has no creation myths its texts are almost always descriptions of immediate experience or interpretations of experience; it has some stories about the past, but only of one or two generations back. Pirahã in general express no individual or collective memory of more than two generations past. They do not draw, except for extremely crude stick figures representing the spirit world that they (claim to) have directly experienced.</p>
</blockquote> So all speakers are subject t…tag:integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com,2011-10-11:5301756:Comment:312272011-10-11T15:07:52.719ZBalderhttp://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/profile/BruceAlderman
<p>So all speakers are subject to and expressors of <em>all</em>'s universal meaning?</p>
<p>So all speakers are subject to and expressors of <em>all</em>'s universal meaning?</p>