Archive for year 2017

How Ego is Blocking the Restoring of the Relational World View

0
December 15, 2017
by in APN

As the title of this essay is meant to suggest, the physical world of our actual experience is ‘relational’ but the relational view is obfuscated by semantic constructions depicting the world as a world of independent things-in-themselves that are the imputed authors of the world dynamic, among which; ‘Western humans’, Western nations and Western corporations.  This essay exposes the deception in this Western scientific-materialist, thing-based world view and shows how individual and collective ‘ego’ continues to block the restoring of ‘relations’ to their natural primacy over scientific materialism/dualism.

 

 

[1.] Everything is in continuous relational flux.

 

 

“The real facts bear witness that humans are not at the top of some self-conceived food chain that we ourselves dominate because we have imagined it as such, but that we exist in what is referred to as a food web, wherein all forms of life are interconnected and thus subject to a variety of codependencies which are necessary for the possibility of life on earth as we know it.” — JJD77, UPEI 

 

Relations are all there is, … relational forms are relational activities within the transforming relational continuum. (more…)

Update on my Philosophical Investigations

0
November 9, 2017
by in APN

 

SUMMARY: All my investigations continue to confirm the findings of Nietzsche in the following respect; Western civilization has put ‘reason’ (science) into an unnatural primacy over ‘intuition’, sourcing chronic dysfunction and incoherence in the Western social dynamic.  ‘Science’, and by this I mean popular, mainstream science that is based on a belief in ‘objective truths’ APPEARS to work well on simple problems but only because ‘science’ is ‘marking its own exam papers’ within its own synthetic dualist, being-base paradigm.  Because we are using scientific thinking on complex relational problems that are far beyond the competency of science, where the ‘error’ due to the inadequacy of science is much larger than on simple mechanical problems, we are engendering unanticipated, unmanaged (unmanageable) ‘externalities’ that are continuing to accumulate and infuse dissonance into the ongoing evolution of the transforming relational continuum we are all included in.  The ‘transvaluation of values’ that Nietzsche has claimed is needed to get us out of this predicament, and which my own inquiry affirms, involves a culture shift that would move us much closer to the indigenous aboriginal culture and to Buddhist, Taoist. and Vedic (Advaita Vedanta) cultures. That is, we would shift from a split-apart dualist understanding of inhabitant and habitat [e.g. man and nature] to an inhabitant-habitat nondualist understanding, affirmed by modern physics.

 

How can I say this in a simple way?  How about; -science and reason, which are dualist and being-based, are always wrong because they simplify the reality of our experience in order to get concise answers.  Yet we make ‘scientific reality’ (SCSR) our ‘operative reality’ that guides our actions and plans.  Our scientifically conceived actions and plans, while successful ‘by their own measure’, engender unanticipated and unmanaged ‘externalities’ that continue to mount.  (more…)

A Nietzschean View on Climate Change

0
November 6, 2017
by in APN

 

             the thing at the centre is its relations

 

Nietzsche’s view is that there is no objective truth or objective reality ‘out there’.  The physical reality of our actual experience is the sole source of truth, and that is why we need to share our experiences with one another, as is the indigenous aboriginal tradition of the ‘learning circle’, in order to holistically ‘image’ the world dynamic [in which everything is in flux (panta rhei) as in a transforming relational continuum] that we all share inclusion in.

 

In general, field and matter are a nonduality wherein epigenetic influence inductively actualizes genetic expression.  This is our ‘physically experienced intuitive reality’ (PEIR).

 

In order to get some talking traction, we use noun-and-verb language to synthetically break this relational continuum down into pieces based on observed relational forms.  This gives us a ‘semantically constructed scientific reality’ (SCSR).

 

Because it was a ‘being’-based (noun-and-verb) language that was popularized in Western culture, this put the Apollonian cart before the Dionysian horse and made us a scientific, reasoning culture that put emotions and intuition second. (more…)

Restoring Intuition to its Natural Primacy Over Reason

0
September 4, 2017
by in APN

 

 

 

STARRY NIGHT — Van Gogh’s Intuition of the turbulence in nature

 

What we observe as material bodies and forces are nothing but shapes and variations in the structure of space. Particles are just schaumkommen (appearances). – Erwin Schroedinger

 

 

INTRODUCTION:

 

Intuition is in a natural primacy over reason [1].  This is the way things are understood in both indigenous aboriginal belief traditions and in the relational interpretation of modern physics.

 

Our experience-based intuition informs us that the storm-cell and the turbulence [a purely relational dynamic] that is epigenetically engendering it, are a nonduality.  Our experience-based intuition further informs us that the social storms of ‘rebellion’ and the relational turbulence of the community they are included in, are a nonduality wherein the ‘inhabitant’ and the ‘habitat’ are NOT two separate things but one inhabitant-habitat nonduality.  Yet ‘reason’ [science and rationality] would have us re-formulate such nonduality in the simplified dualist terms of independent ‘things-in-themselves’ in a notionally empty, non-participating space.

 

Noun-and-verb language is used to ‘dress up’ storms and rebels as ‘causal agents’, notionally equipped with their own internal ‘genetic agency’ that are seen as being fully and solely responsible for their own’ self-development, actions and results.   Our intuition meanwhile screams out to us that, as with the nonduality of storm-cell and turbulence, that these purported ‘independent causal agents’, the storm-cell and the rebel, are NOT self-actualizing but, like sailboats, derive their ‘apparent self-actualizing’ from the ‘turbulence’ aka ‘relational dynamics’ they are situationally included in.

 

In the physical reality of our actual experience as informs our intuition, “epigenetic influence inductively actualizes genetic expression” [turbulence engenders storms].   However, our semantically contrived ‘reason’ obfuscates the physically real sourcing of epigenetic influence by ‘dressing up’ the ‘shapes and variations in the relational structure of space [e.g. Katrina, Harvey], as ‘independent systems-in-themselves’, imputing to them, their own internal ‘genetic agency’ so that the primal role of ‘turbulence’ [epigenetic inductive influence] vanishes from view, leaving the impression that the foreground ‘systems’ [shapes and variations in the relational structure of turbulence] are jumpstart sources of their own development, actions and ‘accomplishments’.  As Nietzsche points out, this hijacking of genetic sourcing by ‘independent beings’ derives from the ‘ego’ of humans who see themselves/ourselves as such. (more…)

Navigating Between Truth and Reality

0
July 3, 2017
by in APN

 

According to Nietzsche, there is no such thing as ‘truth’, or rather, ‘truth is when people lie together in a herd-like fashion’.

In this ‘post-truth’ era, the emphasis is, as in television advertising, on repeating the same statements so as to induce an ‘emotional connection’ and with it, herd behaviour. (more…)

Exploring a Double Bind

0
May 31, 2017
by in APN

 

 “The function of education has never been to free the mind and the spirit of man, but to bind them…acquiescence, not originality. …Schools are the central conserving force of the culture. … In order not to fail, most people are willing to believe anything and to care not whether what they are told is true or false.  Only by remaining absurd can one feel free from fear of failure.” – Jules Henry, cultural anthropologist, in ‘Culture Against Man’

….. We must never forget we have a choice …. (far side)

“It is Henry’s contention that in practice education has never been an instrument to free the mind and the spirit of man, but to bind them. … Children do not give up their innate imagination, curiousity, dreaminess easily. You have to love them to get them to do that. Love is the path through permissiveness to discipline; and through discipline, only too often, to betrayal of self.” – R. D. Laing, psychiatrist and philosopher

I live in a double bind.  It can be depressing.  It is the culture vs authenticity double bind explored by R. D. Laing which arises when you see the world differently from your culture-supporting family and friends but to be too overt about what you are thinking/feeling would be a downer because it ‘undermines’ many of the popular upbeat beliefs and social structures of our times.

 

But to say nothing would be to betray oneself, and to betray one’s culture/society as well, as it continues to believe in and employ over-simplistic rational/scientific assumptions so that well-intended actions end up having us ‘shoot ourselves in the foot’.  On the other hand, to overtly critique ‘common thinking and common practice’ that may not only be ‘accepted thinking and practice’, but ‘thinking and practice’ deemed meritorious, which is rewarded and respected in our society and is encouraged in our children through our educational processes, can invite ‘backlash’ wherein others close to us, equally (but inversely) convinced, of the positive value of the ‘accepted thinking and practice’ which we are critiquing, may identify us as a misinformed ‘trouble-maker’. (more…)

Comments on Switching from Distribution to Invitation

0
March 21, 2017
by in APN

Why I am switching from ‘distribution lists’ to ‘invitation-pending-interest-lists and concealing email addresses.

In composing ‘distribution lists’ [I have never had any fixed distribution lists],  I start with a particular piece of content and go through my contacts list asking myself the question; ‘might so-and-so be interested in this piece?’ and being perhaps overly generous with the ‘yes’ nods, compose my ‘distribution list’.  I leave the email addresses there in the spirit of openness/trust.

The distribution list was never intended as a “discussion forum” list, although it has on occasion been employed as such, not by myself but by one or more recipients on the list.  This led to a situation where I was expected to be ‘the manager’ of discussions that used the distribution list as a discussion forum list and to impose my judgement on what ‘went too far’ or was ‘in error’ and to otherwise ‘set the record straight’.  Since my research [into peacemaking circles etc.] has made me into an advocate of ‘restorative justice’ whereby one does not impose moral judgement but simply promotes and assists in the restoring of balance and harmony where conflict arises, I was not inclined to put myself into the position of ‘moderator’ of a debating forum.  Having served as a circle keeper, I prefer to use to the ‘power of the circle’ as the mediating influence; i.e. to let each person holding the talking stick speak their piece ‘from their heart’ and not exploit their ‘access to the microphone’ to impose judgements.  Circles are more easily accomplished on a face-to-face basis.

 

This is why; as well as the background given below, that I decided to switch from distribution lists to invitation-pending-interest lists, where the emails sent out include only a link to writing on a particular subject that may be of interest, with a brief description of the subject matter [since the subject matter is only a ‘click’ away].  The invitation lists use Bcc’s that suppress email addresses.

 

My apologies if the distribution list traffic was in any way bothersome to you, and please advise if you would rather not be on any invitation lists.

 

Here is my ‘main story’ that you are invited, pending interest, to read;

 

every system is epigenetically actualized by need within the relational suprasystem. noun and verb semantics reconstruct ‘reality’ in terms of ‘systems’ out of the context of the ‘suprasystem’ (as if in a void). for those stoking the functioning of their own systems like the Blacksmith, epigenetic influence is like water to fish though it is the primary physical reality while the realm of the ‘system’ is a ‘semantic reality’ only.

 

The picture is meant to illustrate the physical reality that we are included in something greater than ourselves; … a relational suprasystem or ‘epigenetic influence’ that inductively actualizes, orchestrates and shapes ‘genetic expression’.   Western scientific thinking culture tends to create semantic realities out of ‘systems’ stoked by humans, making it appear as if humans are ‘improving on nature’.  This continually ‘talked up’ semantic reality has become a de facto ‘operative reality’ and confused with the physical reality of our actual experience.

The Blacksmith is ‘being obsoleted’ by epigenetic influences which are inductively actualizing genetic expression in the form of newly emerging ‘systems’.  The epigenetic ‘change field’ that the Blacksmith is included in is like water to fish.  His focus is to stoke the system he is working in so as to sustain its healthy functioning.

 

* * *

I am trying to articulate and share the whys and how’s of my being at odds with the culture I have grown up in.   (more…)

Go to Top