May 31, 2006

 

                                   THE INTEGRATION OF WORLD CULTURES

 

700,000 - 10,000 B.C.E.

PRE-MODERNITY

Levels of Consciousness: Jean Gebser (1905-1973), Jurgen Habermas (1929-) and Ken Wilber (1949-) see consciousness in Pre-modernity as developing through three stages, each one more differentiated and more encompassing than its predecessor.

 

The three levels of consciousness in Pre-modernity are:

           700,000-200,000 B.C.E.:  

The AArchaic-uroboric@ Stage: Humans do not differentiate themselves from their environment.  The world view is Aarchaic- animistic.@  The mode of production is foraging (hunting and gathering) (p. 47; Hall 2005, p. 23).

 

200,000-10,000  B.C.E.:                   

The ATyphon@ (Body-self) Stage: Humans have a Aself@ B a body self B which they differentiate from the natural world.  The world view is magical.  The mode of production is horticultural (p. 47; Hall 2005, p. 24).

 

10,000-2,500 B.C.E.:

The AMythic-membership@ Stage: The locus of the Aself@ is now the mind, which humans differentiate from their body.  The world view is hierarchical.  The mode of production is agrarian (pp. 47, 53-54; Hall 2005, pp. 23-25 and 29).

 

Pre-modern religions: At the core of all the world=s great wisdom traditions is the Great Chain of Being (the Great Nest of Being), as described by Nicholas Berdyaev (1874-1948), Ananda Coomaraswamy (1877-1947), Rene Guenon (1886-1951), Fritjof Schuon (1907-1998), Huston Smith (c.1925-), Michael Murphy (1930-), Seyyed Nasr (1933), Roger Walsh and Les Hixon (pp. 6, 35 and 203).

 

Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche (1940-1987) has shown that, in terms of  Aearth, human and heaven,@ the simple hierarchy of body, mind and spirit was at the basis of even the earliest shamanic traditions (pp. 7-8). 

 

In Hinduism and Buddhism, the Chain appears as the three great states of being B gross (matter and body), subtle (mind and soul) and causal (spirit) (p. 8).

 

 

 

The Great Chain of Being: The Great Chain (Nest) of Being is a description of reality as a rich tapestry of interwoven levels, reaching from matter to body to mind to soul to spirit.  Each senior level Aenvelops@ or Aenfolds@ its junior dimension (a series of nests within nests within nests of Being), so that every thing and every event in the world is interwoven with every other, and all are ultimately enveloped and enfolded by Spirit (God, Tao, Brahman, the Absolute) (pp. 6-7).

 

Arthur Lovejoy (1873-1962) concluded that this view of reality has been:

Athe dominant official philosophy of the larger part of civilized humankind through most of its history.  [It is that view which] the greater number of subtler speculative minds and the great religious teachers [both East and West] have, in their various fashions, been engaged in@ (p. 7).

 

Epistemological Pluralism: Intrinsic to the view expressed by the Great Chain of Being, is epistemological pluralism B the belief that each level of being is correlated with a specific level of knowing.  For instance, a Great Chain composed of four levels B body, mind, soul and spirit B has four correlative modes of knowing  B sensory, mental, archetypal and mystical.  This is usually shortened to the three eyes of knowing:

1.                  The eye of flesh which leads to empiricism, is monological, and discloses the gross realm.

 

2.                  The eye of mind which leads to rationalism, is dialogical, and discloses the subtle realm.

 

3.                  The eye of contemplation, which leads to mysticism, is trans-logical, and discloses the causal realm (pp. 35-37).

 

The traditional view of epistemological pluralism was given a clear statement by the Christian mystics Hugh of Saint Victor (1096-1141) and Saint Bonaventure (1221-1274).  Each Aeye@ is valid and important when addressing its own realm, but commits a fallacy (a category error) when by itself, it attempts to grasp fully either higher or lower realms (p. 18; Hall 2006, p. 1).

 

In the East, Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna (c.150), and in the West, philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) demonstrated the limits of rationality in the face of the Divine (p. 21; Hall 2006, p. 3).

 

Huston Smith (1925-) summarizes:

AReality is graded, and with it, cognition@ (p. 35).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

550 B.C.E.:

THE GREEKS

Level of Consciousness: Humans now see themselves as individuals, rather than fulfilling a pre-determined role in a fixed social hierarchy.  This is the AEgoic Stage@ in the development of consciousness, and it continues through the present time.  The Greeks were in the AMiddle Egoic Stage.@  The Renaissance marks the beginning of the AHigh Egoic Stage (p. 54; Hall 2005, p. 33).

 

The Differentiation of the Value Spheres: Anticipating Modernity, the Greeks advance the idea of three forms of knowledge (value spheres):

1.                  The Beautiful B the aesthetic and expressive currents of each subjective self.

 

2.                  The Good B morals, justness, ethics.

 

3.                  The True B the objective truth, according to dispassionate standards B science (pp. 49 and 98).          

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

400-1450:

THE MIDDLE AGES

Level of Consciousness: During the Middle Ages, consciousness continues at the AMiddle Egoic Stage.@  The world view is still pre-modern (p. 48).

 

Characteristics of all Pre-modern World Views: Pre-modern world views are characterized by:

1.         A Lack of clear Differentiation between the Value Spheres.  The cultural value spheres of art/aesthetics, religion/morals and empirical/science remain confused.  For instance, the activities of the state are not differentiated from the activities of religion (pp. 47-48; see Modernity in the present document).

 

2.                  The Belief that the universe is unfolding away from God.  No pre-modern culture considers the possibility that, like all other living systems, we humans are in the process of growing toward our own highest potential (pp. 102-103).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1450-1700:

THE RENAISSANCE

1550-1650:

Level of Consciousness: The AHigh Egoic Stage@ of consciousness development begins.  It lasts to and including the present time (Hall 2005, p. 36). 

 

The Differentiation of the Value Spheres: The West begins to differentiate the cultural value spheres (art, morals and science)  (p. 55).

 

Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) and Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) innovate the use of precision measurements to map the universe.  With science begins Modernity, and with it, would begin a denial of all the basic tenets of religion (pp. ix and 4).

 

The Differentiation of the Value Spheres is still incomplete: The lack of differentiation of the cultural value spheres is still apparent:

1.                  Buonarroti Michaelangelo (1475-1564) is in constant conflict with Pope Julius II (pope 1503-1513) about the types of figures he is allowed to represent in his art, because the spheres of self-expression/art and religion/morals are not clearly differentiated.  Oppression in one is oppression in the other (p. 48).

 

2.                  Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) is prevented from pursuing the sphere of science because it clashes with the sphere of religion/morality (p. 48).

 

The Beginning of the Representational Paradigm of Knowledge: Rene Descartes (1596-1650), usually considered the first Amodern@ philosopher, sees the aim of philosophy as Arepresentational.@  Philosophy must Amirror nature@ B a nature whose ultimate reality is sensory (pp. 41-42 and 127; See Modernity in the present document).

 

 

 

 

 

1700-1875:

THE ENLIGHTENMENT

The Knowledge Paradigm: The fundamental paradigm of knowledge during the Enlightenment is representational.  The paradigm does not consider the possibility that language per se could influence the acquisition of knowledge.  A word gains meaning simply because it points to or represents an object.  The pointing is purely monological and empirical.  This, it is thought, is the basis of all genuine knowledge.  Even a complex scientific theory is simply a map which represents the objective territory.  If the correspondence is accurate, the map is true.  If the correspondence is inaccurate, the map is false.  Science B and all true knowledge B is a straightforward case of accurate representation, accurate map-making (p. 127).

 

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) points out that you can never know Athe thing in itself,@ only the appearance (phenomenon) that results when Athe thing in itself@ is acted on by the categories of the human mind.  This is a realization of the importance of the mind in truth seeking, and in this respect Kant is the first of the great Post-modern philosophers (See Post-modernity in the present document). 

 

Kant also tries to integrate the cultural value spheres. The four great attempts at integration which would develop after him, would have their roots in his work B  the Romantic, the Idealistic, the Post-modern Post-structuralist, and the Integral-aperspectival movements (pp. 88-89).

 

Johann Fichte (1762-1814) notes that if you cannot know Athe thing in itself,@ neither can you know that it exists.  AThe thing in itself@ is an impossible notion.  The entire perceived universe is the product of mind B but not an individual mind, rather, a supra-individual and absolute Self (Spirit).  It is this Self which produces the entire universe.  Out of the creative imagination of the absolute Self, issues forth the finite world, and in reaction to this finite world, grows the finite self.  Liberation consists in rediscovering the absolute Self of which the finite self and finite world are but manifestations. 

 

Because all forms of knowledge [the four value spheres of Ken Wilber, 1949-)] issued forth from this absolute Self, they can be seamlessly integrated in this Self awareness.  Such integration would heal the Aderemption@ (fragmentation) of Modernity.  Fichte thus anticipates the idea of Idealism.

 

Through his wish to reconstruct the actual path taken by consciousness in its creative unfolding of the universe, Fichte introduces the notion of development (evolution).  The world is not static and pre-given.  It develops, evolves, taking on different forms as Spirit unfolds the universe.  Fichte thus anticipates the idea of evolution (pp. 104-105; see Modernity and Ken Wilber in the present document).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1775:

The Differentiation of the Value Spheres: The four value spheres are now clearly differentiated (p. 104; see Modernity in the present document).

 

1800:

AThe Linguistic Turn@: The linguistic turn in philosophy originates in the realization that language is not simply a representation of a pre-given world, but has a hand in the creation and construction of the world.  The linguistic turn anticipates the structuralism of Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) (pp. 124-125; see Modernity in the present document).

 

1775-1825:

The Beginning of the Dissociation of the Value Spheres: As soon as they are fully differentiated, the value spheres drift from differentiation into dissociation, going their separate ways, with little or no discourse between them (p. 55; see Modernity in the present document).

 

1875:

The Dissociation of the Value Spheres and the discarding of Interiority: The value spheres are now fully dissociated.  In addition, the interior value spheres are negated B they collapse into only the AIt@ of empirical science.  Science overtakes the two interior values spheres B the AI@ and the AWe@ (p. 104; see Modernity in the present document).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1875-1950:

MODERNITY:

Historians define Modernity as that period which developed roots in the Renaissance, blossomed during the Enlightenment, and in many ways continues to this day (p. 41).

 

Two Aspects to Modernity:

1.                  The Dignity of Modernity: Both Max Weber (1864-1920) and Jurgen Habermas (1929-) define Modernity specifically as Athe differentiation of the cultural value spheres@ (art, morals and science), a differentiation which had been anticipated by the Greeks in terms of Athe Beautiful, the Good and the True@ (pp. 11, 47 and 49-50).

 

Max Weber (1864-1920) describes three domains (realities):

1.                  The Subjective: AI.@  Self and self-expression, aesthetic judgment, artistic expression.  The irreducible subjective contents of immediate consciousness and intentionality (p. 50).

 

2.                  The Inter-subjective: AWe.@  The domain of collective interaction and social awareness, justness, goodness, reciprocity, mutual understanding.

 

3.                  The Objective: AIt.@  Objective truth, realities which can be seen in an empirical and monological fashion (pp. 50-51).

 

All Fields affected: The new world view affects all fields of endeavor:

Philosophy: Rene Descartes (1596-1650) (usually considered to be the first Amodern@ philosopher), sees the aim of philosophy as Arepresentational.@  Philosophy must attempt to form a correct representation of the world, Amirror nature@ B a nature whose ultimate reality is sensory (pp. 41-42 and 127).

 

Art (from 1750 onward): Francisco de Goya (1746-1828), John  Constable (1776-1837), Gustave Courbet (1819-1877), Edouard Manet (1832-1883), Paul Cezanne (1839-1906), Claude Monet (1840-1926), Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) B all make an almost total break with traditional themes and modes of composition, and in particular break from the mere depiction of mythic-religious themes.  Nature, not myth, comes to the fore (p. 42).

 

 

 

 

 

Science: Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), Isaac Newton (1642-1727), James Watt (1736-1819), Michael Faraday (1791-1867), William Kelvin (1824-1907) and James Maxwell (1831-1879) B all rely on the measurement of empirical-sensory data.  Where the old sciences had classified nature, the new sciences measure it (p. 42).

 

Cultural Cognition: A general shift occurs from:

Mythic-membership to mental-rational modes of cognition (perspectival rationality).

 

Conventional to post-conventional ethics.

 

Ethno-centric values to universal, global values (pp. 42-43).

 

Personal Identity: A shift occurs from the perception of people gaining an identity from their role in a social hierarchy, to the perception of people as autonomous individuals having an identity of their own B an ego identity defined by personal autonomy (p. 42).

 

Political and Civil Rights: Slavery is outlawed, the idea of women=s rights is advanced, child labor laws are instituted.  The concepts of the rights of humankind (freedom of speech, religion, assembly, fair trial) and equality before the law come into being (p. 42).

 

Technology: The steam engine developed by James Watt (1736-1819), and patented in 1769, marks the beginning of generalized industrialization (p. 42).

 

Politics: Liberal democracies come into being, often through a series of actual revolutions B for instance, in America (1775) and France (1789) (p. 42).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1.                  The Disaster of Modernity: With Modernity, the West becomes the first major civilization in the history of humanity to deny almost entirely the existence of the Great Nest of Being.  Instead of the Great Chain reaching from matter to God, there is now matter only.  The world view of scientific materialism becomes, in whole or part, the dominant official philosophy of the modern West.  On the basis of the thesis that the value spheres other than science are worthless, scientific materialism pronounces the Great Chain of Being non-existent.  Modernity does not accept the existence of the higher modes of being B the trans-mental, trans-rational, trans-personal, and contemplative (pp. 9-10 and 13).

 

Max Weber (1864-1920) observes that Modernity has collapsed all higher modes of knowing into empirical (monological) science.  Modernity means:

Athe disenchantment of the world@ (pp. 11, 38, 76 and 84).

 

Romanticism: Romanticism is the first great movement to express revolt against the negation of the two interior spheres by Modernity. 

 

Romantics try to heal the violent fragmentation of the four cultural value spheres (the four aspects of each holon) with intensity of feelings.  The view is given expression by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), Friedrich von Schiller (1759-1805), William Wordsworth (1770-1850), August von Schlegel (1767-1845) and his brother, Friedrich von Schlegel (1772-1829), Friedrich von Hardenberg (pseud. Novalis, 1772-1801), Samuel Coleridge (1772-1834), John Keats (1795-1821) and Walt Whitman (1819-1892) (pp. 88, 94 and 141). 

 

The Failure of Romanticism: Romantics do not succeed in integrating the value spheres:

1.                  They often end up with a blanket call for de-differentiation B a process which, when it occurs in a living system, is called Acancer,@ a regressive de-differentiation of cells which then grow out of control, and cause the death of the system (p. 97 and 141).

 

2.                  They have no satisfactory explanation for why evolution would do something that it has never done in any other living system, namely make a U-turn right in the middle of its development.  This is rather like every oak tree on the face of the planet suddenly attempting to recapture its acorn-ness (p. 46).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Idealism: Idealism is the second great movement to express revolt against the negation of the two interior spheres by Modernity. 

 

Sometime in the modern era, the idea of history as evolution (a growth toward God) replaces the idea of history as devolution (a fall from God).  We humans, like all other living systems, are in the process of growing toward our own highest potential, and if that highest potential is God, then we are going toward our own Godhood.  Evolution is growth and development toward the highest goal and ground of our own deepest nature.  It is Spirit-in-action, AGod in the making,@ a making which is destined to carry all of us to the Divine.  Cosmic and human history is, most profoundly, the evolution and development of Spirit (pp. 88, 103-104 and 141).

 

Friedrich Schelling (1775-1854) explicitly expresses the idea of spiritual unfolding.  When Spirit first goes out of itself to create the manifest universe, the result is Nature B Aslumbering Spirit@ (pp. 103 and 106). 

 

Georg Hegel (1770B1831) profoundly develops the doctrine.  When Spirit first goes out of itself to create the manifest universe, the result is Nature B AGod in its otherness.@

 

For both Schelling and Hegel, Spirit goes out of itself to produce objective Nature (sub-conscious Spirit), awakens to itself in subjective Mind (self-conscious Spirit), then recovers itself in pure non-dual Spirit, where subject and object are one pure act of non-dual consciousness which unifies both Nature and Mind in realized Spirit (super-conscious Spirit).  The Goal of Spirit is the Path itself (pp. 103, 106 and 108).

 

Hegel summarizes:

AEverything that from eternity has happened in heaven and earth, the life of God and all the deeds of time, simply are the struggles for Spirit to know itself, to find itself, be for itself, and finally unite itself to itself.  It is alienated and divided, but only so as to be able thus to find itself and return to itself@ (p. 111).

 

Involution is the story of Spirit=s alienation from itself.  Evolution is the story the extraordinary return of Spirit to itself (p. 111).           

 

 

 

 

 

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) applies the idea to biology. 

 

Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) makes evolution a universal law. 

 

Pierre Theilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) makes the idea famous in the West.

 

Aurobindo Ghose (1872-1950) gives the idea its most profound spiritual context

                        (p. 103).

 

Idealism is the first philosophy ever to come to terms with B and in fact, fully embrace B the sweeping implications of all-encompassing development, especially in the sphere of religion and spirituality.  It integrates Spirit and evolution by recognizing that evolution is Spirit-in-action, AGod in the making.@  Evolution is the concrete unfolding, holarchical integration and self-actualization of Spirit.  It is the mode and manner in which Spirit creates the entire manifest world, not one item of which is left untouched by its all-encompassing embrace (p. 110).

 

The Failure of Idealism: Idealism possesses no yoga B no tried and tested practice, no set of reproducible injunctions for reliably confirming the trans-personal and super-conscious insights which form the core of its vision.  In the wake of Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), the dismissal by science of Idealism as Amere metaphysics,@ is enough to doom it as a philosophy (pp. 111-113).

 

The Victory of Science:

1925:

Monological Science takes over: An explosive science invades the other spheres.  This science, which includes positivism, empiric-analytic reason, technological modes of knowing, and theories of dynamic process, systems, chaos, and complexity, completely dominate serious discourse in the Western world.  The AIt@ colonizes the AI,@ and the AWe.@  Empirical science becomes scientism B the belief that there is no reality save that revealed by science, no truth save that which science delivers.  The mind, heart and soul of humankind, and even consciousness itself, are pronounced, at best, epiphenomenal, at worst, illusory. 

 

The Agreat interlocking order,@ first conceptualized during the Enlightenment, is a defining feature of the modern scientific world view. Thinking is holistic but the holistic system is one of interwoven AIts@ (pp. 55-57).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) notes that all AIts@ have simple location (location in the sensorimotor, empirical world), whereas none of the interior dimensions do (p. 59).

 

1970:

The Reign of Science: An article, APhysiological Effects of Transcendental Meditation,@ by R. K. Wallace, published in Science (No. 167, p. 1251), is the first of many on the physiological effects of meditation.  Considerable subsequent research confirms that people in a meditative state display real and sometimes very dramatic changes in body physiology, from blood chemistry to brain-wave patterns.  The meditative state seems to be a Afourth state of consciousness,@ along with the waking, dreaming and deep sleep states (p. 197).

 

Science interprets its discovery that many of the Ahigher,@ Atranscendent@ realities (such as consciousness), are actually deeply connected to the organic body and its brain, as providing yet another reason why one should  discard completely all invisible realms, including the Chain of Being.  The exterior alone is real (pp. 62 and 197).

 

Science rejects all Interiors: When modern empirical science rejects the reality of the interior domains:

1.                  It rejects the Great Chain of Being: Science, in effect, rejects all the levels of the Great Chain, except for its lowest (the material body).  All of the levels above matter are interior realities.

 

2.                  Spirit is only one of its many Casualties: Not only Spirit and the spiritual, trans-personal realms are discarded, but so are feelings, perceptions and affects, and intentionality in general B all of the interior domains.  No interior domain has a reality of its own (pp. 142-143).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Structuralism: Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) innovates the mode of thinking known as structuralism. 

 

For Saussure, the linguistic sign is a holon which integrates:

1.                  A material signifier B the written or spoken word.

 

2.                  A conceptual signified B what comes to mind when we see the signifier. 

 

Both of the signifier and the signified which compose the sign, are different from the actual referent (the actual tree). 

 

A given word in itself is basically meaningless.  Meaning is stabilized by the relationships among all of the words themselves B the bark of a tree or the bark of a dog.  A meaningless element becomes meaningful only by virtue of the total structure.  The entire language is instrumental in conferring meaning on an individual word.  (In other words, every sign is a holon).  Meaning comes not merely from objective pointing but from inter-subjective structures that cannot themselves be objectively pointed to (pp. 126-128 and 148).

 

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) notes:

AThe limits of my language are the limits of my world@ (p. 125).

 

Present-day descendants include Roman Jakobson (1896-1982), Jean Piaget (1896-1980), Jacques Lacan (1901-1981), Claude Levi-Strauss (1908-), Roland Barthes (1915-1980), Michel Foucault (1926-1984), Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987), Jurgen Habermas (1929-), Jacques Derrida (1930-), Jane Loevinger (1918-) and Carol Gilligan (1936-) (pp. 126 and 129).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1950-Present:

POST-MODERNITY

Post-modernity is used in two senses, the broad and the narrow sense:

1.                  Revolt against the Domination of Empirical Science: When the word Post-modernity is used in its broad, general sense, it includes any of the major currents occurring in the wake of Modernity, whether a reaction against Modernity, a counterbalance to it, or a continuation of it by other means (p. 43).

 

Jurgen Habermas (1929-) sees Post-modernity (in this general sense) as revolting against:

AThe colonization of the value spheres by science@ (pp 76 and 85).

 

A Major Effect in all Fields: The Post-modern world view expresses itself in the various fields:

Philosophy: Jacques Derrida (1930-) espouses a non-representational knowledge paradigm.

 

Cultural Cognition: A shift occurs from a rational perspectival to an aperspectival network-logic mode of thinking.

 

Technology: The information age (the Internet) is a continuation of industrialization.

 

Integration is part of the Kosmos: Post-modernity points out that interpretation is central to both epistemology (knowing) and ontology (being).  Interpretation is an intrinsic feature of the fabric of the universe.  Every actual occasion has an interpretive component (pp. 117 and 119). 

 

The Assumptions of Post-modern Theories: Post-modern theories have three core assumptions:

Constructivism: Reality is not pre-given, but is in some significant ways a construction, an interpretation.  The world is not merely perceived but also constructed.  This is in contrast to Athe myth of the given.@

 

Contextualism: Meaning is context-dependent, and contexts are boundless.

 

Diversity: Cognition must, therefore, privilege no single perspective.  It must be Aintegral-aperspectival,@ with Adiversity@ (pp. 121, 131 and 145, 149 and 151).  


 

2.                  All Interpretations are socially constructed: When the word Post-modernity is used in its narrow, specific, technical sense, it means the philosophy that says that all interpretations are socially constructed (pp. 42-43 and 122).

 

POST-MODERN POST-STRUCTURALISM (EXTREME POST-MODERNISM): Post-modern Post-structuralism is the third great movement to express revolt against the collapse of the two interior spheres by Modernity.  Post-modern Post-structuralism takes Post-modernity (in its narrow, specific, technical sense) to the extreme (pp. 88 and 141). 

 

Where Post-modernity, in the broad sense of the term, made interpretation central to both epistemology (knowing) and ontology (being); and Post-modernity, in the narrow sense of the term, said that all interpretations are socially constructed, Post-modern Post-structuralism says that there is no truth, only interpretation.  It attempts to deny reality to the objective realm.  This view is also known as extreme post-modernism (pp. 42-43 and 122). 

 

Post-modern Post-structuralism maintains that the objective component of truth can be dispensed with altogether.  There is nothing but interpretation.  This is Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), Georges Bataille (1897-1962), Jacques Lacan (1901-1981), Jean-Francois Lyotard (1924-1998), Gilles Deleuze (1925-1995), Michel Foucault (1926-1984) and Jacques Derrida (1930-). 

 

Despite its performative contradiction (the claims of the theorists are exempt from the Atruths@ they assert), extreme post-modernism is now the most prevalent mood of academia, literary theory, the new historicism, a great deal of political theory, and virtually all of the Anew-paradigm@ approaches to integrating science and religion (pp. 35, 116, 119-120, 122 and 141).

 

The Failure of Post-modern Post-structuralism: Starting from a reliance on integral-aperspectival awareness (vision-logic), the post-modern agenda nevertheless is unable to escape the reduction of reality to surfaces (AIts@) only.  Despite the original emphasis of Post-modernity (in its broad, general sense) on interpretation and interior validation, Post-modern Post-structuralism sees the only reality as sliding chains of signifiers (material marks), holistic chains of interwoven AIts.@  Gone are the signified B the interior domains of the AI@ and AWe@ disclosed on their own terms. 

 

Indeed, most post-modernists go to extraordinary lengths to deny any depth in general.  They thereby deny the possibility of making consequential distinctions between values, aesthetic and moral, and then being able to rank these values meaningfully.  There is no within.  The universe is again dis-qualified (pp. 134-135).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Integral-aperspectivalism: Integral-aperspectivalism is the fourth great movement to express revolt against the collapse of the two interior spheres by Modernity (pp. 88 and 141).

 

Jean Gebser (1905-1973) coins the term integral-aperspectival in order to refer to this pluralistic, multiple-perspectives view, and to contrast it from formal rationality, Aperspectival reason,@ which tends to take a single, monological perspective and view all of reality through that narrow lens.  Integral-aperspectivalism is the view that any single perspective is likely to be partial, limited, perhaps even distorted.  Only by taking multiple perspectives and multiple contexts, can the knowledge quest be fruitfully advanced (p. 131).

 

This view is what Ken Wilber calls vision-logic or network-logic.  Vision-logic does not just represent the Kosmos but is a self-conscious realization that it is a performance of the Kosmos.  With Georg Hegel and Ferdinand de Saussure, vision-logic becomes conscious of its place in evolution.  Vision-logic recognizes the endless networks of holonic interconnections which constitute the very fabric of the Kosmos (pp. 132-133).  

 

The Failure of Integral-aperspectivalism: As soon as vision-logic emerges in evolution, it is crushed by the systems sciences which deny any substantial reality to the AI@ and the AWe@ domains on their own terms.  Vision-logic continues to be Aholistic@ rather than Aatomistic,@ and Anetwork-oriented@ rather than Aanalytic and divisive.@  However, any mode of knowing can be collapsed and confined merely to surfaces, exteriors, and this is what happens to vision-logic (p. 133).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2000:

KEN WILBER (1949-):

Ken Wilber offers a fifth attempt at integration of the value spheres.

AThe integration of the value spheres is the single greatest task which confronts the post-modern world@ (p. 105).

 

The Four Dimensions of all Holons: The universe is made up of four types of hierarchies (holarchies), each showing an asymmetrical increase in holistic capacity.  These are irreversible holarchies of increasing wholeness, increasing holism, and increasing unity and functional integration.  Each holon within a holarchy has its own agency (is a relatively autonomous whole), and its own communion (an extensive network of relationships with the other holons which are an intrinsic part of its environment) (pp. 66-67).

 

These holons have four dimensions, each of which has correlates with all the others.  They are, therefore, intrinsic aspects, features, of the Kosmos (pp. 73 and 83). 

 

In the human realm, the four aspects are:

1.                  Interior Awareness: The holarchy of the interior of the individual has been described by Aristotle (384-322 B.C.E.), Plotinus (205-270), Asanga (also known as Aryasanga, c.300), Aurobindo Ghose (1872-1950), Jean Piaget (1896-1980), Abraham Maslow (1908-1970),  Jane Loevinger (1918-), Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987) and Carol Gilligan (1936-) (pp. 69-71).

 

The holarchy of interior consciousness is the whole point of the Great Chain of Being, as described, among others, by Plato (?427-347 B.C.E.), Plotinus (205-270), Asanga (also known as Aryasanga, c.300), Padmasambhava (c.750) and Lady Tsogyal (777-837).  The point is that there are modes of development beyond rationality.

 

This is Athe Beautiful@ cultural value sphere advanced by the Greeks.

 

2.                  A Collective World Vew: The holarchy of communally shared outlook, the cultural outlook, described by Gerald Heard (1889-1971), Jean Gebser (1905-1973), Erich Neumann (1905-1960), Robert Bellah (1927-) and Jurgen Habermas (1929-) (pp. 71-72).

 

This is Athe Good@ cultural value sphere advanced by the Greeks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3.                  The Outside of the Individual: The holarchy of atoms, molecules, to organisms of increasing complexity (pp. 66-68).

 

4.                  The Exterior of the Community: The holarchy of the social, of the collective forms of holons.  As each individual holon gets bigger, its communal form gets smaller (pp. 68-69).

 

Erich Jantsch (1929-1980) was one of the first to point out why, in any evolutionary, developmental sequence, the bigger an individual holon is compared to its previous level, the smaller is its collective, communal form (p. 68).

 

The external realms (of the individual and of the community) combined, are Athe True@ cultural value sphere advanced by the Greeks.          

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Scientific Method and Levels of Being:

Empiricism: In its broad sense, empiricism means experiential B resorting to experience to ground assertions.  These assertions may be made about any level of being (level of consciousness) since each level has its own mode of direct knowledge.  There is sensory knowledge, mental knowledge, and spiritual knowledge, and all three derive from experience.  All three are empirical.

 

Three Types of Empiricism: The three types of empiricism are:

1.                  Sensory Empiricism which studies the sensorimotor world.  This is the eye of flesh B giving us a monological a science of sensory experience.

 

2.                  Mental Empiricism which includes logic, mathematics, semiotics (the study of signs and their inter-subjective settings), phenomenology, and hermeneutics (the study of interpretation based on grasping the entire network of meaning).  This is the eye of mind B giving us a dialogical science of mental experience.

 

3.                  Spiritual Empiricism which is experiential mysticism, spiritual experiences.  This is the eye of contemplation (satori, nirvikalpa samadhi, gnosis) B giving us a trans-logical science of spiritual experience (pp. 148 and 152-153).

 

Three Steps to Valid Knowledge: According to the scientific method, valid knowledge is obtained by means of three essential steps:

1.                  An Instrumental Injunction: AIf you want to know this, do this.@  Thomas Kuhn (1922-1996) highlights the importance of the paradigm (injunction) B a technique taken as an exemplar for generating data (pp. 155 and 158-159).

 

2.                  A Direct Apprehension (Experience, Illumination): The direct disclosing of the data, referents, in the world space brought forth by the injunction.  These data are a crucial anchor of genuine knowledge.  The empiricists highlight the importance of the apprehension (pp. 156-158).

 

3.                  Communal Confirmation or Rejection: Karl Popper (1902-1994) highlights the importance of falsifiability.  Genuine knowledge must be open to disproof, or else it is dogma (pp. 156-159).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Integration of Science and Religion:

1.                  Science: Science must expand from empiricism in its narrow sense (that of sensory experience only), to empiricism in its broad sense (that of direct experience in general).  Science in this broad sense encompasses all four domains of each holon, including the AI@ and AWe@ which then, under its auspices, can be integrated with the AIt@ and AIts@ domains.

 

The subjective singular, AI@ dimension of human holons, is the traditional Great Chain of Being, except for its lowest level (matter).  The lower stages of human development B up to and including vision-logic (the aperspectival world view) B have been outlined in detail by modern developmental psychology.  The four trans-personal stages B the psychic (psychic world view), the subtle (saintly world view), the causal (sagely world view) and the non-dual (siddha world view) B have been disclosed by the contemplative traditions and recently, by trans-personal psychology (pp. 153, 160, 173-177 and 181-182).

 

Hence, science in its broad sense gives a stunning vindication of the Great Chain of Being.  The Great Chain is now firmly situated within the differentiation of the value spheres by Modernity.  It describes the subjective singular, the AI@ value sphere, and each of its levels actually consists of at least three other domains B the inter-subjective, the objective singular and the inter-objective (pp. 182-183 and 190).

 

Art is the AI@ of Spirit, morals are the AWe@ of Spirit, and science is the AIt@and AIts@ of Spirit (pp. 194-195 and 201).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2.                  Religion: Religion must open its truth claims to direct verification or rejection by experiential evidence.  Like science, it has to engage the three steps to all valid knowledge and anchor its claims in direct experience. 

 

The concrete, literal forms of mythology cannot withstand the tests of evidence.  Authentic spirituality must be based on falsifiable evidence B that is, it must be, at its core, a series of direct mystical, transcendental, meditative, contemplative or yogic experiences (not sensory, not mental, but trans-sensual, trans-mental, trans-personal, transcendental consciousness, direct spiritual experience (pp. 161, 164-165 and 166-167).

 

Each religion needs to focus on those aspects of its tradition which were disclosed by its own deep science of the interiors, whether this be:

The vision quest of tundra shamanism.

 

The yoga of Patanjali (c.150 B.C.E.).

 

The shikantaza of Bodhidharma (482-539).

 

The meditation of Lady Tsogyal (777-837) and Padmasambhava (c.750).

 

The zikr of Jalal ad-Din Rumi (1207-1273).

 

The contemplation of Isaac of Akko (c. 1305), the medieval Jewish mystic of the Kabbalah Segovia School.

 

The contemplative prayer of Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582).

 

The self-inquiry of Ramana Maharashi (1879-1950) (p. 203).

 

Each religion can look to the Great Chain in its own tradition and bracket its specific, exclusive, proprietary, dogmatic, mythic beliefs.  Those beliefs may or may not be true.  They need to submit to the test of deep science.  If they do not past this test, they will not be part of an integration of religion and science.

 

Evolution: The Great Chain of Being, temporalized, is evolution.  The levels of the Great Chain of Being are some of the major stages of evolution.  As the Idealists pointed out, the Great Chain is not given all at once, it unfolds (evolves) over time.  The stages of evolution described by science closely match the corresponding stages described by the Great Chain theorists (p. 205).

 

The idea of evolution is now accepted by major religions:

1.                  Abraham Isaac Kook (1864-1935), Jewish scholar and philosopher, has said (referring to the esoteric system of interpretation of the Scriptures known as the Kabbalah):

AThe theory of evolution accords with the secrets of Kabbalah better than any other theory.@

 

Aurobindo Ghose (1872-1950) has brought Vedanta (and the entire sweep of Indian philosophy) into accord with evolution.

 

The Idealists have embraced the evolution of spirituality.

 

The Pope has declared:

AEvolution is more than a hypothesis@ (p. 205).

 

Politics: An integral approach to politics incorporates:

1.                  All Levels of Consciousness B pre-modern religion, the Great Chain of Being.

 

2.                  All Cultural Value Spheres B in their differentation brought about by Modernity (pp. 210-211).

 

The integration of pre-modern religion (the Great Chain of Being) with each of the four value spheres differentiated by Modernity, has political dimensions sewn into its very fabric.  It opens the possibility of a significant reconciliation of conservative and liberal views.

 

Spiritual (trans-rational) awareness relies on the freedoms gained by  traditional liberalism B in particular, its demand that the state not legislate matters of religion.  In addition, however, spiritual awareness, like traditional conservatism, places Spirit and all its manifestations at the heart of life, including relationships in all domains, from family to community, to nation, to globe, to Kosmos (p. 212). 

 

 

Such a Apolitics of meaning@ is trans-liberal.  Within the political freedom gained by liberalism, people pursue their own spiritual enlightenment and offer it to any and all who desire to be released from the chains of space and time, self and suffering, fear and death.  This means time joined with the timeless, space joined with infinity.

 

Such a world does not attempt to heal the fragments bequeathed to us by Modernity by killing one or more of the contenders B as the Romantics, the Post-modern Post-structuralists, and, when dominated by the systems sciences, the Integral-aperspectivalists would have us do (pp. 212-213). 

 

In this integration, any direct spiritual realization B East or West, North or South B which conforms to the tenets of broad science is recognized, whether it be that of:

Origen (Origines Adamantius, ?185-?254), Christian philosopher and scholar.

 

Plotinus (205-270), Egyptian neo-platonist philosopher.

 

Saint Augustine (354-430), one of the four Latin Fathers, bishop of Hippo, Algeria.

 

Hussein ibn Mansur al-Hallaj (857-922), Arabic-speaking Persian, Muslim mystic and poet.

 

Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), German nun, mystic, composer, writer and cultural figure, known as the Sibyl of the Rhine.  (In classical mythology and religion, Sybil is a prophetess).

 

Jalal ad-Din Rumi (1207-1273), great Islamic Persian sage, poet and mystic.

 

Meister Eckhart (c. 1260-c.1328), German mystical theologian.

 

Dame Julian (Juliana) of Norwich (d. 1343), English religious writer, a hermit, one of the greatest English mystics.

 

Saint Catherine of Siena (1347-1380), Italian mystic and diplomat.  A Dominican, Doctor of the Church.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saint Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), Spanish Carmelita nun, Doctor of the Church, a leading figure in the Counter Reformation.

 

Jakob Boehme (1575-1624), German religious mystic.

 

Baal-Shem-Tov (c.1698-1760), founder, in Poland, of the Jewish religious movement known as modern Hasidism.  The movement stresses the mercy of God and encourages joyous religion expression through music and dance (pp. 211-212).

 

Joining political and spiritual freedom, time and the timeless, space and infinity, we can finally come to a peace which structures compassion into the world and care into the Kosmos (pp. 213-214).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                REFERENCES

 

All page numbers refer to:

Wilber, Ken. 1998. The marriage of sense and soul B integrating science and religion. New York: Random House/Broadway Books

 

Except for:

Hall, Francoise, 2005, AA Transpersonal View of War B War as a Substitute for Cosmo-centrism and Immortality during the Egoic Stage in the Development of Consciousness,@ November 5, 103 pages (unpublished).  This is a summary of the following books:

Wilber, Ken.

1977/1993. The spectrum of consciousness. 20th Anniversary Edition. Wheaton, IL: Quest Books.

 

1980/1996. The Atman project B a transpersonal view of human development. Wheaton, IL: Quest Books.

 

1981/1996. Up from Eden B a transpersonal view of human evolution. Wheaton, IL: Quest Books.

 

1983/2005. A sociable God B (1983 subtitle: a brief introduction to a transcendental sociology), 2005 subtitle: toward a new understanding of religion. Boston: Shambhala.

 

1995/2000. Sex, ecology, spirituality B the spirit of evolution. 2nd edition, Revised.  Boston: Shambhala.

 

1996. A brief history of everything. Boston: Shambhala.

 

2000/2001. The eye of spirit B an integral vision for the world gone slightly mad. Boston: Shambhala.

 

Hall, Francoise, 2006, AObstacles to an Integral Paradigm of Knowledge,@ January 10, 14 pages.  This is a summary of:

Wilber, Ken. 1983/2001. Eye to eyeB the quest for the new paradigm. 3rd Edition, Revised. Boston, MA: Shambhala.

 

Also, unspecified in the text:

Columbia Encyclopedia. 2000. New York: Columbia University/Gale Group.

 

 

 

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