|
|
Anton G. Hardy — author & psychologist
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Excerpts
  “A serious problem confronts us, then, in regard to the human. Why should these disciplines be so stymied in their efforts? Why should such subjects as consciousness and creativity be so resistant to our understanding? The roots of this problem reach down, I believe, to our most fundamental assumptions: they originate in beliefs that are so ingrained in us that they 'make common sense.' Together, these assumptions and these beliefs form a general paradigm that for centuries has governed our thinking. They stem from the philosophical system that is commonly referred to as 'Realism.'” (p. 2)
“In broad outline, Realism establishes two fundamental postulates. It asserts that there is a reality out there that is independent of us and our activities, and in addition, a copy function that brings this reality into our minds. With these assumptions, then, it is able to resolve such important problems as how we come by the contents we have in our mind and how we can agree with each other on what is 'there.' But it has also encountered difficulties. In the course of its long history, it has given rise to various paradoxes, contradictions, and confusions that no amount of philosophical theorizing has been able to resolve. One of these is a resolute bias in favor of the 'physical.' And it is this bias that impedes our efforts to understand the human.
“If we are to be more successful in these efforts, then, we must seek another paradigm. We must search for a different set of principles upon which to base our understanding. And it will be to this task that I apply myself in this book: in the following, I will attempt to bring into formulation a paradigm that can replace Realism and that can lead us through the difficulties that are contingent upon its standpoint. This will be a paradigm, fortunately, that need not be brought forth ex nihilo; in philosophy's long and productive history, important elements of it have already come to expression. My task will be limited, therefore, to picking up these elements and weaving them together: I will attempt to find the thread that, running through them, makes of them a coherent whole.” (p. 3)
“...careful consideration of the elements of consciousness — our 'phenomena' — shows them in every case to be perspectives. Whether perceptual or conceptual in nature, they possess this unique kind of perspectival structure... 'Perspective,' therefore, moves into central position in my discussion: it will be the door that opens for us the domain of consciousness.” (p. 8)
“We can see, therefore, that the concept of 'perspective' leads directly to such major issues as 'reality,' 'truth' and 'knowledge.' And with this resonance of implication, this promise of inherent significance, it confirms its promise as a leverage point for my discussion. Enhancing this promise further is the bridge it establishes between 'objective' and 'subjective': in its very conception, in its structure itself, 'perspective' incorporates in a single entity what in our usual view lies distinctly apart; it overcomes from the beginning the stubborn opposition that arises in Realism between two self-standing domains. The stark division between an 'objective' and a 'subjective' forms for Realism an enduring problem. And by avoiding it, 'perspective' removes from its supporting paradigm this major obstacle to systematic cohesiveness.” (p. 9)
“The task I am setting is by no means an easy one. There are good reasons for philosophy's diminishing interest in a systematic phenomenology, and only one of these is the opacity of its better-known proponents — an opacity that derives both from the failure of these proponents to break definitively with Realism and their inability to sufficiently analyze their fundamental 'things.' Of even greater importance is the instinctive repulsion we feel towards a standpoint that seems to imply ensconcement in a purely private world, imprisonment in a self-enclosed 'mind' that is of uncertain link to any reality. Common sense is affronted; an unacceptable solipsism looms. And pressing questions arise as to how we can have any certainty about the things that we see or think, what the role of 'reality' is, and how we can come by these things that occupy our consciousness to begin with.” (p. 12)
“We all start in life as naïve realists. That is, we believe that the things we see, the objects we touch, the events that are going on around us, are 'real.' These things, these objects, these events are simply and plainly 'there.' In the immediacy of their presence, in the clear evidence they give of their existence, they brook no uncertainty. We come into the standpoint of Realism as though it was inborn: we begin in life as though Realism was our birthright.
“It is not long, however, before we are forced to question these initial beliefs. We notice, for instance, that when we close our eyes, all the solid things of this reality disappear. When we sleep, the entire reality itself vanishes. We are no longer able to hold the opinion that we actually have the reality, therefore, and instead form the great division between 'objective' and 'subjective': we differentiate things from the images, percepts, and ideas we have of these things, and in this way, move into the position of 'sophisticated' Realism.
“This becomes the position, then, that we will henceforth occupy. In it, the 'reality' becomes pushed back, and what is immediately given — what at any moment we actually 'have' — is relegated to the subjective.” (p. 15)
“Further thought shows, then, the all-inclusiveness of this subjective. There is nothing that we have, nothing that is directly given us, that is not of its nature. We may think initially, for instance, that we can contact the reality directly by going up to something and touching it. But upon further consideration, we see that what we actually have is still only the touch-experience — the thing itself is not pressing into our awareness, but is being mediated by our particular sensory system as this exists in us and in our species. And not only everything we start from, but everything we thereupon go to — in our conceptualization about this primary material, in the inferences we draw from it — is similarly of this phenomenological kind. An inference to a real object out there that we take to be evoking our percept of it, for instance, is still an inference: what we directly have is an inference-to-an-object, not an object.
“Thus we are forced to a portentous and far-reaching conclusion. We are each and every one enclosed within a phenomenological world. And we have as little chance of reaching out of this world in the direct grasping of something real as we have of stepping outside our own skin.” (p. 16)
“Whether perceived only dimly or in full clarity, however, this realization [of this 'phenomenological reduction'] is essential for Realism's systematic development. For the reduction gives rise to a number of problems, among them the threat of imprisonment in an all-engulfing 'subjective.' And in order to extract ourselves from these problems, we must erect a structure that will, by establishing certain postulates and drawing from them their implications, provide us with the needed explanations. It was to this task, then, that Realism in its sophisticated form devoted itself; and the outcome was a full-fledged 'paradigm,' a philosophical system that became the dominant influence in human thinking.” (p. 17)
“Realism proceeds, then, by establishing two primary postulates. In the first, it declares that, while the real things are not present to us directly, they nevertheless 'exist out there.' A reality lies behind the directly given data of our mental world. In the second, it asserts that there is some process by which these real things come into the mind. Some kind of copy function exists by virtue of which what is out there becomes transformed into mental contents. With these postulates in hand, then, it proceeds with its explanations.” (p. 20)
“[It's explanation of the] problem of knowledge, however, runs into difficulties. So far, Realism has been led to tie the reality bonds at the source of our phenomenological world: this world arises, it has said, through the reproduction in our perception of what lies outside, and our other mental functions — our thought, our memory, our imagination — follow and depend upon the data perception supplies. In the case of our knowledge, however, it finds that the 'real' is attained only after a long and drawn out process. Furthermore, this is a process that involves and relies upon these very subsidiary functions! For the realities established by science — entities like 'atom,' 'gravity,' and 'gene' — regularly involve operations of inference, hypothesization, and deduction; they stand, not at the beginning of the activity, but at the end. And so, a first hint of a flaw in Realism's paradigm makes its appearance: a puzzle arises as to how these subjective 'verbal' procedures can play the role they do in our attainment of knowledge.” (p. 21)
“Realism's paradigm has developed serious problems, however, and the difficulty regarding knowledge turned out to be a harbinger of other difficulties yet to emerge. But before we go on to see what these are, it is important to note a highly beneficial consequence of its sophisticated position. This is the freedom this position bestows on us to construe 'reality' just as we wish! For as long as we occupied our naïve position, we were stuck with a reality that had to be taken just as it presented itself; we were chained to whatever offered itself up in our perception. Now, however, this reality has been moved to a purely formal status; it has become an element, simply, in an explanatory system. And with this, we acquire complete flexibility in how we will interpret it: we may make of the reality anything we will!
“This flexibility becomes indispensable to the development, then, of both science and philosophy. In science, it gives the investigator the freedom to continually redefine reality as he pursues his goal of creating a comprehensive explanation of the natural universe. He may construe it now as composed of phlogiston and electric fluid, now of ether and little billiard balls, now of quarks and leptons. And in philosophy, it opens a number of explanatory avenues. If the philosopher is primarily interested in explaining our phenomenal contents, he may posit a reality that consists of substantial 'things' that correspond in form and number to the things that are given in our perception; if he is oriented more toward explaining such entities as 'number,' 'truth,' and 'justice,' he may construe it as consisting of abstract ideas; if he is impelled to bring everything into the coherence of a unitary system, he may posit some supreme 'spirit,' 'law,' or 'principle.'
“Realism spawns, therefore, a number of sub-philosophies. And as monists spring up to argue with pluralists, realists (small r) with idealists, empiricists with rationalists, a dialectic ensues that is as interminable as time itself. This very interminability, however — this inability to make essential progress over time — would seem to indicate the presence in its system of some inherent flaw. And indeed, this suspicion is confirmed: as the full implications of Realism's postulational direction became clear, systemic problems arose that no amount of philosophic deliberation could resolve. The task of fulfilling Realism's project bogged down in never-ending fixes. And to this day, Realism's enterprise remains essentially uncompleted.” (p. 23)
“[An] equally damaging problem appears, then, with its second assumption. For when Realism lays down its copy postulate — when it asserts the existence of a process by which the reality can become transported into the mind — it devolves upon itself responsibility for spelling out the means by which this transition is accomplished. Just how does the real — whether it consist in substantial objects, ideal forms, or transcendental spirit — become transformed into phenomenal experience? How is this crucial leap effected? From the 'eidola' of Democritus to the present-day arcana of neurophysiology, however, every attempt to answer this question has failed. Every explanation is forced to rely in the end on either a 'little man in the head' who magically effects the needed leap or an equally magical act, simply, of transubstantiation.” (p. 26)
“In advance of its explicit postulations, then — in advance even of its two fundamental assumptions — Realism takes another, more far-reaching step. It reifies the categories 'objective' and 'subjective.' It erects two ontological absolutes, and these stand henceforth at the head of its system, holding this system as in an iron vise. With fate-like persistence, 'objective' and 'subjective' march into every reach this philosophy makes, now, throwing up antitheses to be resolved, polarities to be reconciled, dualisms to be overcome. And as feuding camps spring up to take opposing sides, Realism's entire enterprise degenerates into incessant struggle, all progress stayed in the interminable beat of a stagnant dialectic.” (p. 28)
“We can begin to see the outline, now, of the paradigm that can replace Realism. It is a paradigm in which 'being' gives way to 'knowing,' in which a single-minded focus on the correct reception of what is out there is replaced by a multidirectioned activity of creative formation. For its source, this paradigm goes back to Kant's revolution: turning us away from the Dingen an sich of an external reality and reorienting us to the 'constitutive preconditions of experience,' this revolution brings our focus to the elements that are necessary for experience to 'be.' And since experience always comes to us in some form — since it appears as a 'thing' occupying space, as an 'event' coming after or before other events, as 'singular' or 'plural,' as tied to other things or events by chains of 'cause' — some kind of formative agent is implied. We are thus led into the task of defining these agents and understanding the ways in which this form-giving is carried out; and in turn, this leads us to such templates as 'space' and 'time,' 'similarity' and 'superior-inferior,' 'number' and 'cause.'” (p. 31)
“These facts suggest, then, a certain definition of 'perspective.' It seems to be twofold in nature. It implies on the one hand some position we take from which we view things, and on the other hand the 'something' that presents itself as we stand in this position. 'Having a perspective,' then, involves both these poles. We could say that a mere standpoint without something to bear upon would be 'empty' while a something without standpoint to view it from would be 'blind.'4” (p. 34)
“As the meaning of objectivity fills and enrichens in this way, then, we come more and more to view ourselves as standing before a great domain of 'Objective Being.' It is a domain that is boundless in its extent and that holds promise in its inherent mystery of exciting discovery. Seeking to actualize this potential, therefore, we begin on an enterprise of exploration; we attempt to ascertain the nature and qualities of its occupants. As before, however, this 'exploration' will consist of originative construction: it will be effected through the engenderment of new and innovative 'things.' And bringing us in this way into an important new estate, it will produce a special fruit of our step into the ideal: it will make of our objective realm a doorway into 'knowledge.'” (p. 40)
“More and more, then, the overriding goal that pulls us through all our conscious construction emerges clearly to view. This is to bring to our experience an inherent unity. It is to make of the endless succession of appearances — of the disorganized diversity that moment to moment assaults us — an ordered whole. Our means for doing this has been to step away from the immediate and enter an ideal world in which the elements of this world increase in their 'generality.' And in measure as we have done this, we have acquired — in both its senses — 'comprehension': we have increased the quantity of material that we are able at any given moment to hold in our grasp; and at the same time, we have come to better and better understand what the present moment brings.” (p. 43)
“The objects of this world are all, furthermore, relational in nature! Whatever their level of generality, they consist of vehicles for the relating of other things together! As we have gone on, then, our ideal world — this objective domain — has begun to resemble a great tapestry that is woven of these different threads of relationship. Each element in this tapestry has become more and more 'contexted'; by virtue of its placement over and over and in different ways in these forms of 'time,' 'class membership,' 'cause,' etc., its position within the whole has become more determined. And so we have become able, by riding on these relationship-lines of 'behind' and 'in front of,' 'before' and 'after,' 'the same as' and 'causing,' to travel from one object to another. We have acquired the ability to transport ourselves from any point in this tapestry to any other. To the extent that our object space has become a well-knitted whole, therefore, any single element in it has come to 'imply' the others; and our constructed world — our ideal world of objectivity — has come to resemble, in a rough way, a mathematical system.” (p. 44)
“At each of these steps [in our conceptual advance] we gain a greater power of survey over the particulars. We achieve a wider and more comprehensive knowledge. By gathering together perspectives that have hitherto been separate into more comprehensive perspectives, therefore, we are able to create more potent standpoints from which to view things. And by stamping these new perspectives with a special word, expression, or formula, we provide them with the handles by which they may be entered into still further series: we achieve with them still more encompassing perspectives.8” (p. 52)
“This shift in the focus of our conceptualization from 'object' to 'concept' brings to singular clarity, now, the power of formation that rules conscious construction. As we accustom ourselves to this new view and learn to follow the concept's coordinative reach into our diverse perceptual and conceptual material, we see thought breaking free of its long bondage to the sensory and stepping forth in exercise of its inherent potential. What was passive from the standpoint of the abstractive view now becomes active; what was the constriction of a material interpretation becomes the flexibility of a functional one. And so thought, no longer confined to reshaping merely what the senses bring in, cuts its ties to the terrestrial and lifts, then soars to ever wider horizons of universality. Like the lightning that jabbed into the primordial atmosphere creating therein new forms and life, our concepts strike again and again into the dark substance of experience, crystallizing fresh chains of 'being' and illuminating in ever-new ways the material we already have.” (p. 53)
“This entire process has as its outcome, then, understanding. Whenever we come to newly 'understand' something, we are signaling our achievement of some kind of order amidst the confused. We are indicating our establishment of a 'one in the many.' In describing the experience we have at these times, we use the term 'insight': we have been gifted, we say, with sudden insight; we have been graced — as though, often, from outside — with illumination. When a one appears where before there had been many — when a new 'being' all at once takes form in the midst of what had hitherto been dispersed — we have been endowed, it seems, with revelation. And we name the mysterious process by which this has occurred 'discovery.'” (p. 54)
“The [advance that Realism made in separating 'mind' from 'reality'] remained, indeed, continually in jeopardy. Again and again in the long history of their paradigm, Realists succumbed to the temptation to collapse this division and merge the mental back again with the real. This showed itself not only in our commonsense outlook where our practical engagement with the things around us virtually mandated that we ignore our phenomenological condition, but at higher explanatory levels as well. At these levels, we find rationality being deserted for the mystical, for instance, when resort is taken to the 'spiritual' or 'transcendental': postulation is made of such special capacities as 'intuition' and 'Nous' that, by enabling us to attain oneness with the universe at large, provide a kind of direct and unmediated knowing. One can gain knowledge, it is claimed, by simply fusing consciousness with the very Being itself. In another direction, the mental is simply reduced to the physical. Any qualities that are unique to the mind are denied, and such phenomena as thoughts, images, and memories are interpreted as events that are purely neurophysiological in nature: they are emanations, simply, of the brain (cf. Dennett 1991).” (p. 58)
“...investigation of the perceptual experience of children, indigenous peoples, and disturbed individuals has been endlessly instructive in its illustration of the different kinds of world that people inhabit. The lesson to be drawn from these observations is that we each make this world, in part at least, in accord with inherent biases: our previous experience, our present interests and intents, our age, our ingrained attitudes — all shape what, for us, is 'there.' And if we assume that others are seeing things just as we do, we are likely to be simply indulging our innate egocentricity: we are perpetuating the belief we held as a child that we all look out upon the one world, and that we must see things, accordingly, in just the same way.10” (p. 61)
“Different societies undertake this formation [of explicit meaning-directions] in different ways, and a diversity of languages thus results. This diversity is indicative, then, of the variety of 'worlds' that people inhabit (Whorf 1956). In each of these worlds, a people have come to live in their language as in the very air they breathe; they see and think along the lines that their linguistic forms lay down.” (p. 78)
“A unique kind of relationship form underlies all this activity, however, and this brings us to the very heart of conscious construction. Making its appearance as soon as human beings turn vocalization to this unprecedented use — as soon as they elevate what is mere sound into this new and specifically human dimension — this relationship form brings into being the unprecedented factor of meaning. The form in question is the symbol; and with it, a peculiar kind of immanence is posited, an interpenetration of two elements that are of different origin and character. We have already encountered this interpenetration in the concept where, in a single entity, a rule that was ideal could infuse material that was concrete; and we encountered it again in the percept where, in a unitary 'thing,' both a concrete something-seen and the mental judgment, inference, or interpretation that informed it were contained. Revealing itself now in its most essential character, this form manifests itself in the way a mere sound can become invested with significance.
“It is through the symbol, therefore, that a 'given' can be wed with a 'not-given,' an 'appearance' with the 'object' it points to, a 'fact' with the 'assumptions' that underlie and condition it, a 'phenomenon' with its 'meaning.' It is by means of the symbol that the diverse attributes of a thing can 'inhere' in that thing, an actual 'burgeon' with the virtual, a simple be 'filled' with all the possibilities that make it, in the end, complex. Thus it is the symbol that provides the essential condition for consciousness. Through its mediation, the entire profusion of conscious formations from the most primitive meaning-wholes to the complex systems of mathematics, science, and philosophy are evolved.” (p. 79)
“Two primary modes thus develop within the symbolic function, a mode of 'presentation' and a mode of 'representation.' The former accounts for the immediacy and concreteness that characterize early conscious life, and the latter accounts for the mediateness and 'objectivity' that succeed it. In the course of this progression, a momentous change takes place in our experience: our initial experience-wholes — each individual and unique — become transformed into another kind of whole, a system; they enter into complexes of relationship. These systems arise in near-endless variety, then, in accord with the different areas of interest that become marked out. But whatever the nature of these areas, they share a common thrust: they transform experiences as they occur in their unending succession from a status of self-standing isolation into a status of mutual contextualization; they endow the individual experience, now, with place.” (p. 81)
“Throughout this entire activity, the symbol function itself remains hidden. In its role as fundamental source in conscious construction, it lies itself beyond visibility. What is visible, in contrast — what comes into awareness — are its products; and more particularly, this consists — after sign and signified have become differentiated — of what is signified. It is the signified that presents to us what is meaningful to our will and desire, our action and knowledge. And it is in the signified that we acquire the direction of focus that makes us in our mental activity 'intend.'
“For this reason, the objective world appears to us always to be immediate. It comes to us as 'given' as it stands before us in its concrete multiplicity. How much the objects of this world are in fact not immediate, however — how much they depend for their very 'being' upon the symbol function — is seen when we realize that they are never given simply in themselves, but always imply something else. They hold in their meaning other contents, both actual and potential, that are connected to them along the paths we have previously laid down. It is only by referring our present content as an 'aspect' to other potential contents, for instance, that we can read it to begin with as an 'object.' It is only by referring its 'here' to a 'not here' that we can see it as positioned 'in space' and located in front of, beside, or over other objects that are also in space. It is only by referring its brief and fleeting 'now' both backwards and forwards to a 'not now' that we can make it endure and bequeath it with an 'identity' that holds through successive temporal moments. It is only by referring it to other contents that are its causes and effects that we can place it in an objective universe at all, that we can understand it as belonging to a great whole whose objects and movements take place in accord with uniform law. Far from being beheld and dwelled upon simply for itself, now, the immediate content has become transparent to these further events. It mediates the vision into that great spatio-temporal-causal order we call 'objective Being.'” (p. 82)
“And this [progress in achieving stability in our conscious world] was a progress that was sustained at every point by the symbol activity. When we survey this activity as a whole, now, we see that it contains two fundamental movements. One is directed toward concentration: it condenses what is scattered and diffuse into the unity of a 'being,' a phenomenological substantiation-of-a-thing. In this way, birth is given to the contents of early expressive life; but it also shows itself later whenever we make effort to reach through things to their essential 'center,' to grasp the core 'character' of something that is vague and diffuse. And so it appears when, faced with some object of great importance to us such as a loved one or pet, we suddenly find arising in us the one word that captures this object's essence, the idiosyncratic 'nickname' that evokes its very soul. It appears again in those conceptual acts in which, striving to reach through a multiplicity of ideas to their deeper meaning, we 'forge a thousand connections with a single stroke' and suddenly find some new construct or idea lying before. And it appears still again when the artist, trying to reach through his experience of a landscape, a person, a tonal or visual movement to its inner form, succeeds in disengaging the character-of-the-thing and embodying it in his chosen medium. In all these cases, something is made to stand there that was not there before; something new is thrust into consciousness as if by a foreign hand.
“To formulate something, however, is not to make it intelligible. To bring something into the clarity of impressionistic immediacy is not to bring it into the clarity of understanding. Thus in another direction, we see a movement toward expansion. Now, these presences are drawn into relationship with what is outside; they become subject to placement in encompassing contexts. Shifting its function from presentation to representation, the symbol activity makes it possible for contents to increasingly 'sign' their way into these wholes; and these wholes, concentrated through a name then, may become objects themselves for further contextualization. In this way, an activity of 'thought' arises, a constant likening and contrasting, subordinating and superordinating, separating and combining of what we have formed along relationship-lines that we have previously laid down. And this slowly brings to us, then, 'understanding'; striving to continually enlarge these contexts, we move towards the goal of a single comprehensive unity, a conception that will succeed in instilling a final 'one' into the 'many.'
“Every crystallization of a something-new is thus succeeded by discursive elaboration of its 'meaning.' Every condensation into a fresh image, object, or concept is followed by its elucidation in terms of what we already have. Intension is followed by extension, and this again by intension. Synthesis leads to analysis, and this to another synthesis. And in this constant ebb and flow, this great sea-tide of the symbol activity, we come to the very heartbeat of consciousness: we lay finger on the living process by which an extraordinary 'world' arises, a symbol-skein that spins us into it in measure as it takes on form and being itself.” (p. 88)
“The question of how our conscious contents come about, of how we come by what presents itself to us, is answered by resort to the symbol function. In its twofold movement toward concentration and expansion, this function gives rise to the entire range of these contents from their most concrete and expressive to their most abstract. The complexities of this production are a matter for continued empirical investigation into the developments that take place in myth and religion, language and art, science and mathematics.” (p. 91)
“...In order to do justice to knowledge as a whole, therefore, a different defining principle than 'existence' must be sought. And we find this in the concept of meaning. In the new paradigm, questions of 'being' are dissolved into questions of 'meaning'; the existence of something — a something that is conceived as standing in isolation in an ontological universe — is replaced by this something's implications by the relationships it implicitly holds with the other elements of its concept field. Instead of viewing the particular thing now as an ontological thing-in-itself, we view it as a functional element in a system: we regard it with respect to its meaning within a concept field at large.” (p. 100)
“...In our knowledge-making in general, the phenomenological paradigm puts before us multiple 'worlds' rather than a single dominant world; it faces us with a diversity of meaning universes rather than a single 'outside' against which we, as subjects, are set. And since all these worlds arise from application of the symbol function — since they are generated through specific steps of symbolic formation — this paradigm brings us directly into the realm of the human: it places us immediately in the arena of human construction. Our former preoccupation with the 'physical' recedes, then, and the enterprise that devotes itself to understanding this domain becomes but one in a general circle of enterprises, each of which contributes to the edifice we call 'knowledge.' The supreme task becomes, then — instead of determining what in the final reckoning 'exists' — determining what the systematic place of each is in the circle as a whole.28” (p. 102)
“The second question concerns the implications of finding ourselves so phenomenologically confined. The consequences of this total immersion in a private world seem so indigestible at first sight that it can well discourage further consideration of the phenomenological viewpoint. Does such an immersion mean, now, that there is no real world beyond our own? Does it imply an eradication of the entire universe that lies outside and around us, that existed before we came into being and will continue to exist after we are gone? Does it involve doing way with the ultimate source in which everything, including ourselves, arises and has its existence?
“The answer is that the [phenomenological] reduction in no way obligates us to give up the notion of a real reality, an an sich that is quite independent of our conscious activity. On the contrary, we have every reason to continue to view ourselves as living in a real world of things and events, as subject to outer circumstances whether these be cataclysmic in nature or mundane, as ensconced in a wider universe that lies all around. The 'critical' point so essential to Kant's position, however, is that this reality, being forever beyond the horizon of experience, lies outside the bounds of what we can meaningfully inquire into, think about, and understand. Our statements in regard to it, therefore — drawing as they must on conceptual structures we have developed for experience — will always be metaphorical in character: they will consist in figures of speech that we have hurled into the dark, merely, from our station in the light.
“When we speak of the an sich, then, it is by necessity in the terms that our spatial, temporal, etc. templates supply. We say that the universe is 'outside' and 'around' us, that it continues 'before' and 'after' us in our temporal existence, that it is the 'causal source' from which all animate and inanimate things arise, that it is 'objective' in character. Once we have made such statements, however, we have no foothold for further inquiry; we are given no basis on which to conduct any kind of investigation that would yield understanding. In order to arrive at such understanding, we must move back into the world of meaning: we must turn to that meaning domain whose character and dynamic it is the concern of the phenomenological paradigm to define.” (p. 104)
“In my discussion thus far, I have sought to establish that we can never know things as they actually are, but only as we see them to be. Exploration of this 'seeing' then led us to its vehicle and expression, the perspective; and perspective-taking showed itself to be present, in turn, in all conscious activity. It manifested itself in perception in our having to occupy some particular standpoint, always, in order to come by what we see; it manifested itself in our thinking in our being thrust into a partial view of things whenever we applied some concept or concept group; it manifested itself in our conscious action — in action that was not simply reaction or the habituated product of learning — in our needing to apply some perspective in order to give this action direction. Perspectives thus constituted the very fabric of experience. They could not in any way be surmounted; and they could be abolished only at the cost of abolishing experience itself.” (p. 107)
“...Continued investigation of perspectives showed that they possessed an inherent capacity for augmentation. By establishing a 'deeper' perspective, others that were more limited in their reach could be brought together and integrated into one that was more comprehensive; and this new perspective, then, could become subject to further integration. Thus the possibility was established of continuous progress. And if 'reality' and 'truth' were not themselves directly graspable, they could be held out as something to be ever more closely approached: they could in good faith be reached for.” (p. 108)
“The analysis of perspective has made us aware of the intimate link that exists between a perspective and its embodiment. In my discussion, I have focused on this embodiment as it takes place in language. Here, we have seen, words establish perspectives; they each cast things for us in a certain way. In general, therefore, the vocabulary and linguistic structures that a society possesses determine how its members will view things. Providing ready-at-hand perspectives, they present the rails along which the perceiving and thinking of these members ride.” (p. 114)
“This line of reasoning leads to the positing of image-making — of 'imagination' — as a primary human function, one that cannot be explained by any other process... Since the image contains no differentiation as yet between an objective and a subjective, it is only when we have crystallized this distinction that we are able to advance to the 'percept' per se. Now images can acquire the ability to 'intend'; they can 'point to' things that we take to be outside them. From our newly objectivistic standpoint, then, we relegate the image itself to the 'subjective' where it is to inhabit fantasy and dreams. This transition from an image-oriented to a percept-oriented stage is not accomplished without difficulty (see Merleau-Ponty 1963); and it would be a mistake to think that, along the way, we have lost the former's qualities. On the contrary, this earlier stage continues to be available to us and, with its lack of differentiation between a subjective and an objective — with its inherent 'murkiness,' its absence of anything that is readily verbalizable — holds special potential for creative formation.
“And from this standpoint, the magnitude of the transition that language effects comes into sharp relief. 'Man is relieved by words of the need to make 'pictures' of things' (Cassirer 1996, 215). For in order to raise ourselves above the constant flow of pictures — of images — that we have in early conscious life, we need to inject into this flow something new; we need to undertake a new direction of construction, one in which we impart to these images a function. This function is representation; and it is effected through the name. When an image is named, it is no longer lost amidst the particulars, arriving and as quickly disappearing as it is replaced by another, but enables us to stand back and obtain through it a 'view'; it transfers our vision to other images that may be drawn into relationship with it by means of one or another rule.” (p. 117)
“This movement can be followed in psychology where this discipline, eager to emulate the physical sciences, forms a similar [to that of the 'physical body'] kind of object. Needing to prepare itself for the activity of measurement, psychology gives rise to a concept for 'subject.' It creates a notion for its disciplinary object, that is, that retains nothing of the characteristics of the living and breathing person who enters its lab. Whether this person be male or female, old or young, healthy or handicapped is irrelevant unless these are among the variables on which it is measuring: possessing no 'being' apart from these variables, the subject becomes the point, merely, at which they intersect.
“This transformation has far-reaching consequences, of course, for psychology's knowledge-making. It puts into jeopardy, in fact, its entire enterprise. For in jumping so quickly into this parametric skeleton, in turning its back on the rich qualities that the human being possesses, it leaves unfinished its initial task, the articulation and definition of these qualities. There is good reason for a science to be occupied in its first stages with 'observation': it needs at this early point to acquaint itself with all the diverse forms that its subject takes in our experience of it so that it may taxonomically order them. By this means, it arrives at its first discipline-specific concepts, the 'types' that effect this ordering. It is from this base, then, that it goes on to develop its higher-order concepts, including those that function to 'explain.' By passing over this activity in its urgency to reach the stage of measurement, psychology deprives itself of the foundation it needs in order to achieve a meaningful knowledge (Hardy 1988, 87 ff).” (p. 131)
“This moral poverty [in the paradigm of Realism] shows itself nowhere more clearly than in the fate the human sciences suffer under its aegis. In fealty to Realism's objectivism, these sciences degrade the human being to a shallow 'behavior.' They designate as central to their scientific object — as the feature in terms of which all its other features are to be understood — the one that is the most superficial. Taking on the garb of 'behavioral science,' then, they become obsessed with exact, if empty measuring. And the outcome is the loss of any compass that could orient and guide them. Helpless now before anything that is humanly 'inner,' they lose their ability to maintain their integrity and inexorably fragment into multiple unrelated initiatives (Hardy 2000).” (p. 132)
“At this point, the Realist is likely to think that this apparent exaltation of 'mind' satisfies his long search for a fundamentum. 'Mind' will be what is ultimate, now, what will supersede any other conception as to what constitutes the 'real.' Going on in this rationalistic vein, then, he will speculate about Absolute Mind; or turning to the related concept of 'Self,' he will posit as his fundamentum a Transcendental Ego or Transcendental Subjectivity. 'Mind' and 'Self' continue to be, however, concepts! As with any concept, they call for investigation of their development in the life of consciousness as a whole, simply, and definition of the contexts in which they arise and possess their meaning.” (p. 132)
“A similar kind of integration has long been sought in the case of Realism's mind-body split. Here, too, two distinct meaning universes confront us, one incorporating objects and events that are physical and physiological in nature and the other objects and events that are 'mental.' The customary approach is to consider these universes to be two domains of 'being' and to seek the real-world elements in the one that materially 'produce' the phenomena of the other. It is to find — most commonly — some physiological process in the brain that 'causes' events that are mental.
“If, instead, we construe the task as one of finding a concept which, 'underlying' these two domains, mediates derivation into each, we quickly realize why this Realistic effort must fail. We are pointed to the fact that both these universes consist inherently in concepts; and since these will ultimately be 'mental' in nature — since they belong to the generally phenomenological domain — the attempt to explain the mental in terms of the physical/physiological devolves into a vicious circle. The 'explanation' will have already incorporated the mental in any subset of concepts it selects.” (p. 134)
“Thomas Kuhn (1970) has done much to further this humanization of the sciences. In his study of scientific paradigms, he points out how fragile, in a way, any paradigmatic perspective is, how prone it is to being replaced by a new perspective. Not that this change — this 'revolution' — is arbitrary: on the contrary, a kind of logic controls it, a predictable course from the presence of one or more indigestible anomalies through stiff resistance to change on the part of an 'old guard' to the boldness and creativity of those (usually younger) who give birth to the new paradigm. Science under Kuhn acquires a distinctly human cast: it is not directed in its development by objective facts so much as by fallible human beings who are striving to order and give meaning to such 'facts.'” (p. 135)
“In this connection, it is important to emphasize that the ontically real brain is indispensable for the mind just as the ontically real external world is indispensable for our seeing. Without an external world we would have no perception, and without a brain we would not have a mind. But this doesn't mean that we can in either of these cases build our understanding of the latter from the former: such an attempt will always run up against the category jump that will make any explanation fail; and however refined our understanding of the brain and its structures becomes, this jump will never be evaded.” (p. 136)
“Since 'similarity' provides the basis for the formation of our classes, it is by far the most frequently used of our ordering principles. The flexibility we have in applying it, however — the creativity with which we can judge things as 'the same' — goes in general unrecognized. In his typical manner, the Realist will turn such judgments into discoveries of actual similarities-of-things in the real world; he is seeing, he thinks, a configuration that is being presented by Nature. When this configuration is composed of events that take place in time — when what is 'same' appears, that is, as a temporal simultaneity — he may consider it to be a mystical 'synchronicity,' a concatenation-of-things that expresses the universal spirit and is laden with a cosmic message (Tarnas 2006, 50ff).
“What goes unrecognized in these hypostases is the function of the perspective in bringing into conjunction just these aspects of human experience. Provided the right standpoint is found, anything can be read as 'similar' to anything else; and the psychologist makes use of this fact when, in a standard test of intelligence, he requires the examinee to find a way in which, for instance, 'enemy' and 'friend' are alike. When a perspective is applied, it automatically brings into view what 'fits.' And the hidden action in these real-world 'discoveries' is always the establishment of some subjectively-generated point of view.” (p. 139)
“An art as much as a skill, perspective-taking varies widely in its manifestations. The rapidity with which it can be conducted shows itself nowhere more clearly, perhaps, than in the way a group of teenagers can shift in their conversation among different facial expressions, bodily postures, and voice intonations as they role-play their way through various virtual perspectives. At the other extreme, the individual who narrow-mindedly believes that 'the way I see things is the way they are' persists often in perspectival rigidity; he conveys by means of his posture, facial expression, and voice intonation the authority of just his perspective. The ability easily to adopt another's perspective — to 'put oneself in another's shoes,' to 'understand where one is coming from' — is needed equally by the help-giver and the salesman. And in humor, the delight often comes from being caught by surprise by an unexpected perspective.” (p. 138)
|
|
|
© 2008 James Publications. All rights reserved.
|
|
|
|
|
|
James Publications
·
Post Office Box 545
·
Guilderland , New York 12084
|
|
|
|
|
|