Jim Cross wrote: ↑Fri Dec 10, 2021 1:42 pm
Ashvin,
I have read Gebser. It was a time ago and I don't remember being all that impressed by it.
The problem with all of the grand theories about consciousness evolving is they always are looking at a selective subset of cases that make their point and ignore the rest. Perspective that is key to Gebser argument can be found in cave art.
https://archeologie.culture.fr/lascaux/en/perspective
Christian Hillaire, Eliette Brunel-Deschamps, and Jean-Marie Chauvet stumbled upon the cave one day. Once inside, they discovered the over 1,000 unique cave paintings. Experience Ardèche tells us that the drawings were of animals, such as horses, lions, and bears. More interesting, they say, is that the paintings used modern techniques such as perspective and movement.
What makes the paintings in Chauvet Cave unique is that you can tell the walls had been prepared as a natural canvas before applying the paint. The walls were flattened and smoothed to make them ideal for painting.
There are complete drawings of animals, including an entire pride of lions. The technique is almost three-dimensional, making it appear as if the animals are perched to leap off the walls at any moment.
https://www.thevintagenews.com/2018/08/09/chauvet-cave/
Maybe you can try to explain the Central Topic.
Gebser goes through the cave art in great detail. I remember the first time I tried reading EPO that I gave up simply because the sheer amount of detail and my own lack of understanding of the holistic argument. As Cleric makes clear, and which I could not possibly make more clear than he did in this essay, all of these things become much more interesting and exciting the more concrete we make them to our own 1st-person Thinking experience (or potential experience), which is what they are all reflecting. We need to try hard to move out of our typical analytic philosophy mode of holding everything as an abstract theory to toy around with once or twice a day, and really try to inhabit this living ecosystem of ideas which permeate our collective and indvidual experience alike. Ironically, the more we do this, the less time we will need to absorb the fascinating content, so it won't feel like a burden or something which takes us away from whatever else we need to get done. We start to realize how everything we are reading speaks directly to our 1st person experience, even if only dimly at first. That is actually how I have come to regain some
deep appreciation of physicalist/materialist worldviews, of course making sure never to reify any of their concepts into the "absolute reality". Same with analytic idealism. Same with Rovelli's mystical scientific philosophy. All of them can be held usefully as symbols which point to a deeper concrete Reality which we all experience in Thinking.
If we feel this is all unnecessary preamble and we just want to 'cut to the chase' of the deepest possible truths embedded in this approach, then unsurprisingly it will feel exactly like what we expect it and desire it to feel like - a time-consuming chore. Anyway, I will paste the table of contents of EPO below, which shows that it can't be said to ignore any cases. I only recommend reading it after Cleric's central topic is grasped to some extent. Otherwise it fall in line as just another set of abstract theoretical speculations, no matter how much evidence, reasoning, and cautions against this Gebser himself provides, and thereby lose much of its value for our concrete Thinking.
PART ONE: FOUNDATIONS OF THE APERSPECTIVAL WORLD A CONTRIBUTION TO THE HISTORY OF THE AWAKENING OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Chapter One: Fundamental Considerations Origin and the Present 1—Mutations of Consciousness 2—Aperspectivity and the Whole 3—Individualism and Collectivism 3—The Possibility of a New Awareness - Transparency of the World 6—Methodology and Diaphaneity 7
Chapter Two: The Three European Worlds
1. The Unperspectival World Perspective and Space 9—Spacelessness Synonymous with Egolessness; Cavern and Dolmen; Egypt and Greece 10
2. The Perspectival World The Development of Perspective since Giotto 11—Petrarch’s Discovery of Landscape 12—Petrarch’s Letter about his Ascent of Mont Ventoux 13—The History of Perspective as an Expression of the Awakening Awareness of Space 16—Eight and Night 17—Psychic Chain Reactions 17—Positive and Negative Effects of Perspectivation 18—The Realization of Perspective in Thought by Leonardo da Vinci 19—Space: the Theme of the Renaissance 21—The Age of Segmentation after 1500 A.D.; Isolation and Collectivism 22—Time Anxiety and the Flight from Time Resulting from the Conquest of Space 22
3. The Aperspectival World Aperspectivity and Integrality 24—The Moment and the Present; the Concretion of Time in the Work of Picasso and Braque as a Temporic Endeavor 24—The Inflation of Time in Surrealism 26—The Integral Character of the Temporic Portrait 27
Chapter Three: The Four Mutations of Consciousness
1. On Evolution, Development, and Mutation The “New” invariably “above” the previous Reality 36—The Idea of Evolution since Duns Scotus and Vico 37—Mutation instead of Progress; Plus and Minus Mutations 38—The Theme of Mutations in Contemporary Research 39—Mutation and Development 40—Psychic Inflation as a Threat to Presentiation 43
2. Origin or the Archaic Structure Origin and Beginning 43—Identity and Androgyny; Syncretisms and Encyclopedias; Wisdom and Knowledge; Man without Dreams 44—The Archaic Identity of Man and Universe 45
3. The Magic Structure The One-dimensionality of the Magic World 45—Magic pars pro toto 46—The Cavern: Magic “Space”; The Five Characteristics of Magic Man 48—Magic Merging 49—The Aura; Mouthlessness 55—Magic: Doing without Consciousness 60—The Ear: the Magic Organ 60
4. The Mythical Structure Extrication from Vegetative Nature and the Awakening Awareness of the Soul 61—Myth as Silence and Speech 64—Mythologemes of Awakening Consciousness 69—The Role of Wrath in the Bhagavadgita and the Iliad; “Am Odysseus” 71—The Great “Nekyia” Accounts 72—Life as a Dream (Chuang Tzu, Sophocles, Calderon, Shakespeare, Novalis, Virginia Woolf); the Mythologeme of the Birth of Athena 72
5. The Mental Structure Ratio and Menis 74—Disruption of the Mythic Circle by Directed Thought 75—The Etymological Roots of the Mental Structure 76—The Archaic Smile; the Direction of Writing as an Expression of Awakening Consciousness 78—Law, Right, and Direction 79—On the “Law of the Earth”; The Simultaneity of the Awakening of Consciousness - Consciousness in China, India, and Greece 79—The Dionysia and Drama; Person and Mask; The Individual and the Chorus 81—The Orphic Tablets 82—The Mythical Connotative Abundance of Words and Initial Ontological Statements 83—Mythologeme and Philosopheme 84—The Riannodamento; the Consequential Identification of Right and Correct; Polarity and Duality 85—Trias and Trinity; Ancestor Worship and Child Worship 86—Origin of the Symbol 87—Symbol, Allegory, and Formula 88—Quantification, Sectorization, and Atomization; the Integration of the Soul 89—Buddhism and Christianity; The Northwest Shift of Centers of Culture 90—The Theory of Projection in Plutarch; relegio and religio 91—St. Augustine 92—The Riannodamento Completed 93—The Immoderation of the ratio 94—Preconditions for the Continuance of the Earth; the Three Axioms of Being 96
6. The Integral Structure
Traditionalists and Evolutionists 98—The Concretion of Time 99—Temporic Traditionalists and Evolutionists 98—The Concretion of Time 99—Temporic Inceptions since Pontormo and Desargues 100
Chapter Four: Mutations as an Integral Phenomenon: an Intermediate Summary
1. Cross-Sections through the Structures The Interdependency of Dimensioning and Consciousness 117—The Diaphainon; The Signs and Essence of the Structures 118—The Presence of Origin; the Symmetry of the Mutations 120
2. A Digression on the Unity of Primal Words An Integral Examination of Language 123—The Bivalence of the Roots; the Root Kinship of Cavern and Brightness 126—Mirror Roots 127—The Root Kinship of Deed and Death 128—The Word “All” 129
3. A Provisional Statement of Account: Measure and Mass The Four Symmetries of the Mutations 129—Transcendence as Mere Spatial Extension 131—Technology as a Material-physical Projection 132—The Anxiety and Cul-de-Sac of our Day 133—The Itself 134—Mystery and Destiny; The “Way” of Mankind 136—Our Egoconsciousness 137—The Realization of Death 138 f.—A Glance at a New “Landscape” 140—The Possibilities of a New Bearing and Attitude 140
4. The Unique Character of the Structures (Additional Cross Sections) Method and Diaphany 143—Magic “Receptivity by the Ear” 145—The Mythical Language of the Heart 145—Irrationality, Rationality, Arationality 147—Idols, Gods, God; Ritual, Mysteries, Methods 147—The Decline and Fall of Matriarchy 149—Patriarchy 150
5. Concluding Summary: Man as the Integrality of His Mutations Deliberation and Clarification 152—The Deficient Effects of the Structures in our Time 153 Chapter Five: The Space-Time Constitution of the Structures
1. The Space-Timelessness of the Magic Structure The Magic Role of Prayer and the Miraculous Healings of Lourdes 163
2. The Temporicity of the Mythical Structure - The Polarity Principle 166—The Movement of Temporicity 166—The Circularity of Mythical Imagery 167—The Mythologeme of Kronos 168—Kronos as an Image of the Nocturnal World 168—The Emergence of Temporicity from Timelessness 170—The Significance of the Root Sounds K, L, and R 171 f.—On the Mirror Roots 172
3. The Spatial Emphasis of the Mental Structure The Root of the Words meaning “Time”; Time as a Divider 173—The Kronos Sacrifice of Dais: the Emergence of Time from Temporicity 174—The Perversion of Time (The Divider is itself divided) and the Declassification of Time in Western Philosophy 178—Thought as a Spatial Process, and the Spatial Emphasis of the Mental Structure 180—The Beginning of Change in Space 181
Chapter Six: On the History of the Phenomena of Soul and Spirit
1. Methodological Considerations Soul and Time, Thinking and Space 189—The Apsychic and Amaterial Possibility of World 189—On the “Representationality” of the Unfathomable Psyche 189 f.
2. The Numinosum, Mana, and the Plurality of Souls Previous Historical Theories 191—History and the Numinosum 193—Mana 194—The Origin of the Concept of Soul 194—Souls and the Soul; Spirits and the Spirit 197—Life and Death as an Integral Present 199—The Numinosum as a Magic Experience 201 f.—The Relocation of Numinous Provocation 202—The Ability of Human Resonance 203—Consciousness 203—Erroneous Conclusions of Postulating the “Unconscious” 204—Intensification, not Expansion of Consciousness; Psychic Potencies and the Centering of the Ego 205
3. The Soul’s Death-Pole The Symbolism of the Death-Soul 206—The Egyptian Soul-Bird and the Angels 207—Sirens and Muses; Death-Soul and Death Instinct—The Mythologization of Psychology and Physics 209—The Egyptian Sail as a Symbol for the Soul; The Lunar Character of the Soul in the Vedic, Egyptian, and Greek Traditions 210—The Ambivalence of Each Pole of the Soul 214
4. The Soul’s Life-Pole
The Symbolism of the Life-Pole 216—The Water Symbolism for the Life Pole 217—Water as a Trauma of Mankind 219
5. The Symbol of Soul The Chinese T’ai-Ki; the Pre-Tellurian Origin of Primal Symbols; Estimative and Living Knowledge 220—Life and Death are not Antithetical 224—The Winged Dolphin as a Greek Symbol for Soul 225—The Journeys to Hades 226—The Living Knowledge of the Soul 226
6. On the Symbolism of the Spirit Souls and Spirits 229—Early Concepts of Spirit; the Symbolism of the Spirit 230—Spirit and Intellect 231—Spirits, Spirit, and the Spiritual 232
Chapter Seven: The Previous Forms of Realization and Thought
1. Dimensioning and Realization The Dependency of Realization on the Dimensioning of the Particular Structure 249—The Constitutional Differences of the Individual Forms of Realization 250
2. Vital Experiencing and Undergone or Psychic Experience
Vital Experiencing as a Magic Form of Realization 250—Undergone Experience as a Mythical Form of Realization 251
3. Oceanic Thinking Circular Thinking; Oceanos and the World as an Island 252—Oceanic Thinking 252
4. Perspectival Thinking The Birth of Mental Thought 255—The Concept of Perspectivity 255 f.—The Visual Pyramid and the Conceptual Pyramid 256—The Spatiality of Thinking 258
5. Paradoxical Thinking Paradox 259—The Intersecting Parallels 260—Left-Right Inversion 261—The Awakening of the Left 262—Women’s Rights 262—Left Values in Contemporary Painting; Diaphany and Verition of the World 263
Ok so this is taking way too long... the above brings us almost to the end of PART ONE
Then there's a PART TWO which is a little shorter, but not much.
