2006:12:15
Ji Ji
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Detumesence. The work is done, the goal achieved, the great river crossed. Ji Ji is that moment just after accomplishment when all is perfectly in place. There's nowhere to go from here but down.
Water is the external face of the hexagram, the watery trigram of the gorge or abyss or ravine. Fire is the internal face. Water over a fire is a sign of civilization, of boiling, cooking, even steam engines in days and places far from the discovery of the principles of the I Ching.
This is one of sixteen hexagrams composed of complements. Think about it, fully one fourth of the I Ching is a study of perfect complements. The most memorable, for their clarity, are the two involving three solid lines above or below three broken lines. But here we have the same basic dynamic as Tai (Peace) (Hexagram 11 in the traditional arrangement), two complementary trigrams. Here we are again balancing forces easily mistaken for antagonists.
But there are no antagonists absent the human view. Fire and water combine, sometimes one consuming the other, sometimes not. The Balkin text talks of this hexagram as being a time after fruition, when follow through and initial measures for the next cycle are the order of the day. The Balkin text also talks of this being the last moment before perfection decays. But perfection is a strictly human view, and again, one of the views this exercise attempts to dispense with. This is one point on a cycle, with forces balanced. The wise person heeds the forces of the moment, neither rejoicing at the completion of the task just ended nor dismay at the inevitability of that task's undoing in time. This moment is just as it is. Soon it will change.
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2006:12:04
Chien
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Obstruction. The outer face of the trigram is the abyss, water. The inner is the mountain, stillness. The reading talks of obstacles and the wisdom of acting accordingly, not wasting one's strength and energy fighting what cannot be fought.
But there is more than simple obstacle or obstruction. From the Wilhelm/Baynes:
An obstruction that lasts only for a time is useful for self-development...the superior man seeks the error withing...the external obstacle becomes for him an occasion for inner enrichment and education.
Soon it will change.
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2006:11:23
Jie
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The Balkin I Ching says the ideogram for this hexagram originally meant a joint on a bamboo stalk. This picture is a nice follow up from yesterday's lecture on structure and natural forces. The joint of the bamboo stalk is the inspiration for bulkheads on ships. The joint on a bamboo stalk paradoxically fills what otherwise would be one large undifferentiated emptiness, creating physical strength but also the buoyancy that keeps bamboo afloat.
The reading focuses on restraint and moderation. It sees the inner trigram as "the lake" rather than the marsh, but for us the emphasis is on the contrast between the highly structured torrent with its great power arising from great disequilibrium with gravity and the marsh, at equilibrium and blurring the lines between river and riverbed and river bank. These extremes in proper alternation can create something flexible and strong, capable of withstanding damage and yet remaining afloat, as with the extremes of emptiness and fullness within the bamboo stalk. Moderation and restraint, and especially moderation in our restraints, is the energy of the day. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:22
Why Does Oblio Hate America?
Liberals would be better served to read Elgin than Lakoff. Specifically, "The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense for Business Success" would be a much better choice for learning to deal with the intellectual thugs in the conservative camp than Lakoff's "Don't Think of an Elephant." Why? Because Lakoff's work presupposes a context of otherwise legitimate and intellectually honest discourse and debate, whereas Elgin's work starts with the assumption that there are people who will try to use language to dominate, harm, and humiliate.
Elgin's assumption is that some people engage, knowingly or unknowingly, intentionally or unconsciously, in behavior that can best be described as verbal attacks. She makes a strong case, with examples that most people can relate to from personal experience. Then she presents relatively simple and straightforward methods to avoid being victimized by these people. And that really is the point, to avoid being victimized.
Of course the first way to avoid being victimized is to remain out of reach of the attacker. That holds just as true in political confrontations between conservatives and liberals; don't engage unless there is reason to believe you can prevail in and profit from the exchange. But where engagement cannot be avoided, there are ways to nonetheless side step verbal violence, and Elgin's wonderful collection of "Gentle Art" books are tops for this purpose. Lakoff's "Don't Think of an Elephant" makes some valuable points that would be good to keep in mind when engaged in honest discourse with legitimate conversation partners. But all too often the exchanges between conservatives and liberals lack honesty and legitimacy; instead they are bash-fests in which liberals willingly participate as ideological piñatas.
And that is perhaps the single hardest part of this point: We liberals need to admit that all too often we are not being invited to discuss matters, we are only being set up to act as punching bags. And precisely because this is the case no amount of dry, academic finesse will be of any real value. If you have to interact with bullies it is vital to know how to avoid being victimized by them.
Now, for a practical example: Consider each of the following, even try reading them out-loud:
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
Why does Oblio hate America?!
If you have taken the time to read each of the examples as expressively as possible you will have noticed the subtle nuances between the various versions. But what all of the versions share is the presupposition that Oblio indeed hates America. This presupposition might not be factually correct, but nonetheless the question simply doesn't make sense without presupposing this one item. There is more. Not only does the question "deductively" presuppose that Oblio hates America, but each and every different emphasized version presupposes (as Elgin points out) that the questioner knows in advance that any reasons given are inadequate, and that Oblio should feel bad for hating America.
Of course Oblio should feel bad for hating America (it just so happens that Oblio loves America with a capital-L.) I think most of my readers (both of you) will agree that hating America is bad. But notice, the power of this pattern holds regardless the content, as can be seen with the examples, below:
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
Why does Oblio do [X]?!
It really doesn't matter much what you replace "do [X]" with, whatever Oblio's reasons they will be inadequate and Oblio should feel bad for doing X and for having such a lousy excuse. And this is an example of the kind of rhetoric the Coulters and Limbaughs and O'Reillys are trained in.
You really ought to read that link and then review this post. The first and foremost linguistic concern in the worthy goal of helping liberals not get pulverized by conservatives is perhaps the simple realization that it's not our imagination: they really do cheat. If you then choose to sit at the table with a known cheat, so be it. But don't make the naive mistake of thinking a better command of the odds for completing an inside straight is going to do you any real good.
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Xi Kan
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Kan, the abyss or gorge, doubled. Danger doubled. Or perhaps not.
I have always had trouble with this trigram and the assumption of dangerous badness related with it. Sure, if the image is about being on a high mountain pass and seeing a river raging in the ravine far below, sure, then there is danger---of falling. If the image is simply standing on the bank of a raging river, sure, there is danger---if one is foolhardy enough to try to swim it.
Before thinking further on this image in isolation, contrast it with Tui, which is the marsh or lake. What is the difference between these two types of water? Structure, relationship to gravity, boundaries. Kan is a time of clear gravitational pull and well defined boundaries. Tui is a time of near gravitational equilibrium and amorphous boundaries.
And so Xi Kan, the doubling of the torrent, is a time when the outer and the inner principle alike are in clear relationship with the primal forces and are well structured. To foolishly oppose or even try to cut across such currents is destined to failure. To follow along the bank to the place downstream where the waters calm is destined to succeed. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:21
Zhun
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Difficulty in the beginning, like the blade of grass just beginning its task of rising up through the soil...and manure. "Thus the superior person regulates and brings order." The longer I meditate on this image the less I need to say. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:11
Bi
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Union. We are introduced to the notion of a ruling line in a trigram, and likewise in a hexagram. The initial line, having just entered the sequence, is weak. The sixth line is about to depart and is likewise weak. The 3rd and 4th lines are interface lines between the trigrams which make the hexagram, and thus in a smaller measure have similar weaknesses. But the center line of a trigram is at the height of its power and influence. So in the lower trigram the number two line is the ruler, and in the upper the number five line. And because the upper trigram is the outer or public face of the hexagram, it then is the ruler of the hexagram.
Which brings us finally to the reading, union, under a strong leader. One lightmaleyangconvex principle amidst 5 darkfemaleyinconcave principles. One creative, active principle in a fertile field of receptive energy. A strong person can lead in such a setting, indeed can even attract others to a cause.
But the blank emptiness of the receptive lines have no care what fills them, and so it is up to the active principle also to set values and criteria. Yes there is power here lead and unite, but for it to be lasting it must be based on sound values of wisdom and justice and sensitivity to the forces that surround. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:09
Da Zhuang
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Great Power. We are 1/4th the way through the building cycle from zero to 63; 1/8th the way through the full cycle from zero to zero, Kun to Kun, darkamptyreceptive to darkemptyreceptive. This is the 16th hexagram in our studies, and corresponds to the number 15 in the binary numbering system.
The readings speak of great strength or great power. But they also harp on the dangers inherent therein. For the life of me I cannot get anything better from the readings than the classic ending panel of Amazing Comics #15, "With great power comes great responsibility."
Energetically this is the first time we see a solid swell of lightmaleyang energy making its way from the bottom of the stack all the way across the divide between trigrams. So the active principle is on the rise and even uniting the trigrams, Heaven below connects with Thunder above via their light lines. But just as the image represents a heretofore unseen solidifying of the active principle on the formerly empty receptive field, it is nonetheless immature, unbalanced. So while there is power here it is not the power to break with traditions and remake the world to our liking. It is instead the power to benefit by doing the right things the right way. Nose to the grindstone, shoulder to the wheel, for this is the day that our efforts will not be for naught, when our great power can serve duty and right. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:08
Heng
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Duration, derived from thunder above gentle wind? How's that again? Two formless changing moving principles combine to give Duration? It is the inner directive, the adherence to one's true nature that endures.
This is also the eldest son wed to the eldest daughter. While moving a bit a way from that dimension of the analysis, it does draw the eye to the current condition of the upper/outer trigram being the complement of the lower/inner trigram. Obviously there are eight such arrangements, and distinguishing among them will be a worthy goal. The outer and inner are "opposites," complementing each other. In this case the outer is a strong and forceful trigram, thunder; this is the public face of the day. But the inner face of the day is the gentle wind. And there must be a kind of solidity, a trueness to form, to sustain such a seeming disparity.
This hexagram also brings to light the development of the nuclear trigrams. In effort to make sense of this arrangement who could resist finding meaning in the presence of the Ch'ien trigram, in this case we find it in the "lower" nuclear trigram; this then suggests we also have Sun, the gentle wind, as an "upper" nuclear trigram, which in turn could lead us to a new hexagram. We won't be following that path today, but it is there and it is part of the depth of study to which the chun tzu aspires.
Duration, despite seemingly transitory phenomena. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:07
Feng
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Abundance; lots of plenty. The wise man shines like the midday sun giving light and heat to all who will partake. Fire below, thunder above, the attention to tiny details of the previous hexagram is transformed by the reversal of that one bottom line into an overflowing cornucopia. Enjoy it while it lasts, make hay while the sun shines. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:06
Hsiao Kuo
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Preponderance of the Small, as per Wilhelm/Baynes. Image, the Hummingbird, who's proximity to Earth is dictated by her metabolism and diet, which is to say, she stays fairly close to the source of the nectar she needs almost second-by-second. Contrast with the soaring Eagle or high-flying Hawk; their food source, protein filled rodents, carries longer, and so they are fit to fly higher. But even the swooping Hawk cannot fall on its prey as quickly as that little Hummingbird can dart into a half-dozen flowers, partaking of the short burst energy it brings.
So Hsiao Kuo, for us, is the principle of the short burst, the fast twitch, the small and fleeting and fast and subtle. No elephants here. Only that sensitivity to minutia which lets the perspicacious perceive where the next bit of succulent sweet life is calling, and to be on our way. Soon it will change.
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2006:11:04
Guimei
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From the Mawangdui: To be upright is inauspicious; there is no place beneficial.
This certainly seems harsh. It is softened, somewhat in the traditional readings, under the heading, "The Marrying Maiden." (The Mawangdui reads, "Returning Maiden.") In the Wilhelm/Baynes the focus is on the metaphorical family relations ascribed to the trigrams, letting us view this hexagram as the marriage of the eldest son with the youngest daughter. This is viewed as subjugation, from a cultural context which allows multiple wives a youngest daughter is less likely to be chief wife, more likely to be subordinate wife. So the traditional readings are all about knowing one's place, not rocking the boat, keeping a low profile, practicing quiet rightness rather than boisterous righteousness.
But the relevance of the traditional filtering the energy images through the lens of the extended family structures of ancient China becomes less and less; so too for the ruler/official metaphors of feudal times. What then of the elemental or energetic? We have ShockQuakeThunderTheArousing above, facing the outer world; below, facing inward we have the gentle lake or marsh. Certainly thunder can herald flooding rains which over flow the lake boundaries or cause the marsh to flood; this then seems close enough to the traditional reading and yet just enough removed into the realm of symbology to be apt for all times.
As the lake or marsh are below the thunder and possibly at its mercy,
so too there are times when circumstances do not leave us any great
power or status or choice. We must continue being what we are, and we
must weather the consequences of what we do with our outward natures,
even if that weathering means a time of the marsh becoming a fetid
swamp, or a lake rising above it's boundaries and destroying nearby
crops. Sometimes such things happen, but the enlightened one goes about
her business attending to what must be attended to without rancor or
remorse for what the weather has brought. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:30
Hsieh
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Deliverance or loosening. The chords of karma, the web of fate, the Gordian knot, they need not be hacked or slashed for this is the time when they simply loosen up and we are delivered from what has bound us. When newly freed we either finish what was interrupted by our binding or we return to our home to enjoy our new found liberty.
This is also a time for forgiving; having found liberty again, we do not dwell on past transgressions, but rather wipe the slate clean, forgiving intentional and unintentional wrongs alike.
The trigram of the mighty water flowing in a deep ravine is below the trigram of thunder. This is a clear and easy progression from the repeated thunder of the previous hexagram to the beginnings of the rainfall. The life giving storm is not yet over, it has only begun, but it will bring the water that opens the buds in their time. Enjoy loosening deliverance. Soon it will change.
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Chen
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Thunder repeated, and doubling of the principle of the eldest son, he who assumes rule with force. But although the thunder comes once, frightening all within a hundred miles, and then again, relieving the tension and sparking laughter in the release, still the wise one's concentrations are not broken and the rituals are carried out without bobble, the sacramental implements handled with unbroken skill. So know, drink deeply of the startling arousing energy, while keeping your concentration. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:28
Yu
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Enthusiasm. The three solid lines of Ch'ien, on the bottom of the hexagram Tai, have given up their power, reverted to the receptive principle, in order to make way for the one strong line now in the top trigram. Sound the call, strike up the band, stir the hearts and call the country to arms; rouse the country side...or your own inner heart. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:27
Tai
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Peace; or so say the more traditional analyses. Mawangdui says, "Greatness: The little go and the great come." I have a preference for the Mawangdui wherever I can make any sense of it at all. This one is easy. The trigram of Kun, the receptivedarkconcave principle is above, or presenting as the public face of the trigram and thus is "outer", Ch'ien, the creativelightconvex principle, is below or "inner". Where Kun is the earth and Ch'ien is the sky then neither is where they belong, but both are naturally en route to their proper place. There is a sense of equilibrium here, because the two trigrams are primal and juxtaposed; this hexagram is surely a stronger signal strength for the untrained eye, perhaps even for the trained eye neurologically, with its easy division of solid lines below the broken ones. But the equilibrium is perhaps only apparent, not any more real than any arrangement of three yin and three yang; the forces are equally represented in many other arrangements.
These complementary forces are juxtaposed and manifest in their easiest to recognize forms. But they are in motion. Typically we view the hexagrams from the bottom up, looking at what has entered from the bottom, but readings for this hexagram refer to Kun as moving downward. That is something to consider; perhaps there is a matter of relative point of view here. It is uninformed physics to say, "Heat rises," for in truth it is the more dense cold matter, gas or liquid, which, being more dense, settles to the bottom, is drawn closer to Earth's gravitational center. As the colder, denser liquid or air is pulled down, falls to the bottom, the lighter water or air is displaced. Tai, then, shows the forces in juxtaposition, and evenly matched, but the cooler dense Kun will be pulled down and the lighter airy Ch'ien will be pulled up.
It just so happens that the inverse of this hexagram is called, in the Wilhelm/Baynes system, "Standstill." But, consistent with my strictly personal explorations of the hexagrams it seems to me a great mistake to make this hexagram "good" and it's complement "bad"; permitting names with such strong semantic attachments as "Peace" and "Standstill" is a mistake. Even the Mawangdui's "Greatness" is dangerous, for too many people attach that term to valuation rather than merely size. In the reading, "Great things come, small things depart," in that context "Greatness" is valuation free. Big things are moving in; little things are moving on. The sage controls all because he treats small things as great and great things as small. This will apply to this hexagram and its complement.
But the question is still raised, then, what distinguishes this hexagram from its complement? One would expect simply that then it will be "Great things leave, small things come." And neither of these is particularly more auspicious than the other, for as there is a time to rest and a time to run, there is too a time for great things and a time for small things. Today's hexagram is a time for big things. Be at peace with great and small, coming and going. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:26
Sheng
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Wood beneath or within the earth; pushing up. The readings seem to point toward an almost inevitable growth, but in the slow steady stages of an acorn on its way to being a mighty oak. Heaping up small improvements; the steady change of the shoot or sprout that can only be seen in retrospect...or time lapse photography. It might even look like standing still to some, but it is moving, upward, toward the goal of fruition. Sheng can also speak to strategy, as in chess, where the accumulation of small advantages yields victory, and that is the principle we ride today. The readings also refer to seeing the great man, as an imperative rather than merely a suggestion for increasing fortunes. While in the process of heaping up these steady incremental accretive improvements we must avail ourselves of guidance from the primal yang; building up all these small changes must be lead by the active principle rather than passively letting things happen. This is a principle of early rocketry, where a small amount of force spent on course correction at lift off means miles of difference in reaching the target, where the same amount of force spent just before reaching the target would make almost no difference at all. So building up these small changes must be guided by the activelightconvexyang principle; they must point toward a goal rather than simply passively receiving. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:25
Ming Yi
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The Mawangdui simply says "Crying Pheasant." The others seem to talk a lot about light being darkened or wounded or lessened; it bothers me. One thing the yin/yang set is not is simple "good versus evil." Good and evil are judgments of men not forces of nature. When we like the results of the influence of a force we call it good; we call bad that which we do not like. But yin and yang are above our liking or disliking, above and far far beyond our judgments. Inhale, exhale. Convex, concave. Light, dark. Man, woman. And while it might be fashionable in patriarchal societies like that of Confucius to cast woman as evil, like that of the Judeo-Christian-Muslim tradition of Eve being fooled by the snake, yin and yang are above and far far beyond such petty myths. There is evil aplenty in the lightmaleyangconvexactive principle; there is good aplenty in the darkwomanlyyinconcavepassive principle. And both principles are always waxing, always waning. There are birds which signal the coming of the new day; there are birds that signal the coming of the new night. Neither night nor day is free from evil; neither is bereft of good. Knowing which prevails is the key to working your own magic on the world, to manifesting the good you were meant to bring to the world.
When we had one light line entering the bottom it was a turning point. When that line achieved the center of its trigram we had the army, stored power under strong direction. A new light line at the bottom again was a turning point, and the stored power of the army became manifest in an ordered prospering society. Then those two lines gave way to create one at the top of the inner trigram, giving us modesty, the accomplished sage who need not lord it over anyone. But now we have a new light line entering at the bottom again, this seems to be a constant reversal, and now we have the crying of the pheasant, the sun going behind the earth, the sweet calming coolness of the first inklings of nightfall. The light is lessened, and we can come out and do the things which the scorching sun forbade only hours ago. The light is lessening and it is time to prosper in the energy between night and day. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:24
Qian
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Apologies that the naming conventions shifts; I am using Professor Balkin's book as my primary source, but sometimes end up falling back on the more familiar Willhelm/Baynes.
Modesty, humility, humbleness, but no humiliation; rather the modesty of the great and strong who need not boast, need not brag. The modesty of the zen archer, pulling a 60 pound bow "effortlessly," except they would never use the quotes, such a one would truly be effortless, quiet, modest. Decreases and increases to make things equal, so says the text. But there is an image too from Lao Tzu, of the Ocean ruling the rivers by remaining always below them, and the sage likewise remaining humble before all and thus having the most to give them. This is the spirit moving with you today if you will let it. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:23
Lin
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Where Shi is water dwelling in the earth, this is the next manifestation of that water, no longer a torrential spring bursting forth surprisingly from nowhere but rather having prevailed and now collected into a lake; the image is Kun, earth, the trigram of three open lines, above Tui, the lake. This is the mother energy overseeing the youngest daughter's energy and all the good that can come therefrom. Still we have the theme of subordinate and superior; the standard texts refer to social organization of leaders and followers. But the energetic principle here is one of a kind of culmination after a kind of risky break. The single solidmalelight line that first entered with Fu, returning, took the big step of breaking so the second line could become solidmalelight. But now the yang of the second line is joined by a new yang in the bottom position. We have here the beginnings of organized positive action, as contrasted with the purely passive potential of the starting hexagram of Kun. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:22
Shi
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The Army. Well, this one I don't get quite so well. But the idea of water stored up in the earth I get. And I follow the travel of the first light line into the field of dark. The readings suggest the line can be seen as a general commanding an army, the one solid energy giving structure to the unstructured. Well, I am supposed to be *learning* through this process. And I *am* seeing this is a different order than usually presented. The superior man brings order. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:21
Fu
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returning
coming back
beginning again, beginning anew
the
first light after the dark night
the first life lying under the deep
snow of winter
the solstice, heralding the coldest months
and
the beginning of shorter days, so easy to miss
in the bitter
cold
From our perspective of starting with nothing this represents the first something entering into the void. It is the first word, the first light, the first thought, the first will of God on the formless, the first use of the receptive which can support all things. Returning makes less sense in this context, but starting and conceiving and the beginnings of change apply. On an otherwise uniform circle one can only navigate by arbitrarily setting a mark for reference. Returning is that first mark, from which we can measure off the degrees of the circle...or the remaining 126 hexagrams of the cycle. Where Kun is zero, Fu is one, the first one, the primal one, weakest in that it is unsupported against five lines of zeroemtpyreceiving but strongest in that it can exists thus unsupported despite its solitude. And there really is no opposition; the six yin lines of Kun are thirsty to receive this first line of yang on the way to building Qian in 62 more days. The spirit has just begun to wax. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:20
Kun
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We start with nothing, at zero, empty. This is the greatest power, for here we are ready for anything, ready to receive anything. From the outset it is important to remember that the pairs in Eastern thought, yin and yang, are not polar opposites in eternal conflict as the Judeo-Christian God and Satan, but rather as simply complementary principles, like convex and concave, inhale and exhale, sleep and waking, man and woman. Kun is woman, that which recieves and makes life with what was recieved. Kun is earth, solid, grounded. Kun is supportive, as the Earth supports all things. But Kun is not "female" in the limited Western sense of gender roles; a man cannot be healthy if he cannot receive air through his nose or food through his mouth or light through his eyes. All living things manifest and are manifested in Kun. Be receptive to the power of receptivity. Soon it will change.
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2006:10:03
Classics, Mine and Others'
Professor Solum of Legal Theory Blog has re-posted his write up on the Prisoners' Dilemma; my 1996 response to the wrongheadedness of the Serendip implementation is here.
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2006:07:29
902 - Native number system may affect brain development
Recently heard on cogling:
Our mother tongue might influence the development of the brain circuits involved in processing numbers and arithmetic.
The writer included a link to this article in the online version of the venerable Nature magazine.
But isn't it accepted that learning affects brain development? If so then this observation would seem to follow pretty naturally. I can't help reading about premotor association results in the native Chinese speakers and thinking about abacuses. The other thing that springs to mind is the claim of a former associate, raised in Hong Kong until she was 13, who told me that Chinese often resort to a kind of hand-waving to resolve ambiguity when they speak, taking the form of "air calligraphy" on their palm to indicate which character they mean when uttering a potentially confusing homonym. This would seem consistent with an increased motor-oriented processing in general, not just because of number systems.
In turn the thought of "air-calligraphy" brings to mind an old chestnut written by Gregory Bateson, "Why do Frenchmen..." which casually explored cultural difference in gestural support for speech communication. It would be interesting to see the results of similar studies aimed more generally at these gestural distinctions.
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Tags: cogling
2006:06:03
903
redacted
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2006:02:06
904
I had something of an epiphany this weekend, a bit of legal theory I've been pondering finally fell neatly apart at the hands of my Prisoners Dilemma write up. I won't go into details here, as I am trying, by and large, to separate the legal/political work from the semantics per se work.
But what a strange distinction to make in the first place. I suppose that's why I need the Oblio's Cap site, because there is a strong argument that the separation of topics is a diminishing of those topics. How can semantics be separate from politics? How can politics be separate from art? Well, that's the reasoning, but better pursued there than here. Here I accept the value of separating topics, and do my best to keep politics and semantics per se sorted. It's a semantic punctuation I provisionally accept.
That aim of separation notwithstanding, today I report on an application of Semantic Restructuring to legal theory: The theories of Nobel winner Ronald Coase, particularly as manifest in his paper, "The Problem of Social Cost," fall apart on an error of logical typing I have labeled "False Quantification."
I am not convinced, however, that my label is worth promulgating. Nor am I convinced that it does me any good to make such claims when the glossary section of this site is in such poor shape.
So, I propose to endeavor to focus on the glossary. To that end, I would be grateful for comments as to which entries need to be added first. Tomorrow, or later today even, I expect to begin with "Error of Logical Typing."
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Tags: context, perception influence, semantic punctuation
2006:02:03
905
We Are All Danes NowHere is the original online; here a locked down copy at wikipedia.
Bandler and Grinder speculate (potificate) on the psychological effects of repressing a sensory system. One can only see the psychopathic behavior of some Muslims as support for this premise. But the follow-up, in Bandler and Grinder methods, is that adding back in the missing sensory system is a valuable therapeutic aid. Clearly this maneuver can be met with abreaction.
Here's a fair-use copy of the pic, ~$~©. But visit the links,
above---and accept cookies for the ads; they deserve the traffic and the
support.
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Tags: context, framing, unconscious
2006:01:30
906
I am a bit self-conscious today. I feel a bit silly about maintaining three sites for zero readers. If it wasn't for google and other web-spiders I'd have no readers at all, or so it too often feels.
Part of the problem has to do with the style of writing. "Blogging" in particular and web writing in general seem to presuppose immediacy and freshness. What I'm doing instead is really much more like personal journalling, and yet putting it where it is visible, even if largely unviewed, makes for differences in what I actually say. So too for the artificial split between ISR and Oblio's Cap. In absence of readers why bother separating them? Because they are separate ways of thinking about my world, and I am better for playing with the distinction.
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Tags: context, framing, techniques
2006:01:24
907
Ponder the difference between talking to a group in their vernacular for one's own gain as opposed to talking down to that same group with the intent to ease their plight. This seems akin to a Grinder/Elgin truth split: one teaches words have no meaning except what we assign while the other builds her career largely on "words can hurt." Both are right, and anyone trying to work solely from one position or the other is in for a hard time.
Likewise, then, for the difference between "matching the audience's model of the world" to get them to sign on to my agenda versus "talking down to the audience."
No, that's not quite right either; there is a pejorative connotation to "talking down to" that I can't quite shake. The difference is, in my hypothetical situation which may or may not be my take on certain political developments, is that one group talks *to* the "common man" and one group "talks down to" that same demographic. The result is, in some commentators' view, a people voting against their class interests. What I am trying to put my finger on is this difference between talking to and talking down to. All thoughts and comments on that difference are germane to this forum.
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Tags: framing
2006:01:17
908
Martin Luther King day yesterday, and with it, thoughts about the implications of having a "Black History Month". Arguably, we all would be better served by something like "ethnic awareness day" or even "civil rights day". And if history were taught correctly, there would be no need for special months in which we focus on the history of the oppressed. So instead of "Black History Month" it should probably be, "Suppressed History Month" or even, "Atonement History Month". And the greatest value, to the status quo, of Black History Month or MLK day is the appearance of having addressed issues that in truth remain unresolved and the semantic punctuation that, for the casual and distanced observer, says, "That's all in the past now." What we really need is a month of reckoning our sins and celebrating the goodness of our enemies. A month where we say, "Hey, I could be wrong, and I'm sure you're right about X, even if we've been shooting each other over Y and Z."
I am sincere in my desire that by this time next year I might figure out a better term for Black History Month, one which stimulates eternal vigilance rather than neatly wrapping things up as settled and done, and which manages to be a little more user friendly than, "Oppressors Own-up-to-it Month".
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2006:01:14
909
Today I am consumed by notions of linguistic matters in political discourse. Check thelawboards
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2006:01:11
910
I am finally getting around to working through "Mind Hacks." As fits my style I am starting at the back. The last two entries are both also reported on in Gladwell's "Blink," dealing with research on priming. I suspect I will eventually get around to creating a "Mind Hacks" related page on this domain, so as to facilitate collection of links and such. Might just use the recently implemented tags feature instead.
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Tags: books, unconscious
2006:01:10
911
I was listening to KPFK Sunday morning, the speaker was saying people who torture are humanoids but not fully human yet. Crazy paradoxical, because dehumanization is arguably the first and most important step in creating the perceptual milieu required to get someone to torture. One does not torture another whom she perceives as "just like me," no, it requires an "us or them" mentality to get folks to torture. And I expect the folks at KPFK to know this and know better than to dehumanize anyone.
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Tags: paradox, perception influence
2006:01:09
912
Was thinking about "circle of excellence" and "deep trance ID" and the sharp-shooter's induction (as told by Erickson and Grinder and Robbins); aren't these three techniques very much the same? I believe so, but I am having a hard time explicating the thought just now. All three guide the client to cathect an otherwise disassociated state? That would be fine, if those words were all in the glossary.
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Tags: techniques
2006:01:08
913
Meaning follows context. Your body is context. So are your representations of your body. And where there is a mismatch between your representations of your body and the reality of your body you will suffer similar mismatch in the expected effects of your communications and the actual effects. This is the basis for self-image based therapies.
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Tags: context, embodiment, perception influence
2006:01:07
914
Taste, satiation, hunger: how do they interact?
Taste is a relatively straightforward chemical reaction resulting in neurological representation.
Hunger is a slightly more complex physiological condition, largely driven by the organism's response to nutrient levels in the blood stream. Hunger, then, is not so much about the contents of the stomach at any given time. The stomach can be full and distended and the organism can starve, die of malnurishment.
But hunger is also used synonymously with desire, which relates it to satiation, which has almost nothing at all to do with such simple and physically grounded phenomena as hunger or taste. The simplest example is to consider an organism at a point in time when it has all the nutrients it needs and reasonably "should" have at any one point in time, but which is also at that time experiencing highly stimulating tastes. If the organism is a human and those tastes are sugar or salt is it quite likely that the intense experience of desirable tastes will lead to continued eating completely unrelated to that person's physiological needs for food.
It is plausible to think that in some context there was a relationship between taste and desirability of foodstuffs, such that in pre-cognitive animals the stimulation caused by some tastes caused increased consumption of such foodstuffs to the animal's general long term benefit. But in the context of modern life this has served to damage millions of us.
Desire for food (the taste or smell or feel or even the socializing and structuring aspects of food) has nothing to do with hunger. What the body needs and what the person wants are unrelated. And our greatest enemy is that category of foodstuffs that fill without satiating.
Conversely, to the extent we limit our consumption to items that satiate, we will approach eating habits that actually conform to the bodies needs.
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Tags: embodiment, perception influence, sensation
2006:01:06
915
I have spent so much time making sure my students didn't conflate Parent-Adult-Child with Blamer-Computer-Placater (and V-A-K) that I only this morning imagined exercises *combining* them; role-play through each of the Satir categories first as Parent; now as Child; now as Adult.
It sometimes seems that the TA model would equate Adult with Leveler; but that would be a mistake. Adult is actually described as a computer; the economist's "rational actor" is probably close to what Berne had in mind for "Adult." The better model shows parent-adult-child as reflective of hierarchy between players and their world. The T.A. Adult is as prone to pathology as the other ego states; the pathological adult is one that fails to appreciate, experience, enjoy, the positive attributes of parent and child. All three states have their proper moments; failure to manifest the ego state appropriate to the given moment, and enjoy it, is the pathology.
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2006:01:03
916
Pondering the differences, Transactional Analysis style, between the roles of sales person, customer service and server. Each has a different default set of power relationships with customers, but each has a "people person" aspect. No conclusions, just letting the three jobs roll around in my mind as I think about the similarities and differences.
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2006:01:02
917
Semantic Punctuation is a term borrowed from Watzlawick's "How Real is Real," one of the most valuable books in my library. When therapists (or artists) talk about "closure" they are talking about "semantic punctuation." The popular book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" starts with the premise that punctuation can in fact affect the semantics of a sentence. Taking the notion a step further, how we encode our experiences into sub-divisions will affect our responses to those experiences.
Perhaps the simplest example is also the most immediately valuable: Where we consider certain chains of events to be complete and self-contained and finished we are less likely to act in a manner intended to affect the outcome of those events. Casually this is expressed as, "You haven't lost until you give up."
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