Replying to LO30142 --
>AM de Lange writes:
>
>>The model of western democracy has too little, if any, LO in it.
Prometheus resounds:
Ah! my good man, dear correspondent, poet-in-residence of Chaordics,
choreographer of dancing thematics, and fractal generator of the morally
sublime, you! dear AM (...who IS that AM...) I thanQ!
Yes! Thank you for reminding me that *knowledge* is fixed in words, but
these words, these devices are but the *minor vessels* in our speech acts,
are but nodes in the overall network, fabric, structure and resplendence
of *meaning* enmeshed in these semiotic spaces we, as human beings,
inhabit.
Words are semiotically laden devices, that is: they indicate not
themselves, but the presence of another! and hence, my ontological maxim
and mantra:
*I laugh! therefore, YOU are!*;
it's corollaries can be called up by substituting any other culturally
charged activity representing action other than *laugh*--such as *think*,
*read*, *speak*, etc.
You see, desCartes and all dualists have it all wrong: his ontologic
mantra,
*I think, therefore I am*,
his maxim (that reduced Morals and Ontology to mere Epistemology) was even
more radical than Plato's--this axiom of dualism pointed inwardly to the
Nothingness of that which is solely *in-* and *for-itself*, totally
annihilating in one Western metaphysical utterance, the sublime dimension
of *mitsein*, *for-another*, the Other and It's critical ontologic role in
all this!!!
What is the difference between Knowledge and Meaning, afterall? Heidegger
called it the *Ontological Difference*, Gadamer, and cultural linguists
after them called it the *circle of interpretation* dwelling in the heart
of Da-sein, Being-there, of the Human being, the only being for whom its
own existence is, itself, an issue! It's constitutive and ontologic
foundation is *Care* (*Sorge*, after the German).
http://www.reasoned.org/dir/phi/gadamer.htm
And this *I*, this ego, this sovereign of Jeffersonian and German
Idealism, this totem of Western Metaphysics, this abstraction, does not
walk on two legs, and has been uprooted from its ontologic ground: the
flesh! This sovereign individual of the Jeffersonian Republic is an
historical aberration, an abomination, and is the first lie past the
portal upon which is grafted the moral lie beneath it: *Know Thyself!*;
*To Thine Own Self, Be True!*
Why! we ALL *know* what _democracy_ is, don't we? I, too, am sick of 21st
century fascism (aka *corporatism*) that passes in the vernacular for
*democratic process* in these USofA, as well, on THIS side of the Atlantic
and Pacific Rims...
Economic Fascism by Thomas J. DiLorenzo:
http://www.borg.com/~rparkany/EconomyOfWar/EconomicsOfWar.html
"Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because
it is a merger of state and corporate power."
-- Benito Mussolini (Encyclopedia Italiana,Giovanni
Gentile, ed.).
Indeed! we need to study Semiotics among us as Learning Organizational
Mentors as heartily as Aristotle enjoined us to study Logic! in order to
ensure that not only _Knowledge_, the Philosophers' Stone, is had, but AS
importantly, this knowledge is made to be Meaningful, and we, Wise, to
boot!
that is: for a hermeneutic circle to be preserved within our thinking
and work that remains inviolate, and discourages Epistemologies
(methods-based, *objectives*-based interpretations and analytics...Kant
called them *Doctrines*) to be passed among us as Ontologies
(methodologies) and between us as so many world-making processes! Our
*intents* are mere masks our personas don in particular situations--mostly
for amusement*--and they are irrelevant to the issues at hand before us!
it is the EFFECTS of our actions, not the intents of some hypothetized
sovereign transcendental ego, to which we must hie if we wish to be fleet
afoot in the face of world-historical crises.
IMHO, that is, and it is from there that I thank you again, AM for having
us attend to meaning-making while we accumulate all this knowledge among
us.
After all, as I recall...It was the Tree of Knowledge (the root of The
Forbidden) that Christ chopped down in the Wilderness after Matin
Scorsese's soliloquy of this First Temptation [for world-power] in *The
Last Temptation of Christ*). ;-} rap.
REFs:
Semioticon:
http://www.semioticon.com/main.htm
Founder and Editor: Paul Bouissac
WORDS OF ART: THE H_LIST:
http://www.arts.ouc.bc.ca/fina/glossary/h_list.html
SEE especially the listing:
HISTORICAL METHODOLOGIES: Those types of criticism which foreground
context, especially information of the environmental or secondary sort.
See especially correlational social history, Geistesgeschichte, iconology,
Marxism, new art history, new historicism, patronage, and reception
theory. The terms macrohistory, microhistory, and quantohistory are also
beginning to appear. Cf
perspectivism, visuality.
AM de Lange wrote:
> Greetings dear Terje,
>
> When i wrote this line, i was thinking of how African societies in
> Southern Africa (distinct from Western Africa) were operating in the days
> before colonialism. There were not such things as voting, a ruling party
> or written laws.
>
> A society was ruled by a chief, usually taking office by heritage. He
> could not do as he wished or saw fit. He had to act according to the
> advice of his elders. They also could not speak as they wished. Their
> wisdom of old age had to be used to listen to the opinions of any member
> of society and represent these diverse opinions in a coherent as possible
> manner. The chief and the elders were thus the learners and articulators
> of the will of the whole of society rather than a section of it or merely
> their own. Of particular importance were the concerns of generations yet
> to be born as well as generations of the past. It was the task of the
> elders to present them and their concerns.
>
> Then the colonialists came, took posession with their powerful weapons,
> destroyed these procedures, kicked Africans out of all decision making
> processes and set up typical western democracies for themselves to which
> the Africans had to bow. Can you imagine what confusion it caused and
> eventually the downfall of former orderly societies? When they left these
> African countries after less than a century, as a result of "uhuru"
> (awakening), the result was a gradual decling into poverty and anarchy.
>
...SNIP...
--"Dein Wachstum sei feste und lache vor Lust! Deines Herzens Trefflichkeit Hat dir selbst das Feld bereit', Auf dem du bluehen musst." JS Bach: Bauern Kantata Richard A. Parkany: SUNY@Albany Prometheus Educational Services http://www.borg.com/~rparkany/ Upper Hudson & Mohawk Valleys; New York State, USA
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <Richard@Karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>
"Learning-org" and the format of our message identifiers (LO1234, etc.) are trademarks of Richard Karash.