Dear organlearners.
Ed Brenegar" <edb3@email.msn.com> writes:
> My perspective is this.
>
> Truth maybe an absolute in the ontological, biblical sense of the word.
> But truth is relative in the sense of human perception. We cannot divorce
> ourselves from our mental models. We can clarify them, change them,
> improve them, but never escape them into some sort of eternal vacuum of
> unmediated awareness of truth. Our mental models are the filters and
> tools of perception. Our mental models are us. They are not something
> distinguished from us, like a shirt or house, which tells people about us.
Ed, shall I cry out: "Perfectly articulated"? I want to say it with all my
heart, but my mind cautions me! What? Is not everyone saying "Let your
heart rule over your mind"? However, my mind tells me, of all human
creations, we have to do with the very unique one here, namely the "mental
model". If I listen to a person performing a sonata of Beethoven and I say
"Perfectly articulated", my mind is quiet. I cannot even come close to it.
When I look as a painting of Rembrandt and I say "Perfectly articulated",
my mind is quiet. I cannot even come close to it. When I work through
Einstein's first paper on relativity theory and I say "Perfectly
articulated", my mind is quiet.
But when I perceive somebody else's mind working closely like my own, my
mind begins to speak: "Something is wrong". Unfortunatetly, the rest is
tacit, even for me. I try to articulate it, but I cannot. I can only
manage to say: "Ed, when Steve Eskow writes, it does not make me deep down
uneasy, but your writing above does." What is stirring my mind? Is it the
Truth reaching out to me, or the lies operating within me?
Ed, I will try to put it calmly. My perspective is essentially the same,
with only one addition. We should improve on our mental models so that
they do not impair our creativity as in the past. For example, we can try
to make openness a property of all of them.
> Now some may say that our mental models form reality or truth. That to me
> is scary. If truth is only self-referential, only what I say that it is,
> then we have lost a rational basis for the common good. We have then
> become a society of narcissists, isolated into our own little world of
> truth. This is the one side of the mental models issue. We must be
> careful not to think that we are can rid ourselves of our mental models,
> and therefore find some sort of self-liberation.
Again my perspective is essentialy the same as yours. You have pointed to
an important way how to move on the scale from "lies" to "truth". We must
not only work inwards, but also outwards. Our connections must become more
encompassing. Some believe that our perceptions are the only reality,
others believe that this universe(s) is (are) reality and some believe
that Creation and the Creator is reality. Whatever case it be, it depends
on how encompassing our connections become.
> In conclusion, I believe that there is truth, both absolute and relative.
> But truth can never be grasped in its totality, but only through of our
> own human limitations in perception. Know thyself, know they mental
> models and know the context of knowing truth, and in this freedom will
> emerge.
Our "knowledge of Truth" depends on our mental emergences. There is no
doubt in my mind about it. (Thus I have to distinguish between "knowledge
of Truth" and Truth.) These emergences depend on some requirements as you
have indicated, namely totality and limitation.
But let us question these requirements by means of their number. Let us
never forget that we are questioning a very complex "thing" - two "things
in combination", namely emergence and Truth.
How many requirements are there?
One? "Fear the one and only God"
(Monotheistic wisdom literature trying to capture the essence of
Truth.)
Two?
"Love God and love thy neighbour as yourself"
(The commands of Jesus Christ, who also said that He is the Truth)
Three?
Live in a loving harmony with the Creator, fellow humans (especially
the dead ones) and the rest of nature.
(African ubuntu, once very common all over Africa south of the
equator, but which has become almost destroyed since
colonialism.)
Seven?
Your "totatality" and "limitation" corresponds to two of the seven
essentialities of creativity.
(Although these essentialities have been discovered as seven, they
may be combined into less than seven and separated into more than
seven. Furthermore, they are not that unique since they only concern
the "form" (mechanics) of entropy production, creativity and
learning. There are also other requirements which have to do with the
"content" (dynamics) of entropy production, creativity and learning.
Thus the number of requirements becomes more than ten!)
Ten?
The Ten Commandments. Upheld them and you shall live to see the
truth.
(The Old Testament from which three major religions emerged: Judaism,
Christianity and Islam)
More than Ten?
More than Hundred?
I have given a number of examples. All but one has to do with religions.
The omnious one is the seven essentialities of creativity. This one came
about because you refered to two essentailities. Furthermore, although
Steve has not said that they are my religion, someone can easily say it.
Remember that I discovered them by searching for corresponding patterns
between the chemical system (material) and the mathematical system
(abstract). What is even more omnious, is that I know far too many
chemists and mathematicians who believe that their subject is the Truth
and live accordingly. In other words, the seemingly odd example has far
too much to do with religion.
Futhermore, the number "seven" is consider as the perfect number in
cabbalism. What is even worse, is that I became intuitively aware of three
of these essentialities which helped me to discover all seven of them
objectively. (My book will even document this. Now "seven" is considered
to be made up of "three" (the number of the godhead and "four" (the number
of humankind). Your "totality" or "whole" is one of the "three". But so
doe "whole" and "holy" derive from one root word "haelig". And the holy is
an attribute of the number three.
I can go on and on, but I merely want to stress that others will also do
it in terms of the historical facts which I will document in my book. The
less historical facts I document, the more the discovery becomes
clinically true and thus open to misuse. Sometimes I wonder if I ever
should have begun writing about these essentialities. Is the Truth out
there - or do we only emerge into Truth when Truth reaches out for us, one
by one?
Is this not what Steve is objecting to, but did not ariculate it because
he is too cultured? The more the dialogue (for many it is merely a
discussion) developed between us, the more I wish he would say the
following: "At, your seven essentialities are perfect, even by merely
their number, to make the most dangerous religion ever. Shut up and write
no more."
My mind listens to him. But now my heart objects. Why? Since I have
discovered them, I have shifted to a new level of awareness with respect
to emergences/immergences. Emergent love enable me to understand far
better the pain and suffering of all of us because of our immergences.
Maybe I should pray that nobody else understand the seven essentialities
because they are perfect to make the most dangerous religion ever. Maybe
that is why I have written in the beginning to you that my mind begins to
stir when two of us think that we are in perfect agreement. Maybe this is
what the LO is really about - to prevent the cloning of minds! Maybe there
is hope for us because although we can now clone a mammal by means of
anyone of its cells, we can also resist the cloning of the human mind.
Steve said, not in the same words, that I am writing science fiction. I
fear that human life has become very close to science fiction. But I also
firmly believe (how ironic) that along our road to healing lies the
concept of Peter Senge: Learning Organisation.
And now I will shutup because I have to make the last revisions to my
manuscript. When It finally gets published, promise me not to read it,
except to use it to aid emergent learning and to prevent mind cloning.
Promise me to tear its "truth" into insignificant pieces.
Love and peace
--At de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre for Education University of Pretoria Pretoria, South Africa email: amdelange@gold.up.ac.za
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