Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id LAA13685 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 24 Nov 2000 11:13:43 GMT X-Originating-IP: [209.240.221.102] From: "Scott Chase" <ecphoric@hotmail.com> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: RE: Fwd: Thinking Like a Chimp Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2000 06:10:14 -0500 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed Message-ID: <F150R1MwnnHxRKYblf800002295@hotmail.com> X-OriginalArrivalTime: 24 Nov 2000 11:10:15.0176 (UTC) FILETIME=[1F082080:01C05607] Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>From: <ddiamond@ozemail.com.au>
>Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>Subject: Re: RE: Fwd: Thinking Like a Chimp
>Date: Fri, Nov 24 2000 15:40:10 GMT+1100
>
>
>Hi Scott, et al,
>
> >From: "Scott Chase" <hemidactylus@my-deja.com>
> >Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2000 09:52:44 -0800
> >To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> >Subject: RE: Fwd: Thinking Like a Chimp
> >
><snip>
> >Are you perhaps familiar with Jung's Seven >Sermons to the Dead (as found
>in _MDR_)? All his >talk of pleuroma and creatura confused me at >about the
>same level as your discussion above (or >is it below?) ;-)
> >
> >Scott
> >
> >P.S.- My email feed ain't so good anymore since >deja made a switch, so I
>might jump to hotmail or >something else if they're any better.
> >
>
>Jung got the concepts of Pleroma and Creatura from reading the works of the
>Gnostics. Gregory Batson got them from reading Jung.
>
>In GENERAL there are TWO (!) worlds of explanation. However there is a
>catagorisation process going on such that the qualities of these two worlds
>vary as you drill down (and these differences (!) lead to the
>re-catagorisation of the general one:many distinctions). Thus you can map
>these distinctions and their derivatives as:
>
>(0) The ONE ------ The MANY
>
>(1) Pleroma ------ Creatura
>(2) Creatura ------ Sentiens
>(3) Sentiens ------ Humana
>
>have seen this extended to:
>
>(4) Humana ------- Society
>(5) Society ------ Theater
>...
>...
>
>In GENERAL the ONE has an object bias, the MANY a relational bias.
>
> >From the perspective of level (1) Pleroma favours a SAMENESS emphasis
>whereas Creatura favours a DIFFERENCE emphasis however there is a hidden
>element that lead to the expression of ONE, thus there is an IMPLICIT
>development path that forces a contraction, a gathering of bits n pieces
>(differences) that become the expression of 'Pleroma' (sameness) etc etc
>This path comes FROM the MANY to the ONE. Once the ONE is expressed so all
>of its energy pours out back into the MANY but at a different level.
>
>As you zoom-in on the MANY so we cut out an element to become the SINGLE
>context which is used as the referenced point, the KEY, within which we
>analyse the associated harmonics we find in the MANY.
>
>Thus at level (2) SENTIENS deals with the DIFFERENCES within the now
>SAMENESS of CREATURA but at (3) SENTIENS deals with SAMENESS (the ONE)
>within which is the DIFFERENCES of Humana etc etc
>
>All humans live in a subset of Pleroma and think/experience in a subset of
>Creatura and so on....
>
> >From the neurological level (-1 :-)) Object thinking emphasises
>self-containment and the ONE. IT is like the mind of a child, single
>context, literal minded. It is also like the reference beam in a hologram,
>it sets the SINGLE context, the frame of reference, the mode of
>interpretation. Being the ONE means asserting the context which leads to
>identifying MEANING. The ONE favours clarity and has an archetypal
>emphasis. The MANY favours re-identifying, using highs and lows to bring
>out an aspect (harmonics analysis) and as such the MANY is the source of
>DIFFERENT meanings DEPENDING ON THE CONTEXT. (Note that in all of this each
>ONE as an individual is DIFFERENT as well as SAME. Again it is CONTEXT that
>determines where you are coming from :-))
>
>Western thinking (and music) has a scale system that senses harmonics in
>the form of dyads, triads etc. My emphasis to Joe is that he believes that
>universally there are trichotomies, my point is that the octave, a
>dichotomy, is primary and you cannot have distinctions of trichotomies etc
>without a dichotomy to start with (and move on through --- the systems of
>categorisations that favour threes seem to lack precision in that the path
>is in twos, fours, eights etc etc IOW bifurcations but not qualitatively
>50/50, a branching from a trunk is a dichotomy but the branch can be
>qualitative different from the trunk! this reflects 1:manyness.)
>
>All harmonics analysis comes out of the MANY, where changing scale sets one
>element as the ONE; thus dichotomous analysis, trichotomous analysis,
>X-otomous analysis... BUT the root is in bifurcations -- di-cho....
>
>You may need to read this (and my other posts) SLOWLY and MORE THAN ONCE
>since I pack in a lot :-) even my websites cannot contain it all (2 x 5Mb)
>:-)
>
>
Aren't Jungians rather fond of the number four? There's some sort of
symmetry deal related to the homeostatic Self archetype as represented
symbolically by a mandala. Also wasn't Jung rather smitten with the notion
of the Virgin Mary being brought as a fourth element alongside the Trinity?
In the March 1998 issue of _Natural History_ Gould (in his essay "The
internal brand of the scarlet") briefly comments on Jung's views on the
importance of the number 4. If I understand Gould, he finds Jung's
archetypal explanations lacking, but sees fundamental importance in the
insight of the quaternity as far as it reflects human biases towards
dichotimization. In this case of fourness we have a dichotomy of a
dichotomy. I don't know that Gould's weak support carries over to mandalas
and the homeostatic Self though. There are the four humors and other
interesting tidbits such as temperament (sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, and
melancholic) pointed out by Gould.
When I recently read the Seven Sermons to the Dead in _MDR_ I did think of
your dichotomizations. Actually here are a couple URL's where this can be
read:
http://www.thelema.net/~auroraconari/seven_sermons_to_the_dead.htm
http://www.luminist.org/Archives/septem.htm
http://home.online.no/~noetic/7Sermons.htm
If Jung didn't have such a penchant for such esoteric stuff and if he didn't
go into his parapsychological (ie- spooky meaningful coincidence) tangents,
he would be far more tolerable. The stuff in _MDR_ where he conversed with
inner representations of his wise old man (Elijah/Philemon) and anima
(Salome) were quite fascinating, but sort of leave one wondering. In a sense
he (or his number 2 personality) seemed to be trying to capture some of the
same spirit as Nietzsche's Dionysian Zarathustra or perhaps even Goethe's
Faust. This reveals more of Jung's personal mythos than anything
corresponding to reality IMO. If he interpreted psychology based on his own
creative illness, this says something about his theoretical system IMO.
Plus, the whole solar phallus man story, from what I gather, doesn't quite
mesh too well on several angles.
Yet, people such as Anthony Stevens will still latch the archetypes and
collective unconscious to a modern reading of evolutionary psychology. The
basic ideas of phylogenetic and ontogenetic aspects of the mind (or psyche)
are quite reasonable, but when fleshed out with the contents of Jung's murky
arguments there doesn't seem to be a whole lot there.
Jungian arguments about how a complex can take control over someone (akin to
demonic possession) are similar to memetic puppet string arguments. Jungian
arguments about there being an archetype for every situation in life or an
archetypal core to every complex are similar to hyperadaptationist arguments
one would expect from hardcore evolutionary psychologists positing a mind
parsed into modules by selection for everything under the sun. I'm not sure
the memeticists of the Self denying ilk would affirm the archetypal Self.
Scott
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