Saturday, 3 November 2007
Friday, 2 November 2007
Opon Ifa as Iconographic Expression of Ifa Divination as Decision Making Template Correlated with Cognitive Science
Eshu figure evocative of the possibility of mediation between forms of being and modes of knowledge
Ground of being
Spiral evocative of ontological and hermeneutic interrelationships
Procession of human, animal and liminal figures suggestive of the various forms of being integrated in the Odu of Ifa and through which the divinatory process mediates
Eshu figure evocative of the possibility of mediation between forms of being and modes of knowledge
Half-humanoid half spiral figure evocative of the grasp of hermeneutic interrelations
through human consciousness-
for sources on this
see witte on eshu figures in Yoruba artist and his eshu book and lawal on spirals in edan ogboni essay
Analogical
Correlation
HERMES-A Heterogeneous Reasoning and Mediator System
An overview of the HERMES Project
HERMES is a system for semantically integrating different and possibly heterogeneous information sources and reasoning systems. This is accomplished by executing programs, called mediators, written in the HERMES system. Mediators, first proposed by Wiederhold, are guidelines of how information from different sources will be combined and integrated. HERMES system is based on the theory of Hybrid Knowledge Bases, due to Lu, Nerode and Subrahmanian. In this framework, external information sources are abstracted as domains which execute certain functions with pre-specified input and output type. These domains are accessed in mediators using a logic-based declarative language. This language is based on Annotated Logics, due to Kifer and Subrahmanian, and it provides a powerfull and extensible programming environment. The system also provides a uniform environment for the easy addition of new external sources to existing mediators. The system currently runs on Sun Sparc stations (under Unix), as well as on the IBM-PC platform under DOS/Windows 3.1. A graphical user interface has been built on both platforms.
http://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/hermes/overview/overview.html
To make Eshu-Hermes connections-see Signifying Monkey-Gates and Faivre on Hermes- Greek God to Alchemical Magus
The Odu are understood, not simply, at one level, as geomantic patterns, or, at another level, as organising categories of the textual corpus of the system, but as a means of developing and organising a systemic construction of the scope of existence, in terms of its extant forms and its possibilities of realisation, from the most abstract to the most concrete. As Joseph Ohomina describes them:
The Odu are the names of spirits whose origin we do not know…. They are the spiritual names of all phenomena, whether abstract or concrete: plants, animals, human beings, the elements, and all kinds of situations. Abstractions such as love, hate, truth and falsehood; concrete forms such as rain, water, land, air and the stars; and situations such as celebrations, conflict and ceremonies, are represented in spiritual terms by the various Odu
The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as a process through which this data base of ontological values is galvanised in relation to particular situations represented by the queries presented to the oracle. These situations would be interpreted in relation to their ontological identification in the various Odu. The correlation between this understanding of the Odu and ideas about female biology emerges in the feminine characterisation of the Odu and the resonance of this characterisation in the sculptural realisation of the space on which the Odu are configured in divination. The Odu are collectively understood as female and, in this collective identity, as being the wife of Ifa. The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as being characterized in terms of relationships between a female and a male personality. This implies a generative process that emerges on the space where the Odu patterns are formed, graphically represented by the empty centre of the divination tray. Within this empty space, therefore, the macrocosmic values represented by the Odu in their fundamental characterisation as cosmic forms converge with the microcosmic patterns represented by the client’s query. The empty space, therefore, becomes a generative space, a womb of transformation, akin to the vaginal space where new life emerges after its transformation within uterine space. The correlation of macrocosmic and microcosmic frameworks in the divinatory process could be understood to be expressive of a convergence of forces similar to the integration of the power of life which is universal but manifests anew in each life form and the distinctive genetic encoding that emerges from the gene banks of both parents in the conception and growth of new human life.
Analogical
Correlation
caOBNET
OBJECTIVE BAYESIAN NETS FOR INTEGRATING CANCER KNOWLEDGE: A SYSTEMS BIOLOGY APPROACH
INTRODUCTION
Cancer treatment decisions should be based on all available knowledge. But this knowledge is complex and varied: it includes not only the patient's symptoms and expert knowledge of the relevant causal processes, but also clinical databases relating to past patients, databases of observations made at the molecular level, domain knowledge embodied in medical ontologies, and knowledge encapsulated in medical informatics systems such as argumentation systems. What is needed is a principled way of integrating these knowledge sources.
Objective Bayesian nets offer a principled path to knowledge integration. Objective Bayesianism is a theory that represents background knowledge using probabilities. These probabilities - e.g. the probability of recurrence of a patient's cancer; the probability that the patient will respond to treatment - are invaluable for making treatment decisions. An objective Bayesian net is a practical device for representing and calculating these probabilities. By building an objective Bayesian net one can practically integrate disparate knowledge sources.
The goal of this project is to implement this approach and to analyse its performance. We are particularly keen to investigate the way in which objective Bayesian nets can be used to combine
- qualitative and quantitative knowledge: the integration of quantiative statistical databases with qualitative ontological, argumentative and common sense knowledge is an important goal from the point of view of the knowledge engineer;
- molecular and clinical knowledge: the integration of different levels of analysis is an important goal from the systems biology perspective.
http://www.kent.ac.uk/secl/philosophy/jw/2006/caOBNET.htm
Analogical Correlation
Bayesian Rationality: The Probabilistic Approach to Human Reasoning (Oxford Cognitive Science) (Paperback) by Mike Oaksford (Author), Nick Chater (Author)
Are people rational? This question was central to Greek thought; and has been at the heart of psychology and philosophy for millennia. This book provides a radical and controversial reappraisal of conventional wisdom in the psychology of reasoning, proposing that the Western conception of the mind as a logical system is flawed at the very outset. It argues that cognition should be understood in terms of probability theory, the calculus of uncertain reasoning, rather than in termsof logic, the calculus of certain reasoning.
Table of Contents
Logic and the Western conception of mind; Rationality and rational analysis; Reasoning in the the real world: how much deduction is there?; The probabilistic turn; Does the exception prove the rule? How people reason with conditionals; Being economical with the evidence: collecting data and testing hypotheses; An uncertain quantity: how people reason with syllogisms; The rational analysis of mind: a dialogue
About the AuthorMike Oaksford is Professor of Psychology and Head of School at Birkbeck College London. He was a research fellow at the Centre for Cognitive Science, University of Edinburgh, he was then lecturer at the University of Wales, Bangor, and senior lecturer at the University of Warwick, before moving to Cardiff University in 1996 as Professor of Experimental Psychology, a post he held until 2005. His research interests are in the area of human reasoning and decision making. In particular,with his colleague Nick Chater, he has been developing a Bayesian probabilistic approach to deductive reasoning tasks. According to this approach reasoning " are the result of applying the wrong normative model and failing to take account of people's normal environment. He also studies the way the emotions affect and interact with reasoning and decision making processes.
Description
Are people rational? This question was central to Greek thought; and has been at the heart of psychology, philosophy, rational choice in social sciences, and probabilistic approaches to artificial intelligence. This book provides a radical re-appraisal of conventional wisdom in the psychology of reasoning.For almost two and a half thousand years, the Western conception of what it is to be a human being has been dominated by the idea that the mind is the seat of reason - humans are, almost by definition, the rational animal. From Aristotle to the present day, rationality has been explained by comparison to systems of logic, which distinguish valid (i.e., rationally justified) from invalid arguments. Within psychology and cognitive science, such a logicist conception of the mind was adopted wholeheartedly from Piaget onwards. Simultaneous with the construction of the logicist program in cognition, other researchers found that people appeared surprisingly and systematically illogical in some experiments. Proposals within the logicist paradigm suggested that these were mere performance errors, although in some reasoning tasks only as few as 5% of people's reasoning was logically correct. In this book a more radical suggestion for explaining these puzzling aspects of human reasoning is put forward: the Western conception of the mind as a logical system is flawed at the very outset. The human mind is primarily concerned with practical action in the face of a profoundly complex and uncertain world. Oaksford and Chater argue that cognition should be understood in terms of probability theory, the calculus of uncertain reasoning, rather than in terms of logic, the calculus of certain reasoning. Thus, the logical mind should be replaced by the probabilistic mind - people may possess not logical rationality, but Bayesian rationality.
About the Author(s)
Mike Oaksford is Professor of Psychology and Head of School at Birkbeck College London. He was a research fellow at the Centre for Cognitive Science, University of Edinburgh, he was then lecturer at the University of Wales, Bangor, and senior lecturer at the University of Warwick, before moving to Cardiff University in 1996 as Professor of Experimental Psychology, a post he held until 2005. His research interests are in the area of human reasoning and decision making. In particular, with his colleague Nick Chater, he has been developing a Bayesian probabilistic approach to deductive reasoning tasks. According to this approach reasoning nullbiasesnull are the result of applying the wrong normative model and failing to take account of people's normal environment. He also studies the way the emotions affect and interact with reasoning and decision making processes.Nick Chater is Professor of Cognitive and Decision Sciences at University College London. He has an M.A. in Psychology from Cambridge University, and a PhD in Cognitive Science from Edinburgh. He has held academic appointments at Edinburgh, Oxford, and Warwick Universities. His research focussed on attempting to find general principles that may be applicable across many cognitive domains, ranging from reasoning and decision making, to language acquisition and processing, to perception and categorization. Since the late 1980s, in collaboration with Mike Oaksford, he has been interested in the application of probabilistic and information-theoretic methods for understanding human reasoning.
Rationality in an Uncertain World: Essays in the Cognitive Science of Human Understanding (Paperback) by Mike Oaksford (Editor), Nick Chater (Editor)
Book DescriptionThis book brings together an influential sequence of papers that argue for a radical re-conceptualisation of the psychology of inference, and of cognitive science more generally. The papers demonstrate that the thesis that logic provides the basis of human inference is central to much cognitive science, although the commitment to this view is often implicit. They then note that almost all human inference is uncertain, whereas logic is the calculus of certain inference. This mismatch means that logic is not the appropriate model for human thought. Oaksford and Chater's argument draws on research in computer science, artificial intelligence and philosophy of science, in addition to experimental psychology. The authors propose that probability theory, the calculus of uncertain inference, provides a more appropriate model for human thought. They show how a probabilistic account can provide detailed explanations of experimental data on Wason's selection task, which many have viewed as providing a paradigmatic demonstration of human irrationality. Oaksford and Chater show that people's behaviour appears irrational only from a logical point of view, whereas it is entirely rational from a probabilistic perspective. The shift to a probabilistic framework for human inference has significant implications for the psychology of reasoning, cognitive science more generally, and forour picture of ourselves as rational agents. SynopsisThe essays in this work focus on problems with logic-based approaches to human reasoning and show how a probablistic approach can provide a more psychologically plausible, computationally viable and philosophically respectable account of human inference. The author's probablistic approach shows that although people's behaviour appears irrational from a logical point of view, it is entirely rational from a probablistic perspective. There are new chapters on the emerging empirical support for probablistic models and on the cognitive mechanisms, such as neural networks, that may implement them in the mind. Moreover, the presentation of optimal data selection is simplified reflecting the author's experiences with teaching this material at the advanced undergraduate level.
Professor Mike Oaksford
My research concerns how people reason and construct arguments in discourse. From a logical point of view, people seem to make many errors and biases in their deductive reasoning. However, from a probabilistic point of view, these “errors” are the rational result of people being more sensitive to the strength of an argument defined using Bayesian probability theory rather than to deductive validity. This approach can also be generalised to account for the differential strength of the informal argument fallacies that have accrued in logic text books since Aristotle. This research involves experimental work and modelling the resulting inferential behaviour. I am also interested in how the emotions, both experienced and anticipated, affect people’s reasoning and decision making.
Students
Mal Christie: Minimal risk models of route finding and the representation of risk
Adam Corner: A Bayesian approach to circular reasoning (Cardiff, Joint with Ulrike Hahn (Psychology))
Rhys ap Gwilym: Bootstrapping informed economic behaviour in the lab to real markets (Cardiff, Joint with Patrick Minford (Economics))
School of Psychology, Birkbeck, University of London
http://www.bbk.ac.uk/psyc/staff/academic/moaksford
Nick Chater
My research focuses on looking for fundamental principles of cognition, which might apply across several cognitive domains. I am particularly interested in problems of uncertain inference, that arise in learning, reasoning, and perception; and in models of judgement and decision making, based with on cognitive principles. I also work on real-world applications of the cognitive and decision sciences.
Courses taught MSc Cognitive & Decision Sciences
http://www.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/people/profiles/chater_nick.htm
MSc Cognitive and Decision Sciences (CoDeS)
This program studies the cognitive processes and representations underlying human thought, knowledge and decision-making. It integrates a wide range of disciplines and methodologies, with the core assumption that human cognition and choice are computational processes, implemented in neural hardware. Key topics include: the nature of computational explanation; the general principles of cognition; the scope of rational choice explanation; probabilistic models of the mind; learning and memory; applications to economics and business. The program involves intensive training in experimental design and methodology, building computational models, and carrying out a substantial piece of original research.
Why CoDeS?The program draws on an outstanding faculty, ranging across many disciplines, including internationally renowned researchers in psychology, computational modelling, neuroscience and economics. London is one of the global “hot-spots” for research in cognition, decision-making, and neuroscience; and it is an intellectual “hub”, with a high density of research seminars and scientific meetings that attract leading international researchers. London is also one of the world’s foremost commercial and political centres, with consequent opportunities for high-level applied research; and it is a vibrant, culturally diverse and international city, with world-class music, theatre and galleries.
Who should apply?This program will appeal to outstanding students interested in pursuing a research career in the cognitive and decision sciences, as well as to students wishing to develop an understanding of core theoretical principles of human thought to tackle applied problems, e.g., in business or public policy. The program will involve challenging formal, conceptual, and empirical work, and hence outstanding talent and motivation, including the ability to think clearly and creativity, and rapidly acquire and integrate new knowledge, is more important than specific disciplinary background. Relevant undergraduate backgrounds include psychology, economics, neuroscience, philosophy, computer science, mathematics, statistics, physics and engineering.
Course outline
The course is made up of eight taught modules and a research project. There are six core modules, which will provide students with a firm basis in both the theory and practice of cognition science and decision-making, and two specialist modules, selected by students from a wide list of options. The options and research project will allow students to pursue their own specific interests, and complete a significant piece of research work.
Core modules:
INTRODUCTION TO COGNITIVE SCIENCE (convenors David Lagnado and Marius Usher)
This module introduces the foundations of cognitive science, highlighting its interdisciplinary nature. A historical review will include seminal work in computer science, linguistics, neuroscience, psychology and philosophy. The central metaphor of the mind as an information processor will be introduced, and various computational models of cognition discussed, raising questions of cognitive architecture, modularity, symbolic vs. connectionist representation, algorithms for learning and reasoning etc. Philosophical issues will also be explored, including classical theories and current debates in the philosophy of mind.
PRINCIPLES OF COGNITION(convenor Nick Chater)
This module outlines general theoretical principles that underlie cognitive processes across many domains, ranging from perception and memory, to reasoning and decision making. The focus will be on general, quantitative regularities, and the degree to which theories focusing on specific cognitive scientific topics can be constrained by such principles. There will be particular emphasis on understanding cognitive principles that are relevant to theories of decision making. The course will also deal with the issue of which mental processes are subject to general theoretical principles, and which must be understood one-by-one.
JUDGMENT AND DECISION MAKING(convenor David Lagnado) This module will introduce normative and descriptive models of judgments and choice. Formal models will include the axioms of probability, Bayesian networks, decision theory and game theory. The classic violations of these normative models will be critically discussed, in particular probability biases and choice anomalies. Current psychological models of judgment and choice will be presented, including heuristics and biases; prospect theory; decision field theory; sampling approaches and rational analysis models. These will be evaluated and linked with more general principles of cognition. The implications of this research for practical decision-making, and the use of decision aids, will also be discussed.
KNOWLEDGE, LEARNING & INFERENCE(convenors Nick Chater and Mike Oaksford)
This module introduces the range of computational formalism and methods that are currently used in the cognitive sciences. These will include Bayesian methods, symbolic approaches from artificial intelligence, machine learning techniques, and neural networks. The course will also show how these techniques can be applied to explain specific cognitive phenomena, by describing a range of current computational models. Students will also have the opportunity to develop their own simple computational models of cognitive processes.
PROGRAMMING FOR COGNITIVE SCIENCE (convenor Marius Usher) This module introduces students to the basics of programming for cognitive and decision science. It will be made up of two main components: (1) Designing and programming simple laboratory experiments; (2) Computational modelling and simulation. The course will involve both theoretical and practical work. Students will program their own cognitive science experiments, and learn how to build simple computational models and run simulations. These practical projects will be tied in with the empirical and theoretical work covered in other modules (e.g., judgment and decision-making; knowledge, learning and inference).
RESEARCH STATISTICS (convenor Paul Cairns)
This module is intended to give students the more advanced statistical tools that they will need to analyze data in a range of psychological experiments. The course will therefore cover (1) a range of nonparametric tests such as Friedman and Jonckheere; (2) Advanced topics on ANOVA such as post hoc tests, ANCOVA and contrasts; (3) Introduction to multivariate methods such as MANOVA, Factor Analysis, Multiple Regression and the basics of the linear model.
Optional modules will include:
Neural computation: Models of brain function (Anatomy)Topics in Economics and Psychology (Economics)Supervised Learning (Computer Science) Unsupervised Learning (Computer Science) Applied Decision-making (Psychology)Learning and Memory (Psychology)Cognitive Neuroscience (Psychology)Neuropsychology of memory (Cognitive Neuropsychology)Applied cognitive science (Human-computer interaction centre)
Disorders of executive functions (Psychology) Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (Psychology) Brain and Cognitive Development (Psychology) Cognitive Neuropsychiatry (Psychology)
I am thereby developing a conception of Ifa hermeneutics which integrates the conception of an ontology, as understood both in terms of philosophy and in terms of computer science.
My interpretation of Ifa is related to the philosophical conception of ontology because I understand the Ifa system structured in relation to an ontology which ,from one perspective, could be understood to be centred on the relationship between the Ori and the universe. This universe itself is onsts in terms of interactive relationships between various forms of being, both human and nonhuman. In the characterisation of these beings, the conception of consciousness and agency as demonstrated by both biological forms as weell as non- biological forms/entities is central.
The interaction between these ontological forms is developed in Ifa in terms of a hermeneutic form, the Odu, which is understood as a correlation of human cultural forms, verbal language and numerate organisation-the odu patterns-and the agents who are understood as manifest through these cultural forms but as not being exhausted by a description of them purely in terms of human cultural construction but as demonstrating a sense of direction distinctive to them and not derived from human agency-abimbola on the odxu as spirits having their own ori.
To what degree are the cultural forms through which they are realised understood to be implicated in their nature?
See the possible contrast between notions of understanding Yoruba as central to understanding ifa,as in the UNESCO ifa presentation and ohominas contrary position. see also conceptions in the orisha tradition on the reciprocal relationship? Or even dependence on by deity on the human being-karen barber-how man makes God,in achebe-use carefully-how olu came to be made-on the creation and abandonment of gods-soyinka on similar ideas at the end of credo and paradoxical relationship of that to his earlier thrust in the poem-to the development of a metaphysics that develops similar ideas in terms of a particular conception of the relationship between from and essence where the form is a material form, whether ideational, textual or figural,or even simply an object, in the work of modern western occultism,[particularly the work of dion fortune, regardie, Crowley and whitcomb.see the essay on the aim of religion, the method of science.
See also hostage to the devil for a related discussion of spirit.
See also oyubukeres perspective as a scholar of African classical thought and an enthusiast of western esotericism.
On ontology in philosophy see as a beginning-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology
In terms of the relationship of my understanding of Ifa to ontology in terms of computer science and information science, the Ifa system could be understood to constitute “a data model that represents a set of concepts within a domain and the relationships between those concepts” and “is used to reason about the objects within that domain” as wkipedia describes ontology in computer since and information science, where the data model consists of the various modes of being through which the ifa system mediates and the information structures- a metaphysical form codified in terms of both literary and numerical forms in relation to the social knowledge of the diviner-through which this mediation is actualized/ effected. The data model is focused in the Odu and the conceptions they embody. The odu are used to reason about the objects within that domain, using forms of inference distinctive to ifa hermeneutics.
On ontology in computer science and information science-see as a beginning-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_%28computer_science%29
How Can the Human Mind Occur in the Physical Universe? (Hardcover) by John R. Anderson (Author)
.
"The question for me is how can the human mind occur in the physical universe. We now know that the world is governed by physics. We now understand the way biology nestles comfortably within that. The issue is how will the mind do that as well."--Alan Newell, December 4, 1991, Carnegie Mellon University The argument John Anderson gives in this book was inspired by the passage above, from the last lecture by one of the pioneers of cognitive science. Newell describes what, for him, is the pivotal question of scientific inquiry, and Anderson gives an answer that is emerging from the study of brain and behavior. Humans share the same basic cognitive architecture with all primates, but they have evolved abilities to exercise abstract control over cognition and process more complex relational patterns. The human cognitive architecture consists of a set of largely independent modules associated with different brain regions. In this book, Anderson discusses in detail how these various modules can combine to produce behaviors as varied as driving a car and solving an algebraic equation, but focuses principally on two of the modules: the declarative and procedural. The declarative module involves a memory system that, moment by moment, attempts to give each person the most appropriate possible window into his or her past. The procedural module involves a central system that strives to develop a set of productions that will enable the most adaptive response from any state of the modules. Newell argued that the answer to his question must take the form of a cognitive architecture, and Anderson organizes his answer around the ACT-R architecture, but broadens it by bringing in research from all areas of cognitive science, including how recent work in brain imaging maps onto the cognitive architecture.
Amazon.com book description. Accessed 29/05/07
Compare weitjh your similar claims about ifa hermeneutics in relation to relating thepresent with the past and the future in your ifa/van gogh essay and with onwuejeogwu in his afa book and his conception of time in his inaugural plus your conception of wenger and matwoods work as creative sytntesais of diverse facrors under the inspiratipon oif the phenomena they studied
Ground of being
Spiral evocative of ontological and hermeneutic interrelationships
Procession of human, animal and liminal figures suggestive of the various forms of being integrated in the Odu of Ifa and through which the divinatory process mediates
Eshu figure evocative of the possibility of mediation between forms of being and modes of knowledge
Half-humanoid half spiral figure evocative of the grasp of hermeneutic interrelations
through human consciousness-
for sources on this
see witte on eshu figures in Yoruba artist and his eshu book and lawal on spirals in edan ogboni essay
Analogical
Correlation
HERMES-A Heterogeneous Reasoning and Mediator System
An overview of the HERMES Project
HERMES is a system for semantically integrating different and possibly heterogeneous information sources and reasoning systems. This is accomplished by executing programs, called mediators, written in the HERMES system. Mediators, first proposed by Wiederhold, are guidelines of how information from different sources will be combined and integrated. HERMES system is based on the theory of Hybrid Knowledge Bases, due to Lu, Nerode and Subrahmanian. In this framework, external information sources are abstracted as domains which execute certain functions with pre-specified input and output type. These domains are accessed in mediators using a logic-based declarative language. This language is based on Annotated Logics, due to Kifer and Subrahmanian, and it provides a powerfull and extensible programming environment. The system also provides a uniform environment for the easy addition of new external sources to existing mediators. The system currently runs on Sun Sparc stations (under Unix), as well as on the IBM-PC platform under DOS/Windows 3.1. A graphical user interface has been built on both platforms.
http://www.cs.umd.edu/projects/hermes/overview/overview.html
To make Eshu-Hermes connections-see Signifying Monkey-Gates and Faivre on Hermes- Greek God to Alchemical Magus
The Odu are understood, not simply, at one level, as geomantic patterns, or, at another level, as organising categories of the textual corpus of the system, but as a means of developing and organising a systemic construction of the scope of existence, in terms of its extant forms and its possibilities of realisation, from the most abstract to the most concrete. As Joseph Ohomina describes them:
The Odu are the names of spirits whose origin we do not know…. They are the spiritual names of all phenomena, whether abstract or concrete: plants, animals, human beings, the elements, and all kinds of situations. Abstractions such as love, hate, truth and falsehood; concrete forms such as rain, water, land, air and the stars; and situations such as celebrations, conflict and ceremonies, are represented in spiritual terms by the various Odu
The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as a process through which this data base of ontological values is galvanised in relation to particular situations represented by the queries presented to the oracle. These situations would be interpreted in relation to their ontological identification in the various Odu. The correlation between this understanding of the Odu and ideas about female biology emerges in the feminine characterisation of the Odu and the resonance of this characterisation in the sculptural realisation of the space on which the Odu are configured in divination. The Odu are collectively understood as female and, in this collective identity, as being the wife of Ifa. The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as being characterized in terms of relationships between a female and a male personality. This implies a generative process that emerges on the space where the Odu patterns are formed, graphically represented by the empty centre of the divination tray. Within this empty space, therefore, the macrocosmic values represented by the Odu in their fundamental characterisation as cosmic forms converge with the microcosmic patterns represented by the client’s query. The empty space, therefore, becomes a generative space, a womb of transformation, akin to the vaginal space where new life emerges after its transformation within uterine space. The correlation of macrocosmic and microcosmic frameworks in the divinatory process could be understood to be expressive of a convergence of forces similar to the integration of the power of life which is universal but manifests anew in each life form and the distinctive genetic encoding that emerges from the gene banks of both parents in the conception and growth of new human life.
Analogical
Correlation
caOBNET
OBJECTIVE BAYESIAN NETS FOR INTEGRATING CANCER KNOWLEDGE: A SYSTEMS BIOLOGY APPROACH
INTRODUCTION
Cancer treatment decisions should be based on all available knowledge. But this knowledge is complex and varied: it includes not only the patient's symptoms and expert knowledge of the relevant causal processes, but also clinical databases relating to past patients, databases of observations made at the molecular level, domain knowledge embodied in medical ontologies, and knowledge encapsulated in medical informatics systems such as argumentation systems. What is needed is a principled way of integrating these knowledge sources.
Objective Bayesian nets offer a principled path to knowledge integration. Objective Bayesianism is a theory that represents background knowledge using probabilities. These probabilities - e.g. the probability of recurrence of a patient's cancer; the probability that the patient will respond to treatment - are invaluable for making treatment decisions. An objective Bayesian net is a practical device for representing and calculating these probabilities. By building an objective Bayesian net one can practically integrate disparate knowledge sources.
The goal of this project is to implement this approach and to analyse its performance. We are particularly keen to investigate the way in which objective Bayesian nets can be used to combine
- qualitative and quantitative knowledge: the integration of quantiative statistical databases with qualitative ontological, argumentative and common sense knowledge is an important goal from the point of view of the knowledge engineer;
- molecular and clinical knowledge: the integration of different levels of analysis is an important goal from the systems biology perspective.
http://www.kent.ac.uk/secl/philosophy/jw/2006/caOBNET.htm
Analogical Correlation
Bayesian Rationality: The Probabilistic Approach to Human Reasoning (Oxford Cognitive Science) (Paperback) by Mike Oaksford (Author), Nick Chater (Author)
Are people rational? This question was central to Greek thought; and has been at the heart of psychology and philosophy for millennia. This book provides a radical and controversial reappraisal of conventional wisdom in the psychology of reasoning, proposing that the Western conception of the mind as a logical system is flawed at the very outset. It argues that cognition should be understood in terms of probability theory, the calculus of uncertain reasoning, rather than in termsof logic, the calculus of certain reasoning.
Table of Contents
Logic and the Western conception of mind; Rationality and rational analysis; Reasoning in the the real world: how much deduction is there?; The probabilistic turn; Does the exception prove the rule? How people reason with conditionals; Being economical with the evidence: collecting data and testing hypotheses; An uncertain quantity: how people reason with syllogisms; The rational analysis of mind: a dialogue
About the AuthorMike Oaksford is Professor of Psychology and Head of School at Birkbeck College London. He was a research fellow at the Centre for Cognitive Science, University of Edinburgh, he was then lecturer at the University of Wales, Bangor, and senior lecturer at the University of Warwick, before moving to Cardiff University in 1996 as Professor of Experimental Psychology, a post he held until 2005. His research interests are in the area of human reasoning and decision making. In particular,with his colleague Nick Chater, he has been developing a Bayesian probabilistic approach to deductive reasoning tasks. According to this approach reasoning " are the result of applying the wrong normative model and failing to take account of people's normal environment. He also studies the way the emotions affect and interact with reasoning and decision making processes.
Description
Are people rational? This question was central to Greek thought; and has been at the heart of psychology, philosophy, rational choice in social sciences, and probabilistic approaches to artificial intelligence. This book provides a radical re-appraisal of conventional wisdom in the psychology of reasoning.For almost two and a half thousand years, the Western conception of what it is to be a human being has been dominated by the idea that the mind is the seat of reason - humans are, almost by definition, the rational animal. From Aristotle to the present day, rationality has been explained by comparison to systems of logic, which distinguish valid (i.e., rationally justified) from invalid arguments. Within psychology and cognitive science, such a logicist conception of the mind was adopted wholeheartedly from Piaget onwards. Simultaneous with the construction of the logicist program in cognition, other researchers found that people appeared surprisingly and systematically illogical in some experiments. Proposals within the logicist paradigm suggested that these were mere performance errors, although in some reasoning tasks only as few as 5% of people's reasoning was logically correct. In this book a more radical suggestion for explaining these puzzling aspects of human reasoning is put forward: the Western conception of the mind as a logical system is flawed at the very outset. The human mind is primarily concerned with practical action in the face of a profoundly complex and uncertain world. Oaksford and Chater argue that cognition should be understood in terms of probability theory, the calculus of uncertain reasoning, rather than in terms of logic, the calculus of certain reasoning. Thus, the logical mind should be replaced by the probabilistic mind - people may possess not logical rationality, but Bayesian rationality.
About the Author(s)
Mike Oaksford is Professor of Psychology and Head of School at Birkbeck College London. He was a research fellow at the Centre for Cognitive Science, University of Edinburgh, he was then lecturer at the University of Wales, Bangor, and senior lecturer at the University of Warwick, before moving to Cardiff University in 1996 as Professor of Experimental Psychology, a post he held until 2005. His research interests are in the area of human reasoning and decision making. In particular, with his colleague Nick Chater, he has been developing a Bayesian probabilistic approach to deductive reasoning tasks. According to this approach reasoning nullbiasesnull are the result of applying the wrong normative model and failing to take account of people's normal environment. He also studies the way the emotions affect and interact with reasoning and decision making processes.Nick Chater is Professor of Cognitive and Decision Sciences at University College London. He has an M.A. in Psychology from Cambridge University, and a PhD in Cognitive Science from Edinburgh. He has held academic appointments at Edinburgh, Oxford, and Warwick Universities. His research focussed on attempting to find general principles that may be applicable across many cognitive domains, ranging from reasoning and decision making, to language acquisition and processing, to perception and categorization. Since the late 1980s, in collaboration with Mike Oaksford, he has been interested in the application of probabilistic and information-theoretic methods for understanding human reasoning.
Rationality in an Uncertain World: Essays in the Cognitive Science of Human Understanding (Paperback) by Mike Oaksford (Editor), Nick Chater (Editor)
Book DescriptionThis book brings together an influential sequence of papers that argue for a radical re-conceptualisation of the psychology of inference, and of cognitive science more generally. The papers demonstrate that the thesis that logic provides the basis of human inference is central to much cognitive science, although the commitment to this view is often implicit. They then note that almost all human inference is uncertain, whereas logic is the calculus of certain inference. This mismatch means that logic is not the appropriate model for human thought. Oaksford and Chater's argument draws on research in computer science, artificial intelligence and philosophy of science, in addition to experimental psychology. The authors propose that probability theory, the calculus of uncertain inference, provides a more appropriate model for human thought. They show how a probabilistic account can provide detailed explanations of experimental data on Wason's selection task, which many have viewed as providing a paradigmatic demonstration of human irrationality. Oaksford and Chater show that people's behaviour appears irrational only from a logical point of view, whereas it is entirely rational from a probabilistic perspective. The shift to a probabilistic framework for human inference has significant implications for the psychology of reasoning, cognitive science more generally, and forour picture of ourselves as rational agents. SynopsisThe essays in this work focus on problems with logic-based approaches to human reasoning and show how a probablistic approach can provide a more psychologically plausible, computationally viable and philosophically respectable account of human inference. The author's probablistic approach shows that although people's behaviour appears irrational from a logical point of view, it is entirely rational from a probablistic perspective. There are new chapters on the emerging empirical support for probablistic models and on the cognitive mechanisms, such as neural networks, that may implement them in the mind. Moreover, the presentation of optimal data selection is simplified reflecting the author's experiences with teaching this material at the advanced undergraduate level.
Professor Mike Oaksford
My research concerns how people reason and construct arguments in discourse. From a logical point of view, people seem to make many errors and biases in their deductive reasoning. However, from a probabilistic point of view, these “errors” are the rational result of people being more sensitive to the strength of an argument defined using Bayesian probability theory rather than to deductive validity. This approach can also be generalised to account for the differential strength of the informal argument fallacies that have accrued in logic text books since Aristotle. This research involves experimental work and modelling the resulting inferential behaviour. I am also interested in how the emotions, both experienced and anticipated, affect people’s reasoning and decision making.
Students
Mal Christie: Minimal risk models of route finding and the representation of risk
Adam Corner: A Bayesian approach to circular reasoning (Cardiff, Joint with Ulrike Hahn (Psychology))
Rhys ap Gwilym: Bootstrapping informed economic behaviour in the lab to real markets (Cardiff, Joint with Patrick Minford (Economics))
School of Psychology, Birkbeck, University of London
http://www.bbk.ac.uk/psyc/staff/academic/moaksford
Nick Chater
My research focuses on looking for fundamental principles of cognition, which might apply across several cognitive domains. I am particularly interested in problems of uncertain inference, that arise in learning, reasoning, and perception; and in models of judgement and decision making, based with on cognitive principles. I also work on real-world applications of the cognitive and decision sciences.
Courses taught MSc Cognitive & Decision Sciences
http://www.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/people/profiles/chater_nick.htm
MSc Cognitive and Decision Sciences (CoDeS)
This program studies the cognitive processes and representations underlying human thought, knowledge and decision-making. It integrates a wide range of disciplines and methodologies, with the core assumption that human cognition and choice are computational processes, implemented in neural hardware. Key topics include: the nature of computational explanation; the general principles of cognition; the scope of rational choice explanation; probabilistic models of the mind; learning and memory; applications to economics and business. The program involves intensive training in experimental design and methodology, building computational models, and carrying out a substantial piece of original research.
Why CoDeS?The program draws on an outstanding faculty, ranging across many disciplines, including internationally renowned researchers in psychology, computational modelling, neuroscience and economics. London is one of the global “hot-spots” for research in cognition, decision-making, and neuroscience; and it is an intellectual “hub”, with a high density of research seminars and scientific meetings that attract leading international researchers. London is also one of the world’s foremost commercial and political centres, with consequent opportunities for high-level applied research; and it is a vibrant, culturally diverse and international city, with world-class music, theatre and galleries.
Who should apply?This program will appeal to outstanding students interested in pursuing a research career in the cognitive and decision sciences, as well as to students wishing to develop an understanding of core theoretical principles of human thought to tackle applied problems, e.g., in business or public policy. The program will involve challenging formal, conceptual, and empirical work, and hence outstanding talent and motivation, including the ability to think clearly and creativity, and rapidly acquire and integrate new knowledge, is more important than specific disciplinary background. Relevant undergraduate backgrounds include psychology, economics, neuroscience, philosophy, computer science, mathematics, statistics, physics and engineering.
Course outline
The course is made up of eight taught modules and a research project. There are six core modules, which will provide students with a firm basis in both the theory and practice of cognition science and decision-making, and two specialist modules, selected by students from a wide list of options. The options and research project will allow students to pursue their own specific interests, and complete a significant piece of research work.
Core modules:
INTRODUCTION TO COGNITIVE SCIENCE (convenors David Lagnado and Marius Usher)
This module introduces the foundations of cognitive science, highlighting its interdisciplinary nature. A historical review will include seminal work in computer science, linguistics, neuroscience, psychology and philosophy. The central metaphor of the mind as an information processor will be introduced, and various computational models of cognition discussed, raising questions of cognitive architecture, modularity, symbolic vs. connectionist representation, algorithms for learning and reasoning etc. Philosophical issues will also be explored, including classical theories and current debates in the philosophy of mind.
PRINCIPLES OF COGNITION(convenor Nick Chater)
This module outlines general theoretical principles that underlie cognitive processes across many domains, ranging from perception and memory, to reasoning and decision making. The focus will be on general, quantitative regularities, and the degree to which theories focusing on specific cognitive scientific topics can be constrained by such principles. There will be particular emphasis on understanding cognitive principles that are relevant to theories of decision making. The course will also deal with the issue of which mental processes are subject to general theoretical principles, and which must be understood one-by-one.
JUDGMENT AND DECISION MAKING(convenor David Lagnado) This module will introduce normative and descriptive models of judgments and choice. Formal models will include the axioms of probability, Bayesian networks, decision theory and game theory. The classic violations of these normative models will be critically discussed, in particular probability biases and choice anomalies. Current psychological models of judgment and choice will be presented, including heuristics and biases; prospect theory; decision field theory; sampling approaches and rational analysis models. These will be evaluated and linked with more general principles of cognition. The implications of this research for practical decision-making, and the use of decision aids, will also be discussed.
KNOWLEDGE, LEARNING & INFERENCE(convenors Nick Chater and Mike Oaksford)
This module introduces the range of computational formalism and methods that are currently used in the cognitive sciences. These will include Bayesian methods, symbolic approaches from artificial intelligence, machine learning techniques, and neural networks. The course will also show how these techniques can be applied to explain specific cognitive phenomena, by describing a range of current computational models. Students will also have the opportunity to develop their own simple computational models of cognitive processes.
PROGRAMMING FOR COGNITIVE SCIENCE (convenor Marius Usher) This module introduces students to the basics of programming for cognitive and decision science. It will be made up of two main components: (1) Designing and programming simple laboratory experiments; (2) Computational modelling and simulation. The course will involve both theoretical and practical work. Students will program their own cognitive science experiments, and learn how to build simple computational models and run simulations. These practical projects will be tied in with the empirical and theoretical work covered in other modules (e.g., judgment and decision-making; knowledge, learning and inference).
RESEARCH STATISTICS (convenor Paul Cairns)
This module is intended to give students the more advanced statistical tools that they will need to analyze data in a range of psychological experiments. The course will therefore cover (1) a range of nonparametric tests such as Friedman and Jonckheere; (2) Advanced topics on ANOVA such as post hoc tests, ANCOVA and contrasts; (3) Introduction to multivariate methods such as MANOVA, Factor Analysis, Multiple Regression and the basics of the linear model.
Optional modules will include:
Neural computation: Models of brain function (Anatomy)Topics in Economics and Psychology (Economics)Supervised Learning (Computer Science) Unsupervised Learning (Computer Science) Applied Decision-making (Psychology)Learning and Memory (Psychology)Cognitive Neuroscience (Psychology)Neuropsychology of memory (Cognitive Neuropsychology)Applied cognitive science (Human-computer interaction centre)
Disorders of executive functions (Psychology) Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (Psychology) Brain and Cognitive Development (Psychology) Cognitive Neuropsychiatry (Psychology)
I am thereby developing a conception of Ifa hermeneutics which integrates the conception of an ontology, as understood both in terms of philosophy and in terms of computer science.
My interpretation of Ifa is related to the philosophical conception of ontology because I understand the Ifa system structured in relation to an ontology which ,from one perspective, could be understood to be centred on the relationship between the Ori and the universe. This universe itself is onsts in terms of interactive relationships between various forms of being, both human and nonhuman. In the characterisation of these beings, the conception of consciousness and agency as demonstrated by both biological forms as weell as non- biological forms/entities is central.
The interaction between these ontological forms is developed in Ifa in terms of a hermeneutic form, the Odu, which is understood as a correlation of human cultural forms, verbal language and numerate organisation-the odu patterns-and the agents who are understood as manifest through these cultural forms but as not being exhausted by a description of them purely in terms of human cultural construction but as demonstrating a sense of direction distinctive to them and not derived from human agency-abimbola on the odxu as spirits having their own ori.
To what degree are the cultural forms through which they are realised understood to be implicated in their nature?
See the possible contrast between notions of understanding Yoruba as central to understanding ifa,as in the UNESCO ifa presentation and ohominas contrary position. see also conceptions in the orisha tradition on the reciprocal relationship? Or even dependence on by deity on the human being-karen barber-how man makes God,in achebe-use carefully-how olu came to be made-on the creation and abandonment of gods-soyinka on similar ideas at the end of credo and paradoxical relationship of that to his earlier thrust in the poem-to the development of a metaphysics that develops similar ideas in terms of a particular conception of the relationship between from and essence where the form is a material form, whether ideational, textual or figural,or even simply an object, in the work of modern western occultism,[particularly the work of dion fortune, regardie, Crowley and whitcomb.see the essay on the aim of religion, the method of science.
See also hostage to the devil for a related discussion of spirit.
See also oyubukeres perspective as a scholar of African classical thought and an enthusiast of western esotericism.
On ontology in philosophy see as a beginning-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology
In terms of the relationship of my understanding of Ifa to ontology in terms of computer science and information science, the Ifa system could be understood to constitute “a data model that represents a set of concepts within a domain and the relationships between those concepts” and “is used to reason about the objects within that domain” as wkipedia describes ontology in computer since and information science, where the data model consists of the various modes of being through which the ifa system mediates and the information structures- a metaphysical form codified in terms of both literary and numerical forms in relation to the social knowledge of the diviner-through which this mediation is actualized/ effected. The data model is focused in the Odu and the conceptions they embody. The odu are used to reason about the objects within that domain, using forms of inference distinctive to ifa hermeneutics.
On ontology in computer science and information science-see as a beginning-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontology_%28computer_science%29
How Can the Human Mind Occur in the Physical Universe? (Hardcover) by John R. Anderson (Author)
.
"The question for me is how can the human mind occur in the physical universe. We now know that the world is governed by physics. We now understand the way biology nestles comfortably within that. The issue is how will the mind do that as well."--Alan Newell, December 4, 1991, Carnegie Mellon University The argument John Anderson gives in this book was inspired by the passage above, from the last lecture by one of the pioneers of cognitive science. Newell describes what, for him, is the pivotal question of scientific inquiry, and Anderson gives an answer that is emerging from the study of brain and behavior. Humans share the same basic cognitive architecture with all primates, but they have evolved abilities to exercise abstract control over cognition and process more complex relational patterns. The human cognitive architecture consists of a set of largely independent modules associated with different brain regions. In this book, Anderson discusses in detail how these various modules can combine to produce behaviors as varied as driving a car and solving an algebraic equation, but focuses principally on two of the modules: the declarative and procedural. The declarative module involves a memory system that, moment by moment, attempts to give each person the most appropriate possible window into his or her past. The procedural module involves a central system that strives to develop a set of productions that will enable the most adaptive response from any state of the modules. Newell argued that the answer to his question must take the form of a cognitive architecture, and Anderson organizes his answer around the ACT-R architecture, but broadens it by bringing in research from all areas of cognitive science, including how recent work in brain imaging maps onto the cognitive architecture.
Amazon.com book description. Accessed 29/05/07
Compare weitjh your similar claims about ifa hermeneutics in relation to relating thepresent with the past and the future in your ifa/van gogh essay and with onwuejeogwu in his afa book and his conception of time in his inaugural plus your conception of wenger and matwoods work as creative sytntesais of diverse facrors under the inspiratipon oif the phenomena they studied
The Opon Ifa as Subsuming Ontological and Epistemological Orientations of Ifa Dvination:Opon Ifa Cosmogram and the Mapping of Existential Realities
Mapping out your Case for Change
A Visual Dialogue process from Delta7 Associates
Sometimes we get lost, we lose our way, become unclear about our organisation's direction. Perhaps this is because we have just too much to deal with or perhaps our map is out of date.
Maps are a useful tool to help us to get our bearings, recognise landmarks, choose the right direction. They are a good metaphor for how we see the world. They help us make sense of our situation, to see how it all fits together. We use them to orient ourselves, help find where we are, what we choose to focus on, make decisions and take action.
Yet maps need continual revision to be true, accurate and useful. Problems arise when our maps become out of date and inaccurate. Yet we continue to hold on to them. We we cling to our maps, and derive comfort from them. We defend them against challenges from objective evidence or others opinions. We try to change the world to fit our maps. Sometimes we hope a problem will go away. It can be uncomfortable or even painful to give up or change our maps, so we tend to avoid taking those steps.
WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MAPS AND THE REALITY OR PHENOMENON THEY PUPORT TO DESCRIBE?
When you meet with colleagues, you quickly find that problems look different from others’ perspectives, We each have a piece of the puzzle. Maps are a way to fit them together to get the big picture, a picture everyone can see. Conflict arises when we try to use our maps on others before we have taken care to know about how they see the world.
Maps are a powerful and unique form of sharing knowledge on what needs to happen and why. They guide us from point to point; they give us a broader perspective and they display intricate structures, patterns and connections. They create a world view. They can connect us to what we know, where we are, where we have been and hopefully were we are going. They simplify and organise what is complex. They are a powerful means of finding a way through a complex problem, giving us more clarity, order and meaning.
Making Progess
Would you like to make a map? Perhaps you need something to give your team clarity on the changes that need to happen? Together we can make a map to help you organise your thinking, clarifying the situation, direction and purpose; give visual structure to all the things you are dealing with and see how it all fits together, giving you a firmer grasp on what is going on and what needs to be done.We can create a common map to engage them in a lively and animated discussion on the current challenges your organisation is facing, their context, and what needs to be done to overcome them. The map we make can be used to start a dialogue with your team, to start conversations that explore new territory…
Here are a few questions to think about before we meet.
Where are you right now? What sort of journey are you on? What direction are you going in? What does the terrain look like? What What are the obstacles are in your way? What do they look like?
what is the best direction to take?Where do you want to get to? What do you need to move forward?
Julian Burton
From http://www.delta7.com/html/map.html
The Opon Ifa as Subsuming Ontological and Epistemological Orientations of Ifa Dvination:Matrixial Theory of Ifa Hermeneutics
The Odu are understood, not simply, at one level, as geomantic patterns, or, at another level, as organising categories of the textual corpus of the system, or at another, as volitional agents, but as a means of developing and organising a systemic construction of the scope of existence, in terms of its extant forms and its possibilities of realisation, from the most abstract to the most concrete. As Joseph Ohomina describes them:
The Odu are the names of spirits whose origin we do not know…. They are the spiritual names of all phenomena, whether abstract or concrete: plants, animals, human beings, the element, and all kinds of situations. Abstractions such as love, hate, truth and falsehood; concrete forms such as rain, water, land, air and the stars; and situations such as celebrations, conflict and ceremonies, are represented in spiritual terms by the various Odu
The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as a process through which this data base of ontological values is galvanised in relation to particular situations represented by the queries presented to the oracle. These situations are interpreted in relation to their ontological identification in the various Odu. The correlation between this understanding of the Odu and ideas about female biology emerges in the feminine characterisation of the Odu and the resonance of this characterisation in the sculptural realisation of the space on which the Odu are configured in divination. The Odu are collectively understood as female and, in this collective identity, as being the wife of Ifa.
The divinatory process, therefore, could be understood as being characterized in terms of a relationships between a female and a male personality. This implies a generative process that emerges on the space where the Odu patterns are formed, graphically represented by the empty centre of the divination tray. Within this empty space, therefore, the macrocosmic values represented by the Odu in their fundamental characterisation as cosmic forms converge with the microcosmic patterns represented by the client’s query.
The empty space, therefore, becomes a generative space, a womb of transformation, akin to the vaginal space where new life emerges after its transformation within uterine space. The correlation of macrocosmic and microcosmic frameworks in the divinatory process could be understood to be expressive of a convergence of forces similar to the integration of the power of life which is universal but manifests anew in each life form with the distinctive genetic encoding that emerges from the gene banks of both parents in the conception and growth of new human life.
The Opon Ifa as Subsuming Ontological and Epistemological Orientations of Ifa Dvination:Mediation between Modes of Being and Forms of Knowledge
Ohomina’s conception of the Odu, in relation to the Yoruba conception of the comprehensive knowledge of Orunmila, could be described in terms of a primordial intelligence through which is mediated/which mediates/on which is inscribed the ontological identity of all forms of/in existence.
This idea can be used as a postulate operating as a springboard for developing other ideas the validity of which does not depend on an acceptance of this underlying/inspirational/overarching idea.
See Kepler-in the beginning God geometrized.
Newton-on God at the end of the Principia.
Stephen Hawkin-the mind of God in relation to the Unified Field Theory.
Saturday, 27 October 2007
Sri Yantra and Astrological Correlations
Yantra is basically a diagram representing the astronomical position of the planets over a given date and time. It is considered auspicious in Hindu mythology. These yantras are made up on various objects i.e. Paper, Precious stones, Metal Plates and alloys. It is believed that if we, as humans, follow the basic principal of constantly concentrating on the representation, it helps you build Fortunes, as planets above have their peculiar Gravity which governs basic emotions and karma, derived to attain satisfaction. These yantras are basically made on a particular date and time depending on the prescribed procedures defined under vedas.
Sri Yantra at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SriYantra_construct.svg
Yantra is basically a diagram representing the astronomical position of the planets over a given date and time. It is considered auspicious in Hindu mythology. These yantras are made up on various objects i.e. Paper, Precious stones, Metal Plates and alloys. It is believed that if we, as humans, follow the basic principal of constantly concentrating on the representation, it helps you build Fortunes, as planets above have their peculiar Gravity which governs basic emotions and karma, derived to attain satisfaction. These yantras are basically made on a particular date and time depending on the prescribed procedures defined under vedas.
Sri Yantra at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SriYantra_construct.svg
From
Saturday, 20 October 2007
Yantra Theory and Practice
The Sri Yantra and the the Creative Dance between Male and Female Principles in the Emanation of Being from a Central Point
TEMI ESAN ON SRI YANTRA AS DESCRIBED AT http://www.cosmiclight.com/sriyantra.htm
20-10-07
the unending creativity. The never ending creative process. The existence of endless possibilities, permutations and combination, infinite renewal and convergence, no beginning, no end and all this from Infinite Love. the whole concept of Infinity. Unity of purpose to achieve infinite ends. one creative process supporting the other. No one stands alone.
The Sri Yantra, or Yantra of Creation, originated in our pre-history. It has been known in the Hindu and Buddhist traditions and since the Vedic times as the most powerful and mystically beautiful of all yantras (geometric mandalas known as power diagrams).
It represents the timeless creative principle of the universe, the continuous unfoldment of all realms of creation from the central source, and with that mindfulness, it is used as an object of meditation.
The central point, called bindu, represents transcendental unity and the source of creation. The opposing sets of triangles represent the male and female principles which form creation, themselves being recognized as expressions of the polarity inherent in the creative force of the bindu. The surrounding geometries represent the realms of creation, entirely supported by the creative process, and which would have no reality whatsoever without the omnipresence of the transcendental source.
We meditate upon that Divine Sun,the true Light of the Shining Ones.May it illuminate our minds.
The Gayatri Verse of the Vedas(from a time long before the historical records)
It represents the timeless creative principle of the universe, the continuous unfoldment of all realms of creation from the central source, and with that mindfulness, it is used as an object of meditation.
The central point, called bindu, represents transcendental unity and the source of creation. The opposing sets of triangles represent the male and female principles which form creation, themselves being recognized as expressions of the polarity inherent in the creative force of the bindu. The surrounding geometries represent the realms of creation, entirely supported by the creative process, and which would have no reality whatsoever without the omnipresence of the transcendental source.
We meditate upon that Divine Sun,the true Light of the Shining Ones.May it illuminate our minds.
The Gayatri Verse of the Vedas(from a time long before the historical records)
http://www.cosmiclight.com/sriyantra.htm
Stephen Michael Nanninga
TEMI ESAN ON SRI YANTRA AS DESCRIBED AT http://www.cosmiclight.com/sriyantra.htm
20-10-07
the unending creativity. The never ending creative process. The existence of endless possibilities, permutations and combination, infinite renewal and convergence, no beginning, no end and all this from Infinite Love. the whole concept of Infinity. Unity of purpose to achieve infinite ends. one creative process supporting the other. No one stands alone.
Friday, 12 October 2007
Ontological and Epistemological Questions Evoked by Wenger's and Maltwood's Cosmogeographies
Astrological Mandala
Cancer mandala by Tad Atmann
The ontological questions evoked by the conceptions of both artists and which I explore include:
To what degree could these ambitious efforts to reinterpret spatial forms in terms of more than physical conceptions throw light on the modes of sentience thereby demonstrated by these artists, and by implication, the modes of awareness demonstrated by similar responses to space in other cultures, places and periods?
Could such efforts at correlation across spatial and cultural boundaries assist us in understanding the manner in which people are fitted to space and time?
Or to put it differently, the interactions between space, time and mind and between various forms of being? What credence could be given to Wenger's and Maltwood's claims of modes of agency expressed in or through landscape that are different from those forms of agency privileged in Western high culture?
In the perspectives advanced by Wenger and influenced by the Classical Yoruba philosophy of nature,landscapes are understood to embody sentient beings,beings who are neither plainly and completely human or animal.
Within the world's dominant culture, Western high culture,however,unlike in Classical Yoruba thought,trees are simply vegetative forms that demonstrate the characteristics understood of such forms. They are not sentient nor act as homes for sentient beings. The attestations of non- human and non-animal sentience in nature also emerges in the popular but ontologically marginal neo-pagan movement in the West.The Classical Yoruba/Wenger conception of forms of sentience in nature and those of Western neo-Paganism,which has some significance for Maltwood's work, can be seen,therefore,to demonstrate significant degrees of correlation.
With reference to Maltwood's work,central questions that emerge about its wider ramifications include "Can landscapes be understood in terms of large scale configurations of cultural forms in such a manner that the development of both natural forms and human made forms coalesce over the centuries ?" "Can the various interventions on landscape by the human community coalesce with natural forms to create such expressions as the gigantic representation of the convergence between two different forms of human culture, the astrological and the Arthurian,which Maltwood argues for the Glastonbury landscape?
We shall be moving outward from the centre of the artistic structure, whether cosmographic map or cosmographically structured forest space. In terms of radiation in terms of in relation terms its ideational significance and secondly, the of these correlative physical and ideational correlations to radiations of the artistic creations of the artists from its sources in their mental worlds and the possibility of interpreting these mental worlds in terms of the creations they have enabled to bring into being, as well as a challenge to the dichotomy thus established.
May we not speak of the works shaping as well as being shaped by the artist's minds/and may mind not be understood as thought, feeling, as well as physical activity in as much as it expresses ideational and at times cognitive value that is not registered in mental consciousness, whether emotional or ratiocinative or even intuitive?
Image:Cancer mandala by Tad Atmann at http://www.atmann.net/artdesign.htm
Cancer mandala by Tad Atmann
In addition to exploring the cosmographic and psychological or psychosocial implications of the artists’ recreation of landscapes, I am also exploring the implications of their conceptions beyond the compass of their work. Their work invites a consideration of questions about the nature of being that go beyond the dominant forms in Western high culture, the world’s dominant culture. Western high culture is the world’s dominant culture on account of the dominance of the West in all aspects of life, from the political, to the economic, to the scientific and technological, to the military and cultural. Globally, this culture is the official standard of evaluation of competing world views, of social and economic systems.
[For development of similar conceptions about the West see Francis Fukuyama The End of History and responses to that work.See also Huntindgdon's Clash of Cultures.Also see also works and ideas on Globalisation.But these works will also need to be examined in relation to earlier works that examine the West within different perspectives such as Oswald Spengler's Decline of the West and Arnold Toynbee's Civilisation.On the role of physics in this culture see Pythagoras Trousers by Margaret Wertheim]
The ontological questions evoked by the conceptions of both artists and which I explore include:
To what degree could these ambitious efforts to reinterpret spatial forms in terms of more than physical conceptions throw light on the modes of sentience thereby demonstrated by these artists, and by implication, the modes of awareness demonstrated by similar responses to space in other cultures, places and periods?
Could such efforts at correlation across spatial and cultural boundaries assist us in understanding the manner in which people are fitted to space and time?
Or to put it differently, the interactions between space, time and mind and between various forms of being? What credence could be given to Wenger's and Maltwood's claims of modes of agency expressed in or through landscape that are different from those forms of agency privileged in Western high culture?
In the perspectives advanced by Wenger and influenced by the Classical Yoruba philosophy of nature,landscapes are understood to embody sentient beings,beings who are neither plainly and completely human or animal.
Within the world's dominant culture, Western high culture,however,unlike in Classical Yoruba thought,trees are simply vegetative forms that demonstrate the characteristics understood of such forms. They are not sentient nor act as homes for sentient beings. The attestations of non- human and non-animal sentience in nature also emerges in the popular but ontologically marginal neo-pagan movement in the West.The Classical Yoruba/Wenger conception of forms of sentience in nature and those of Western neo-Paganism,which has some significance for Maltwood's work, can be seen,therefore,to demonstrate significant degrees of correlation.
With reference to Maltwood's work,central questions that emerge about its wider ramifications include "Can landscapes be understood in terms of large scale configurations of cultural forms in such a manner that the development of both natural forms and human made forms coalesce over the centuries ?" "Can the various interventions on landscape by the human community coalesce with natural forms to create such expressions as the gigantic representation of the convergence between two different forms of human culture, the astrological and the Arthurian,which Maltwood argues for the Glastonbury landscape?
We shall be moving outward from the centre of the artistic structure, whether cosmographic map or cosmographically structured forest space. In terms of radiation in terms of in relation terms its ideational significance and secondly, the of these correlative physical and ideational correlations to radiations of the artistic creations of the artists from its sources in their mental worlds and the possibility of interpreting these mental worlds in terms of the creations they have enabled to bring into being, as well as a challenge to the dichotomy thus established.
May we not speak of the works shaping as well as being shaped by the artist's minds/and may mind not be understood as thought, feeling, as well as physical activity in as much as it expresses ideational and at times cognitive value that is not registered in mental consciousness, whether emotional or ratiocinative or even intuitive?
Image:Cancer mandala by Tad Atmann at http://www.atmann.net/artdesign.htm
Tuesday, 9 October 2007
EPISTEMO-BIOGRAPHICAL CORRELATIONS
MANDALA OF THE TWO REALMS:WOMB AND DIAMOND MANDALAS
What am I doing here?
What has led the researcher here?
Can the lens of critical exploration be turned on the researcher himself, so that, just as the artists' psychosocial worlds are explored, those of the researcher are also examined?
Can the lens of critical exploration be turned on the researcher himself, so that, just as the artists' psychosocial worlds are explored, those of the researcher are also examined?
The artists are creating cognitive worlds through the development of metaphysical conceptions in imaginative terms.
These creations demonstrate particular ontological,epistemological and social implications.Along similar lines, the researcher is creating a universe of cognitive possibilities through his work on the artists.
These creations demonstrate particular ontological,epistemological and social implications.Along similar lines, the researcher is creating a universe of cognitive possibilities through his work on the artists.
Can both cognitive universes illuminate each other?Can the efforts of the artists and that of the reseacher studying their work throw light on each other?Is such mutual illumination not the very purpose of research,in the first place?
Not necessarily.
Research is more often understood as a one way illumination with the researcher's efforts throwing light on the subject studied. It is less often perceived as capable of facilitating understanding of the research project as an aspect of the life of the researcher themselves.
Less often studied is the potential of the research project for facilitating an understanding of the life of the researcher as a primary hermeneutic project within which the academic research project is a secondary phenomenon.The academic project is a secondary phenomenon demonstrating the directions taken by particular imperatives and orientations within the larger project.
Less often studied is the potential of the research project for facilitating an understanding of the life of the researcher as a primary hermeneutic project within which the academic research project is a secondary phenomenon.The academic project is a secondary phenomenon demonstrating the directions taken by particular imperatives and orientations within the larger project.
Why has the researcher chosen this project?What combination of choice and circumstance has contributed to their entry into this effort? Could the answers to these questions throw light on the manner in which they frame and investigate their subject? The manner in which the subject is framed and examined is of course crucial to whatever understanding emerges from the investigation.That being the case,could a study of the factors external to the explicit boundaries constituted by the public face of the research project but which shape the project contribute to a better understading og the immediate goals of the project?
My use of the metaphor of light in this context also evokes questions that help clarify the issues at stake. In terms of relationships between the extra-academic context of research and the academic structures in relation to or in terms of which research takes place.
In speaking of the extra academic and the academic contexts in relation to mutual or one sided "illumination" what are the implications of this metaphor evocative of casting light from a source onto another? It suggests a projection outward from a source onto an recipient of what has been cast from the source. In other words an effect moving outward from a source to a target. How accurate is this metaphor here? To what degree ism it helpful in suggesting what could actually take place oin relation to these two existential universes?
Perhaps a more helpful metaphor could be one that evokes, not so much the movement of something from a source to a target, even if such movement occurs mutually, from target to a source and from the erstwhile target to the source that had earlier impacted it, but a metaphor that suggests something more of the simultaneously temporal and atemporal, linear and nonlinear conjunctions and correlations that emerge in the relationship between the academic structures of research and their informing extra academic contexts. A dynamism evoked, perhaps, by a geometric form that suggests such a complex interplay, possibly the diagram of interlaced triangles that emerges in both Hindu and Hermetic thought.
In both traditions, it stands for the interpenetration of different modes of being. In Hermeticism, as a pentagram,it resents the interpenetration of spirit and matter. In Hinduism, as a Yantra,it evokes the interpenetration of masculine and feminine forces in the constitution of being. The central idea is that of interpenetration, where one aspect of being does not demonstrate a fundamental separation from the other without being identical with it.
In this context, the metaphor of illumination remains helpful, but with a recognition of its limitations as suggesting a linearity that might not be sufficiently accurate in its evocation of the relationships between the academic structure of research and the larger extra academic context that informs research.
Above:Images of Mandala of the Two Realms:Womb and Diamond Mandalas from http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/mandala1.shtml
More on womb and diamond mandalas
http://www.brh.co.jp/en/experience/journal/48/research_3.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandala_of_the_Two_Realms
My use of the metaphor of light in this context also evokes questions that help clarify the issues at stake. In terms of relationships between the extra-academic context of research and the academic structures in relation to or in terms of which research takes place.
In speaking of the extra academic and the academic contexts in relation to mutual or one sided "illumination" what are the implications of this metaphor evocative of casting light from a source onto another? It suggests a projection outward from a source onto an recipient of what has been cast from the source. In other words an effect moving outward from a source to a target. How accurate is this metaphor here? To what degree ism it helpful in suggesting what could actually take place oin relation to these two existential universes?
Perhaps a more helpful metaphor could be one that evokes, not so much the movement of something from a source to a target, even if such movement occurs mutually, from target to a source and from the erstwhile target to the source that had earlier impacted it, but a metaphor that suggests something more of the simultaneously temporal and atemporal, linear and nonlinear conjunctions and correlations that emerge in the relationship between the academic structures of research and their informing extra academic contexts. A dynamism evoked, perhaps, by a geometric form that suggests such a complex interplay, possibly the diagram of interlaced triangles that emerges in both Hindu and Hermetic thought.
In both traditions, it stands for the interpenetration of different modes of being. In Hermeticism, as a pentagram,it resents the interpenetration of spirit and matter. In Hinduism, as a Yantra,it evokes the interpenetration of masculine and feminine forces in the constitution of being. The central idea is that of interpenetration, where one aspect of being does not demonstrate a fundamental separation from the other without being identical with it.
In this context, the metaphor of illumination remains helpful, but with a recognition of its limitations as suggesting a linearity that might not be sufficiently accurate in its evocation of the relationships between the academic structure of research and the larger extra academic context that informs research.
Above:Images of Mandala of the Two Realms:Womb and Diamond Mandalas from http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/mandala1.shtml
More on womb and diamond mandalas
http://www.brh.co.jp/en/experience/journal/48/research_3.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandala_of_the_Two_Realms
MANDALA THEORY AND PRACTICE AS HERMENEUTIC STRATEGY IN EXPLORING THE COSMOGEOGRAPHIES OF WENGER AND MALTWOOD:THE DIAMOND MANDALA AND DEDUCTIVE THOUGHT
MANDALA FORMS IN AFRICAN AND ASIAN ART AND THOUGHT
The mandala could depict the internal universe of the individual.This would be a representation of the universe that constitutes the mind of the invidual.
In depicting the universe to which the individual belongs,it often does so in cosmographic tems,representing the metaphysical structure of the cosmos.That possibility of representing the universe external to the individual could be adapted to the depiction of the univese from any perpective,whether metaphysical,physical,social, or psychological.
The essential point is to depict the universe to which the individual belongs.
This depiction could be done in relation to greater degees of inclusiveness,beginning from the social world of the invidual to increasingly larger configurations, till they encompass the world.
The Classical development of mandalas as epistemological tools,constructed according to particular aesthetic criteria,emerged in India,in Hinduism and later,in Buddhism,particularly in the developments of Buddhism in other Asian countries,particularly Tibet.Iconographic forms similar to the mandala in construction and sometimes in interpretation and purpose have been develped in other cultures,but it seems that the literature currently available suggests that it was in Hinduism and Buddhism that they achieved their most precise and elaborate charaterisation as cogntive tools.
The second approach to navigating the space delineated by a mandala is to explore it in terms of centrifugal movement, a movement inwards from the margins to the centre. Such centrifugal motion is meant to enable the meditator on the mandala relate themselves to the integration of multiplicity to unity that the mandala depicts.
This unity is often cosmographic.It could also include,or be exclusively psychological.It could also be a social unity.The mandala could focus on the universe of which the individual is a part but to which the individual belongs as an entity who is distinct in some ways from that univese.
This unity is often cosmographic.It could also include,or be exclusively psychological.It could also be a social unity.The mandala could focus on the universe of which the individual is a part but to which the individual belongs as an entity who is distinct in some ways from that univese.
The mandala could depict the internal universe of the individual.This would be a representation of the universe that constitutes the mind of the invidual.
In depicting the universe to which the individual belongs,it often does so in cosmographic tems,representing the metaphysical structure of the cosmos.That possibility of representing the universe external to the individual could be adapted to the depiction of the univese from any perpective,whether metaphysical,physical,social, or psychological.
The essential point is to depict the universe to which the individual belongs.
This depiction could be done in relation to greater degees of inclusiveness,beginning from the social world of the invidual to increasingly larger configurations, till they encompass the world.
The Classical development of mandalas as epistemological tools,constructed according to particular aesthetic criteria,emerged in India,in Hinduism and later,in Buddhism,particularly in the developments of Buddhism in other Asian countries,particularly Tibet.Iconographic forms similar to the mandala in construction and sometimes in interpretation and purpose have been develped in other cultures,but it seems that the literature currently available suggests that it was in Hinduism and Buddhism that they achieved their most precise and elaborate charaterisation as cogntive tools.
Within these religious cultures,the mandala was most often understood as a cosmographic representation which would asisst the contemplative achieve a cognitive identification with the metaphysical structure and dynamism of the cosmos.The possiblity of such identification implies a detree of conjunction between cosmic structure and the structure of human consciousness.Without such a conjunction,would apprehension of cosmic form be possible by a conscousness that was a part of that form?
The notions of microcosm and macrocosm are central to Classical mandala hermeneutics.
Whether the mandala is meant to be contemplated in terms of a centripetal or a centrifugal configuration,its interpretation consists in the intergretion of the multifarious aspects of the phenomenon being contemplated into a unity. This unity could be constiutted by the origin of the phenomenon,or by a later stage of the development of that phenomenon.
The starting point of a process often contains the potential later realised in subsequent developments of that process,but that does not make the starting point equatable with a later,more comprehensive stage of its development.The latter stage could embody previously latent or even unanticpated aspects that would represent,at times,even a new form entirely.
Along those lines,Dion Fortune's conception of cosmic development,similar to Hegel's conception of the develpment of ideas,of history, and of being,in general,posits an emergence from a centre and a reabsorption into that centre at the end of a cycle of experience.The cosmos that is reintegrated into that centre,however, is not identical with that which went out.It is identical in its fundamental metaphysical grounding but is not identical in the possiblities of being that have been actualised through the progression it has undergone. This can be related to the Hindu conception of cosmic time known as the Yugas.It would be valuable to explore the level of sophistication of the Hindu conception.A similar conception might also have been developed in Helena Blavatsky's Secret Doctrine.In a similar stream of ideas and contexts,it could be relevant to see Dr.Douglas Baker's books.
This progression is made possible by the act of manifestation from the primal centre where the potentialities that are actualised through this progression are latent.
It is possible to utilise Fortune's conception of cosmic progression without necessarily identifying with its larger postulations about the cosmos.Such a caefully qualified appropriation wcould involve a focus on its epistemological implications rather than its metaphysical focus/directon.
An imaginative exploration of such conceptions of the emergence of the manifest cosmos from a primal centre can,in my view,facilitate an understanding of how the individual's psychogical and social universe is manifest from a psychological and social centre.
Our interest when reflecting on the mandala in relation to the work of Wenger and Maltwood is in terms of cosmographic conceptions and psychological processes.In terms of cosmograpohic conceptions,my interest is in the radiation of meaning from a central point within the cosmogeographic creations of the artists as well as the convergence of meaning towards a central point in those cosmogeographic forms.
In relation to the psychological processes of both artists I am exploring the manner in which their cosmogeographic creations represent the development of meaning through the interplay between the self,the landscapes they interpret and the interptetive communities in relation to which the artists interpret the landscape and the specfic interpretive techniques or technologies which they employ in carrying out and concretising their interpretations
More specifically,I am interested in the radiation of meaning from a central point-the self-into the cosmographic formation of landscape.I am also interested the configuration of meaning in relation to the self from forms external to the self,specifically,landscapes and interpretive forms.Interpretive forms include both bodies of ideation and iconography and the communities in relation to which they have emerged.
In relation to the cosmogeographic constructions of Wenger and Maltwood,therefore, I am exploring the cosmographic and psychological implications of their constructions of lanscapoe through an interpretive strategy represented by outward and inward motion.Outward motion-from the self to the landscapes.Inward motion-from the landscapes to the self.
We are examining,therefore,their development of physical space in terms of explicit cosmological correlations.We are also interested in the implicit psychological correlations that their works evoke.
Sunday, 7 October 2007
MANDALA THEORY AND PRACTICE AS HERMENEUTIC STRATEGY IN EXPLORING THE COSMOGEOGRAPHIES OF WENGER AND MALTWOOD: THE WOMB MANDALA AND INDUCTIVE THOUGHT
MANDALA FORMS IN ASIAN AND AFRICAN ART AND THOUGHT
Let us begin our navigation of the landscapes which the artists have transformed into cosmographic spaces. We begin from the centre of the patterns they have created. Beginning from this spatial and ideational nexus will enable us gain orientation as we move ahead into the larger space.
We are thereby navigating the landscapes in terms of the mental navigation of a mandala.A mandala can be navigated in one of two ways,each of them corresponding to the conception of either the womb mandala or the diamond mandala.The womb mandala represents the emergence of the universe from a primal centre,and,one could say,suggets the emergence of the multiciplicity of the human mind or even of the complex structure of a human life,or of any phenomenon,from a unifying centre.The emergence of the many from the one.It corresponds to a centripetal movement,where one navigates the mandala outward from its centre to its outer edges.It can also correspond to an inductive process of thinking,where one moves from the general or the universal to the particular.Deducing particular examples from a general point or rule.
We are thereby navigating the landscapes in terms of the mental navigation of a mandala.A mandala can be navigated in one of two ways,each of them corresponding to the conception of either the womb mandala or the diamond mandala.The womb mandala represents the emergence of the universe from a primal centre,and,one could say,suggets the emergence of the multiciplicity of the human mind or even of the complex structure of a human life,or of any phenomenon,from a unifying centre.The emergence of the many from the one.It corresponds to a centripetal movement,where one navigates the mandala outward from its centre to its outer edges.It can also correspond to an inductive process of thinking,where one moves from the general or the universal to the particular.Deducing particular examples from a general point or rule.
Saturday, 6 October 2007
CONTRASTIVE AND CONTRADICTORY VALUATIONS OF EPISTEMES IN WESTERN CULTURE
These questions, however, could be understood as more complex than has just been described above. The mainstream tradition of Western philosophy from the Pre-Socratics to Derrida and after, enjoys prestige that ensures it is the system in terms of which the educational system is organised-agreeably a very loose statement. But I wonder how commonplace is the experience of people being expected to, being trained to, or actually reading Kant, Descartes, Aristotle or even Plato for inspiration, relaxation or for using their ideas as a means of exploring questions in or for directing their lives? And yet, these philosophers are discussing issues that touch on the very tissue of daily human existence but they have not been instutionalised in that way.
One major Western thinker who seems to be an exception is Freud on account of the massive impact he has had on how people conceive of the mind and of relationships. On the other hand, people in Europe and North America who are disposed to go great thinkers forideas relative to the business of living , it seems to me, are more likely to go to Asian and esoteric Western thought.
We have heard of Madonna's fascination with the Jewish mysticism of the Kabala, The Beatles' fascination with a particular school of Indian mediation, but I wonder if we shall ever hear of people's fascination with Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Descartes, Wittgenstein etc, even though the Asian thinkers and the Kabala are much more counter intuitive, less close to conventional common sense than the Western philosophers?
One major Western thinker who seems to be an exception is Freud on account of the massive impact he has had on how people conceive of the mind and of relationships. On the other hand, people in Europe and North America who are disposed to go great thinkers forideas relative to the business of living , it seems to me, are more likely to go to Asian and esoteric Western thought.
We have heard of Madonna's fascination with the Jewish mysticism of the Kabala, The Beatles' fascination with a particular school of Indian mediation, but I wonder if we shall ever hear of people's fascination with Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Descartes, Wittgenstein etc, even though the Asian thinkers and the Kabala are much more counter intuitive, less close to conventional common sense than the Western philosophers?
NETWORKS OF EPISTEMES WITHIN AND BETWEEN WESTERN,AFRICAN AND ASIAN THOUGHT
Along these lines, therefore, all divinatory systems are marginalised systems, whether Ifa or astrology which is to a significant degree Middle Eastern and European in origin and in current application.
The Hermetic tradition, which is a tradition of knowledge that has existed as an undercurrent of Western thought since the Renaissance, and which integrates astrology, alchemy, magic and the more modern Neo-Pagan and Wiccan traditions which emerged in Europe in the 19th and twentieth centuries are marginalised traditions. I expect Indian philosophy enjoys a lot of prestige in India and in the West, but I wonder to what degree, if any, Indian and any other educational systems are organised in terms of the fundamental goals that run through that philosophy, goals, which as far as I can see from my limited understanding, are fundamentally different from that of Western thought and Western education. If I am correct in my scepticism, Indian philosophy in its Classical and perhaps most distinctive form, is a marginalised system within India.
The study and practice of Indian systems such as Buddhism, Vedanta and Yoga is
very strong in the West, both within academia and outside it, where they are vigorously practiced. To what degree, however, are Western educational systems influenced by the fundamental postulates of these Indian systems, particularly about the nature of mind and its relationship with the universe? When they are adapted for use in Western institutions to what degree, are , what is ,in my view, their fundamentally transformative and transcendental motivations incorporated, and to what degree are they modified to accommodate more limited conceptions of reality which are dominant in mainstream Western thought?
The Hermetic tradition, which is a tradition of knowledge that has existed as an undercurrent of Western thought since the Renaissance, and which integrates astrology, alchemy, magic and the more modern Neo-Pagan and Wiccan traditions which emerged in Europe in the 19th and twentieth centuries are marginalised traditions. I expect Indian philosophy enjoys a lot of prestige in India and in the West, but I wonder to what degree, if any, Indian and any other educational systems are organised in terms of the fundamental goals that run through that philosophy, goals, which as far as I can see from my limited understanding, are fundamentally different from that of Western thought and Western education. If I am correct in my scepticism, Indian philosophy in its Classical and perhaps most distinctive form, is a marginalised system within India.
The study and practice of Indian systems such as Buddhism, Vedanta and Yoga is
very strong in the West, both within academia and outside it, where they are vigorously practiced. To what degree, however, are Western educational systems influenced by the fundamental postulates of these Indian systems, particularly about the nature of mind and its relationship with the universe? When they are adapted for use in Western institutions to what degree, are , what is ,in my view, their fundamentally transformative and transcendental motivations incorporated, and to what degree are they modified to accommodate more limited conceptions of reality which are dominant in mainstream Western thought?
DYNAMIC HIERACHIES OF EPISTEMES
The question of what constitutes a marginalised as different from a dominant from of knowledge is understood here in term of its relationship to the dominant episteme in global terms as represented by Western high culture. The manner in which this culture interprets the character of the world and how it is best understood, and the implicit or explicit evaluation of the relative significance of various ways of arriving at knowledge in relation to this dominant
paradigm is the dominant means of studying reality in the world today.
As far as I know, the official approaches to the universe, those that are dominant in educational systems and those publicly acknowledged in public communication, in all continents, are structured by this culture which has its origins in Europe, specifically Europe as it emerged after the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Every other conception of the world and of epistemological procedures, whether in the West, Africa or Asia, regardless of the status it
enjoys outside mainstream education within or outside its country of origin is a marginalised system since it will not be held up as standard of evaluation.
paradigm is the dominant means of studying reality in the world today.
As far as I know, the official approaches to the universe, those that are dominant in educational systems and those publicly acknowledged in public communication, in all continents, are structured by this culture which has its origins in Europe, specifically Europe as it emerged after the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Every other conception of the world and of epistemological procedures, whether in the West, Africa or Asia, regardless of the status it
enjoys outside mainstream education within or outside its country of origin is a marginalised system since it will not be held up as standard of evaluation.
EXPLORING WENGER'S AND MALTWOOD'S COSMOGEOGRAPHIC CREATIONS THROUGH DIALOGUE BETWEEN CONTRASTIVE BUT COMPLEMENTARY EPISTEMES
Wenger's and Maltwod's conceptions of the landscape they interpret depict these spaces as embodying cosmographic forms. They both try to lead the audience to a participation in the mysteries the landscapes may reveal, Wenger through her sculptures and Maltwood, through her maps of the landscape.
The blog explores these conceptions of landscape in terms of adialogue between marginalised and dominant hermeneutic forms within and between Africa, the West and Asia. The major hermeneutic forms are the Ifa divinatory system which has its origins with the Yoruba, Western mainstream and esoteric philosophies and Asian philosophy.
The blog explores these conceptions of landscape in terms of adialogue between marginalised and dominant hermeneutic forms within and between Africa, the West and Asia. The major hermeneutic forms are the Ifa divinatory system which has its origins with the Yoruba, Western mainstream and esoteric philosophies and Asian philosophy.
Thursday, 4 October 2007
Maltwood's Glastonbury Cosmogeography as Crystallising Experiences and Perceptions of Self and Cultural Transformation
Centripetal and Centrifugal Mandala:Opon Ifa Cosmogram and Maltwood's Glastonbury Cosmogeography
Maltwood interprets the Glastonbury landscape in terms of astrological and Arthurian imagery. Her work represents the landscape as delineating images that derive from these cultural forms.
Her interpretation of the Glastonbury landscape could be understood as correlating a number of elements in Western thought. It integrates conceptions of terrestrial and celestial correlation with ideas of the transformation of the self within the framework constituted by such a unified understanding of the universe. Her focus is on astrology whose adherents could be understood as relating the spatial and temporal limitations and coordinates of their terrestrial existence with the expansiveness represented by the celestial locations and cosmic motions of the celestial bodies, and, thereby, to a degree, at least, overcoming or transforming the finitude to which they are confined within the limitations of space and time.
Her ideas also integrate notions of transformation of self depicted in the Grail motif from Arthurian legend, where pre-Christian motifs such as the chalice of the Irish goddess Ceridwen are fused with the Christian motif of the chalice from which Christ drank at the Last Supper to create the image of the Grail, a transformative object which is capable of transforming a person who perceives or holds it into a more than human state of being.
Her interpretation of the Glastonbury landscape could be understood as correlating a number of elements in Western thought. It integrates conceptions of terrestrial and celestial correlation with ideas of the transformation of the self within the framework constituted by such a unified understanding of the universe. Her focus is on astrology whose adherents could be understood as relating the spatial and temporal limitations and coordinates of their terrestrial existence with the expansiveness represented by the celestial locations and cosmic motions of the celestial bodies, and, thereby, to a degree, at least, overcoming or transforming the finitude to which they are confined within the limitations of space and time.
Her ideas also integrate notions of transformation of self depicted in the Grail motif from Arthurian legend, where pre-Christian motifs such as the chalice of the Irish goddess Ceridwen are fused with the Christian motif of the chalice from which Christ drank at the Last Supper to create the image of the Grail, a transformative object which is capable of transforming a person who perceives or holds it into a more than human state of being.
Intra and Intercultural Transformations Dramatised by Katherine Maltwood's Glastonbury Mandala
Katherine Maltwood's Glastonbury Mandala
This drive towards new forms of meaning by increasingly larger groups of people has led to the development of new methods of discovering and relating with the sacred, of conceiving the world and of navigating within what has been described as a “re-enchanted” universe . Some of these efforts are efforts to re-discover or recreate endogenous pre-Christian world views and technologies of fundamental meaning, of which the sacred is an inclusive category.
It is in the latter effort of develop these conceptions of meaning in terms of pre-Christian conceptions of nature and the human and their interrelationship that the convergences between the ideas developed by Wenger and Maltwood, in Nigeria and in England, respectively, converge. These correlations also demonstrate their distinctive achievements as aspects of larger cultural movements which have been catalyzed by changes in European society which have impacted on Africa.
Wenger’s history, therefore, could be said to dramatise the confluence of Europe and Africa in a particularly visceral form as a European whose vocation in Africa not only represents par excellence the efforts of many Africans to rediscover and recreate in relation to the changing Weltanschaaung in African emerging from the encounter of African world views with other world views, but also the efforts of Europeans to develop newer forms of meaning that bypass or are not limited to Christianity, reclaim the realm of the subjective and the magical in nature from both Christianity and modern science and technology.
With time, these movements, in both Europe and Africa,developed into efforts to achieve these goals through the development, rediscovery or recreation of ways of conceiving the human being, the cosmos and their interrelationship that are pre-Christian and are often materially embodied while emphasizing on the material as representing only one pole of being.
With time, these movements, in both Europe and Africa,developed into efforts to achieve these goals through the development, rediscovery or recreation of ways of conceiving the human being, the cosmos and their interrelationship through methods that are pre-Christian and are often materially embodied while emphasizing the material as representing only one pole of being.
This trans-materiality is often expressed in terms of human embodiment and the capacity for consciousness; agency and the embodiment of modes of being that go beyond the material in nature. It is also demonstrated in the capacity of the human being to relate with and shape their individual universe, and even participate, to a degree, in the shaping of the larger cosmos through such action.
In the development of these categories of being and of human agency in relation to them, the movements to which Wenger and Katherine Maltwood belong to could be understood as belonging to could be said to demonstrate significant points of convergence, and their divergences could be understood to highlight their similarities.
These developments are represented in the West by such movements, among others, as Paganism, magic and Wicca. These possibilities of thought are crystallised in Maltwood’s correlation of astrology, Arthurian literature and the esoteric undertones of the Grail Legend, in interpreting the Glastonbury landscape in terms of conceptions of meaning and purpose that transcend the limitations of Western high culture as it has emerged since the circumscription of the character of reality and, correspondingly, the development of a scale of valuation in the assessment of human pursuits that emerged after the seventeenth century Scientific Revolution.
It is in the latter effort of develop these conceptions of meaning in terms of pre-Christian conceptions of nature and the human and their interrelationship that the convergences between the ideas developed by Wenger and Maltwood, in Nigeria and in England, respectively, converge. These correlations also demonstrate their distinctive achievements as aspects of larger cultural movements which have been catalyzed by changes in European society which have impacted on Africa.
Wenger’s history, therefore, could be said to dramatise the confluence of Europe and Africa in a particularly visceral form as a European whose vocation in Africa not only represents par excellence the efforts of many Africans to rediscover and recreate in relation to the changing Weltanschaaung in African emerging from the encounter of African world views with other world views, but also the efforts of Europeans to develop newer forms of meaning that bypass or are not limited to Christianity, reclaim the realm of the subjective and the magical in nature from both Christianity and modern science and technology.
With time, these movements, in both Europe and Africa,developed into efforts to achieve these goals through the development, rediscovery or recreation of ways of conceiving the human being, the cosmos and their interrelationship that are pre-Christian and are often materially embodied while emphasizing on the material as representing only one pole of being.
With time, these movements, in both Europe and Africa,developed into efforts to achieve these goals through the development, rediscovery or recreation of ways of conceiving the human being, the cosmos and their interrelationship through methods that are pre-Christian and are often materially embodied while emphasizing the material as representing only one pole of being.
This trans-materiality is often expressed in terms of human embodiment and the capacity for consciousness; agency and the embodiment of modes of being that go beyond the material in nature. It is also demonstrated in the capacity of the human being to relate with and shape their individual universe, and even participate, to a degree, in the shaping of the larger cosmos through such action.
In the development of these categories of being and of human agency in relation to them, the movements to which Wenger and Katherine Maltwood belong to could be understood as belonging to could be said to demonstrate significant points of convergence, and their divergences could be understood to highlight their similarities.
These developments are represented in the West by such movements, among others, as Paganism, magic and Wicca. These possibilities of thought are crystallised in Maltwood’s correlation of astrology, Arthurian literature and the esoteric undertones of the Grail Legend, in interpreting the Glastonbury landscape in terms of conceptions of meaning and purpose that transcend the limitations of Western high culture as it has emerged since the circumscription of the character of reality and, correspondingly, the development of a scale of valuation in the assessment of human pursuits that emerged after the seventeenth century Scientific Revolution.
Tuesday, 2 October 2007
Transformations of Self and Landscape as Elements in Inter and Intracultural Transformations across Cultures
Wenger's Transformations of Self and Landscape as Elements in Inter and Intracultural Transformations across Cultures in Africa and the West
She could be understood as participating, not only in the birth of a new self through her experiences and her responses to them,but as participating in larger cultural transformations in the development of new forms in modern African and post-World War 2 European culture.
These forms are expressed in Africa in the search for new cultural forms in the aftermath of the havoc wreaked on endogenous African cultures by colonialism and their subjugation through their interpretation in terms of the evaluative criteria of Western high culture.
In Europe and North America these novel cultural forms are expressed in terms of new ways of conceiving relationships to metaphysical and ultimate meaning in contrast to the dominant paradigms that emerged after the Scientific Revolution in the seventeenth century and the later Industrial Age.These cultural and economic developments cemented the progressive loss of social prestige and power to shape human minds suffered by Christianity,the previously dominant religion of the West, since the schism represented by the Reformation.
In Europe and North America these novel cultural forms are expressed in terms of new ways of conceiving relationships to metaphysical and ultimate meaning in contrast to the dominant paradigms that emerged after the Scientific Revolution in the seventeenth century and the later Industrial Age.These cultural and economic developments cemented the progressive loss of social prestige and power to shape human minds suffered by Christianity,the previously dominant religion of the West, since the schism represented by the Reformation.
Oshun Forest Cosmogeography as Transformative Nexus in Wenger's Biographical Itinerary
SUSANNE WENGER,ULLI AND GEORGINIA BEIER:CO-TRAVELLERS AT A NEXUS OF CULTURAL TRANSFORMATION
Oshun Forest Cosmogeography as a Transformative Nexus in Wenger's Biographical Itinerary:The Emergence of an Integrative Vocation as a Consummation of Professional and Personal Growth
This self constitutes a sense of vocation centred in her sense of mediation between cultural forms, between natural forms represented by the forest and between these and the non-human forms which are embodied by the forest but can not be characterised purely in terms of a description of its material constitution.
4.Ulli Beier later on in life.
From: http://www.ralf-siedhoff.de/raiarts/chronik.html
Oshun Forest Cosmogeography as a Transformative Nexus in Wenger's Biographical Itinerary:The Emergence of an Integrative Vocation as a Consummation of Professional and Personal Growth
She understands herself as mediating between both the material form represented by the forest, the cultural forms in relation to which she encounters the forest as a hermeneutic space, and the non-human, non-material forms embodied in nature, which, at various points, she describes as spirits, transcendent energy fields, gods, and by the name they are characterised in the tradition originated by the Yoruba, and in terms of which it is named, the Orisha, of the Orisha religious tradition.
Wenger's chance encounters with the Orisha priests as well as with the natural spaces and cultural forms that inspired her in Yorubaland emerged from an unanticipated trip to Nigeria initiated by her then boyfriend and eventually,husband, the German Ulli Beier,who was to become in Nigeria a catalytic force in the development of the early stages of modern African literary,visual and intellectual culture through his activities as a cultural connector and educational entrepreneur and scholar.
Wenger's chance encounters with the Orisha priests as well as with the natural spaces and cultural forms that inspired her in Yorubaland emerged from an unanticipated trip to Nigeria initiated by her then boyfriend and eventually,husband, the German Ulli Beier,who was to become in Nigeria a catalytic force in the development of the early stages of modern African literary,visual and intellectual culture through his activities as a cultural connector and educational entrepreneur and scholar.
This chance trip by two carefree people,as Beier described the experience, proved providential for Wenger in relation to her own sensitivity to what she describes as archaic modes of interpreting the world.Her encounter with endogenous Yoruba culture constitutes a shaping of experience into hermenutic forms that have led to her development of a new self within the crucible of her encounter with the cultural and spatial forms that characterise those areas of Yorubaland where she has lived.
This self constitutes a sense of vocation centred in her sense of mediation between cultural forms, between natural forms represented by the forest and between these and the non-human forms which are embodied by the forest but can not be characterised purely in terms of a description of its material constitution.
Images:
Susanne Wenger in advanced old age,having lived in Yorubaland since 1950.Osogbo,where she has lived almost all that time,celebrated her 90th birthday in 2005.For birthday honours see http://www.rootsandrooted.org/susanne.htm
Image from couragefilms.at/pages/documentary/wenger/wenger-info
Susanne Wenger in meditation at the Oshun river.
1. From The Adunni Olorisha Trust at http://www.geocities.com/adunni1/sw.html
2. and A Life with the Gods in their Yoruba Homeland by Susanne Wenger and Gert Chesi
3. Ulli Beier and his second wife Georginia Beier,who also played a fundamental role in his cultural efforts in Nigeria. Ulli is in Nigerian attire.
Susanne Wenger in advanced old age,having lived in Yorubaland since 1950.Osogbo,where she has lived almost all that time,celebrated her 90th birthday in 2005.For birthday honours see http://www.rootsandrooted.org/susanne.htm
Image from couragefilms.at/pages/documentary/wenger/wenger-info
Susanne Wenger in meditation at the Oshun river.
1. From The Adunni Olorisha Trust at http://www.geocities.com/adunni1/sw.html
2. and A Life with the Gods in their Yoruba Homeland by Susanne Wenger and Gert Chesi
3. Ulli Beier and his second wife Georginia Beier,who also played a fundamental role in his cultural efforts in Nigeria. Ulli is in Nigerian attire.
From the University of Amherst archives at http://www.amherst.edu/library/archives/exhibitions/beier/ulli-georgina.html
4.Ulli Beier later on in life.
From: http://www.ralf-siedhoff.de/raiarts/chronik.html
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