You had me all the way up to the last line "To your Truth". That line seems to contridict the rest of your comment which seemed to be about aligning with reality at large instead.
I recommend the book The New Polytheism by David Miller, which offers another option for a post-post-modern and post-religious lifeway. From the book description:
“Following in the archetypal psychology tradition of James Hillman, this work by David L. Miller argues that the traditional psychotherapeutic goal of an integrated whole is monotheistic. He argues instead for a polytheistic theology that is psychological, iconoclastic, and gnostic and views the mythos of gods and goddesses imaginally, as a theologica imaginalis, a perspective for which Gaston Bachelard and Henry Corbin laid the philosophical foundation.”
I'm not familiar with Miller's work, and only know Hillman via Tom Cheetham's _Imaginal Love_ so I.may be off base here ... For me, Neo-Platonism takes the best parts of polytheism and integrates them into a monotheistic framework in essence if not in name, in much the se way as happened in Hindu philosophy. So I was skeptical of Hillman's critique of Jungian "monotheism".
Ali, just amazing. How in all my years of listening to John did I miss theosis?! My research for the last dozen years has been participatory consciousness but looking into indigenous systems, Goethe and Whitehead and other process philosophers. I’ve dived into learning all things theosis in the last few hours and it’s utterly congruent, and very clear on the direct, non-subjective experiences of morality (the true and the good and the beautiful) that emerges, directly and for everyone, from participative encounter.
I teach theosis under the name co-becoming (an Australian indigenous term, as I do this work on their land and under the awareness of 60,000 years of such practice here) using ecological and embodiment frames, dreaming the long game of a global Gaian religion (I think we spoke of our shared hope for this when you were here?). I find people to be extraordinarily receptive to participatory consciousness, given an appropriate frame - no drugs or Christianity needed. I feel this capacity will only grow as tender, heartsore feelings for Earth’s losses increase.
A rich and vital discovery in co-becoming is awareness of how tiny we truly are compared to life’s majesty. Returning to an appropriate context, ie being utterly humbled, this I believe awakens the kinds of capacities we so desperately need. (You must read Stephen Buhner on this if you haven’t yet - Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal Realm is life-changing).
Landsong so strong down under. I miss it so, so so much... The way the jukubah just grabs hold. Even inside a steel box on wheels at a hundred kilometres an hour the dream time used to practically rip my foot of the accelerator and slam on the brakes. "Come talk to me." It would whisper, wordlessly.
Move a rock. Pick up a bone. Sit in meditation and just listen. Let the insects eat my dead skin and drink my sweat. Wager that the bull ants would let me coexist without biting. Make a deal with a fly to chase away the mozzies in exchange for sweat. Breathe. Understand. Serve. Close up and move on.
Great article and great commentaries. I agree with the sentiment that there is a bias in the assumption that all people crave unity. The ego craves polarity to reinforce its idea of self. As long as the identification with ego exists, separation is craved — not unity.
While paradigms of thought can move the needle on higher consciousness, again, the bias is that culture is what’s moving people toward or away from these states — rather than the idea that something higher, more mysterious, is actually the director of thought and culture itself. It’s the underbelly with no human author.
Of course, anthropomorphism reigns — we think we’re doing something, or that we have to do something. And yet, what if we are being thought? What if we are being done to?
There’s also this idea — often reserved for the far left — that if only people were exposed to more ideas, or the right kind of ideas, they wouldn’t be the way they are: asleep, complicit, confused, or even evil. That somehow the state of the world is an education issue. And so those who know unity deep within them, and have a penchant for words, try to articulate the inarticulable — and wait, with anticipation, for the great awakening to erupt or at least the quiet conversion of malice into compassion.
But how someone reads the work depends entirely on their level of consciousness to begin with. A new idea can’t be understood unless it’s already inherently born within — unless the inner architecture is there.
The wounds of being misunderstood get tickled as the commentaries trickle in — each person reading from their own level of awareness, their own psychic lens.
So, do we stop writing?
Stop pointing to what doesn’t work?
Stop longing out loud for unity or a new way?
I don't think so. And yet, perhaps we write with less desperation, virtue or hope?
Iron sharpens iron. As we write, we sharpen our understanding. As we read, we unify with the inner workings of those we read — fulfilling the intention, or even the prophecy, of unity in praxis.
And, perhaps we write with the awareness that we are, in many ways, speaking to ourselves — and not to those who don’t yet resonate with the ideas, the truths, or the deeper wisdom behind them.
Well done Alex, This is a good overview of what Steve McIntosh refers to as the "disasters" of the post-modern world view. I want to highlight several points, then point to the "dignities" of the post modern world view, especially in the environmental movement that points out the "disasters" of the dominant worldview led by western "Imperial Modernity."
"There are only overlapping narratives and power games. If no single narrative can make a claim to truth, then you can’t have fascism. According to this worldview, you can control reality by controlling the stories people tell about it."
There is a dominant narrative, driven by power, that is driving the global economy and western societies. It is the modern narrative of progress. This narrative is occurring during the "Technosphere" - the period of human development where we are infatuated with any and all technology. Interestingly, as Envionmental lawyer Andrew Kimbrell has noted, the dominant modern narrative of progress has a pre-modern religious quality to it, a secular trinity.
“Science will let us know anything, (the father)
- Technology will let us do anything, (the son)
- The market will let us buy anything.” (the holy spirit)
With these beliefs and ideologies, there are engrained and accepted communities of beliefs and practice that Kimbrell refers to as the: - Cult of Objectivity, the Cult of Efficiency, & the Cult of Competition.
A new cultural narrative will build on the dignity of the post-modern critique of this dominant modern narrative, and move towards a more sustainable and life-affirming and earth-affirming narrative. Remember, the post-modernists brought us the environmental and ecological movements before they brought us "woke" ideology. http://tiny.cc/mkxp001
Ken Wilber is the source of the terms "dignity and disaster" to describe worldviews--Steve McIntosh sometimes uses Ken's ideas in his writings without attribution.
Have you looked at Bohm’s ‘On Dialogue’ and ‘Wholeness and the Implicate Order’? He had something and had left a quiet legacy. That’s western, so there’s the Sufis, yeah?
Big Yes to Bohm. Wholeness and the Implicate Order offers a framework for understanding how Theosis works. And his On Dialogue suggests that "coherence" must be achieved in cultural contexts for the emergence of a new post/postmodern society.
One key practical example of the return to foundational morality is coming from the genocide of Palestinians. Westerners are being reminded of the core principles of their early-worldcentric morality and basic humanity while seeing that the system they live within doesn't align with those values. This is increasingly uniting people across the spectrum.
The subtitle drew me in and got me to read the post carefully. I fully agree with the emphasis on Theosis—first, because so many saints and sages have pointed toward it; and second, because if Johnny V. is pointing to it, we’d better pay attention.
That said, the lived practice of Theosis, even within (my own) Eastern Orthodox tradition (where Katarsis > Theoria > Theosis comes from) is rarely embraced beyond monastic circles. It remains a path mostly for those who have renounced the world.
So even though Theosis is the path to participate in the Divine, I don’t see it becoming a mainstream way. It demands a radical kenosis, self-emptying of the ego, that most of us, truthfully, are not willing to undergo.
I also am intrigued by Ali pointing to Theosis as a possible attractor concept. It appeals across several paradigms, from Orthodox to New Age, with variations in emphasis. Thus a possible bridging concept.
Thanks Ali.... It's coming ........"he said nothing good could ever survive unless it had a tradition but he also knew no tradition could survive unless it included change as one of its traditions"
Hahah thanks Alexandra - "Enough DMT to hold all perspectives simultaneously, but not too much to make you entirely dysfunctional." is one of the best lines I've heard in a long time :D
I have some experience with both options as I believe you do 😜💋 Can replace “DMT” with “intensive meditation practice” or “fasting, ice baths, breathwork”. Your choice entirely.
An integrating metaphor is the organism. In an organism the parts contribute to the whole and vice versa. The health of the parts contributes to the whole and vice versa. And can be the basis of a care ethics. For any Christians here Paul in ICor.12 makes it the basis for all being entitled to equal care - this avoids the usual dilemmas of equality of resources etc and embraces diversity of strength weaknesses and gifts.
You want to know what happens next? Look at ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, the many collapses of China's history. All reached some version of postmodernism just before falling apart.
"White identity." Is that post-conventional? Sounds very conventional to me. White and Black are racial terms, especially without qualifying markers adjoining then. Race is a crude basis for identity. Race obscures ethnicity, culture, and nationality.
For the life of me, I don't understand why post-conventional, heterodox thinkers won't call into question the concept of Race, the process of Racialization, and the Racial Worldview that keeps both the idea and horrific process in place.
Haha yes thanks, amended now - I had a separate section about Klein’s book ‘Abundance’ and they got mixed together in a postmodern haze :-P
Good point about race - and a bigger question about whether a post-conventional perspective should include or transmute concepts - I don’t really know but agree with you in terms of the problem of the construct of race (and the arbitrariness of it when we’re looking from a wider perspective) - so is the trans-rational perspective post-racial? I like the idea
A variation thereof is reframing racism around the human race, not as skin colour (which is largely irrelevant (scientifically speaking)/and equivalent to class, gender and nationalist discrimination more broadly). The racism that matters is the car racing, or other racing varieties kind (horse, bike, etc...). The human race. What are we all racing towards? Calling it accelerationist, immediately aligns with a current political force. But what is the point of rushing headlong forward? What does the hurry and thrill of competition provide and hide? At this point in history it seems to me that the powers that be want climate change to roll on asap, to alleviate the gaping moral chasm that Germany handled so terribly during the Nazi era and which begs us once again to deal with an oversupply of humans lowering the price of a life (slaves are cheaper than ever) and increasing the sense of scarcity of resources. The arguments about fairer distribution, because we still have enough to feed everyone, is irrelevant to the political riddle that faces our culture now, or down the road. Managed decline is synonymous with genocide and opens the moral chasm wide, because of the intentionality implied in management. Mass human casualties from climate change disasters and crop failure rolls the dice of chaos and suspends the moral peril of intentional discriminated genocide, regardless of the moral theory that might be taped together from wherever to try and justify such murderousness and unbridled slaughter.
Peter Thiel (leading accelerationist) supposedly wishd for ethical genocide already and no doubt Palantir and Social scores will follow through on the profiling of the worthy and expendable. AI and humanoid Robots will only exacerbate the oversupply of humans. (Phew! That got a bit wordier than intended.)
I was about to say something similar. The American obsession with race, and indeed the whole pseudoscientific idea of races needs to be abandoned. On the other hand, we can talk about a European identity, perhaps.
I appreciate the goodwill in your effort to synthesise postmodern fragmentation and traditional intuitions. However, through the lens of the Spiral Dynamics model, this article can be seen as the product of a Yellow ideal. The trouble is that people who should be at Yellow, including the model creators, still haven't fully left Tier 1. They forget that Tier 1 values emerged in the darkness of humankind's clueless past. After all, humankind was never given an instruction manual, and it shows.
You claim that people naturally want cohesion, but reality is not reliable in that hopeful way. Instead, life = unreliability. Reality is more like a raging torrent that doesn't care about our desperately assembled mental rafts. So we have to turn around to face our discomfort and vulnerability, thereby aligning with reality. As soon as we reframe the discomfort of the unknown is being normal, it becomes easy because reality at large supports our human reality.
Another way of putting it is that we need to stop seeking illusion and avoiding reality. The illusion, which affects all of Tier 1, is that we are dependent on ideals. In reality, happiness is innate to being, not manufactured.
Personally, I am opposed to the ideals in this article relating to meaning, unity, tradition, and shared dialogue with people in Tier 1 who still cling to hope. So here’s one person who doesn’t crave cohesion. As soon as you face reality, you will see, within, a cascade of pain-causing avoidances that were previously obscured by hopes and ideals. Every day we avoid that is another day of adding unhappiness to life due to unforseen consequences of our attachments.
Peak fragmentation.... Not even close yet, I don't think.
We are still in "infinite postponement" mode. Nobody is dealing with the overarching issues in any meaningful way. And there is a good reason for this unspeakability, morally.
I can't say more about this situation either without breaking taboos. And so when theory becomes problematic to a point of being unutterable living through embodiment becomes the only solution left. It's not explained or justified, it's just done. It's post ideological. It's post theoretical. And post modern.
The collective direction of travel is downward and inward as things slowly come to pass. Disintegration becomes a driver of modular reform towards the basic needs for survival. Water security, food security, energy security and community security become guiding paradigms. Nobody cares about the identity or ideology of the person cleaning the solar panels. But the physical requirements of the work will make some necessary discrimination to ensure the task is done properly.
We are at the start of a new Age (of Aquarius) and unlike the Age which is ending, the major human traits of the new age are mental playfulness rather than the emotional vibe of the last two thousand years of Pisces. We are furiously trying to build the AI mind that might make training wheels for the next level of evolution, but will these efforts pay off? Or will AI just produce endless hallucinations, or worse (given the reports of lying and devious behaviour by AI)..?
The subjective is alternative to the theoretical. It is living the truth instead of arguments about the identity or ideology of things. The mental force (air element) driving the new, needs physicality to ground itself. The base chakra (sex) provides the physical foundation, not only for the everyday life, but the future itself is made between our legs. That is part of the Taboo making it so hard to articulate the way forward. The fig leaf of Christianity must drop away. The centrality and pivot of the Heart (4th in seven chakras) will give way to a renewed duality of Sixth chakra sense making with an anchor in the first chakra to keep us grounded. Aquarius, the water carrier, is a geo-engineering force we call climate change and changing rainfall patterns because clouds carry water. Totally Aquarius driven. Like the ground water pollution from fracking which will ensure that we will carry our (drinking) water with us. How many reusable water bottles do you own? That's the cosmic water carrier force at work.
Ceaseless mental chatter and churning through ideas. Also the Aquarian force coming on. A sense of borderline telepathic abilities being born out of social media brain stimulation and the little tick on messaging apps saying "read"/"seen"? That's the Aquarian force coming on...
I suspect you are sarcasting, and it is indeed an awkward comment I posted. But the missing Truth that Alex seems to refer to is not (in my experience) done in by postmodernism or much else. Subjectivity becomes the best map in a world of overlapping and sometimes contradictory models and theories. We all have an evolutionary riddle inside us. Discern and solve it to grow. All the riddles are individually made and tailored for us. It's the true internal compass.
I am sincere. You speak of subjective forces, but we are all subject to our body and its profound mysteries. and you also widen the context with astrology, a vast frame. These are the kind of mysteries that can only and have always been understood with Theosis, participative practice. Yet practicing theosis together with other humans can create a fascinating objectivity of awareness of these mysteries.
Yes, well. I am reluctant to get caught up in the minute aspects of astrology. But the broad characteristics seem quite useful for synthesis. But Alex is (from my understanding/perspective) on a mission for Mythos of the new. And pitching for his next meta product/course sales. I don't want to bomb or sabotage him because I generally like his tone and content. But... Theories are a distraction from storytelling, isn't it?
Ah! Peak Fragmentation!
Not as I see it (as a beekeeper).
You see, there are
Three rules of the Swarm
Let me enlighten you
To this hidden, secret code:
:
SEPARATION:
(So bees don’t bump into others And fall out of the sky.)
:
COHESION:
(So the bees stick together
And confuse predators.)
:
ALIGNMENT
(So the swarm heads towards
The predetermined destination).
:
All three forces are at work
Simultaneously.
:
Fragmentation is Separation
(With all the issues described)
:
Yet the other two forces
Are always at work concurrently.
The Trio dances through history
Weaving their magic on humans
As much as the natural creatures
Like bees, ants swallows or fish.
:
They have no need
For grand words,
Nor micro-segmentation
Of past trends.
Presence does not require it
It just lets you dance to its rhythm.
:
And so you see,
Our fixation on classification
Leads to the fragmented left-brain thinking
Whilst all the while
Powerful forces are at work
To bind us and take us forwards.
:
Monotheism, Polytheism …
Monotonous Poly-tunnels of the mind.
It really doesn’t matter too much
What others think or do,
So long as you remain aligned
To your Truth.
:
Lorne
You had me all the way up to the last line "To your Truth". That line seems to contridict the rest of your comment which seemed to be about aligning with reality at large instead.
Therein lies the paradox!
I recommend the book The New Polytheism by David Miller, which offers another option for a post-post-modern and post-religious lifeway. From the book description:
“Following in the archetypal psychology tradition of James Hillman, this work by David L. Miller argues that the traditional psychotherapeutic goal of an integrated whole is monotheistic. He argues instead for a polytheistic theology that is psychological, iconoclastic, and gnostic and views the mythos of gods and goddesses imaginally, as a theologica imaginalis, a perspective for which Gaston Bachelard and Henry Corbin laid the philosophical foundation.”
Nice thanks, added to my pile!
I'm not familiar with Miller's work, and only know Hillman via Tom Cheetham's _Imaginal Love_ so I.may be off base here ... For me, Neo-Platonism takes the best parts of polytheism and integrates them into a monotheistic framework in essence if not in name, in much the se way as happened in Hindu philosophy. So I was skeptical of Hillman's critique of Jungian "monotheism".
Ali, just amazing. How in all my years of listening to John did I miss theosis?! My research for the last dozen years has been participatory consciousness but looking into indigenous systems, Goethe and Whitehead and other process philosophers. I’ve dived into learning all things theosis in the last few hours and it’s utterly congruent, and very clear on the direct, non-subjective experiences of morality (the true and the good and the beautiful) that emerges, directly and for everyone, from participative encounter.
I teach theosis under the name co-becoming (an Australian indigenous term, as I do this work on their land and under the awareness of 60,000 years of such practice here) using ecological and embodiment frames, dreaming the long game of a global Gaian religion (I think we spoke of our shared hope for this when you were here?). I find people to be extraordinarily receptive to participatory consciousness, given an appropriate frame - no drugs or Christianity needed. I feel this capacity will only grow as tender, heartsore feelings for Earth’s losses increase.
A rich and vital discovery in co-becoming is awareness of how tiny we truly are compared to life’s majesty. Returning to an appropriate context, ie being utterly humbled, this I believe awakens the kinds of capacities we so desperately need. (You must read Stephen Buhner on this if you haven’t yet - Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal Realm is life-changing).
So grateful to you for this wonderful article.
Landsong so strong down under. I miss it so, so so much... The way the jukubah just grabs hold. Even inside a steel box on wheels at a hundred kilometres an hour the dream time used to practically rip my foot of the accelerator and slam on the brakes. "Come talk to me." It would whisper, wordlessly.
Move a rock. Pick up a bone. Sit in meditation and just listen. Let the insects eat my dead skin and drink my sweat. Wager that the bull ants would let me coexist without biting. Make a deal with a fly to chase away the mozzies in exchange for sweat. Breathe. Understand. Serve. Close up and move on.
He talks about Theosis (and other -osises) in the After Socrates series, if I remember correctly
Great article and great commentaries. I agree with the sentiment that there is a bias in the assumption that all people crave unity. The ego craves polarity to reinforce its idea of self. As long as the identification with ego exists, separation is craved — not unity.
While paradigms of thought can move the needle on higher consciousness, again, the bias is that culture is what’s moving people toward or away from these states — rather than the idea that something higher, more mysterious, is actually the director of thought and culture itself. It’s the underbelly with no human author.
Of course, anthropomorphism reigns — we think we’re doing something, or that we have to do something. And yet, what if we are being thought? What if we are being done to?
There’s also this idea — often reserved for the far left — that if only people were exposed to more ideas, or the right kind of ideas, they wouldn’t be the way they are: asleep, complicit, confused, or even evil. That somehow the state of the world is an education issue. And so those who know unity deep within them, and have a penchant for words, try to articulate the inarticulable — and wait, with anticipation, for the great awakening to erupt or at least the quiet conversion of malice into compassion.
But how someone reads the work depends entirely on their level of consciousness to begin with. A new idea can’t be understood unless it’s already inherently born within — unless the inner architecture is there.
The wounds of being misunderstood get tickled as the commentaries trickle in — each person reading from their own level of awareness, their own psychic lens.
So, do we stop writing?
Stop pointing to what doesn’t work?
Stop longing out loud for unity or a new way?
I don't think so. And yet, perhaps we write with less desperation, virtue or hope?
Iron sharpens iron. As we write, we sharpen our understanding. As we read, we unify with the inner workings of those we read — fulfilling the intention, or even the prophecy, of unity in praxis.
And, perhaps we write with the awareness that we are, in many ways, speaking to ourselves — and not to those who don’t yet resonate with the ideas, the truths, or the deeper wisdom behind them.
And maybe that’s enough.
Well done Alex, This is a good overview of what Steve McIntosh refers to as the "disasters" of the post-modern world view. I want to highlight several points, then point to the "dignities" of the post modern world view, especially in the environmental movement that points out the "disasters" of the dominant worldview led by western "Imperial Modernity."
"There are only overlapping narratives and power games. If no single narrative can make a claim to truth, then you can’t have fascism. According to this worldview, you can control reality by controlling the stories people tell about it."
There is a dominant narrative, driven by power, that is driving the global economy and western societies. It is the modern narrative of progress. This narrative is occurring during the "Technosphere" - the period of human development where we are infatuated with any and all technology. Interestingly, as Envionmental lawyer Andrew Kimbrell has noted, the dominant modern narrative of progress has a pre-modern religious quality to it, a secular trinity.
“Science will let us know anything, (the father)
- Technology will let us do anything, (the son)
- The market will let us buy anything.” (the holy spirit)
With these beliefs and ideologies, there are engrained and accepted communities of beliefs and practice that Kimbrell refers to as the: - Cult of Objectivity, the Cult of Efficiency, & the Cult of Competition.
A new cultural narrative will build on the dignity of the post-modern critique of this dominant modern narrative, and move towards a more sustainable and life-affirming and earth-affirming narrative. Remember, the post-modernists brought us the environmental and ecological movements before they brought us "woke" ideology. http://tiny.cc/mkxp001
Ken Wilber is the source of the terms "dignity and disaster" to describe worldviews--Steve McIntosh sometimes uses Ken's ideas in his writings without attribution.
Have you looked at Bohm’s ‘On Dialogue’ and ‘Wholeness and the Implicate Order’? He had something and had left a quiet legacy. That’s western, so there’s the Sufis, yeah?
Big Yes to Bohm. Wholeness and the Implicate Order offers a framework for understanding how Theosis works. And his On Dialogue suggests that "coherence" must be achieved in cultural contexts for the emergence of a new post/postmodern society.
I really like this article. Integral theory understandings of this moment of collective maturation are becoming more mainstream.
I've been writing about it for a more entry-level audience in my Precarious Adolescence series. https://substack.com/@betweendeserts/p-160073330
One key practical example of the return to foundational morality is coming from the genocide of Palestinians. Westerners are being reminded of the core principles of their early-worldcentric morality and basic humanity while seeing that the system they live within doesn't align with those values. This is increasingly uniting people across the spectrum.
The subtitle drew me in and got me to read the post carefully. I fully agree with the emphasis on Theosis—first, because so many saints and sages have pointed toward it; and second, because if Johnny V. is pointing to it, we’d better pay attention.
That said, the lived practice of Theosis, even within (my own) Eastern Orthodox tradition (where Katarsis > Theoria > Theosis comes from) is rarely embraced beyond monastic circles. It remains a path mostly for those who have renounced the world.
So even though Theosis is the path to participate in the Divine, I don’t see it becoming a mainstream way. It demands a radical kenosis, self-emptying of the ego, that most of us, truthfully, are not willing to undergo.
Theosis lite?
I also am intrigued by Ali pointing to Theosis as a possible attractor concept. It appeals across several paradigms, from Orthodox to New Age, with variations in emphasis. Thus a possible bridging concept.
This ties in with the way Vervaeke treats Neo-Platonism as a kind of philosophical Rosetta stone.
Oooh, I need to go revisit that.
Thanks Ali.... It's coming ........"he said nothing good could ever survive unless it had a tradition but he also knew no tradition could survive unless it included change as one of its traditions"
Please find a brief essay which is very much about the theme of peak fragmentation
http://fearnomore.vision/world-2/integrity-of-the-whole
Related references
http://fearnomore.vision/human/what-man-represents
http://beezone.com/adida/quandramamashikhara/thelawofpleasuredomeedit.html
http://beezone.com/current/the-big-picture.html 1995 talk
Plus Love Is a Fierce Force
http://beezone.com/lopezisland/lopezislanddescription.html
The World As Light
http://beezone.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/of/The-World-As-Light-Introduction-to-the-Art-of-Adi-Da-Saraj
The conundrum of the One and the Many.
Nothing new under the sun eh?!?
And I never new Nagel went to an Ashram 😂😂😂
Great article Alex 🙏🏽❤️
Enough DMT to hold all perspectives simultaneously, but not too much to make you entirely dysfunctional. 🧠💨
Hahah thanks Alexandra - "Enough DMT to hold all perspectives simultaneously, but not too much to make you entirely dysfunctional." is one of the best lines I've heard in a long time :D
I have some experience with both options as I believe you do 😜💋 Can replace “DMT” with “intensive meditation practice” or “fasting, ice baths, breathwork”. Your choice entirely.
An integrating metaphor is the organism. In an organism the parts contribute to the whole and vice versa. The health of the parts contributes to the whole and vice versa. And can be the basis of a care ethics. For any Christians here Paul in ICor.12 makes it the basis for all being entitled to equal care - this avoids the usual dilemmas of equality of resources etc and embraces diversity of strength weaknesses and gifts.
You want to know what happens next? Look at ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, the many collapses of China's history. All reached some version of postmodernism just before falling apart.
I think you meant Ezra Pound, not Ezra Klein. 🙂
"White identity." Is that post-conventional? Sounds very conventional to me. White and Black are racial terms, especially without qualifying markers adjoining then. Race is a crude basis for identity. Race obscures ethnicity, culture, and nationality.
For the life of me, I don't understand why post-conventional, heterodox thinkers won't call into question the concept of Race, the process of Racialization, and the Racial Worldview that keeps both the idea and horrific process in place.
Haha yes thanks, amended now - I had a separate section about Klein’s book ‘Abundance’ and they got mixed together in a postmodern haze :-P
Good point about race - and a bigger question about whether a post-conventional perspective should include or transmute concepts - I don’t really know but agree with you in terms of the problem of the construct of race (and the arbitrariness of it when we’re looking from a wider perspective) - so is the trans-rational perspective post-racial? I like the idea
Post-racial, trans-racial, or a variation thereof can work. But for goodness' sake, point to ways beyond racialism!
A variation thereof is reframing racism around the human race, not as skin colour (which is largely irrelevant (scientifically speaking)/and equivalent to class, gender and nationalist discrimination more broadly). The racism that matters is the car racing, or other racing varieties kind (horse, bike, etc...). The human race. What are we all racing towards? Calling it accelerationist, immediately aligns with a current political force. But what is the point of rushing headlong forward? What does the hurry and thrill of competition provide and hide? At this point in history it seems to me that the powers that be want climate change to roll on asap, to alleviate the gaping moral chasm that Germany handled so terribly during the Nazi era and which begs us once again to deal with an oversupply of humans lowering the price of a life (slaves are cheaper than ever) and increasing the sense of scarcity of resources. The arguments about fairer distribution, because we still have enough to feed everyone, is irrelevant to the political riddle that faces our culture now, or down the road. Managed decline is synonymous with genocide and opens the moral chasm wide, because of the intentionality implied in management. Mass human casualties from climate change disasters and crop failure rolls the dice of chaos and suspends the moral peril of intentional discriminated genocide, regardless of the moral theory that might be taped together from wherever to try and justify such murderousness and unbridled slaughter.
Peter Thiel (leading accelerationist) supposedly wishd for ethical genocide already and no doubt Palantir and Social scores will follow through on the profiling of the worthy and expendable. AI and humanoid Robots will only exacerbate the oversupply of humans. (Phew! That got a bit wordier than intended.)
Race has always been nonsensical to me. My ancestors were some wonderful mix of Neaderthals, Cromagnon, Australapithicus etc etc. So were yours.
Think with the long view people!!!
Hope the Jazz Life is treating you well Greg ❤️🎶
I was about to say something similar. The American obsession with race, and indeed the whole pseudoscientific idea of races needs to be abandoned. On the other hand, we can talk about a European identity, perhaps.
I appreciate the goodwill in your effort to synthesise postmodern fragmentation and traditional intuitions. However, through the lens of the Spiral Dynamics model, this article can be seen as the product of a Yellow ideal. The trouble is that people who should be at Yellow, including the model creators, still haven't fully left Tier 1. They forget that Tier 1 values emerged in the darkness of humankind's clueless past. After all, humankind was never given an instruction manual, and it shows.
You claim that people naturally want cohesion, but reality is not reliable in that hopeful way. Instead, life = unreliability. Reality is more like a raging torrent that doesn't care about our desperately assembled mental rafts. So we have to turn around to face our discomfort and vulnerability, thereby aligning with reality. As soon as we reframe the discomfort of the unknown is being normal, it becomes easy because reality at large supports our human reality.
Another way of putting it is that we need to stop seeking illusion and avoiding reality. The illusion, which affects all of Tier 1, is that we are dependent on ideals. In reality, happiness is innate to being, not manufactured.
Personally, I am opposed to the ideals in this article relating to meaning, unity, tradition, and shared dialogue with people in Tier 1 who still cling to hope. So here’s one person who doesn’t crave cohesion. As soon as you face reality, you will see, within, a cascade of pain-causing avoidances that were previously obscured by hopes and ideals. Every day we avoid that is another day of adding unhappiness to life due to unforseen consequences of our attachments.
Peak fragmentation.... Not even close yet, I don't think.
We are still in "infinite postponement" mode. Nobody is dealing with the overarching issues in any meaningful way. And there is a good reason for this unspeakability, morally.
I can't say more about this situation either without breaking taboos. And so when theory becomes problematic to a point of being unutterable living through embodiment becomes the only solution left. It's not explained or justified, it's just done. It's post ideological. It's post theoretical. And post modern.
The collective direction of travel is downward and inward as things slowly come to pass. Disintegration becomes a driver of modular reform towards the basic needs for survival. Water security, food security, energy security and community security become guiding paradigms. Nobody cares about the identity or ideology of the person cleaning the solar panels. But the physical requirements of the work will make some necessary discrimination to ensure the task is done properly.
We are at the start of a new Age (of Aquarius) and unlike the Age which is ending, the major human traits of the new age are mental playfulness rather than the emotional vibe of the last two thousand years of Pisces. We are furiously trying to build the AI mind that might make training wheels for the next level of evolution, but will these efforts pay off? Or will AI just produce endless hallucinations, or worse (given the reports of lying and devious behaviour by AI)..?
The subjective is alternative to the theoretical. It is living the truth instead of arguments about the identity or ideology of things. The mental force (air element) driving the new, needs physicality to ground itself. The base chakra (sex) provides the physical foundation, not only for the everyday life, but the future itself is made between our legs. That is part of the Taboo making it so hard to articulate the way forward. The fig leaf of Christianity must drop away. The centrality and pivot of the Heart (4th in seven chakras) will give way to a renewed duality of Sixth chakra sense making with an anchor in the first chakra to keep us grounded. Aquarius, the water carrier, is a geo-engineering force we call climate change and changing rainfall patterns because clouds carry water. Totally Aquarius driven. Like the ground water pollution from fracking which will ensure that we will carry our (drinking) water with us. How many reusable water bottles do you own? That's the cosmic water carrier force at work.
Ceaseless mental chatter and churning through ideas. Also the Aquarian force coming on. A sense of borderline telepathic abilities being born out of social media brain stimulation and the little tick on messaging apps saying "read"/"seen"? That's the Aquarian force coming on...
Utterly fascinating Morten, thanks
I suspect you are sarcasting, and it is indeed an awkward comment I posted. But the missing Truth that Alex seems to refer to is not (in my experience) done in by postmodernism or much else. Subjectivity becomes the best map in a world of overlapping and sometimes contradictory models and theories. We all have an evolutionary riddle inside us. Discern and solve it to grow. All the riddles are individually made and tailored for us. It's the true internal compass.
I am sincere. You speak of subjective forces, but we are all subject to our body and its profound mysteries. and you also widen the context with astrology, a vast frame. These are the kind of mysteries that can only and have always been understood with Theosis, participative practice. Yet practicing theosis together with other humans can create a fascinating objectivity of awareness of these mysteries.
Yes, well. I am reluctant to get caught up in the minute aspects of astrology. But the broad characteristics seem quite useful for synthesis. But Alex is (from my understanding/perspective) on a mission for Mythos of the new. And pitching for his next meta product/course sales. I don't want to bomb or sabotage him because I generally like his tone and content. But... Theories are a distraction from storytelling, isn't it?
Here is my contribution to bridge into the new.
https://books2read.com/u/br8yvM