Indigenous Science

A Physicist on Indigenous Science – Dr. Sam Kounosu

Dr. Shigeru “Sam” Kounosu is a Japanese nuclear physicist who now lives in Canada. He worked with notable figures such as Robert Oppenheimer, and is widely respected and known for his scientific and scholarly achievements. He was appointed as Professor Emeritus at the University of Lethbridge in Canada.

In these lecture drafts and personal letters to friends, Dr. Kounosu candidly expresses his unconventional, cutting-edge ideas, most often exploring the connections and disconnections between physics and native science. He is among the first scientists of western training to do so, which adds to the significance of these documents to the development of the indigenous science paradigm.

WISN director Dr. Apela Colorado, who has valued and kept all her correspondence from Dr. Kounosu for 25 years, has opted to share his letters to her in the hope of furthering the bridge between the sciences, and between the indigenous and western mind.

Great care was taken to preserve and respect Dr. Kounosu’s unique voice in his writings, and with this intent, editing done on his letters was kept to the barest minimum.

Indigenous Science

1 September 1988 Personal Correspondence on Cross-cultural Science Translation (PDF)

Sept. 1, ’88.

REf. Native Science Conf.

Dear Pam

Here is my suggestion for the “Frame” for the Native Science Conference. There is nothing I can say to you that you do not already know. I only attempt to write out some ideas that might make you feel assured. You are honoring me by taking the posture of asking for help. Whether I could help or not, I have to respond.

I gave you a picture of the Matrix. So this time I shall explain the Matrix and add notes. The picture is simple, but it has to be so. Once you get into discussions, however, the picture turns quite complex. Perhaps, it may be better explained in several “Levels”. As to the trick of “Simplicity” which constitutes the backbone of European “Science”, there are several philosophical problems. But I shall explain them later (see Appendix A).

Level I. Nominal Comparison

Imagine average North American White Male University students, and consider a task of explaining Native Science in contrast to European Science, such as;

(1) That Native Science is not “alienated” from its practice.

(2) Native Science/Counseling is more “Supportive” than “Clinical”

(3) Native Science is an integral part of Communal Living, not Individualistic Assertion of Knowledge. There is no Intellectual Hero in Native Science.

Having such a task in our mind, let us look at a “Comparison Table” (Map) such as below, and think about what questions the simple map might generate.

The basic idea here is to trace 4 items in relation, not just pairing comparison of 2 in antagonism. Dialectics of conflicts must be presented, but at the same time if we can shift our attention to the relational dynamics in looking at 4 items, that would be nice. I am trying “Quadra-lectics”.

———

[Table 1]

European Native American

Psychoanalysis

Physiology

Therapy Medicine

Ritual Healing

(Native

Science?)

Medical Science Clinical

Practices

Medicine ( ? )

Social Sciences Social Works Community

Participation /

Support

( ? )

– – – – – – –

I–1. The Question on the Existence of Native Science.

The first reaction of the students is to question “Does Native Science Exist?” They might say, “Science” has to be “documented” knowledge (book knowledge). Therefore, (in the nominal sense) Native Science does not exist.”

You have gone through the question thousands of times, and you even feel angry about the ignorance of the students. [Besides, for the participants of the planes conference, the answer is already clear. There is no need to go back to the rudimentary question.] But, be patient. The question is not trivial.

Let us look at possible questions/debates the table might generate. i.e.

a. “What example of Native Science do we have?”

b. “Where and how can one find Native Science?”

c. “What use does it serve to find Native Science?”

d. “Why do we need to elaborate/document on Native Science?”

“Does it help anybody?”

e. Do not Natives have/want “Wisdom”, not “Book Knowledge” sense of “Science”? Do they wish to be “Scientific” in the sense “Technical” or “Intellectual”?

If “Science” means “to reduce anything into simple mechanical routines”, is it not reducing Wisdom/Spirit into Machine?

f. “Suppose there is a set of basic ideas, guiding principles, metaphysics, or world-view, for the Native Praxis. Can we call it “Science” without modifying, correcting, or enlarging the European notion of Science?” “If so, on what ground can we justify the change?” “Is the change necessary?” “Does the change help anybody”? “Why do we need alternative sense of Science?”.

Etc.

I-2. Questions on European Science.

But then, there are questions about European Science. The advantage of Quadra-lectics is that it makes easy to see there also exists conflicts/problems/antagonism/tension inside European Science. One has to look at every combination (there are 6 of them) of the 4 in relation.

a. There are problems in asserting that (European) Psychoanalysis is a “Science”.

European “Medicine” may be more of an Art than a Science.

How Scientific are the Sciences, such as Social Sciences or Physics?

b. What is the relation/connection between “Science” (Theory/Knowledge) and Practices?

What good does Theoretical Science provide to the Praxis? (What roles does “Theology” play in Religions as social/psychological phenomena?)

Is the theoretical sense of science only for edifying?

c. How relevant are “Social Sciences” to “Social Works”?

How useful is it to elaborate “Theory” for the people who practice routines which are nominally associated (subjugated) to the Theory?

What does the science of Economy say about the bureaucratic system/technique/procedure of the Social Work/Service/Welfare?

To be sure, it is reasonable to question if the Economics that we have in our academia today is a “Science”. It is sometimes said to be “Dismal Science”, but it may not be a “Science” at all.

Interestingly, by some strict definition, Physics is not a Science. Some physicists even “proudly” say that they are “Artists”.

d. What is wrong with being a “Non-Scientist”? Why should every good thing be a “science”? Is not being a “Humanitarian” enough?

Those questions have to be asked to make a comparative match with questions in I-1.

[See for the problems of European Medicine; Charles E. Rosenberg in The Care of Strangers, Basic Books 1987, talks of the inconsistency of “Vocation” and “Stewardship” which are nonetheless made into a “marriage of convenience” between Healers and Hospital. Illich, Foucault, et al likewise criticized the Medical Profession/Institution. And even our conservative governments are aware of some of the problems, because it costs too much.

I suspect the institutions of “Clinical Social Work” have similar problems with “Medicine”. The “Success” of Institutionalization/Professionalization always brings problems.

And, this leads to the question of the Social Cost (Pollution, Entropy) of the Mechanical Thinking that is worshiped as “Scientific”.]

I-3. Why bother making a comparison?

You might say; “I have made comparisons. So what?” In fact, you showed me many articles which are written on comparisons. Ones which attack European Science always carry some comparisons as the basis of attack.

On the basis of comparisons, one can go to

(i) Assimilation (Surrender) to European Science,

(ii) Rejection of Science without assertion of an alternative.

(iii) Rejection of Science, with assertion of Pure Humanism, Spiritualism, or Wisdom.

(iv) Compromise, Reconciliation, Integration.

(v) Construction of Strategy to deal with the Conflicts/Problems.

(vi) Emergence of Alternative Science, with a creative vision of World Community.

In terms of questions, students might ask

a. Is it not a step in assimilating Natives inot the Domination by European Intellect?

Just because European Culture/Civilization has a distinct fragment called “Science”, why should Natives have it?

b. Is not the show of difference a device to “demonstrate” the Intellectual inferiority of Natives?

c. When European Science itself is having troubles, if not in crisis, why should Natives look for “Science” to copy the troubles?

d. What are we going to do with the differences? Are we to eliminate the differences, say by making one of them extinct?

e. Are we not interested in Native Science, because we have troubles with our European Science? [Turning Point, et al]

II. Level II Case Studies at Level I

Here, we consider Graduate School level of talking/thinking. They presumably had exposure to the level I questions, at least some of them. You are a Professor supervising young Ph.D. candidates who are working on Native Science. What would you tell them?

 For Master’s Thesis, an articulation/elaboration on the Level I questions is a good exercise. They must do one. They must read and know a body of materials (book knowledge) and do at least one “Field Work” to see what the written materials are talking about. I point out here that even if one does work on one aspect, having awareness of the overall picture is helpful. That is the Table I is worth looking at repeatedly. The Map tells where one is.

This level of work is publishable in academic journals. In fact, many are published. But they are “academic” in that they are not intended to help people.

One might select a thesis that Native Communities (Culture) ought to reject European Science in totality and live in an “Ideal Isolation”. I concede that this might be a possible and viable strategy for some nations. When an African Economist proposed it as an answer to the problem of Economic Colonialism, I agreed. The Burmese Socialist Government, which is talked about in News Media today, tried this. Pol Pot Communists went to the extreme of even eliminating “science” along with “Intellectuals”. [Mao’s Red Guard was anti-intellectual, but respected “Science”. What Mao might have thought or hoped of “Science” — that is, there is a dialectics of “Destructive Technology/Constructive Science — may be a topic at Level III.]

I acknowledge the value of Warning Statements, pointing out problems of European Science. But I wonder what the writers are thinking as to what to do about the problems that they saw.

One can write and talk about “Rejection of European Science” and “Back to Traditional Native Medicine”. However, the comparison to European Science is there. Even if the comparison is rhetorically avoided, such works can hardly escape from being a “Reaction” to European Science.

What is worse, by the “angry rejection”, they may be taken as implicit acknowledgement that they cannot overcome European Science — i.e. acknowledgement of unquestionable superior “rationality”, “intelligence”, “power”, etc. of European Science. Saying “I cannot help Europeans from going down to Hell with their Science” may be taken as an equivalent of saying Native Wisdom has no capability to help.

That leads us into Level III. (Critical Reflection), and IV. (Creation of Alternative Science).

III. Critical Reflection

III-1. Supportive Counseling versus Clinical Operation.

As an example, let us take up the differences between “Clinical Therapy” and “supportive Counseling”. Native Healing is “Supportive”. It is not done in the sense of “putting a totally incapacitated patient, knocked unconscious, on a table to operate on it”. (The pardigmatic Metaphor of European Medical Science). Native Medicine often involve Family and Community. It was not done on an Individual basis. All powers (love relations and functions) are solicited for help. Medicine men/women are “Mediums” and “Facilitators” for the power to come together, not power itself.

In the beginning, I said “North American White Male Students”. Female students are excluded, because in the “Macho Science”, they may not talk/think/behave in the “typical” ways. There is usually considered to be a weakness and “unscientific” tendency in Females. they do not like to play the role of (Male) God in cutting up people on the operation table, even if the ultimate aim is to help the guy. Females tend to see “People” being sick or in trouble, rather than entertain the glorious mission of fighting a War against Disease (Evil) as Male Doctors often do. Male Doctors do acknowledge “Will To Live” in patients, but such “help” is solicited in “their” Fight against Disease. “Conquer the Disease” is the main paradigm of Male Medical profession. “Care of person” is the job of nurses, not doctors.

It is not that Females are dysfunctional in Clinical situations. In fact many are engaged in Clinical Social Works — except that they tend to take a posture of either (i) “being told” what to do, alienating them from personal involvement/responsibility, or (ii) like the case of the Big Nurse, identifying themselves with the Power Structure. they are more at home with “Supportive Counseling”, if not merely “Comforting”.

That makes interesting “observation” what Native Healing (Medicine, Science) is “Feminine”. Calling upon the help of the Power Spirit is not the same thing as having a sense of Power within oneself.

In the context of Social Works, what are the role/function of the workers? And what kind of Science would be helpful for them?

For the Clinical works, there Power Science justifies, and even what they do is a false sense of compelling workers to do.

Is there any “Science” behind supportive Counseling?

Evidently, the Support is needed, appreciated, and recognized as effective. But “Science”?

European Science came from “Fighting”. Humans, faced With Fear, either get aggressive or regress into inability. In that “Science” is “empowering” — to make humans assertive, aggressive, active —. “Love Play” has always been in Science, particularly in creative works, but it has always been “subservient”, “secondary”, “helping side” of the Power side. There have been many talks by great scientists about “Love” in science, but texts in Science do not intend to “teach” about that.

I would imagine even Clinical Social Works is motivated by “Love/Care”. But “Love/Care” is not the main “Operational Principle” of the Clinical Social Work, but the “Power of Technical Routines” is the main concern. Having or seeing Problems, the Clinical Operation set itself up as the means to Fight — the “War” to eliminate the problem —.

“Supportive Counseling” may be seen as “weak”; some might perceive it as “ineffective”, if they do not know the performance, say in terms of quantified “Success Rate”. This is because the Support gives an impression that it leaves the problem unresolved. It is not attacking the problem directly, but merely caring for the person.

The separation/dichotomy of “Being” and “Problem” is a heritage from Ancient Atomism. Being is a Dynamics and Problem is a Dynamics. Although the “level” of Dynamics may be different they are both Dynamics (Interaction). The Mechanical Science whch sees “Beings” as “Objects” is totally inadequate. There exists the awareness of such an inadequacy in some sciences, but it is far away from the “Science” of the Clinical Social Works. And because the majority in Social Works is Clinical, the Social Works as a whole has not yet come to construct “Science” for the “supportive counseling”. It is left for a few brave (or rather bleeding) souls to practice on ad hoc basis.

It is not only Native Science that is unrecognized and repressed, but all “Love Sciences” are.

This is a topic for the Level III works.

III-2. The Difficulty of Translation

Another possible topic at Level III is that of “Translation”, “Cross Cultural Understanding”, “Bridging”, “Interfacing”.

It is understandable that the Native Community entertains an Ideology of Separation/Rejection. After all, it has been European Culture that separated, rejected Natives. European Domination accepts only total Surrender of Natives, territory, culture, bodies, souls, and even history.

Therefore, naturally any attempt in the direction of “understanding” is suspected or viewed as “Compromise”, “Betrayal”, “Sell Out”, “Contamination”.

In many Colonized countries, a certain portion of natives became “Translators” for the European Power. They enjoyed somewhat privileged positions in the power structure, while others were mercilessly exploited, oppressed, killed and even sold as slaves. East Indians were often imported into other colonies to serve as lower class officers for European Administrators. Even after these colonies gained independence, the “Class Distinction” remained. [Japan narrowly escaped that owing to the late coming of Europeans to the Far East.] Native Americans have never developed such a “Class Distinction”, but nonetheless there are resentments against those who sell services to Europeans.

Eber Hampton in “The Sweat Lodge and Modern Society” mentions the destruction of Native Agriculture, which David Riesman missed in his Harvard lecture. Indeed, that is a “deliberately forgotten history” (The Big Brother erased it). But many Natives themselves seem to have erased the history when they refer to “Traditional Fur Trade”. The Fur Trade, when Iroquois Nations became addicted, destroyed their Agriculture and Community Craft Industry that they had. Hunting to provide for their own community needs is Traditional. Hunting to sell furs is not. I say this not as an accusation, but as an example of how easy it is for History to be destroyed by “Translators”.

And one thing which caught my attention is that Eber Hampton appears to be proud of “Indian English”, but it is strange for a guy like me who never learned English enough to develop “my own English”. I only manage to read an write in English as a “Foreign Language”. To me Indian English is not a Native Language. However, that betrays a tragic reality of Native Life today. Namely, without Translation into Academic English, Eber could have gotten nowhere.

You might say “Live with Native Language!” That is easy to say, as long as one is not going to do it in real life. Even without European Languages, what will Natives today do? What about the rifles that they use in their hunting? What about power boats? TVs, refrigerators, Trucks, Supermarket, Hospitals and Alcohol? The pens and papers used to apply for European Welfare? They are not “Languages” in the formal sense, but, they are the kind of idioms and vocabulary by which Native Living is spelled out.

There are millions of “Non-Reserve Indians” whose homes are on the streets of Whitemen’s Cities. Thousands of Native children were adopted by European families. Even if “Pure Blood Indians” opted for total separation in some Indian Territories (Nations, Reserves), there would be millions who will be “Outsiders”.

And what will the pure-blood Nations do about dealings with the rest of the World? A Closed State in political rhetoric is easy, but the problems of actually Living Life cannot be wiped off by the inflated hot rhetoric. Much as I admire and sympathize with the sentiment which might say, “Fuck European Science”, I cannot imagine any other way but to come to terms with European Science in one way or another.

And to come to terms with the other Science, one needs to have one’s own Science, or equivalent thereof. Ideally, the Native Science is so much better in that it can understand European Science, including its limitations, weaknesses, and faults, as well as strength and power. One cannot get that by closing the door and watching T.V. while drinking beer and liquor from European stores.

Let David Riesman be alone. He can rot in his ignorance. As far as he is concerned, he is doing very well without knowing about Natives. Even if he happened to know about Natives, he is not obliged to restore Native Farming for Education. Therefore criticizing David Riesman is a waste of time. It can only be done by Natives.

The atrocities, sufferings and pains inflicted on Natives, pureblood or otherwise, inside reserves or outside, are Real. They are there, whether one likes it or not. They cannot be ignored. Europeans imposed them on Natives, but if Natives do not remove them, Europeans would not. That makes dealing with European Science unavoidable. There, Translators have very important roles to play. If European Science is the Enemy, one has to know it to fight it. One might even think about the possibility of “Beating the Enemy at his own Game”.

Righteous indignation is natural, and there ought to be more of it. That is the Passion needed. I would venture to say that is the Fire Way. However, sooner or later, one has to come to the question of “What To Do About The Problems?”

To face the question of “What To Do About the Problems?” is a Science. Describing the problems, so that many people come to know the problems and can start building basis of co-operation, is the important first step in the Science. But one cannot let one’s passion be exhausted by that. There is a next step, which is harder.

If we attempt Science, we need

(1) The “Science of knowing what problems are, and

(2) The Science of knowing what to do about them.

The second step has to be persistent. I would characterize it as the Water Way.

[There is the Earth Way to make things concrete, and the Wind Way has to help with Creativity needed. Then must come the Tree Way to Integrate and gently embrace the whole. But that is the topic of Level IV.]

Let me try here my armchair psychoanalysis. Natives are brave, and they are not afraid of European Science. What they Fear is not that. They are not “running away” from European Science under the disguise of righteous indignation — though European Science is indeed horrible —. The psychological trouble is that any Learning involves Love. Learning of Science is “Erotic”. Traditionalists may indeed Fear this “Love Affair”. They are afraid of “Seduction” by European Science.

Education can be “Sweet”. Yet my grandfather rioted against the Japanese Government when it imposed the school system on his village. He said, “It is bad enough that peasants are forced to pay high Tax, but now the Government is taking our children away”. He appeared to stand against Education. That is strange for one who learned to read and write on his own. He was not afraid of Science, but eagerly read and learned. Besides, he often took care of “troublesome kids” from villages around, and was known as a great educator (Therapist/Counselor). But his sense of Education was not “School Education”. Being a peasant himself, he knew what was needed to be learned. He never lost his Peasant Spirit. I have known a Scholar in the same village who was reading works of French Linguist in 1945 when most Japanese did not have any more than one pair of shoes, in the aftermath of WWII. In 1945, the life of Japanese was worse than that in, say, Nigeria then, a lot less than “Bushmen” in Canada. He did not become a Frenchman but stayed as a Peasant even after he became the president of a college. He was entirely self-taught. It is unfortunate that Japanese Peasants are not well known as “Samurais” who constituted less than 10% of the Japanese population.

I am not saying the Japanese are any better in comparison with Native Americans. They have a lot of problems. But the point is that learning European Science without selling our souls is possible. One jus has to remember that accumulation of “knowledge” is not of any value, but how much help one can offer to others in community is the measure of Science.

Level IV. Tree Science

This is Pam’s Science. I am not qualified to talk about it. The Conference hopefully comes to the Vision of it. Or better yet, Pam will bring a Prophecy. I am merely guessing at your dream. By introducing “Quadra-lectics”, you are overcoming the antagonistic paradigm in European Dialectics and introducing “relational science” which is a better Format for Healing/Love. You suggested the idea of 4-in-Relations not by so much words, but by dream-pictures.

I imagine you would talk about concrete, real, direct and personal experiences in Community Counseling. It is always good that talk is made “concrete”. But, You are “Counseling” the World Community by the same talk. If you can help the Healing of a Native Community, the very same Science can heal the World Community.

You might talk about your Science that you are raising.

There was one thing You said that was something to the effect of “in some cases there may not be a cure”. I do not know what you were referring to. Therefore I may be totally off the mark. But if you mean by “cure” in the “Clinical” sense, there is no cure for any case. The community has to recognize its own problem. The community has to do its own healing. Agencies from outside can only be helpers. Suppose the agencies of the dominant culture find a situation in some native community is a “problem”, then it is likely that the “problem” is, by a large measure, caused by the dominant culture. [If a child is behaving badly, it is likely that the family is in trouble.] And if so, then Clinical Therapy ought to be applied to the dominant culture, first of all.

If the Clinical Therapy is either not workable or not acceptable to the dominant culture, it is silly to expect the same would work for, or be acceptable to, the Native Community in question. One cannot apply the Principle of “Do as I tell you, not do as I do”. Science ought, at least, to be honest.

One of the advantages you have is that you are in a position to practice the therapy of the dominant culture, though yours is not the “clinical” kind. If you remember, that is where I met you, namely in Peace Research which is a science for “counseling” the World, in particular the most powerful of European Nations. It is what I might call “Social Therapy”.

Here, I like to tell you that Newtonian Mechanics was a very powerful “Therapy” (Brainwashing) which “empowered” Europeans to Industrialize. Yet, Newtonian Mechanics is made of nothing but “Words” and “Metaphors”.

You might think about why the “Story” called Newtonian Mechanics was so effective, so powerful. If you were in the Europe of the 16th century, you might have said that there was no “cure”. Germany did not come into the “Scientific Revolution” until the 19th century. In the beginning of the 20th century, Russians and Italians were no more ahead of the Japanese who started to learn European Science some 20 years before that time. And the learning of European Science in any country came at a horrendous cost.

Your Native Science (or Tree Science) may appear powerless. Because the only thing you can do at this moment is just make up “stories”. You may not foresee the consequences of what you are making up, any more than Galileo, Descartes and Newton did about their “Stories”. But, that does not mean there is no consequence, no effect. You might get a big surprise. It is not defending the traditional Native Culture that I am concerned about, but rather I am interested in Native Science as a Creation of Alternative Science which works for the World. It is a gift from Native Culture.

That brings me to say a few things about “Science”. “Science” is not an object of Archeological Study of some Dead Knowledge. It has a life, dynamic, development, creativity. At least, Science responds to the problems of community of the time. Or rather, Science is created and manifested as the response of Community to its problems. Just as Love takes a particular form of expression in a particular relationship, Science is particular to the situation; The Vision that one seeks is particular to the one who is in the particular circumstance. I respect ancient Wisdom. but Wisdom is wisdom, only if it is alive in the minds and souls of people today and functioning. That is why the learning of wisdom takes creativity. And I hope all the suffering Natives have had to go through was not vain.

—–

This is incomplete, but I send this to you for now. The Appendix A shall follow.

Yours

Sam K.

P.S. Thank Chyna for me. I appreciated her patience. She is an impressively well-behaved, happy child. Her mother must be a very loving person. I wonder if I am wrong in saying “Looking at a Child is looking at Parents”.

Indigenous Science

The Need of Sensitivity in Science: As the foundation of Cross-Cultural Science Education

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 1

328-1640

THE NEED Of SENSITIVITY IN SCIENCE:

—As the foundation of

Cross-Cultural Science Education—

“Science sets forth this formative process in all its detail and

necessity, exposing the mature configuration of everything which

has been reduced to a moment and property of Spirit. The goal is

Spirit’s insight into what knowing is. ”

[Hegel: Phenomenology Of Spirit. 1807.]

1. That what we usually think as “Science” is “Power Science”

and lacks Sensitivity.

The image of Powerful Science bulldozing through problems

and resistances to get things done is very strong in our mind.

And, therefore, it is hard to talk about “Sensitivity” as an

important element in Science.

Occasionally we do talk about beauty, poetry in science,

such as Fabre’s The Diary of Insects, and Einstein’s Cosmic

Vision. But, I am afraid, we tell such stories as “diversions”

from the main instructional materials. Perhaps we tell more jokes

of dubious value to entertain students more frequently than

telling about the “sensitive” tender elements in Science.

By and large we treat the sensitivity in Science as of

secondary importance. As a consequence, teaching practices of

Science tend to be that of imposing the Powerful Science on the

minds of students. We may not be conscious of us doing that. But

if we step back and look at our practices, it appears that we are

teaching Power side of Science almost exclusively and neglecting

I think it is unfortunate, for the creative thinking, the

sensitivity is essential. Even if the majority of human

population has to perform mechanical routines to make a living,

our children deserve an educational period where they are treated

with the delicacy of the Sensitive Science. For that reason, I

would try here a “scientific explanation” of

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 2

the Sensitivity, is a rational to stress the importance of it in

Science. I hope, my explanation is sufficiently general to

encourage Sensitivity in human life in general.

And, I have a feeling that what I meant by Sensitivity also

has some meaning to the Cross Cultural Education. Since I am not

familiar with the Cross Cultural Education that experts here are

engaged, I do not make a claim. Rather, I would like to ask you

if what I am going to discuss here has any relevance to the Cross

Cultural Education. I would be grateful if you kindly give me

back responses and reactions to what I said.

2. Where can Sensitivity be located in our Intelligence?

In order to introduce the Sensitivity, let me talk briefly

about “Science” in general. To save time, I present a simplified

archeological diagram here.

Science is a part of human intelligence to use the

faculties of our brain/mind.

(i) The first level of intelligence on the surface is Object

Recognition level. This is what Atomism does. We recognize

objects and identify them. We sometimes decide to ignore things

as well at this level.

(ii) The second level is Relation Recognition level. There we

think of relations between Objects. Statistical Correlations,

Causal linkages may be recognized and identified. Basically, the

relations recognized are of the “Linear” kind. [*See Subnote 1.]

(iii) The third level is Utility Recognition level. We sense what

we can do with the objects and relations we recognized.

(iv) The fourth level is Strategic Construction. This is often

referred to as “Problem Solving” intelligence. We take the

situation at hand as the starting point, and see the desired

state as the final point. If we find “The Means” to connect these

two points, we call it “The Solution” of the problem.

As such, the fourth level resembles the second level,

except that the “Connection” (Relation) is imposed by us. And,

often times, the task of finding the “means” to connect the two

points is accomplished by ignoring and cutting off relations that

existed. The image for this “problem

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 3

solving” is Alexander The Great cutting a knotted ball of string

with a sword in one blow. The sword is the imposed connection

cutting through all pre-existing relations. Unfortunately, this

happened too many times when a powerful dominant Culture met

In these 4 levels, there is no need of the Sensitivity.

Rather, we would think of the “Minimum” that is necessary for

what is desired. We deem that is “Efficient” and “Rational”

within the contexts considered.

For example, we recognize two towns on both sides of a

mountain. That is at the Object Recognition level. We see people

going back and forth between the two towns. This is the Relation

Recognition level of thinking. We see the Utility of the

exchanges. And we Bulldoze to make a Highway between them and

think that the problem is solved.

The “Science” in our ordinary sense is an organized and

formalized “knowledge” at the above 4 levels of intelligence. It

empowers people in that sense. Let me call this Power Science. It

lets us do things. But there are levels below this, if we dig

into our minds deeper.

(v) Although we seldom think any deeper than the Power Science

levels, we occasionally do “Think Twice”. We ask whether or not

the construction of the Highway was a good thing. Let me call

this 5th level intelligence as the “Reflective Level”.

We do have this intellectual capacity to “Think Twice”

about what we have done, and also sometimes what we are about to

do. That is where the Sensitivity comes in. Although we have the

Power to do and to get a certain thing that we desire, we ask

ourselves if doing so might not hurt someone. We exercise a care

to protect other’s safety, interests, wellbeing. This takes a

fair amount of imagination as to the situations that we are about

This requires thinking of the whole system of things in a

complex web of relations. It is different from the kind of

thinking of Power science which can be metaphored as that of

“Drawing a line from a point A to a point B”. For, in the complex

web of relations, there are lines from the point B to the other

point C, which in turn relates to other points. All linked in

that sense, the circle of the linkage most likely comes back to

the initial point A. That complicates the situation. A

straightforward thinking is only applicable

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 4

to linking nearby points. The whole circle of relation is not

“straightforward”, but rather “Non-Linear”. That makes thinking

[Linear/ Non-Linear distinction is explained in Subnote 1.]

But the strange thing is that Humans do have an intuitive

sense by which they can “Feel” the harmony or disharmony of the

whole system. Even in highly theoretical works, physicists often

came to “Feel” the whole thing and said it is a “Poetical

Beauty”, or “Poetical Unity”.

That is the “Care” that one exercises to understand the

whole of the cyclic relationships and the “Beauty” that one feels

about the whole are related.

I think it is highly desirable that children are given the

opportunity to experience the “Care” and “Beauty”. It requires

Sensitivity to experience it. But the Sensitivity cannot be

developed without experiencing it. I think this is a great

challenge of Science Education.

I would like to suggest that Science Education has to aim

at the caring level of intelligence. And I think it is possible

to lead students to that level by asking them to “Think Twice” as

often as possible. The Science Education has to contain exercises

for saying “I can do this But on the other hand…” Such exercises

are training for Sensitivity.

We might call this “The Sensitivity Science Education”, in

a contrast to the “Power Science Education” that we have been

And I hope that they enjoy seeing the “Beauty” attained

after many exercises of “Thinking Twice”.

3. The Sensitivity Science is a “Pragmatic” necessity for

Human Survival, and Cross Cultural Science Education is a

beautiful way of the Sensitivity Science Education.

In view of what we are doing nowadays to our Environment

and to our fellow Human beings, I would say that without

Sensitivity, we will not survive the 21st century. For the

sensitive eyes, the bad consequences of the Power Science are

visible almost everywhere. Even if we do not want to see them,

things such as Acid Rains descend

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 5

upon us. Incidences such as Chernobyl happens and force us to

know what we are doing to ourselves.

In the line-like thinking of Power Science, we do not see

the remote consequences of our actions. But the fruits of our

deeds loop around and come back on ourselves.

In that, I am not a Romantic Idealist to advocate the

Sensitivity Science. I have a “Pragmatic” concern about the

future of the World in which our children live or die. Either we

educate ourselves and change to become Caring Beings, or we

annihilate ourselves. It is not possible to evade the choice.

Fortunately, however, we have a marvelous educational

opportunity called Cross Cultural Education.

It gives very good opportunity to Think Twice about the

Power Science that our dominant Culture has been practicing up to

The Cross Cultural Education is one way of giving our

children the opportunity, and a beautiful way of doing the

Sensitivity Science Education. Here, remarkably, we have a

consistency of the means and the aim. We have the way of studying

which cal1s for Sensitivity. And we have the aim that is the

I look upon Cross Cultural Education to be not a “Tokenism”

to satisfy disgruntled minority races, or “Window Dressing” to

soothe the “Guilt” from the colonial oppressions and the racial

discrimination in the historical past. But I consider it as a

Golden Opportunity for every one to learn the way of Survival and

at the same time the way of constructing a beautifu1 Future.

Beyond that, I would like to stress here that this is not a

subject of “social studies”, but of “Science”.

I am not saying this because I am a scientist and wanted to

externalize the power of science. You must realize that I am a

“scientist” only in the Power Science. Among other things it was

the prejudice of the “Power Science” that used to say that Euro

Americans have the Science.

And, I have to learn Cross Cultural Science for my own

sake. And people here are great help to me. I wish I could go

back to school again and experience beautiful education that you

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 6

– – – – – – – –

I add one, perhaps, “Bad” example for the advocacy of Cross

Cultural Science Education. It is from General Relativity.

General Relativity can be viewed as an “art” of how to

connect a small local Linear way of thinking (analogous to making

a short sentence) to the next. The connections of many small

Linear descriptions (analogous to a whole “story” made of many

sentences) make up a Global Geometry which may be “Non-linear”.

General Relativity is concerned with the Whole of the Global

Connections. Needless to say, to make a comprehensible coherent

picture is not a trivial task. Some constructions are beautiful,

The “connected whole” is a “World View”. And among many

ways to make up the “connected whole(s)”, we can study how to

compare various ways of making “connected wholes”. In this sense,

General Relativity is interesting. It resembles “Cross Cultural”

However, as I said before, General Relativity is “perhaps a

bad example”. The trouble with this example from modern physics

is that it is by and large inaccessible to the general public.

There are “popular books” such as The Turning Point by F.

Capra etc. However, ordinary Science Education does not come

anywhere near to the “Way of Thinking” contained in those modern

developments in science. Schools, perhaps unconsciously, teach

the 300 year old physics and waste time in “beating the

established mechanical routines into blank minds of children”

under the name of Science Education. It so happens that the Old

Science also carries the Authoritarian Ideology of that

It also represents the “Alienated” mentality of the 19th

century European Intellectuals. [see] M. Berman. The

Reenchantment of The World.] That Science emerged in the 17th

century as a “Liberation of Thinking” is largely forgotten and

perverted, under the disguise of “Rigorous”, “Exact”, discipline.

Psychoanalysts ought to examine why so many scientists and

science teachers today still maintain the illusion of “rigorous,

exact science” as if they have never heard of the Uncertainty

Principle or Godel’s proof of Incompleteness of Mathematics.

Their quasi-religious belief may be within the Freedom of Belief

allowed by the Constitution, but the Authoritarian posture of

scientists talking down to the

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 7

public, as if they are the guardians of the Absolute Truth, is a

pedagogical disaster in barring the majority population from

access to the modern science.

That I have a considerable difficulty in talking about

fruits of the modern science in terms of “Ways of Thinking”

attests to the failure in Physics Education for which we

physicists are collectively responsible. We have spent Hundreds

of Billion Dollars of tax money, but we have not helped society

with cultural developments in terms of the Ways of Thinking. The

public money is used to edify a small group of specialists and

widen the gap of thinking inequality, not mentioning the North-
South disparity in science-technology and wealth. We ought to

think, for example, why we do not use science to make rudimental

water supply systems available to the poor half of Humanity. It

could be done at a fraction of the cost of sending a school

teacher to Space and getting killed in a Show of National

Superiority. I do not think it is excusable.

One very inexpensive way of introducing New Way of Thinking

to general public is to do Cross Cultural Science. Since most of

the “Sciences” from different cultures are accessible through

non-technical expressions, they are better suited for general

Education. (I fancy that “Hopi Relativity” is just as good in

conveying the main idea as General Relativity which is accessible

only through complicated mathematical manipulations.) That is to

say, we have discovered a mountain of treasures in the Native

Science. I recommend school teachers to seriously look into

Native Science and take advantages of the treasure.

(However, I would caution the teachers to pay proper respect in

exchange, lest be accused of stealing the last and the most

precious treasures of the Natives after taking everything away

from them. One way of expressing respect is to invite Native

Scientists and let them speak, rather than giving an

“Interpretation” to students as if that is genuine Native

Science. And if possible, let students learn from the way the

Natives live with the “Science in their actual life, rather than

substituting an “intellectualized version” for it.)

– – – – – – – –

My story here was perhaps tedious and technical and it was

from the background of the Power Science. But I hope it is of

Thank you for your patient listening.

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 8

[Subnote 1. On Linearity.

“Linear” means “line-like”. When relations between pairs of

two quantities, such as “Input and Output” plotted on a graph

paper appear like lines, the relations are called Linear.

Most relations in Reality, however, are not Linear. Why,

then, do we favor Linearity? The most theories in science are

Linear ones. Economists use Linearized models; Political

Scientists and Politicians talk and think in Linear Language. We

usually think Linear, such as if something is good, then more of

it is better. It is not rare that sick people take more pills,

thinking that the more pills he or she takes, the faster the cure

is, then ends up with an Overdose. Or a man who makes hundred

thousand dollars a year thinking that he would be a twice bigger

man if he could make $200,000 etc.

But, the worship of Linearity is not just silly

superstition in numbers. There is a definite advantage in

Linearity. I cite an example.

Suppose a psychologist or social scientist is faced with an

unknown entity or system named, say, G. How will the scientist go

about knowing what G is?

The first principle of Science is the Principle of “Do

something and see what will happen”.

So the scientist does something, which in psychologist’s

jargon is called “Stimulus”. Sociologists might call it “Input”.

Something happens in Response (X) to the Stimulus (x), or Output

corresponding to the Input. By this, the scientist gets a data

(X) = {G} (x) or x → X

Of course this one data point is not enough for the

scientist to claim “Knowledge” on the entity. The scientists have

to try more Inputs and get Outputs. But if the entity (or system)

is Linear, it is easier to know what Response would be for any

Stimulus. For example, the Linear Entity G would produce a

Response 2X for Stimulus 2x, and 3X for 3x, and so on, i.e.;

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 9

What is more, provided the Entity (System) G is Linear, the

scientist can predict what the Response (Output) would be for an

arbitrary combination of various kinds of Stimulus, say like

(3X + 2Y – Z) = {G} (3x + 2y – z).

This predictability is an enormous savings in the cost of

the research to construct the Knowledge about the Entity (System)

Having this sense of Linearity in mind, one looks into

texts in Physics, Engineering, Economics, etc. One would find

that the majority of Theories are about Linear entities or linear

systems. Texts in Psychology, Sociology, Political Science,

Anthropology etc. are not explicit in what they mean by

“knowledge”. But when they do imply “knowledge”, they are usually

an implicit assumption of Linearity.

Most economic-politico-social policy recommendations from

the Power Science are of the Patch-work type which in effect says

“Granting that all other things stay constant, do x to get the

result X”. This is only justifiable on Linearity Assumption. The

characteristic of Linear Thinking is that it neglects all

complications. It only sees the starting point (the problem as

the initial state) and the desired end point, and finds the means

to connect the two points. It is like drawing a line between two

points without looking at other points around. Perhaps, it is

analogous to shooting an arrow at a target. As such, the

concentration of attention is necessary and it is not a bad thing

In real systems, however, when one thing is changed, all

others change. There would always be the second, third, fourth

order effects, like the ripples created by a stone dropped in a

lake. Linear Assumption is simple and convenient, but it is a bad

“superstition”, if it is worshiped as The Best Science. Yet the

Insensitivity of the Power Science neglects the higher order

Another trick of the Power Science is that, when the

uncertainties in the higher order effects are visible, it goes

for “Short Term” projections and makes decisions on that basis.

It is hoped that the higher order effects would not manifest in a

short time scale taken as the reference frame of the thinking.

Unfortunately, the neglected higher order effects do not

disappear; they “disappear” only in the short-term thinking.

People have to pay for them eventually. A funny thing about this

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science 10

is “scientific”. That is the Power Science; it provides an

edifying cover not only for the negligence, arrogance, and

insensitivity, but for the stupidity. I would think that the

Native Science which thinks on a long-term scale would be good

“medicine” for the Power Science.

Non-linear entities or systems are that which cannot be

treated by Linear Theory. That is the definition. Non-linear

entities and systems are nasty, for they defy the simple

“predictability” of the kind illustrated above.

Non-linear systems are “Unpredictable”, which means there

is no possibility of doing the “science” which usually means

“predicting power”. Of course, we can do a modified sense of

“science”. In fact, non-linear physics is now getting

fashionable, where things like “Catastrophe Phenomena” are

What is so-called “Ecology” in biology and geology is

largely confined to Linear cases. Some Biologists and Geologists

are aware that Nature is Non-linear and Catastrophic Instability

— such as mass extinction — is expected. But the prejudice

(or rather “superstition”) of majority of the scientists

demanding “Predictability” for “science” on some emotional ground

does not make the study of Non-Linearity in Nature popular.

As to knowledge in social and Humane areas, their implicit

Linear “Rhetoric” are yet to be recognized. “Causal Relation” is

often nothing more than a Linearized Expression. As a

consequence, people do not know they are assuming Linearity.

Hence, Linear Thinking is prevalent.

I do not think the “Linguistic Philosophers” are even aware

of Non-linearity, except perhaps in Logical Paradoxes. (The

“Paradox of Self-Reference” has a “loop structure” and as such it

is Non-linear. “Circular Argument” is also Non-linear. They

reject it. But interestingly the most “definitions” in sciences

are “circular”. Newton’s Laws of Motion and Darwin’s famous

statement “Survival of the Fittest” are well known examples.

Perhaps, because of these bad cases, philosophers do not like

Non-Linearity, But, their dislike prevents them from serious

studies of Non-Linearity. This is unfortunate.)

However, the Philosophy of Dialectics is a Non-linear one. [See

Thorn cited below] But I doubt Dialecticians themselves such as

Marx — are aware of the Non-linearity.

Sensitivity and Cross Culture Science

As to Mathematics of Non-Linearity, see Rene Thom: Structural

Stability and Morphogenesis. Benjamin. 1972. (Thom also had an

interesting thing to say about Math Education, Science 1972.)

Also, there are several texts on Non-Linear Physics. What

is called “Solution” is an unusually stable wave produced by Non-
Linearity. It is to be noted that “Stability” can be a

manifestation of Non-linearity. Non-linearity is not always

unstable and catastrophic. I suspect almost all biological and

social systems (such as human life) is “stable” because of Non-
linearity. They “die”, however, because of the Non-linearity that

maintained them to be stable for a while (quasi-stable).

The escalation of Nuclear Arms race which goes in a

“vicious circle” is an example of bad Non-linear Dynamics. On the

other hand, the “positive enforcement” effects in Education etc.

are also Non-linear Dynamics.

These examples show that Non-Linearity is important and

interesting. But here again, it is too technical to be taught

directly in schools. I would appreciate very much if you could

suggest to me some ways of bringing “awareness” of Non-Linearity

into school science education. Interestingly “Sensitivity” is a

highly Non-Linear Phenomenon. I wish some psychologists would

write about “Non-Linear Dynamics of Mind”. Hegel came close to

doing that, but his intellectual snobbism is too much for popular

reading. Perhaps, Native Science might have good stories to tell

Oct.18, ’87. S. Kounosu Phys. Dept. U. of L.

Indigenous Science

21 November 1988 Personal Correspondence on Lust, Natural Love, Cosmology

Handwritten Notes Italicized 1

Copy to Pam

Nov. 21, ’88.

Dear Norm

Thanks for your letter. I sent a copy to Pam.

I am going to send you several stuffs to show what I have

been doing. But for now, I tell you about Leonard Cohen’s

Beautiful Losers. It is old stuff from Hippy days, published in

mid 1960’s, and it was a hit then. So you might know it. Anyway,

I write assuming you have some memory of the story. I came to it

from a review which said something about “Cosmology”. So I

checked it up.

There are other “motives”. One is your letter, though I do

not know what you said led me to this. Something you said did the

trick. Another one came from a Blackfoot lady. I gave an exam to

my introductory physics class and the result was disastrous. It

depressed me enormously. I cannot teach. Not that I taught

before. I do not “teach” any way. But this time, it made me think

that I ought to resign. Then, I met this woman from whom I am

learning Blackfoot language. She asked “How are you?” (I mean she

asked, not just greeting. Incidentally, you say “Tsa Niita’piwa?”

If you mean greeting, then you reply “Soka’piwa”.) So I told her

the reason for my depression. She laughed and said “Don’t you

have Lust any more?”.

“Lust!” The word sent me down to my memories. I am a clumsy

guy from my early childhood. That is why I tried to “know”

everything about humans. By 6th grade, I understood what adults

were talking about. I had no difficulty reading adult books, and

read a lot, more than my schoolteacher mother ever did. That was

a kind of compensation for my inability to do “Lusty” things.

They say “Those who cannot, teach”. In my case, “Those who cannot

do, try to know”. Relative to that, you are doing splendidly.

But, I am used to it and that does not hurt me much, for the most

time. Only occasionally, it does hurt, and I go down deep into

despair. Usually, I do not complain, because there is no use

saying anything to anybody. They have their own troubles and

doing the best they can. The last thing they need is someone

nagging them.

My mistake was that understanding of what is “talked” is not

understanding of anything.

Handwritten Notes Italicized 2

“Ah, that is your Ego!” you would say? Yes that is there

too, So, I tell you my troubles. But Orientals have this

peculiarity that they do not talk much in Love and in Sorrow.

They would be silent about deepest part of feeling, as if they

are afraid that talking might make things cheap. Oriental lovers

just gaze into each other’s eyes and don’t utter even a single

word for 3 hours. It also happens between friends. (This, Leonard

Cohen would know nothing about.)

Now, about this Beautiful Loser. It is a story, or rather a

“non-story”, about an Indian Saint Catherine Tekakwitha, the

narrator which is a scholar-researcher who admires Saint

Tekakwitha, Edith an Indian girlfriend of his, and “F.” a

homosexual friend. I do not know if Cohen was conscious of it or

not, it involves 4 elements. That is the Symmetry Group (2 x 2),

characteristic to Native American Myth-Mandala. [The story “To

Carry The Grace” is based on the Native Geometry of 4 elements. I

added one more, Tree Princess, to suggest a way out. You know who

the Tree Princess is. But my Princess is not quite ready to

accept the meaning of her Being. That is another reason why I

look into stories like this.]

Tekakwitha is an Iroquois name. She was a Mohawk girl

adapted from “Tribe A… ” and was Christianized by Jesuits. She

represents the Native Spirituality. Edith represents decaying of

the same “Tribe A… ” in the story and a (suspected) member of

only some 20 survivors. Out of the 20, 4 are young women whom F

“managed to fuck them all”, including Edith. F is the modern

decadence, nihilist, sex maniac. F is one side of the Euro

American Culture which does the “let it go”. He also represents

“Urban Indian” Phenomenon. The narrator is another side of the

same White Culture which did not “let it go” — in story he is

having “Constipation” problem —.

In terms of Group Dynamics the “story” is simple one. But

of course it is not “a story”, but a Style of writing — in the

sense “media is the message” —. I could not help thinking that

if you write like this, you would have sold a half million copies

two years ago.

It is only clumsy guys like me who see “Geometry” in

stories. The million people who read this story, probably did not

read “Geometry”. Say, 90% read “Explicit Sex”, 1% read an Indian

Story, and 1% read something else.

This does not say, however, that people did not get

anything beyond a dirty sex story. Implicitly, they do probably

sense something. And for the sensing of that “something”, I do

not think it to be of any help to know the Geometrical Structure

of the story (or the Dynamics of the situation). I only do it

because I am always looking for

Handwritten Notes Italicized 3

“Native Science” in anything, so much so that I see the (2×2)

Group Dynamics almost everywhere.

And, that “doing science” to story destroys my enjoyment of

“unadulterated” reading. I cannot read things for pure

enjoyment’s sake any longer. That is bad. For a while Cohen

entertained me by defying my “science”. And I liked his “Style”.

But it lasted only a quarter of the story through. I soon caught

up with the author in technical sense, and the rest became

predictable, and in fact deteriorated even in its “style”. His

story got to the climax too soon, like premature ejaculation.

That is no fun. The picture of Catherine Tekakwitha stayed on the

wall in the room where all those Lusts were going. The “sensual”

Tekakwitha did not “come”. The story ends with the suicide of

Edith (extinction of the romanticized Indians) in the first

quarter of the book. If I did not have a respect for Tekakwitha

enough to make up a sensual story in my imagination the

“Cosmology” world have collapsed. At expense of (1) all manner of

fucking, (2) suicide of an Indian gir1, and (3) religious death

of an Iroquois Saint Maiden, the story failed to elucidate what

this “Lust” is.

[My theory of (2×2) Dynamics suggests that Cohen missed one

more entity (power being) to go beyond the romanticism that

is too frequent in Whitemen’s intellect. Pam’s “Rock” might

be the one (4).

To be sure, in Cohen’s Story, there was a feeble attempt to

go back to “Spirituality”. That is the episode about the

“Water”. It took place a few days before Edith commits

suicide. “Going back to the Tradition” often takes place in

Desperation” “Going back to Nature” (and join Indian way of

life), “Going back to Uninhibited Sex”, etc. are variations

on the same theme. The frantic sex life is the Last Refuge

for those “Urban Indians”, from European Tribes or Native

American ones.

In the desiccated modern urban society, they try to escape

through the only intimate sensual medium left for them. The

Capitalism left nothing else but Sex. It is a “let it go”

only in the sense of relieving Constipation in the urban

Waste Land. It is the only “moist” thing in the Hell. As

such I respect it, but, to me, it is rather painful.

The “Natural Love” is indeed uninhibited and people did

walk around naked. Sex was free, but it was no “Big Deal”

like those Urban Indians are obsessed with. Sex was as

natural as eating, peeing, etc. That is, Love was diffused

all around, permeated in, distributed throughout every

interaction in the community life. There is no “Intensity”

of the kind that Cohen was

Handwritten Notes Italicized 4

“making points” and keeping scores about. They shared women

and men, mothers, sisters, brothers, just as they shared

foods, dwellings, works, and life.

Bourgeoisie life dried up all that Except Private

Possession, including Private Sex. Having Free Sex does not

bring back the Love Community. We perform all sorts of

rituals, including Sex but that would be vain. What was

lost will not come back, no more than Buffalo herds come

back to the prairie. That is, unless we bring back the

whole Community, the whole Boundary Condition to the Field

Equation, the whole Enchanted Cosmos.

While we are refusing our neighbors Free Foods, Free Sex

will not liberate us. Love is a whole life, not an

obsession with “coming” and “going”.

Intellectually and Emotionally, Cohen probably knew it. But

he also knew that Urban Bourgeoisie Indians, from European

Tribe or Native American ones, are not capable of the Whole

Love. Hence there is no way out. That is why his story is a

story of Death. He meant to write another Waste Land. And

he did.

Hippies were too narcissistic to clean up their ass of

Christian shit like “Chosen People”. And probably they

thought themselves as the “Vanguard” for Sexual Revolution.

The “Savage Indian Wild Sex” might be their way of “back to

nature”. In a narrow sense, they were correct. Except their

Bourgeoisie snobbism blinded them to their lifestyle based

on destruction of Nature and desecration of community.

Greenwich Village had nothing in common with the Amazonian

Tribe Village that George Wallace wrote a poem about.]

The “Cosmology” of Beautiful Losers is analyzed by Dennis

Lee in Savage Fields. ANANSI 1977. It gave a rave review to

Cohen. But I am rather disappointed. Most “erratic” literature on

Indians do not do justice to the “Lust” that my lady friend is

referring to. Sex is there to sell the book.

The “Beautiful Losers” are not beautiful. But it is perhaps

another “Constipation” of Euro American Intellect. And if that

was the aim of his description, Cohen succeeded very well. Saint

Tekakwitha failed to “loosen” the intellect. That may be blamed

on Judeo-Christianity.

By the same token, the cover picture on a book by Gunther

S. Stent, Paradoxes Of Progress, is misleading. The picture is

from “The Golden Age” by Lukas Cranach. Naked

Handwritten Notes Italicized 5

men and women are dancing around a tree, perhaps the Tree of

Knowledge. The book talked of problems of “Scientism”, suggesting

“The Fall” by “knowing”. But it did not cut through the surface

of discussing “Ethics of Science” etc., to get to the “Lustic

Origin” of human Intellect.

So I am back to the question of Lust. Cohen was writing

about Lust. So was Stendhal, Lawrence, Goethe, Nietzsche, etc.

etc. Also, all Indian stories written by Europeans are stories of

Lust in one form or another. Even Max Weber was writing about

Lust, which he saw as Conflict-violence-irrationality and hence

could not find any way out but to control it by Power. That is

what I told Galtung. Galtung, being a good “scientist” in the

Weberian sense, was very much surprised hearing a physicist say

this, In effect, I told him that “Peace Research” has not even

begun to look at the Origin of Conflict-Violence, though it was

the theme of Literature and Art since anything was written or

drawn by humans.

I would very much like to write about “Lust” for Peace

Research. Alas! I am not much of a man of Lust. My sexual

adventures, aside from book-knowledge and imagination, is very

limited. Those who know it, namely you, do not write. Despite all

my pushing, Pam does not use writing as a means of knowing. I

would think that one does not need to constipate before shit.

(Pregnancy is a different matter. According to Blackfoot Myth,

women have to have a Big-Being Orgasm to get pregnant. That is a

part of the Lust.) But then, what could I say? I do not have

anything even to constipate! I write and write, in a hope that

they come to constipate someday. I hope it comes before my Lust

runs out.

I heard that “Okanagan” means the Lost People (or Lost

Souls). It has a marble quarry somewhere, which I have not yet

seen. I might pay homage there and see what the Rock tells me.

What was that Thomas Hardy was suggesting about the Power of Rock

(Stonehenge) in Tess?

Yours

Sam K.

P.S. If you do not need it for a while, can I borrow back

Easlea’s Fathering the Unthinkable. Internal-library Loan

Handwritten Notes Italicized 6

is somehow holding me up on this book. In the spring semester

next, I plan to do a bit of Feminist Science in Physics 2020. I

also coordinate an Integrated study course on Peace and War.

There, I intend to talk about something like “The Paradox of

Intelligence; its making of Wars and Peace”. I will not fail to

mention an anthropological finding that to gain women was the

biggest cause of fighting. In addition, I would say that our

sense of Power came from the feeling–illusion of men subjugating

women in sexual contexts. For that, we Nuclear Physicists built

the Super Bomb. I think it is a clumsy way of imitating Orgasm. I

like to do it “Gracefully”, if possible at all.

Community Development, Healing Practices, Indigenous Science

20 August 1988 Personal Correspondence on Community Culture Healing, Spirit and Science (PDF)

Aug. 20, ’88.

Dear Pam

I write to you again. For your laugh, I quote a joke.

“A famous physicist worried about Library space projected

that, at the present rate of increase in the number of articles

published in Physical Review, they will soon reach a rate which

will have to fill library shelves with the Speed exceeding that

of Light. However, this does not violate the Principle of

Relativity, for the journals contain no Information.

[Physics Today Aug. ’88. P. 9.]

– – – – – – – – –

I have a proposal to make, and I would like to discuss the

matter. How about writing a paper on European and Native

Community/Culture Healing as a Therapy/Medicine? I know I am

trying to push you to do an Academic thing. But, now that you

moved, there is nothing much I can do anyway. So perhaps it is

safe to make a proposal. Besides, I do not know how “Community/

Culture Healing” would fit with what you do on the job. Please

let me know the situation.

The idea came from reading an article by William K. Powers

“Alternatives To Western Psychotherapy: Modern-Day Medicine Man”

mentioned before [In Beyond The Vision U. of Oklahoma Press 1987.

Psychotherapy has Psychoanalysis as a theoretical part, though

the relation of “Theory” and “Practice” contains problems.

Likewise, Native Medicine has Native Science, though the relation

between them may be different from that in European system. But

the Science ought to be relevant and helpful to practice of the

Medicine. In fact, we have been deciphering Native Science from

the Medicine in the traditional culture, as the Science existed

there to deal with problems in life.

The comparison of the complex of science-therapy in Western

Culture to one in another Culture is interesting enough. But I am

not just proposing to make a comparison. Something new is added.

Native Community/Culture is facing new problems stemming from its

encounter with Western Ideology and Technology. The new problems

require new responses. It means more trouble, but that also means

a new development in Science for both sides. As a “Wisdom”,

Native Science needs not to change, but its expressions have to

reflect the changed environment in order to be helpful to the

people. You have been on that task. But if you wish to elaborate

on Native Science at higher and deeper level of

Native Science, working out “practical applications” is one of

the ways to do that. Comparison is a mere entry device.

As “Spirit” is revealed through manifestations, the Science

is learnable through “working it out” (praxis). Writing a paper

is a way of helping people who face up to the problems and

looking for ways of healing. The paper may look “theoretical”,

but it is (i) a report on experiences, and/or (ii) elaboration of

“strategy”. It is not “Wisdom” itself, but it is an intermediate

“translation” in a sense of being an “approach to”, or a “way

to”. Just as we cannot prescribe “Vision”, we cannot describe

“Wisdom”. We can, however, talk about experiences or the

procedure leading up to it.

And, to the extent the problems are brought by “European”

things, what we write have to contain “European” things. That is

the necessity of the circumstance, and also from the work being

“translation”, “interface”, and “praxis in the present world”.

There is an element of “Beating European Intellect at its

own Game”. We might say “If Europeans brought Guns to Natives,

Native Science can shoot the same guns better”, or “If Christians

talk of Love, Native Science does it better”. It is not that

competition is the aim, but the pains and suffering of the people

under “European Power Science” is real — unfortunately we in

bourgeoisie academy do not immediately experience them — and a

way of Medicine/Therapy must be proposed now.

Actually, for this, it probably matters little if it is

called “Native Science”, “Marxism”, or “Born-Again Christianity”.

There are “Natives” colonized all over the World, even in Europe.

In some degree, I have a special interest in Japanese affairs

which do contain “Native Problems”, and you have “Native

Americans’ in the center of your heart, and in that we are

“Racists”. But I do have something beyond that, which has to do

with “People”, “Humans,”, not “Race”. I am not helping Native

Americans as a Race. It makes me feel sad to think, but I stand

outside “Native American Science” — She is your baby. I adore

her, but that is all I can —. At least, I try to avoid becoming

a “Fake Indian”. [I saw an NFB film on Long Lance: “Chief Buffalo

Child”.]

It does give me a pain of being an “Outsider”, forever

segregated and cast away from the happy community of people whom

I care, but I hope I have a spiritual strength to withstand the

alienation. The danger of the alienation becoming a bitterness

and then intellectua1 arrogance is great. But that is where

devices, strategies such as Participatory Research come in. It is

an intellectual thing to do, and as such, it perhaps is not quite

genuinely

satisfying. If Alcoholism is a problem, Intellectualism is also a

problem.

However, I think that there is a “meaning” in both

Alcoholism and Intellectualism. Rejecting or rather pretending

that one is staying clear out of the problems, with righteous

contempt, is not an answer. I would much rather have you drinking

and suffering than being like an angel. For the pain can also be

source of creative energy. The period of Colonialism is not yet

over, and if we are comfortable in the World as it is today,

there is no reason for us to do anything about it. At least, in

that way I can talk with you.

I said the above, because if you are “Perfect Indian”,

“Noble Savage Philosopher”, you would not play with an academic

game like writing intellectual paper. A Japanese proverb has it

that “Great Man is a Useless Man” — nobody can use him, nor

does he use anybody —. But, I would like to drag you down to a

lesser being who suffers pain like “ordinary” people do and

could, at the best, be “useful” to people as such. If there is no

problem, pain, malaise, there can be no Science. Both

Intellectualism and Alcoholism are product/expression of

suffering. I would dare further to say that Spiritualizing is a

“moral equivalent” of Alcoholism.

Now, that has been my excuse to you to make a proposal. For

you to judge whether it is helpful or not, you would ask what it

involves. So I shall explain.

One important thing Powers missed in the article is that

Native Medicine is done as “Communal Affair”, if not “Ceremony”,

whereas Western Psychotherapy is highly individualistic ritual.

That stems from Psychoanalysis being an analysis (theoretical

construct) about the Individual. Freud’s paradigm is to “adjust”

deviant individuals to the given Civilization (*1). C.G. Jung saw

this defect/limitation in Freud’s works. He went to “Collective

Unconscious” etc. to correct the ignorance/ignoring, and made

“Psychoanalysis” useful in “Social Psychology”, “Anthropology”

and “Linguistics”. Jung’s works were closer to Hegelian Field

Dynamics, as a contrast to Newton-Kantian Mechanics of Freud. And

it opened a way to “Cultural Analysis”, supplementing “Social

Analysis/Criticism” of Marx et al. You might say it is

“Environmental Science” in contrast to Individualistic/Atomistic

Science of a single Tree.

(*1) [To be sure, Freud did write Der Zukunft einer Illusion

1927, Das Unbehagen in der Kultur 1930. It is interesting

to note that the English translation of the second book is

“Civilization and Its Discontents”. Freud knew better than

confusing

Civilization with Culture. But the title was approved by

Freud. The reason become clear if one reads the book. The

“culture” of Europe in the 20th century is nothing but a

“Civilization” — i.e. Technopolis —. Freud, in his zeal

to establish his science to be an Eternal Truth, totally

ignored History of European Social Technology. (Jung failed

in this respect as well.) It is surprising to see this in

an intellectual circle in which Hegel and Marx were well

known. Perhaps, it was Newton-Kantian blindness to History.

Or, it is because European chemistry (Atomism) was A-
Historical (Non-Dynamical).

It is also interesting to note that, the term “Unbehagen”

is equivalent of French “malaise”, that is more like

“disease”. “Discontent” came from the first title Freud

gave, which was “Das Ungluck”. The translation of the title

is not quite right, but from the content of the book the

English title is just right. That is, Freud failed to treat

the “Disease” of the modern European Civilization in which

he was a part. European Science has had this peculiar

posture of as if God was looking at problems from outside.

Scholars talked as if they themselves had no problem of

their own. A.A. made one progress in this respect in that

they talk of “My problem”. What I like to see is a Science

of “Our problem”.]

However, even Jung did not come to think of “Therapy on

Community”. Social Psychology, Anthropology, or for that matter,

Sociology, Economics, did not think of practice of “Therapy” in

relation to them as “Science”. Marx, Keynes were exceptions. It

was not that Social Scientists did not attempt to influence

Social Policies, or Psychologists did not interfere with

Educational Policies. The relation between these Sciences and

Practices were not only obscured by pretended “Scientific

Objectivity”, or “Value Neutrality”, but also ignored, perhaps,

from their “Static-ism” (inactivism), if not incompetence. They

did not have the degree of relation that physics had with

Industrial applications, and Medical Science had with Clinical

Practice.

I imagine “Social Work/Welfare” uses existing Social

Sciences as its theoretical grounds (metaphysical axioms and

Rhetoric-Jargons). Yet, I wonder if the relation is clear at all.

Suppose an Economist proved that in a pluralistic society, “the

Value Maximum does not exist”, what change then social

work/welfare as a discipline of practice would undergo? In fact

the proof was given by Arrow in 1940’s (*2), but I am afraid

Scholars in Social Work/Welfare behave as if they are totally

ignorant of implications of Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem, just

as the

most Natural Scientists are oblivious to Godel’s Incompleteness

Proof. If the Science means anything, one would expect certain

effects from changes in the science to changes in the practice,

at least something comparable to that from Medical Science to

Clinical Practice.

I am not saying every “theory” has to have direct and

immediate effects on practices in therapy/healing. For the case

of Native Communities, even the identification of problems is a

problem for itself , let alone talking of Healing. But then, I

would expect that Native Science is relevant and useful in the

identification (diagnosis/analysis). I also expect the Science to

provide a “Language” by which the problems can be described,

communicated, and efficiently understood, so that people can make

an effective co-operation.

Now, I am quite aware that there are difficulties, say in

the relation between Western Sciences and their therapeutic

practices. There exists no such thing as “Sociotherapy”, so that

I cannot comment on what Social Science does. Incidentally,

Gellner mentioned before [The Psychoanalytic Movement. Paldin

1985.] discussed the problems in Psychoanalysis/therapy.

Gellner, however, took a rhetorical posture of comparing

“Psychoanalysis” to other Sciences, and pretended that other

Sciences, particularly Natural Science, have no such problem. It

is false. There is no “Science” that is free from troubles. Every

one of them has one degree of trouble or another. In fact,

Natural Science escapes the trouble by ignoring — only deals

with simple linearized models —. Even our “Logic” has troubles

when it tries to deal with “dynamics”, beyond its traditional

“static” and “atomistic” territory. [Russell’s Paradox, etc. see

The Mathematical Experience. P.J. Davis, R. Hersh. Penguin 1984

for example.] It appears that Gellner is ignorant about these

problems in Western Science. Unfortunately, this ignorance, or

rather ignoring, about Logical foundation is rather universal

among English speaking “philosophers of science”.

[I picked up from the New book section of our library a

book; Philosophy, Science And Social Inquiry, by D.C.

Philips. It is a neat summary of “British-American

Philosophy Of Science”. There is no mention of the problems

in Logic. It has a chapter on “Neo-Hegelian Critique”, but

there is no discussion of Hegel’s “Logic of Science”.

On the other hand, if we read, say, Paul Ricoeur’s Lectures

On Ideology And Utopia, the whole 19th century German

Philosophy, covered by Marx’s German Ideology, was a

struggle on “Science”. But it is

not recognized by British-American Academia. It appears

that there was an implicit censorship by those who were in

the academic “Empire Building”. They appear to be no

different from Racists and Colonialists.]

What is interesting, however, in Gellner’s book is that

despite his implicit rhetorical assumption, the troubles of

Natural Science come out. His criticisms against Psychoanalysis

being not a science are applicable to Natural Science just as

well. That is why it is worth reading

Of course, Freud failed to achieve his ambitious goal.

Rather, he went back to the level of Newtonian Mechanics, and

treated “Civilization” to be a “State of Technology” in a

society. His therapy was a technology of adapting individuals to

the society dominated by the Technology. It did not come to

Therapy on the Technology itself. Besides, he was a self-centered

S.O.B., of which many books had been written. That was very

common, Ego-Inflating effect of the Competitive Intellectualism

that we are under. I hope efforts such as Participatory Research

would take care of the problem of Intellectual imperialism (or

rather Judeo-Christian Superiority-Persecution Complex) in

Science.

In this respect, it is interesting to note that Powers

reports on “Abdication” (p.137 point 7). European way of seeing

this is “Loss of Power”. But, I suspect rather it means “retiring

from responsibility obligation”. “Power” in Native lingo probably

means “Function”. One who “has” a Power is obliged to perform the

function. I wonder, in this sense, what “power” university

professors have.

I ought to mention here that Marx also failed in reaching a

“Science” — Marx had never come to elaborate what he meant by

his “Science”, though he was very proud of saying “Scientific

Socialism”, “Proletariat shall have Science to Liberate

themselves”, etc. —. Marx failed to do “Philosophy of

Technology”, but did only “Mechanics of Power”, and consequently

failed to help the construction of the “Science” that was

expected for the Oppressed to develop.

What you want to do in the name of Native Science is what

Marx, Freud, Jung et al. failed to achieve. Therefore, if you

make mistakes here and there, you have nothing to be ashamed of.

Mistakes will hurt you, but that is all. The important thing is

that you pointed the direction, a Vision/Dream/Prophecy.

[You might think I am unduly hard on you, but

actually it is you who picked such a difficult task. It is

as if you are saying you like to jump into a volcano. I

push you over the cliff, because you are standing at the

edge. Afterwards, I and friends of yours will erect a

gravestone there, inscribed as “Here once stood a brave

soul”.]

I would go on further to say Native Science is a way to

“Wisdom”, not the “science” of the European sense. And if it is

“Wisdom”, it has to be in a Community/Culture, not property of

one individual, however genius you are. It can only be developed

by “History”. All we can do is the task of Midwife. And you need

co-operation of many people, and communities (Participatory

Research?). What I am proposing you to write is not Native

Science itself , but merely one among many “about Native Science

— something like “Comparison of What Native and European

Sciences would say about Community Healing/Therapy.” —.

Richard Gwyn, writing on the crushed “Prague Spring” 20

years ago, says: “The real cost of that smashing of a mailed fist

into a gentle smiling face has been an intangible one. The

Czechoslovak sickness of today is neither economic nor political

but is psychological; it can only be described as

institutionalized immorality”. [Leth. Herald. Aug 23.] If one

says this about Czechoslovakia, what must one say about The First

Nations of America? Is it Institutionalized Immorality? And if

so, how does one go about Healing it?

Yours

Sam K.

(*2) As to K.J. Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem, see Social Choice

And Individual Value. John Wiley 1951. Cowles Foundation

Monographs vol. 12.

My Economist friend referred me to Q. James, Saposnik, and

Ruben. General Equilibrium And Welfare Economics but I have

not read this.

The main point of Arrow’s Theorem is that “Values” cannot

be ordered in a linear hierarchy (in Boolean Lattice). If a

set of propositions does not form a Boolean Lattice, the

Classical Logic cannot be applied. For Non-Boolean set, the

Probability Calculus becomes unworkable, Quantum Logic is

Non-Boolean. It creates linguistic situations where The

Principle of Exclusion of the Middle breaks down

(Uncertainty

Principle). A Dutch mathematician E. Brouwer talked about

this problem in 1920-30s.

But, as far as I know of, there has been no Social Science

built upon explicit basis of Non-Boolean Logic. There have

been suggestions that Zen philosophy is non-Boolean, but I

have not seen any serious writing about this. There is also

such a thing as “Fuzzy Logic”. But I see no sign of it

applied to Socia1 Sciences.

I would like to ask you, or to Woody, if Quantum Logic

(Non-Boolean Linguistic Structure) can be found in Native

narrations. I am looking for cases where “Either/Or”

propositions get into clear trouble.

As to Quantum Logic, I enclosed some references. But they

perhaps require some more explanations and elaborations to

make it relevant to Cultural talks.

 

Indigenous Science

Untitled

Native American Science, I hope, stands on “Will To Love/Grace”.

Actually, Science has all three phases of “Will” (Hope, Aspiration, Desire, Value, Ideal, Idea, Purpose, Theory, Achievement, etc.), “Becoming” (Process, Means, Technology, Know-How, Manipulation, Practice, etc.), and “Being” (Fact, What is, What is given, Existence, Condition, Environment, etc.) But in the Western sense, the “Will” part in Science has been hidden or even denied in the name of “Value Neutrality”, or “Objectivity”. Only guys like Husserl, Heidegger (Phenomenologists) took issue with this aspect of Science.

To be sure, if you equate “Reason”, “Rationality”, “Intelligence” with “Science”, then the story is different in contexts like “Reason and History”, “Theory and Practice” etc. there have been many arguments. But, Philosophers in English speaking countries used not to understand them to have anything to do with “Science”. When one is to talk about “Will” in relation to “Science”, one has to take “Science” in wider sense. If one does, then Hegel, Nietzsche, et al. were, in fact, talking about “Philosophy of Science”. (A. Whitehead is an exception).

Now it appears that things are changing. Gradually, Nietzsche, Hegel, Marx, Husserl, Heidegger, et al — the whole German Philosophy of Science — are revived even in American Academia. In terms of “Sociology of Science”, the influence of Frankfurt school on “Science” is coming into the U.S. (Habermas, Ricoeur, et al.) Canada is lagging behind. They dare not say anything until some big names at Oxford or Cambridge start saying things. That is from the “Colonial Mentality” of Canadian Academics. They wait for big Bandwagons to come and offer a ride.

You might try Name Dropping. It is not effective to try justifying and defending Native Science. Instead, you might have to argue that if White Culture refuses to learn Native Science, the world will be destroyed. Just as the missionaries did to natives up to this time, you tell them you want to save their souls, and see how they react.

Whatever anyone says, Love and Care of Gaia/Tree is a Science. [At least it is no less a Science than the Thirst for Power and Greed for Material Possession are Science.] This alternative science may not be suitable for organizing industries and exploiting nature and people. It may not help the present system of Political Economy and its Ideology. But it is necessary wisdom for survival at least, if it fails to reach “Grace”. In a sense, it is more complex and difficult, because this science does not ignore the “Will” part. It does ask what it means to “know”. That, however, makes it more interesting. At any rate, there are reasons for me to write like mad. I may be a compulsive writer, but I cannot write fast enough for the needs.

[I wanted to write to you about an article; “Alternative To Western Psychotherapy: The Modern-Day Medicine Man” by William K. Powers (from Beyond Vision U. of Oklahoma Press 1987.) and a book I mentioned to you before The Psychoanalytic Movement by Ernest Gellner (Paladin 1985.)

I think there are parallels among connections of “Psychoanalysis-Therapy”, “Social Theory/Ideology-Social Policy/Welfare”, “Science-Production”, “Education-Culture”, and “Native Medicine-Community”. Patterns and problems in them may be comparatively identified. But, I could not even start on it as yet.]

Now you know why I am happy to help you. Whether you need or not, I will pursue alternative science in one way or another. You owe me nothing. Rather, I am thankful that you give me the opportunity and motive. I have “means” to complete the “perfect crime”. That is beautiful, if not “graceful”.

I know you have to do things within a frame related to Native Welfare. The second gateway is Native Education which Leroy probably does. I do Peace Science. The fourth one is Feminist Science, for which I will find someone, somewhere.

Things already start happening. Don’t be too defensive. The World is waiting for you. All you have to do is to tell what you are dreaming about or suggest the direction of the Spirit. Once you do that, you will be surprised to find many helpers. Close your eyes and jump off the bridge! At least you get to somewhere.

Yours

Sam K.

Indigenous Science

Part II: Love Science

Part II. Love Science.

5. I have talked about Power Science. It is easy to talk of how powerful Science_Technology is. It is also easy to talk of how dangerous Science-Technology is and go into gloom and doom. If you are typical of European intellectual — the ones who are “Educated” in European Power Science — you might think of the situation in a “Dialectics” of two oppositions. It came from the religious tradition of thinking things in “Good/Evil” antagonism. Science does that in terms of “Atom/Void”, which is the prototype of “Ego/Environment”. In schools, I observe a prevalent pattern of thinking which goes by “Teacher/Student” antagonism, which is enforced by “Those who have Knowledge/those who are ignorant”. Pardon me to say this, but that is the Missionary mentality. It is intellectual colonialism that a Kipling poem “The Whiteman’s Burden” expressed. At any rate, the picture/metaphor of Two In Opposition is a powerful image, but too simple to get us anywhere.

So let me introduce a slightly improved picture/metaphor/map about the situation. By doing so, we are taking one step into and actually doing a bit of Love Science that I am going to explain to you. Interestingly, this came from Indian Science that I would like to mention later.

The picture/metaphor/map is not perfect, but helps us to find a way out of the Antagonistic Way of Thinking. It is very simple. Namely, picture in your mind a circle and divide it into 4 sectors. It looks like:

Power Science \\ Power Elite

Recognized Authority\\Dominant Male

Edified Intellect\\Growth Economy

===========

Love Science\\The Exploited

Un-Recognized Intelligence\\The Oppressed

Life in Practice\\Subjugated Female/Environment

6. I have put in a few words in the map to illustrate what I am going to talk about. But please notice the Form/structure first. The Form (format) is a circle containing 4 things. This is a way to avoid Two in Opposition. I intend to do “Multi-lectics” instead of “Dia-lectics”. The Form can also be called “Matrix Form” in a mathematical jargon, as a contrast to the simple Linear Form comparing object A and object B. The “Mat” of the “Matrix” is “Mat” of “Mather”. If I may, I like to call it “Matalectics”. “Lectics” is a way of talk, and it came from narrating legends.

By drawing a circle around the 4 things, I am indicating that they are there in relations. In particular, I am saying “Love Science” has always been in existence. It is just that formal text in Physics failed to mention it, or rather the “Science Education” did not wish for you to know about it.

In elementary school and junior high, I always notice how students are eager to learn. If we define “Science” to be “Ability/Competence to Learn”, those children are geniuses. They learn better because they Love to Learn. The way the eagerness and ability to learn get killed as they go up grades in school education is a sad scene, and I would very much like to talk with Educators about the tragedy. But, before that, let me identify what I mean by “Love Science”.

In a small book, The Limits of Science, Peter Medawar talks about “What is Science”. One story that this distinguished Nobel Laureate Biologist narrates is about a house wife who is confronted with a breakdown of her electric home appliance. He says that the house wife who looks around the toaster, locates a broken wire and fixes it is doing “Science”. I agree. That is a beautiful example of Science. But, I also notice that she is not “Recognized” as doing science. Nobody would call her a Scientist and pay premium salary. Why not? Medawar is totally blind to this social “Class Distinction” implicit to honor titles like “Scientist”. How come a super-intelligent scientist such as Dr. Medawar can be blind to the Class Distinction, and in a nation notorious for its acute Class Consciousness at that? That is the problem of “non-recognition”.

One more example. In hospitals, it is often an experienced Nurse that tells young interns what to do. But it so happens that the Nurses are paid far less than the Doctors. The reason is, I presume, the Doctors have gone through years of Formal Education and know “Science”. Whereas, Nurses do not know “Science”, though they may have vastly superior “Practical Knowledge” gained from their experiences.

Actually, if they ever do anything creative, even hard-nosed scientists do Learn things just the same way the elementary school children and nurses learn. The way they go about doing their science is very “Emotionally Involved” and they have “Sensual” contact with Nature. It is a passionate Love Affair. They experience intense Pleasure doing their stuffs. You may have experiences of thinking about Woman or Man in your life os intensely that nothing else in the World mattered. That is no difference from what creative scientists do. It is dangerous, and I am not saying all scientists do that. In fact, 99% of professional scientists are more likely “laboring” through their job, just as alienated as production line workers are.

If you read Max Weber’s “Science As A Profession” and “The Protestant Ethics And The Spirit Of Capitalism”, you would probably understand the sense of the “Alienation” in the “Professionalized Science”. The feeling is strangely very similar to the one we get from reading Death of a Salesman or the like. [See also: A. Mitzman. The Iron cage – A Historical Interpretation of Max Weber.] So that the scientists have to maintain some personal sensual satisfaction in some ways. Some opt out for “Power Trip”. As Henry Kissinger said, “Power is the best aphrodisiac”, and it is very sensual stuff anyway.

It is just that in the formal discourse of science, and in teaching in particular, the Sensual, Love Affair part is not mentioned –Scientists are forced to act like Macho guys. And science teachers are, perhaps, afraid that showing Human Emotions in class rooms is “Unscientific”. It is a Taboo. So it is not “Recognized”.

You are not Vainglorious persons, and think that “Recognition” is not a big deal. You know what you did and can be happy with it, regardless if society grants a Recognition or not. I admire you for that.

7. But there is a catch. As Feminist critics of science pointed out, “To Recognize” is “To Know”. Epistemology has to do with “Recognition”. Besides, “Science” is not a private knowledge, but it represents the Intelligence of a Culture/Society as a whole. What is not recognized by a Culture/Society cannot be the Knowledge that acts as the “common ground/reason”, so that people can organize co-operation on the basis of it. What is not recognized is not “legitimate” to have a “social efficacy”. It is like a beautiful Color that you saw, but you have no way of telling your friends about it. Or it is like UFO that you have seen, but you keep it to yourself. Our society cannot make an appropriate response to the things it does not recognize. The chances are that when a society denies recognition, usually it actually “knows” but is repressing it with a great energy cost. As a consequence, society tends to make a wrong response to the thing it denies.

In the history of science, there were many cases of non-recognitions. Things that do not sit well with the dominant Paradigm of the time are always suppressed from “knowing”. You might have heard that people at the time of Galileo Galilei thought that the Earth is flat. Well, it so happened that some 100 years before Galileo, Christopher Columbus knew that the Earth is round, and on the basis of that knowledge he sailed across the Atlantic Ocean and got to the America. People on street actually knew the round Earth. It was only official scientists and philosophers who did not know it, because their Text which they had to uphold as “Truth” and “Authority” did not say so.

If you believe that Science is Powerful and Cut-and-dry hard-nosed stuff, you learn to ignore all “human frailties”. All human traits, such as foibles, sensuality, passion, pride, love, enjoyment, fun, pleasure, adventure, groping for unknowns, wonderment about mysteries, etc. are “By Definition” not parts of the Science as such. The are not recognized, repressed out of consciousness, intellect. If you keep that up, very soon you would learn not to see, feel. That is what happened to mediaeval scholars and scientists, and we can be just as well.

The “non-recognition” is the key to the repression, oppression, and prejudices against women, the poor, the unemployed, the disadvantaged, and Natives under Colonial Domination. That is, one who does not see the existence of Love Science in the Matrix picture cannot see the existence of the Oppressed, Exploited either, let alone seeing the four in relation.

It is far from innocent. I believe German intellectuals who claim that they did not know the infamous Concentration Camps during WWII. Even if they saw it with their own eyes, they would not “recognize” what was happening.

And, it is very likely that we are blind to certain things we do not feel easy about. What is more, if you are “sensitive”, chances are that you get hurt. You sense that you are vulnerable and ephemeral. You do not feel like a Macho Hero. The you lose out in competitions. So you do not like to “know”. Rather, we like to know something that makes us feel “Powerful” and “Invincible”. We say, before knowing anything “What’s in it for me”. That is our usual epistemological stand.

8. I did not give any “definition” of “Love Science”. It is because “Love Science” is not “Deductionist Science”. Rather it is a matter of recognition that you give to your Love Science that you have been doing. That is, seems to me, the only way to “know” Love Science.

If that is difficult, there is a neat way. That is, we can look into how children do their “science”. Give them a recognition they deserve. By doing so, we also give a recognition to our learning. So both get recognition.

On CBC news, I heard of a 12 year old boy who is studying the local rail road. It was news from a small community in Newfoundland where the Rail Company is about to pull out rail service. He thinks that is a disaster and tries to find a way to save the communities linked by the rail road. The way this kid is going about studying the matter is very impressive. I think people who listened to the news felt a fine scientist there. I do not mean the statistical numbers that the kid collected or the notes that he kept writing. I mean the care that this boy is extending to the lives of people in the communities around. That is remarkable.

And, I do not overlook that fact that people, who recognized a scientist in the boy, must have known what “science” is to recognize it. That is, they also learned science that they had. They might not have had chance to exercise their science, but now that they “discovered” it, they can do it too. And by doing, they would learn more.

The essence of science is not in “knowledge”, but in “how to learn”. Once known it is a matter of “history” to record, not a matter of science. In a peculiar social circumstance, our science is developed to be an official record keeper on “Knowledge Claims” very much like what the Patent Office do —. But, I think such is an anomaly that our egoistic competition for power created. Love Science as the communal and environmental intelligence is emerging now to correct such an anomaly.

If we must have a “definition” of Love Science, we can say it is learning from care and for understanding of relations among lives and natural and human environment.

It is also an “empowerment” (though I do not like this word) of people to liberate themselves, in a sense people recognize what ability they have in themselves.

Another neat way of learning Love Science is to look for Native Science in Native Way of Life. To be sure, I do not know Native Science. I am not making any knowledge claim. I was lucky to find some friends to go along in an adventure into unknowns. Interestingly, however, I did find very sophisticated pieces of science. The 4  element Matrix way of thinking I used in the above is one of them (with a bit of my interpretation which may well be wrong).

I also find that the notion of Space-Time is different and interesting. This is something to do with what American Linguist Benjamin Whorf and Edward Sapir found in their studies on Hopi and Navajo Languages known as “Whorf-Sapir Hypothesis” on the Language — how people speak reflects how people think —. Surprisingly, Hopi and Navajo have a Relativistic Thinking. I think they are ahead of Einstein in that they appear to have a Space-Time Geometry that includes “Becoming” part, along with “Being Part”. It is “Existentialistic” as well as “pragmatic”. It is fascinating to study their Science, for it suggests a way of overcoming the dialectical opposition of “Space-Time” and “Existence” (Object-Being). I am thinking that this “Relativity” might work better in dealing with Human-Environment relation/dynamics than the way of European Science which is developed for power of production.

[Remember Wayne Gretzky’s Super-Relativistic Map? Native Hunters used to make Maps before their expeditions in the form of “Dreams”, or in “Vision Seeking”. You can see this in the book, Dreams And Maps by Hugh Brody (NAS text). You also recall the famous “I have a Dream” speech by Martin Luther King Jr. The Dream is a Map.]

S.K.

Indigenous Science

8 August 1988 Personal Correspondence on Grace, Will, and Power

Aug. 8, ’88.

Dear Pam

The enclosed is the 4th draft of “Tree and Wind”. I have made a major shift in the theme from Love-Making to “Grace”. I wonder what native word(s) for “Grace” is. Ex-minister friend of mine thinks that Grace is a Buddhist concept, rather than Christian. Grace in Christianity appeared in the context of Marian worship (a Feminist Movement in ancient times). That was not a part of the official dogma that St. Paul et al preached, though they could claim that Grace is implicit in their construction.

A small note. According to the Zodiac, You are Air-Wind and an Intellectual. I am an Earth element, which is about right in that I am a peasant/artisan. However, just to show you the prestige of Earth Power, I enclosed a newspaper article by Gwynne Dyer (Leth. Herald Aug 5.) Dyer is talking of “Gaia” — which actually includes Air, Water, Trees — Dyer asks a rhetorical question if care and concern for Gaia is a Pseudo-Religion. But he does not question whether or not the prevalent worship of the power of science-technology is more of Pseudo-Religion than the reverence for Gaia is. I guess Dyer knows, but he must have thought that the time to ask the second question has not come yet. It is safe to pretend that Science-Technology is rational and there is no problem with it. You might try criticizing Dyer for not knowing Native Science.

In a philosophy journal from Japan, this month, there is an article on Heidegger by a German Philosopher, Klaus Held. It is not directly on science, but on the problems of “Being” and “Will To Know” – Held is rather conservative and falls back on the old Cartesian/Kant assumption of “I think, therefore I know”. Heidegger was not satisfied with such an “easy answer” Husserl who is cited in the article, started with Kantian Axiom of “Cartesian Science can know everything and anything”, but he could not find ground for the position. That was Husserl’s “Krisis der Europaischen Wissenschaften” (1-936). Held appears to have made a retrogression to the 19th century. Somehow the worship of European science (Intellectuality) goes on, despite all proofs to the contrary. Dyer and Held are not alone.

But, interestingly, the discussion went onto the question of “Will To know”. Air-Wind is “Will — in the sense of “Will to Power” which Nietzsche et al talked about. In contrast, Earth is “Being”. Between “Will” and “Being”, there comes “Becoming”. Heidegger knew that much.

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“Sociology” in North American texts does not like to talk about this. What has happened is that the “discourse” of north American academics has come to avoid the question of “Power” in general and “Power of Knowledge” in particular. It is characteristic of the modern Social Science in North America to deny “Power” as if it is a “ghost” in some superstition.

“Science” is said to be “Value Neutral”. And if so, it would be awkward for Social Science to comment on power.

[Wright Mills’ work on “Power Elite” (1959) was “disproved”, according to my Sociologist friends. They told me of their “feeling of relief” by it, for they did not like too much of “Radical Politics” in academic discourse.]

Besides, in the “Free World” that North Americans were proud of, there ought not to be “Power” which might be controlling the proud “Free Individualists”, except perhaps the Almighty Power of the God that they believe and presumably obey.

It might also be that the memory of Hitler who played with phrases like “Will To Power” was not forgotten. It was bad enough for any north American to be called “Pinko”, let alone being associated with Nazism. This, however, does not mean that Americans disliked “Power”. On the contrary, Americans then were almost intoxicated by their perception of themselves as the “World Power”.

[There was a sense of the U.S.A. as the heir of the defunct British Empire. Documents such as National Security Council-68 drafted in 1950 clearly spelled out the notion of the USA as the New Empire. See, M. Kaku and D. Axelrod To Win A Nuclear War. Black Rose Books 1987.

Kissinger was a “Power Ideologist” and wrote in Foreign Affairs 1958-59, “America needed to construct its World View in terms of Power and Will” and “Statesmen must act as if their intuition were already experience, as if their aspiration were Truth”. Eisenhower apparently failed to understand the “Power Philosophy”, but Kennedy came to make a

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Indigenous Science

On Science: Power/Love // The Dominant/The Repressed

For Education Seminar

On Science: Power/Love // The Dominant/The Repressed

1. It is well known that just before his death, Einstein talked about a necessity of changing “The Way of Thinking”. That was some 35 years ago. He warned that while everything else changed since two explosions of Atomic Bombs, our way of thinking had not changed. And as the consequence, we are drifting towards our own annihilation by the power of our own science. He meant our way of science has to be changed. His saying is famous, but so far we have failed to heed his warning.

Today, the danger of all-out Nuclear War between the two superpower nations has somewhat receded. But, we have not eliminated the possibility of Nuclear Holocaust. And, we have problems of Air and Water Pollutions, Acid Rain, Waste Disposal, and accelerated destruction of Natural Environment, all thanks to the rapid developments in our Science-Technology. We have come to suffer increasing Stress, Tension, Anxiety and Alienation in our society. Despite Economic developments, the gap between the Poor and the Rich is widening. We have now Permanent unemployment as a part of our economic structure, demoralizing young generation into despair. Economic inequality, internal to our own country as well as in international sense is reaching a degree that can be called criminally immoral.

We may not think of ourselves as privileged, but Canadians are within the top 10% of the richest nations and the fact that we are in a university places in the top 10% of Canadians. That puts us in the richest 1% of the Humanity. The poor half of the Humanity live with an annual income less than $500. We are the “Yuppies”. Yet we cannot escape the problems of the World today.

Even if we think of Education to be the means to attain “Good Life” in personal sense, let alone thinking of Education for a better life of Humanity as a whole, we are failing. The warning of Einstein still stands like a bad prophecy. Einstein meant “Science” to be the “Way of Thinking” that has to be changed. But we have failed to do so. Perhaps, that is why Educators are concerned about Science (and Technology), and that is where “Love Science” comes in [*1]

2. But, you might ask what is wrong with “Science”. Did it not work wonders? Let us think about this, for answering this question is one way to understand that our science is “Power Science” and also we may pick up some clues as to how to change that.

Let me take the “Progress” of science-technology for example, and talk about it a bit. In the past 400 years or so, the progress was fantastic and it brought a general improvement of Physical Health standard. In industrialized countries, it helped the peasant class, at least some of them in the class, to climb out of the life of heavy physical labors and created the “middle class”, if not “affluent” consumers. This came about because our “Power Technology” provided the means to convert and substitute the Fossil Energy for Human Muscle Power. The fossil energy had been accumulated and stored on the Earth for the past hundreds of millions of years. It was just sitting there. To exploit it was a very “clever” move, as I shall explain below.

Thanks to the free gift of Fossil Energy, we, at least some of us, are liberated from heavy physical labors to do things like science. (Please remember that we are the top 1% of the Humanity, and ones who have Time to think. The rest of Humanity hardly have the “Luxury” of thinking. That puts us in a certain obligation.) And, at the same time, in order for the Progress of Technology to continue, Science as its Infrastructure had to be developed. This made up a “Positive Feedback Loop that can be nicknamed “Vicious Circle” and it took off and escalated. We call this phenomenon Industrial-Scientific Revolution. To be sure, for the Industrialization to advance, other Infrastructures, such as organizational management, systems of market distribution and government control had to be developed. The emergence of modern Nation-State and Colonialism coincided with the Industrial Revolution, not by chance but by necessity. Modern School Education system was also a product of the historical time. The development of Science was only a small part of the huge social movement as such.

3. However, the concentrated massive power is the characteristic of Industry. for an illustration, let us look at Energy Economy, (Physical Power Economy). In the U.S. and Canada, the average Energy Consumption per capita is like 10 tons of Coal Equivalent per year. In terms of “Human Power” unit, this amount is about 300 “Human Power-Year”. That is to say , we have 300 slaves working for each of us. This is the reason why we have only 4% of working population in agriculture and we can still have plenty of foods.

Of course, we only use about 1/3 of that power for production of things and efficiency is low like 10%. Nonetheless; we are supported by the Fossil Power Input, equivalent of 10 very diligent slaves for each of us in average. But the labor force working in the primary energy production sector is less than 1% of the total. That is to say, the concentration of the energy sector is such that one person can provide for energy needs of 100 other workers. This is an example of “Concentration” of Power just as Nuclear Bombs are. (Every one manpower invested in primary Energy Industry is returned some 10,000 manpower equivalent of “raw” Energy. Unfortunately, this will not last too long.)

Number of active Physicists in North America is about 50,000. Scientists and Engineers combined, we may have 750,000. That is about 0.4% of the total population. They are the “Producers” of the “Science-Technology” as the infrastructure of the industry and the rest are the passive “Consumers” of the science-technology as such. [*2]

4. Thus, you might wonder if Public Education System needs to care about Science Education at all. It might make sense to have specialized schools for scientists and engineers — like “Military Schools” and let them concentrate on Science Education. Even if there is a failure rate of 80%, the Lethbridge School District needs only one Science Education Class for each grade, and the rest of the children may be spared of the pain, frustration and humiliation of taking Science-Math courses which they hate anyway. As far as the Science that is needed for Production Industry is concerned, that would be sufficient.

If so, is it not a waste of time, money, and manpower to try “Ramming Physics down the throats” of children who are going to be passive consumers of “science” as such? In terms of economic efficiency, University of Lethbridge need not have a Physics Department. It is a lot economical to pay the specialized students to go to “The Western Canada Federal Industrial Science University” where Research in such Science can also be concentrated. (U.S.S.R. seems to practice this.) Science is often said to be “universal” and “International”. If so, why not let a few American Elite Institutions for science-Technology take care of all North American needs in this regard?

At any rate, unless one is going to be a Hard-Hat Scientist or Engineer, why should anybody know anything about Science of that sense?

I ask the above questions to you, for I hope you would think about what “Science” means to you, What Values Science has, other than being an Infrastructure to Production Industry.

Your answers to the questions, I think are keys to the fundamental question of Science Education, and ways to respond to Einstein’s warning.

[*1. Historical note.]

I quoted Einstein’s statement made in 1954. But a long time before that the questions about “Science” and its relations with “Labor”, “Industrial Production”, “Power” and “Love” were raised by the 18th and 19th century Utopian thinkers.

F.E. Manuel. Utopian Thought In The Western World. (Harvard U. Press 1979. Leth. Pub. Lib. 335.02.M.) has chapters titled “New Face of Love”, “The triumph of Love”, etc. referring to Count Claude Heri de Saint-Simon (1790-1825), and Francois Marie Charles Fourier (1772-1838).

You find in the book that these philosophers dealt with problems of “Science” and “Love”, and rightly or wrongly made concrete proposals for Education so as to make an ideal Society. Interestingly, at first Saint-Simon was a believer of Science and sought salvation of humanity in Science. But he soon came to criticize the failures of “scientists” already some 200 years ago. He saw that scientists were no more than servants to Industry.

If you read on to Robert Owen and Karl Marx et al who followed, you find a long history of the unresolved struggle about “Science” relative to “Power” and “Love”.

As to Historical Development of “Masculine Science”,  Brian Easleea Witch Hunting, Magic and the New Philosophy, and Evelyn Fox Keller Reflections on the Gender and Science offer analyses.

As to Ideological Struggles about “Human Science” since the time of Marx, Paul Ricoeur’s Lectures On Ideology and Utopia gives a philosophical analysis.]

[*2. Canada has 1.2 Scientists & Engineers per 1,000 population. U.S. has 3.2, Germany (w) 2.1, Japan 4.3 (1981-82). About 40% of the U.S. scientists and Engineers are employed in the military-industrial complex, which makes the number to be about 1.9.

It is also known that some 1/2 of the US graduate students in science and Technology is imported from abroad. The science Education there, even for a limited purpose of supporting Industry, is failing, despite many “Tinkering” attempted on Science Curriculum. A recent joke (half serious) is that in order to free Male scientists to do SDI, science Education has to attract more Females who could replace Males in Science Teaching. That Teaching is considered to be “less important” than Research is the current ideology in the North America, and the joke carries the obvious Male Chauvinism.]

[References]

F. Cottrell. Energy And Society.

J.M. Fowler. Energy and the World.

E. Shumacher. Small Is Beautiful.

B. Ward. Spaceship EArth.

J. Ellul. The Technological System.

A. Toffler. The Third Wave.

D. Bell. The coming of Post-Industrial Society.

K. Polanyi. The Great Transformation.

E.P. Thompson. The Poverty of Theory and Other Essays.

F. Capra. The Turning Point.

M. Bellmann. Reenchantment of the World.

B. Easlea. Witch Hunting, Magic and the New Philosophy.

E. Fox Keller. Reflections On the Gender and Science.

P. Medawar. The Limits of Science.

M. Weber. Science As a Profession. (in Gerth and Mills. From Max Weber.)

H. Marcuse. One Dimensional Man.

Eros and Civilization.

M. Foucault. Archaeology of Knowledge. Power/Knowledge

F.W. Manuel. Utopian Thought in the Western World.

P. Ricoeur. Lectures on Ideology and Utopia.

I. Illich. Shadow Work.

P. Freire. Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

P. Colorado. “Science: A Way Of Knowing – AWay of Life” (in Child Welfare Needs. Indian Association of Alberta.)

Appendix to Part I.

On Tunnel Vision, Peripheral Vision, A-Life-Through-Doing-One-Thing-At-A-Time, Columbus’s Vision, and Dream Map In Your Head.

There are differences in Ways of Thinking, (Levels of intelligence, or Quality of Mind, etc.) But it seems that people tend not to see them. Using familiar examples, I would like to demonstrate the differences. The examples are also useful in distinguishing Power Science and Love Science. Besides, for teachers to know the differences in the ways mind works may have a pedagogical value. Let me cite 3 examples.

(A). Wayne Gretzky is said to be capable of knowing what his teammates are doing while chasing a puck towards the goal. The defense men of the other team try to block his advance not only by physical presence but try harassment, so that Gretzky may be disoriented. In this sense Hockey is different from Baseball. It is just as a “mental” game as a game of physical power. You like Hockey because it is a complex game, besides being a Powerful and Exciting one.

I do not know much about Hockey, but I count on your knowledge to try illustrating what it means to have a different way of thinking , or different levels of intelligence. Help me.

My question is this. How does Wayne know and keep track of his teammates while concentrating on the puck in front of him?

Chasing the puck is a “Goal Oriented” task. Your eyes are fixed on the Object. You are moving the Object to the Goal with all of your Power and don’t have time to look around. You have a Tunnel Vision to do that. That is the situation Newtonian Mechanics deals with. The motion is from a point A to point B. Yu force the way through. That is the way Power Science thinks; Max Weber in Science As A Profession, talked about this and said “If you are not willing to put on Blinders, you’d better go see a movie (i.e. you are not cut out to be a scientist/scholar)” If you have a purpose, you better concentrate on it. “One Track Mind” is the must in science. You understand that.

But that is not quite enough. Gretzky has something else in his mind. Remind you that just breaking through the defense is difficult enough. You do not have too much room left in your mind to think about something else, like which movies to go, etc.

Yet, it is said that Gretzky has a kind of “Moving Map” in his head and know where his teammates are at that moment and also anticipate where they are going to be. He also knwos defensemen of the other team are coming at him and about to give him a hard body check into the side wall. The Map is not the usual static one at a given time, but a dynamic one that contains anticipated Future, or the “Flow of the Game”. In that sense, the Map is a Relativistic one.

[I do not know, but I do not think Gretzky has ever taken Relativity course. Here, what is important is not whether Gretzky knows Relativity in formal sense or not. What is important is that, as educators or educators-to-be, you recognize it. The role of educators is not “teaching” anything like Relativity, but to recognize it in actions of people and encourage them. Any mediocre person can read physics texts to a roomful of students and think it “teaching”. To recognize what students are doing takes more understanding than just ability to read off texts.

Particularly, I think this ability to “recognize” what is in children is an absolute necessity, if one wishes to get involved in Cross Cultural Education.]

The “Map” is imaginary thing in his head. And I do not know how he carry and maintain it. He is not looking around. It seems that he make up the Map by Periphery Vision, plus perhaps by Intuition, Instinctive Feeling, or Dream-like Fantasy.

As to Periphery Vision, we know one thing. That is, even the 100 yard sprinter running gets the sense of his Body Balance from Periphery Vision. The sprinter has a Tunnel Vision as to the goal and the track in front of him or her. What the sprinter is doing is “One Track Minded” thing. But the Tunnel Vision on an object does not tell how one’s body is oriented. It is the Periphery Vision that tells your body orientation relative to the Environment that you are Not Looking At.

If you make an analogy here, you can sense what I am driving at. The way our Power Science and Technology do things is very much like the 100 yard race. Things are done with a Tunnel Vision, often in competitions with something or somebody. That is, Power Science-Technology has not Periphery Vision to sense its own orientation. The Natural and Social Environment is ignored.

What I am insinuating here is that Love Science is like Periphery Vision. Gretzky got it.

(B) To illustrate the Power of having a Map further, let me cite a historical event. This has to do with how Christopher Columbus got to America. In a sense, this is a bad example in that the Power was used to help build European Colonies. But the Map of Columbus is also a dramatic example of the fundamental method of modern science that I cannot resist citing.

Before Columbus’ time, European navigators were sailing along coastline using landmarks. The mode of operation is characteristically “One Thing At A Time”. This science of navigation was good enough for them to navigate around Mediterranean. It was powerful enough for them to go along African coast to its southern tip. They used to make maps with Landmarks. But to copy maps, and other reasons, they start drawing lines on maps. You note that these lines are not “Real”. They do not exist out on the ocean. They only exist on maps that human minds made. They are mental artifacts.

But the imaginary lines had a great effect on the way people think and act. Once lines are on the map, it is a matter of time for some navigator to think of sailing along a line, like “go on East Wind 10 knots for 2 days” and trace the course on a map to keep track of where the ship is. In fact, Spanish navy perfected the method to locate a fleet in the middle of the Atlantic shortly before Columbus’s time. Columbus learned that. Combined with the knowledge-vision that the Earth is round — and fortuitously there was an error that made the Earth look half its size —, Columbus came to see that India was just 40 days of sailing to the West.

Of course, only Columbus came to have the Map-Vision. Navigating on Imaginary Line was a new science, and others, even a map was shown, would not have had confidence in it anyway. The story says that Columbus had a mutiny on his ship, but since crews did not know how they could set a course to go home, he was not killed.

In a way, the lines are the Man-made Rules imposed on the Nature, and imaginary ones at that. Yet the Imaginary lines imposed on Space-Time was the foundation of modern Geometry and Physics. From that Descartes’ Analytical Geometry emerged, though the story is that Descartes had a Dream in which and Angel appeared and told him how to start New Science. Newton was very much impressed by Descartes’s Geometry and wrote his Mechanics emulating Descartes. Einstein came some 250 years after Newton and negated him, but he also used an Imaginary Map, i.e, Geometry.

Now the point of narrating this story of Imaginary Map is that Gretzky is doing precisely what Columbus, Descartes, Newton, Einstein did. He overcomes the Tunnel Vision by having a Map in his head. By the help of Imaginary Map, which he is not even conscious of, he can do something beyond “reacting” to the immediate situation in front of him, and go beyond the level of “intelligence” that is characteristic to the mode of operation called “One Thing At a Time”.

(C) When you become a grade one teacher, you have some 30 children each doing different things, each having peculiar problems, crying and laughing and some have to go to the bathroom. As a teacher, you care for each one and every one all the time. You know what each of them is doing and what they are about to do. If you think Gretzky is a miracle, you are a miracle.

How do you do that? Your answer probably is “One Thing at a Time”. After all, that is the most any human being can do. But what about your Periphery Vision? While you are wiping off Jony’s bloody nose, you are aware Betty and Rosy are pulling each other’s hair.

On the top of it, you have a Map in your Head called Lesson Plan or Day Plan. The Map is like Ideal Dream and never works under daylight. Nonetheless, without the Map, you would not be able to keep your sanity.

When you said “I do one thing at a  time, and just keep going”, you are not telling the truth. You do not work like Scientists in teaching grade one. You have to care about everything at the same time. But you somehow keep your physical and mental balance relative to, or by the help of the imaginary Map you have in your head. It is just that you are not “Consciously” thinking about it when you are rushing Nick to the bathroom.

What a human mind can do is amazing. Consciously thinking is just a minor insignificant fragment. Our “Rational Thinking” cannot do that, so we say “ONe Thing At A Time”. And we imagine we are running in a Maze with a Tunnel Vision. (The reason why Maze is confusing and disorienting is that we do not see the whole picture. That is when we have no Map. We do not have Environment to know where we are and guide our way out.)

—–

I think you know what I am talking about. When you are in the world of children, you no longer have the luxury of having a Tunnel Vision on one object called “children” or “Class”. You are in it. They are all around you. Perhaps, you feel as if you are trapped in a Maze and you say to yourself that all you can do is to do “One Thing At a Time”. But actually, you do have Peripheral vision, Environmental awareness, Dynamic Map, and are performing a miracle.

“Love Science” to me is to recognize that miracle of yours, feel dignified and enjoy it.

***I add here two notes. (i) Today, Science is fragmented and no longer has a Vision-Map. It is pursuing “One Thing At A Time” with a tunnel vision. I am afraid, Science today, in that sense, has retrogressed, (ii) The Science of “visionary-Map” navigation was practiced by Polynesians long before Europeans came to know it. Native Hunters in the North woodlands also knew the Science, as Hugh Brody’s book Maps and Dreams (a NAS text) illustrates.

 

Indigenous Science

Notes on Power, Love, and Science: From Agony to Max Weber

DRAFT — Handwritten Notes added in Italics

Notes on Power, Love, and Science:

—From Agony to Max Weber —

Program:

1. Preliminary Notes: Why dig up Weber this late?

2. Texts by Weber, analysis/interpretation.

[“Religious Rejections of the World And Their Direction” (Gerth and Mill).

“The Relationship of Religion to Politics, Economics, Sexuality, and Art” (Fischoff)

My intention is to read these texts as if they included “Science” in the title “Religion”]

3. Love Science Possible?

—Being Rational and Becoming Wise —

—–

I. Preliminary Notes: Why dig up Weber this late?

1-1. How I came to read “good old” Weber again?

Weber’s works are the classics in sociology. One might say Weber started “Social Science” and presumably all social scientists have read Weber, just as every physicist reads Newtonian Mechanics.

Yet, in listening to social scientists in a North American setting, I used to notice that their works do not seem to reflect their knowing of Weber’s works. By and large, Weber is forgotten or ignored. I knew Marxists do not like Weber. But most of social scientists in North America are not Marxists and would deny that they have an “ideological bias”. So that was not the reason.

I thought perhaps Weber has become obsolete. Sociology in recent times has had sophistication surpassing Weber, particularly in “scientific” methodology. Weber’s works might be thought as belonging to the “pre-science” level of Sociology. For one thing Weber did not take Statistics on questionnaires and thus is “out of style” in the modern Sociology.

[In contrast, every physicist today would say that Newton’s Mechanics was superseded by Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. They even say Newtonian Mechanics is “wrong”. Yet, they do still read and even use it. That it was “proved” to be wrong, does not make Newton “obsolete”. Physics is “co-operative” and “constructive” in that sense. It is built on the works in the past. Even mistakes are not wasted.

The attitude of social scientists seems to be “competitive” and “arrogant” in this respect. They have too much of Oedipus Complex?]

But my friends did not suggest me any reason why they discarded Weber.

I even suspected racial prejudice against Germans. Although British American academics do exhibit anti-continental bias, that did not seem to be sufficient.

I have been puzzled about this curious social phenomenon in sociology. In order to find out what has happened to Weber’s work, I picked up a few books and read a few pages. [1] To my surprise, it was I myself who had forgotten Weber! I found Weber in despair, and defeated into “Power Science”. Yet his yearning and struggle for “Love Science” are evident. To my interest in the possibility of “Love Science”, Weber provides a nice text/material, though his conclusion is negative. I intend to analyze why (how) Weber came to the negative verdict.

[Weber reached his negative conclusion, because he started with an axiomatic proposition that “Rationality” is born out of the World View that basic human relation is conflict/strife. And consequently he would not get out of the world of conflict/strife where Love can only be “irrational”, “insanity”. To overcome the conflict/strife among and enforce any control over irrational fighters, a stronger force (violence) is needed. That leads society to Nation-State which is the ultimate violence. “Rationality” is the justification of the ultimate violence. And European Science is based on “Rationality” as such. I shall discus this further in part 2 and 3.]

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full use of it.]

But, it is “Right that is more popular word/notion among north Americans and Scholars of the time. they were not quite out of the McCarthyism. In the Cold War climate, there was a subtle anxiety as to talking of certain subjects. Not that academics liked McCarthy nor did they necessarily support Cold War Ideology, but they appeared to have exercised “avoiding troubles” and “choosing rewarding topics”. They were,  in general “defensive”. That is how “The Universe of Discourse” among scientists then was formed.

Even today, I sense that North American Social Scientists are “defensive”. They talk of Human Right, but not much about the Dynamics of Power. Talks of Power actually presuppose existence of Power or Power Structure in which “Right” appears as “resistance” and “protection”. But in the rhetoric of talking about “Right”, “Power” is implicit, not direct target of attention. The rhetoric does let people to have a discourse on problems of power in a sense of “reacting to” them, but it avoids directing the discourse to the essence of Power question of how the Power exists and is maintained in the first place. The “Human Right” rhetoric  covertly makes the Power and its violence “acceptable,” say like, “It is there and one cannot do anything about its existence itself” or “Power is a part of the Given Social Condition which cannot easily be changed and hence one ought not to attempt to change. And since one is not going to change it, it ought not be talked about.”

Talks of “Human Right”, (“Property Right”, etc.) do not intend to deny the “Right” of a “Sovereign Nation-State” of exercising its violence such as declaring War, imprisoning and quarantining people. “Right” is technological “moderations — “sugar coating” — of the fundamental violence. It does not intend to eliminate violence, but “justify under conditions”, specify the procedures, and the manner of violence. But, of course, it may be thought as “the best one can”, given that humans are aggressive beasts.

That is not what I am concerned. The problem comes when the technology of “the best one can” becomes the foundation of “Rationality” and hence “Science”. Love is then excluded from Ratinality and Science. That is the problem. And modern social scientists do not question their metaphysical assumption that “humans are fundamentally aggressive,

Weber talked about “Legality” in Wirtschaft and Gesellschaft. Woody might be interested in this. America, our schools in general ignore “Rechtssociologie”.

“Right” refers to what is permitted by and within a given power structure. For Native Americans to be granted the “Right” to hunt and fish is not the same thing as having “Power” to do the same. When we come to consider “Love and Nature” as a part of Native Science, we shall have further complications–you see why I am stuck!

violent”. “Right” is a compromise between fighting beasts.

*See also: Wirtschaft and Gesellschaft for “Law”/ Niklas Luhmann Rechtssociologie

Radical left scholars who followed the orthodox Marxist belief in “Power Struggle” did not wish to talk critically about Power either. They see Power is the instrument to be used by the “Vanguard of the History” (i.e. Communist Elite) for the construction of the Proletariat Utopia. But, at the same time, they appeared to have had a “gut feeling” that Power is fundamentally “Irrational”, despite their rationalization.

Hume said “Reason is, and ought only to be, a Slave to Passion”, If so, then “Science” as something about “The Means” is not competent to deal with the “Passion” (Will, Desire, Value, etc.) that exercises Power. And Scientists and Scholars are, then nothing more than technical “assistants” at their best to the “Sovereign Power Being”. Prostitutes have a better position in that they might touch the Passion of the Sovereign Power Being. By some reason, Scientists and Scholars, at least in their pretense, talked as if dealing with “Passion” is below their intellectual dignity. [Kissinger was merely “honest” in this respect.]

Weber became, in effect, a persona non grata, because of the “defensiveness” of Scientists and Scholars.

1-2. Weber’s personal struggle in Power and Love.

Weber characterizes “Power” as “that which forces people to do what they do not otherwise do”. And it was placed as the fundamental element of every human relation, upon which Social Relations were considered to be built. Weber did recognize “Love/Eros/Affinity” in human relations, but he concluded that they are “irrational” and unfit as foundation of social institutions — may they be “marriage”, “economy”, “legal”, “religions” or “politics” —.

Ironically, Weber’s writings betray an inordinate internal struggle with regard to the question of Power and Love. It is as if Weber wanted some sensitive souls to sense that what he formally announced in his “Science” were quite opposite of his internal feeling. In the name of “Science”, he had to say what he said. But at the same time, he had apparent pain in obeying the “Norm” of Science, which he himself imposed on his works. He advocated “scientific objectivity” and “Rationality” in the strongest argument that he could find. But then he turned around and cried in the pain that “Iron Cage” of science gave him. [See Mitzman. “Iron Cage”.]

It is well known that Weber had difficulties with his “Junker” father and “religious” mother. He could not respect “philistine” father. Nor could he accept “spiritualist” mother. He went to military school and became an army officer. He engaged in “duels” and at one time got his face cut. It is said that his mother slapped him for that. He disliked “stupid” military, but at the same time he took pleasure in displaying “machismo” and was a proud officer. He had an affair with a girl and then married another, which bothered him a great deal later on. He had many nervous breakdowns. He had to fight with his own conditions of mind alternating between “high excitement and deep depression” which were out of his control. In short, Weber was a huge bundle of inner contradictions.

[See the introduction to From Max Weber by H.H. Gerth and C.W. Mills. Galaxy Books. 1958. H38 W36.]

His intense search of “Science” (Rational Intelligence) was not just for “academic” interest nor accidental. He was searching for a salvation of his soul in the quest of “Science”. I admire Weber for this. At least, his “Science” was not for “academic prestige/promotion”, “salary increments”, which he advocated in his “Science As A Vocation”. He was dead serious.

1-3. The Inner Conflict/Strife of Modern European Intellectuals.

*+ “Modernity or Modernism? Weber + contemporary social theory in lash.

One can see the same “conflict” in the modern intellectual movements in Germany, say in Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Nietzsche, Goethe, Marx, Freud, Mannheim, Marcuse, Habermas, et al. In the 19th century, the “Peasant” Germany was trying to respond to the “industrial Revolution”, which invaded her. It set a peculiar tradition for German intellectuals. Germans were asking questions to themselves. Adapt “Science” and survive? Resist it? Make it acceptable? Fight and win the race to the modern scientific/intellectual hegemony? They were apprehensive about “Science-Technology” and at the same time they were trying to “Modernize” Germany. To them, “Science” was an enigma and hope.

[as to the “cultural/intellectual” history, see P. Ricoeur Lectures On Ideology And Utopia. Columbia U Press 1986.]

The intellectual turmoil in historical Germany has a good parallel with what Weber had to go through in personal sense. And in European Intellectual Tradition, the sharp, conflict, confrontation, crisis, were the well-spring of intellectual achievements. Marx’s sense of “Dialectics of Class Struggle” and Freud’s sense of “Oedipus Complex” are cases in point. “Strife” is the trademark of European Intellectuality. From the European standard, Oriental “attitudes” such as Zen and Tao are not “Intellectual”, let alone “Scientific”. Marx called it “Asiatic” in a sense of contempt.

I add here that Native Americans and Intelligentsia in “Colonial countries” have the same trouble as Germans had in the 19th century, in their confrontation with invading “European Science/Technology/Rationality”.

[See V. Deloria God Is Red.

E.W. Said Orientalism.

Pantheon Books 1978. DS12 524.

(This is from an Islamic point of view)

Nathan Reigold. Scientific Colonialism.

Smithsonian Inst. Press 1987.]

There is also a parallel in “Feminist Science”.

[See Evelyn Fox Keller. Reflections On Gender And Science.

Yale Univ. Press 1985.

Hilary Rose and Steven Rose. Ideology Of/In The Natural Sciences. G.K. Hall & Co. 1979.

Mary Field Belenky. Women’s Ways of Knowing. Basic Books 1986.]

1-4. The Epistemology of the Oppressed.

I had some interest in “Native Science” that a small group of Native American scholars in my locality was doing. I soon came to realize that the central issue in the research is “Power of Knowledge; European versus Native”.

The “Power of Knowledge” became an important issue, because the overt physical violence used by “Conquistador” was replaced by a more effective means of repression, which is the control by “Science/Knowledge”. We have now “Epistemological Oppression”.

The typical everyday example of “Epistemological Oppression” is that the oppressed people have “no voice”. It is not that the oppressed did not complain. They do. But they are not “heard”. The reason is simple. The intellectuals in the position to effect social scale communication regard the “Voice of the Victims” as not “scientific”, “Objective”, “Rational”, “Inarticulate” etc. That is, the poor people have no “authority” nor “legitimacy” to command listening. They are denied the access to the communication.

[See Bishop Remi De Roo. Cries of Victims, Voice Of God. Novalis. 1986.]

And it is more tragic that the people themselves have the tendency of worshiping “intellectual heroes”. I observed that people, and academics  alike, tend to listen and “believe” big name “scientists” such as Carl Sagan. Suppose a child suggested to them that, say, “Universe may be like an Infinite Series of Images made of two parallel mirrors”, nobody would pay any attention. They have to be told by Big Name Scientists and get “impressed”. Not that they do not know fallacy of “Hero Worship” in Science. In fact they complain against the discrimination. But the statement from a child is not “quotable” in academic communication, whereas the same sentence from a Big Name Scientist has a “quoting value”. And the very people who complain that “nobody listens to me” do not in general listen to children or their own close friends. The discrimination has a “One-Way” hierarchical structure. It is tragic when that happens to ethnic minorities. In a mutual contempt, they deny their own access to the “grassroots support” that their community could provide. “Power Science” enforces such a tendency among the oppressed and silenced.

We note here that “knowing” in the professional sense has little to do with a scholar’s living, other than in the sense of job security and winning the competition for prestige and power positions. If a statement is not “quotable”, it is useless for “publication” on which they depend their life. Their “Knowledge Acquisition” (they call “Knowledge Production” in a megalomaniac conceit) is “Alienated Work”.

It would be quite a different story, if the “knowing” has to do with actual life — say, asking where the bathroom is in an urgent need —. Even a child can be a great help. Scholars and Scientists would appreciate the value and thank the child. But in the formal sense of “knowing” (science), “helpful communication” as such does not count.

The “knowing” in formal, institutional Science is primarily for “Knowledge Claim”, not for “helping people”. And if the Scientists and Scholars wish to have “Immortality” in their Knowledge Claim, they have to “register” the claim. The helpful communication that ordinary people provide for each other is not “Immortal” but “Ephemeral”. It helps and disappears. Scientists and Scholars, as “professionals” in the Knowledge Claim competition could not afford to waste their mind on “insignificant” statements of little children or people with no “authority”.

And even in ordinary conversations, we often engage in “Knowledge Competition”. Whoever utters a “New Knowledge,” say, read from newspapers or new books — win their game. The primary aim of talks as such is “Display of Knowledge” in the “One-Upmanship” game. It matters very little that what was said helps nobody. One tries to sound “smart” and gain”admiration”. Suppose one tries to help one’s friend by offering a comment that touches on an important problem in the friend’s life; it is most likely resented. Unless one is confident in the degree of “intimacy” with the person, one must regard offering a “too personal comment” is unwelcome offense, and it is not good “etiquette”.

We do know the disgusting habit of “righteously superior” people to offer “free advices” unsolicited. They are not “polite”. Even to our own children, we try to control our impulse to offer “free advice”. We should be careful! People could be offended by offer of help. I wonder in what degree even Lovers tolerate mutual help. Rather the game of “news” is relatively innocent.

Weber had something to say about this. He thought that intellectual discourse is fundamentally a “Power Struggle”. He suggested that even Lovers cannot avoid “dominating”, “subjugating” and thereby “exploiting” in mental sense. To him, the propensity of women to submit themselves to the intellectual domination of males and become “willing victims” is “Irrational”, yet that seemed the only “practical” way the Love Relation can be maintained. However, in his despair he did suggest the possibility of “Grace” — he used this word only once in the entire book —, but did not say any more than using the word. [I shall come back to this point later.]

But, that tell us that we do not “communicate”. We do not like to listen, even if it is really helpful. We resent precisely because “helpful communication” is “real”. And we do not wish to know other people’s troubles, because we have our own and we might be embarrassed to realize that we have no ability to help So we stay in “pleasant” exchanges of superficial greeting, such as “good morning”. When we say “How are you?,
we do not really mean to say that we are interested.

In this way, people with low social status are denied of the access to social scale communication. The Native Scientists know that well, for they suffer the very same “discrimination” and they talk about “Silenced People” in the History. Yet, it seems that they are not aware that they themselves do the same to the “Powerless”.

[Subnote 1-4. Example of mutual disrespect among the oppressed.

It is well known that even unionized Laborers vote for the Conservative Politicians. Not that workers trust the politician, but they do not trust themselves. Weber would point out that “Power” could not exist without the “Dependency” of the subjugated.

We might go to a small town and observe how the town council makes decisions, say on the basis of “Expert Recommendation”. There may be oppositions from townspeople and they might make a presentation to the town council. The typical attitude of the councilors is to say “Whose opinion do we believe?” Obviously the councilmen have no ability to “think” for themselves and have to depend on “Experts” from a Consultant Firm in a Big City. The town pays several hundred thousand dollars to the experts and ask for “Scientific Research”. Having paid for it, they cannot now listen to townspeople, who are “obviously” uneducated, ignorant, and, worse, “emotional”. That is to say, the councilmen do not believe that townspeople can be “intelligent”. It is logically understandable. As far as the councilmen are concerned they represent the best of the town’s intelligence otherwise they would not be elected. But since they do not know, they have to believe that nobody in town knows. That is the reason why they asked the Consultants. And that is what Weber discussed under the terms of “Legitimacy” and “Authority”. From that “Ought”, one can easily slip to “Is” of the fact.

It used to be said “If you are so smart, how come you are not rich (and powerful)”. One can sympathize with such sayings and understand that the issue of “Credibility” is important — for the most cases in politics have to do with “unknowns” and the community has to “gamble” on the basis of incomplete set of information —. The real issue is not the “Fact” which belongs to the Past, but “Trust” in the Future sense. We do not make important decisions by opinions of anybody whose past record does not impress us. But that is not because the Past Record is relevant. An opinion at a particular time expressed in a statement is not actually the issue. The issue is “With Whom One Feels Like Risking Life?” Certainly, we do not go into a venture with “Losers”. We look for “Winner/Hero — i.e. Authority, The Power —.

If the National Leader says “Let us fight a War”, you follow. Suppose your wife says do not like War. You say to her and to yourself “That is irrational. I cannot and ought not follow women’s intuition”, Besides, following wife’s instinct is below man’s intellectual dignity. It hurts your pride in “manhood”. That is why we go to wars. Needless to say, there are plenty of “Rational arguments” why you have to fight. In our history, there was no war that was not intellectually “justified” and “rationalized”.

Such cases make us question as to why we “repress” our feelings hinder “intellect – just like colonial officers suppress colonized people and that is the problem of “Power Knowledge” that I would like to discuss in this note.

[See also:

Max Weber. The Sociology of Religion. (19220 (Tr) E. Fishoff. Beacon Press 1956. BL 60 W433.

Arthur Mitzman.  The Iron Cage. A.Knopf 1970. Hm22 G3 W455

S. Lash and S. Whimster (ed) Max Weber, Rationality And Modernity. Alen & Unwin 1987 . JM22 83 W454735.

E.W. Said. “Foucault and the Imagination of Power”. in D.C. Hoy (ed). Foucault: A Critical Leader. Blackwell 1986.]

1-6. Asiatic Sense of Knowing

Weber is a European Scientist. His sense of Knowing and Intellect is distinctively European. There are, however, non-European sense of Knowing and Intellect.

The first thing Confucius said in the Analects — which is the most important text of all Confucian teaching — is that:

“Is it not pleasure to learn and in times recall what one has learned and fondle them. It is like having an old friend visiting from afar. If people around me does not know this pleasure, it is nothing to warm up about. (Pleasure is mine)”.

Of course the above is my translation. When I was taught Confucius, my teachers did not offer such a translation. Rather, my teachers and scholars alike hurriedly passed the first paragraph and went into the “technology” of how to maintain ritual orders etc. I hated Confucius. But by a chance I came to read the text again, I noticed that in the first paragraph Confucius was stating the Purpose of Learning. The purpose was “Pleasure”. One studies in order to know “Friend”. Confucius did care about pragmatics of rituals for the good of society. But “Knowing” was not for the “utilitarian value” nor the “Moral Cords”. It was simply the pleasure of having Friend.

Such “Knowledge”, if it is called knowledge, has nothing what so ever to do with “Power”. Just as it is absurd to “Claim Friend”, the “Knowledge of Friend” is not claimable. In this, Confucius was much like Taoists and Zen Learners.

I mention this as an example of Non-European sense of Knowing. It is a “Sensual Pleasure” that the Knowledge is cherished.

To be sure, even in Europe, there is “Knowing the Sensual Pleasure”. Knowing Art, Music, and Poetry is of that kind. But that is definitely outside the sense of Knowing of European Science. It is not “Rational” from European sense of Epistemology.

We open any European text books on Epistemology, and read a few paragraphs. We would notice that the preoccupation of “Philosophers” in Epistemology is “Justifying the Power/Authority of Claimed Knowledge”.

In the Oriental sense, no Justification is needed.

You say “That is Irrational”? If you say so, I agree. For the term “Rational/Irrational” is defined in the context of having conflicts and power struggles as to knowledge claim. (It came from Religious Inquisition, where “right or wrong,” was a deadly serious matter that People were often burned on stake or stoned. Socrates was pre-Christian. But even then the “Truth” of knowledge Claim was a serious matter in which “wrong” was punishable by death. That is far different from the “Sensual Pleasure” of Tao, Zen or Confucius.

I am interested and proposing to look at Weber from Non-Authoritarian view of Knowing. I note that Weber went into despair because he could not resolve “conflict” even between Lovers. The reason is his European Intellect stood on Power Conflict. Using such an Intellect/Rationality, he naturally could not resolve the Conflict of Sexes.

Confucius would have recommended to have “Proper Ritual of Mutual Respect” between Sexes. That would be “practical”. Weber, however, sensed that Sex (Erotic Relation) has “Religious” significance. That is: Sex (Eros) is something “Sacred” to Weber. Therefore, he would not go along with Confucius. To that I rather take Weber’s side.

Nonetheless, Confucius offers a perspective from which one can see what Weber was thinking/feeling. As such I value Confucius.

Indigenous Science

On “Time” and “Eros/Passion”. Ver. 24/7/1987.

Note for Phys 2020.

Physics and Society

24/7/87. S.K.

On “Time” and “Eros/Passion”.

I. Introduction.

We divided this course, for convenience, into three parts. We have now come to the Part III: “The Future of Science”. You have heard what mistakes scientists, including this professor here, had made, in the past up to the present. Now it is your turn to make your own mistakes. I stress here that it is you that creates “the Science of the Future”. I have concerns for the Future, but all I can do is to watch you from my grave.

However, talks on Future are talks in Hope. And perhaps, it may be helpful if I give you some encouragement. I shall do so, in a manner peculiar to physicists. Namely, I give you a lecture about “Time”. And I shall point out where “Eros/Passion” can be located in the Time Dimension. What the Physics of Time has go to do with “Eros/Passion” is the punch line of my story.

In addition, I like to tell you what I learned from Native Science/Philosophy. I shall discuss the Native Metaphysics of Time in comparison with our dominant, Euro American Metaphysics of Time. This has also to do with the Spirituality of Native Americans. In order to discuss that I have to talk of the relation between European sense of Time and its Eros/Passion. And like the most things I talk about, the relation is on a two-way feedback. By trying to appreciate what other cultures offer, we understand our own better.

[References]

As background and further readings, I refer you to a few books here.

A.N. Whitehead Process And Reality Free Press. 1929.

H. Bersson Time And Free Will Harper Torchbooks. 1910

V. Deloria Jr. God Is Red Laurel Book. 1973.

J. Highwater The Primal Mind Harper & Row. 1944.

M. Berman The Reenchantment of the World Cornell U Press. 1981

H. Mareuse Eros And Civilization Vintage Books. 1955

M. Foucault  The History of Sexuality (3 vol.) Vintage Books. 1978

M. Jammer The philosophy of Quantum Mechanics John Wiley 1974.

II. The Future is “Nothing”. But then, Why talk of Future?

1. The first thing I would like to draw your attention is that “Future” is not “Fact”. The “Future” does not even exist in the Materialist sense. If you are still thinking that science such as Physics is about “Facts”, then you would say that “Future” cannot be a subject of science. Talks of the Future are talks of “nothing” (as yet).

Logically, you are quite right. But you also note that it is meaningless to know anything, if there is no Future, any systematic knowing takes a finite Time. If you did not think there would be a “Future”, you would not have invested the time and efforts to know anything. Besides, the most impressive displays of the “Power of Science” has been its ability to “Predict”. But, “Prediction” is a version of “Prophecy” and it is a matter of “Teleology”. It concerns with the question of “Belief/Faith” about unknown Future.

2. Science may be just a set of descriptions of what has happened, as some philosophers contend. Or Science may be just “attempts to explain” what have been observed in the Past.

I suppose “description” and “explanation” are parts of Science. Bt without some “illusion” of the Power to Predict, Science would have been a hobby like “stamp collection” and commentaries thereof. Certainly, such a hobby would not have impressed people enough for them to give the Billions of Dollars in grants. It could not have been a profession, let alone being edified and valued as an intellectual discipline — and, you would not have been forced to take physics course by the “Authority” , which does not recognize your intense hatred of Physics hammered into your heads —.

You venerate “knowledge” in general, because “Knowledge” is useful in your Future. !!!

And you pay for it.

[I have reservation as to the above assertions. I would view that “intelligence” is a matter of your own Creation. The “Dead Knowledge” in books or in computer memory is not useful, unless you use them. It is your use that is the value, not the “Knowledge” itself. However, let me stick to the “common belief” of our culture for now.]

At any rate, thinking of Future is inevitable. The Future is not a “Fact”, but it does affect science. The Future is “nothing” (as yet), but it is very important to us.

3. You can take an extreme pessimistic position to say “Humans cannot possibly know anything about Future” and even accuse me that I am “Irrational” and “Irresponsible” to talk of Future that I know nothing about. Or you might judge that I “lost touch with Reality” (insane), where “Reality” consists of Facts only.

4. But, I point out that at least some of you also commit the same “sin” or “insane act” of thinking and talking of the Future. I give you a familiar example.

In the typical Love Affairs, of which some of you have had a great deal of experiences, there are frequent references to “Commitment”. If you have not heard the word, and have no idea about what it means, let me explain it to you by an illustration.

——

In the play, My Fair Lady, [A.J. Lerner. Coward-McCann. 1956], the climax comes in Act II, when the heroine asks: “What’s to become of me?” A professor of Linguistics, Dr. Higgins, made a bet and successfully taught this poor girl Eliza from the East End slum to say correctly “Rain in Spain falls mainly on a plain” and to be admitted as a lady by the High Society.

Incidentally, even a great physicist, Michael Faraday had to learn the same in order to be admitted to the Royal Society. British society is a Class Society, where the art of “Snobbism” flourishes. And in the art, to have a mastery of the peculiar language (lingo) is very important.

At any rate, after the smashing success in the demonstration of his power of knowledge in Linguistics, Dr. Higgins has no further use of Eliza. The experiment is over. The scientist predicted the outcome and indeed it became “True”.

Was the girl happy, having been well accepted into the High Society and charmed most anybody? No.

She complains; “It is good that you succeeded in your science. But what about me?” She is asking for a “Commitment” for the Future.

In her case, the “commitment” she is seeking is not “security”. For she had all manners of guys chasing after her. The question is rhetorical and actually a confession of her “vulnerability”. She fell in Love with this arrogant son of b…, who think of her no more than an experimental animal picked up from the gutter of London slum, and treated her like a slave who brings his slippers while he reads news paper.

His idea of marriage was probably with a lady from a “Proper Family” with a big dowry or high society connections for his patronage.

The enlightened feminists today would say that Eliza is irrational, if not insane. They would say; “To hell with guys like that!”. Of course, Professor Higgins has all that “correct” power words, such as “Purely Subjective”, “Your Imagination”, etc., to talk back.

But the “commitment” is also “vulnerability”. It is a gamble on the unknown, unpredictable Future.

Materialistic girls today may think that “commitment” is a guarantee of future comfort. I know even radical revolutionary women, such a s Rosa Luxemburg dreamed of a nice cozy house with white picket fence, of being taken to Sunday walk with kids, and all that sort of things I do not blame girls to wish that. But, no one can guarantee the Future in such a sense. Girls know that, yet ask for “promise”. The reason for this is not “commitment” as guaranteed material security. It is, if any, more than that.

You might say that it is a commitment to “Share the Fantasy” (hope, faith) of the Future. It is not an exaggeration to say that the commitment asked was the “meaning of life”. In fact, even colloquialism refers to it as “Meaningful Relationship”.

———-

5. Now, you are certainly right to think that such a problem is not a matter of “Physics”, (a pun intended). But I am going to tell you Physics of such matters, any way.

You know that the Future is not knowable and that you are vulnerable to all sorts of accidents, dangers, happenings, circumstance, contingencies, etc. The fact that you are the wisest and nicest guy in the world does not make you invincible. You would like to deny it, but whoever you are, you are just as vulnerable as everybody.

So, you accept your vulnerability and go on living. One of my friend is a Christian minister. He told me that the name of Judeo-Christian God is “What Will be, will be” (Que sera sera.). I would say that is “reasonable” enough. But, then, why people fall in love and become more vulnerable than they already are? I blame “Eros/Passion” for the insanity. Of course, I think it beautiful, I mean tragically beautiful. The idea may be that human existence is vulnerable any way and therefore one has nothing to lose by falling in love. One might just as well be possessed by Eros and be Passionate.

And, I beg you here to note that it is all because of the Time Dimension. If we had no Time, we would have had no trouble like that. You might, of course, say that you have no Time nor Energy for Love Affairs, let alone thinking about Time. But by that you are saying you are dead.

6. [For those who are hardnosed businessperson, I mention one problem in Economics of Profit Maximization. This is known  as “Arrow’s Paradox”. It so happened that even in a perfectly deterministic world, the “profit” (or “utility”) depends on the Time Interval chosen for the calculation of the maximum.

What is profitable in short term is not necessarily profitable in long terms. That is, the maximum cannot be calculated without choosing a time scale.

If one takes the Economics of Profit (Utility) Maximization as the proto-model for Rationality, the Rationality cannot exist for indefinite Time interval for which Humans may exist. Since you do not know how long you live, you cannot calculate how to get the Maximum out of your wife or husband.

You might say: “One who laughs last, laughs the best”. But the problem is that we have no idea when the last is. Economy is irrational.]

III. Time is not a thing. Then, what is it?

1. O.K. you understand why we have troubles. It is because of Time. And because we have troubles, we think and talk about Time. But what is this thing called “Time”?

Well, “Time” is not a “thing”. It is “nothing”. It does not exist, in any objective, material, sense.

It is a way we think and talk. It is a mere “concept”, or a mere “word”. What is worse, there are many different senses to the same word “Time”. Even in the Physics of General Relativity, there is a well known ambiguity as to which “t” in the equation is the “Time”.

You may be asked by your friend “Do you have Time?” Your friend may be asking if yo have a watch to tell what Time it is then. Or the friend may mean to “have” or “spend” a Time together.

And, the “It” of the utterance “What time is It?” means nothing. The utterance is saying “What time is the time?”. That is worse than the “It” of the “It rains”. And, nobody “has” Time, hence can “spend” Time.

But, don’t be silly. They are “Idiomatic” expressions. You say “It rains like dogs and cats”. Since you have never seen hundreds of dogs and cats falling down, that is a bad metaphor. But, you know what the expression means as your friends know. Idioms are like the “Joke #19” which do make you and your friends laugh. Or, Idioms are like Rituals in language art, commonly shared by a community.

“Time” is an Idiom. By our linguistic habit or ritual, we supposedly understand the idiom. That is, until some crazy physicist or philosopher asks, “What is Time?”

If you were Wittgenstein, you might say that “Time” ought not to be placed as the Subject of a sentence. This is a typical case of “pseudo-philosophical” problems created by misuse-abuse of sentence structure. “Time” ought to be treated as an “Adverb”, not a “Noun”.

[Some Physicists are fond of doing Wittgensteinian tricks with words. They say “Electron” is a Verb, just as “Red” is an adjective. There is no such “thing” as an “electron” nor “red”. But then, is “Energy” a “verb” or “adverb”? It is ambiguous. And the ambiguity is essential to our art of language. In mathematical logic, we found that what is precisely definable is meaningless. (I shall explain this to you later). So, we try to find “meaning” in the ambiguity. This is the “Uncertainty Principle of Linguistics”.]

But you would complain that saying that Time is not a “noun” does not help you much. You are right! In order to know the Idiom, we have to know in what sort of occasions, we use the word “Time” (and associated words), like anthropologists do to people of other cultures. Only in our case, we have to play the role of the anthropologists (outside observers) to our own “peculiar” thinking and language habits. However, it turned out that it is easier to observe others. To us, “I” is the most difficult thing to know. We would, therefore, start with “Time” senses of other cultures and hope our learning of others help us to know ourselves.

2. Let us, therefore, take our “prejudice” that American Indians do not have the sense of Time.

In God Is Red,  the author Deloria says that Natives have no sense of Time. Deloria is a Native. Well. Is it true?

First of all, I like to tell you that the American Natives had a well developed Astronomy. Mayan Calendar was very accurate. There are archaeological sites all over North America which indicate that the Indians observed Time. Perhaps, it is possible that the Natives lost their “ancient” science under the colonial repression. And they themselves might believe that Indians do not have science. If so, it is a bad superstition, if not a self-imposed racial prejudice.

[Do you know our mathematics came from Arabs and East Indians? Today, it seems that Arabs and East Indians themselves think that Mathematics is European invention. The repression, and racial prejudice are internalized. This is sad. And I must tell you that you yourself may have the same underestimate of yourself. You think without me teaching Physics, you cannot do Physics. That is a sad superstition. I am just as stupid as yu are, if not worse. You can do anything, if you think you can.]

That “Indians don’t have the sense of Time” may refer to their apparent habit of not being “punctual”. They agree to a Time of a public meeting. Only after one hour later, some people begin to trickle in to the meeting! Even then, they do not show any sign of concern about Time. We hear such stories many times. And Natives themselves talk and laugh at that.

The trouble is, however, that Americans, Canadians, and Japanese are the same. In village meeting, etc., people come one hour later. When U.S. occupied Japan, Americans used to give Japanese lectures about the importance of Punctuality. To be modern civilized people, one has to be punctual. The lecture sounded very good. But when I came to the U.S. some years later, I find out that trains never run on Time. In Japan, if train is late, they pay money back. And usually Japanese trains keep accurate Time, say like within 10 seconds of the scheduled time.

In hunting of Buffaloes, the Natives had to coordinate their actions within the accuracy of a split second. Otherwise, Buffaloes would escape and the village go hungry. Natives do keep appointed Time, that is, when they wanted. Don’t you believe the myth like Indians have no sense of Time. They do not come to the meeting on Time, because it is an expression of “protest”. It is not “dignified” to show up on Time for town meetings etc. They are saying that they do not want to live by Whitemen’s “Norm”.

[Be aware girls or boys who let you wait on date. It is a well known trick. You are being hooked! Besides, she or he is demonstrating “who is the boss” in the situation.]

So were Japanese peasants. They, perhaps unconsciously, wanted to insult government officials by making them wait for hours. That is why they came later. They knew what is the Time very well. Interestingly, they had much faster communication to know what officials are going to say. And American occupation officials often embarrassed by finding out that people already knew what their Head Quarter is planning before they themselves were informed.

The “Punctuality” was a Christian ritual invented by monks in monastery. Japanese did not want to behave like Christians. They found out that trains in Christian countries never run on time, so they now run their train exactly on time without feeling guilty. It is their own Norm, not Euro American Norm.

Likewise, if and when Indians wanted, they can be very precise. They have an advantage of “dreaming” beforehand what is going to happen. [See Highwater.]

3. But, if you take Time to be some line-like segment punctuated at the Beginning and at the End, then it is right to say Indians and Japanese lack the sense of Time. I point out to you that the Punctuated Linear Time is distinctively Judeo-Christian. And the peculiar sense of Time is “Religious”, with a sense of violence for the punctuations. They mark and sense Time by “points”. Euro Americans often say that the “birth” is traumatic. And the “death” is dreaded. They constitute “events” with a “religious” significance, or traumatic impact.

In a contrast, Indians and Japanese do not understand the trauma and dread. Rather, to them, Time is “Continuity”, not “Punctuality”. Japanese trains run on Time very accurately, because rail men are preoccupied with making “connections” to other trains. It is not for the sake of making punctual events.

And, Birth, Death occurs more or less “natural” to them. Japanese peasant women used to go work in field in the morning, give birth in the field, carry the baby and vegetables on her back home in the evening. The events do make impacts, but not as much as Euro Americans get. There is not “religious” significance to the events, let alone “sins”, disasters, etc. The happenings are “events”, but taken as “course of events” in “flow”. That is, their sense “events” includes “Flow of Time”, not “Point”. In physicists’ language, the Euro American Time is Newtonian, whereas Indian Time is that of Relativity (Einsteinian).

Besides, the Native Time is not only continuous but also “internal”. It is their own Time, not something imposed by external authority, such as God or Physics. If they say Time is a part of Universe, then the Universe is something to which they participate. It is not external.

[E. Husserl” Zur Phenomenologie des innern Zeitbewusstseins discussed an “Inner Time”. But his was the European Time. I would call it “Ego Time”. It is subtly different from Indian Inner Time.

The difference clearly shows up when Indians talk of their ancestral Time. The tense in such talks is in “Present tense”. European cannot do that. Because the Past is no longer in the Inner Time.

However, Existentialists, such as Kierkegaard in The Concept of Anxiety apparently came close to include “continuity” in Time. But, here again, it is European Time. I shall explain the difference between “Anxiety” and “Eros/Passion” later.]

They may go to work in a factory and may be forced to punch Time Card. That is alienated external Time. They would resent that. In our bourgeoisie life, we worry about Time, such as the end of the month by which time we have to pay all bills and mortgages. Small merchants have to worry about Time, for the interests on their debts are counted by the day, week, or month. The Time as such is external. It is not “your making” that the Time passes. You do not participate in the making (creation) of Time. (God did it.)

4. To be sure, in Newtonian Physics, physicists do make “events” by observing them. There, the “Egos” of the physicists are involved, and the scientists do take credit for the events. The young observatory assistant who saw the latest Super-Nova became a hero, just because he happened to see and registered his “discovery” in the sacred record kept by the institution of Astronomy before anybody else. [See Discovery. June 1987.]

However, the “observations” have to be according to the official ritual code. Newtonian Physics requires that the observation to be externalized by use of “scientific instruments”, such as telescope, measuring sticks, etc., and they must be expressed in the edified format of description, such as saying “at a point of Time; t = 02:15:32 at a point of location x = 12.45, y = 0.66, z = 302.14” to make an “event”. By such “Initiation Rituals” or “Editing Rituals”, the personal experiences are converted to a “Scientific data”. The ritual procedure “purifies” and eliminate the “human experience”. The Science that replaced God’s Truth cannot allow contaminations by human experiences. That is how the Time is externalized.

Even Einstein’s Relativity is understood by many scientists as a physics consisting of “events” which are just the same as those of Newtonian events. It took emergence of Quantum Physics to break this “God’s Eye View” of the world to do science.

[The “God’s Eye View” is the one pretends that the knower, as a superior being, is outside of the world that is observed. That gives “Objectivity” and “Value Neutrality” to Science and Scientists.

However, by doing so, scientists are alienated from the Nature. They become “outsiders”.

The communication becomes one-way. You get information from the object, but you give nothing to the object. This is a perfect “intellectual colonialism, exploitation”.

To be sure, this is only a religious-ideological fantasy. In real life, we cannot be like God. There is no such thing as “Value Neutral Knowledge” possible to humans. Humans cannot be outside this Universe, or what Buddhist call “Vicious Reality”.]

6. Then came Quantum Physics. The first public “event” marked the emergence of Quantum Physics in the Euro American Time was a public lecture give by W. Heisenberg in Chicago in 1929, Heisenberg announced “Uncertainty Principle” in the lecture (note that he did not do so in an academic paper.)

Among the audience in the Chicago lecture, there was a poet. The poet was Robert Frost. He narrates his reaction. [The Norton Reader. (Ed.) A.M. Eastman 3rd ed. Norton & Co. 1973 p. 519.]

“The other day we had a visitor here, a noted scientist, whose latest word to the world has been that the more accurately you know where a thing is, the less accurately you are able to state how fast it is moving.

You can see why that would be so, without going back to Zeno’s problem of the arrow’s flight. In carrying numbers into the realm of space and at the same time into the realm of time you are mixing metaphors, that is all, and you are in trouble. They won’t mix. The two don’t go together.”

The poet was absolutely right. This is perhaps surprising to the most scientists today. For they think poets would not understand anything about physics. And around 1930’s, the “second class” physicists were saying that there is only 3 intellectual giants who understand Quantum Physics in the World. Actually, the “3” was an exaggeration. They probably meant, Niels Bohr, Erwin Schrodinger and Werner Heisenberg. But there were others such as Louis de Broglie, Paul Dirac, Wolfgang Pauli, et al. Hideki Yukawa’s work on Nuclear Force/Meson Theory was done in early 1930’s in Japan. There were a lot more physicists who understood the new physics.

Besides, what a French Philosopher, Henry Bergson was writing on Time in 1890’s was very much in agreement with Quantum Physics. In terms of “operational approach” and “uncertainty/probability” that the new physics came to rely upon, there were philosophers like, C.S. Peirce, John Dewey. And, Poetical Philosophy of George Santayana, Existentialism of Martin Heidegger were already there. In retrospect, we can now appreciate their commonness with Quantum Physics. Only those “second class” scientists did not understand the new physics.

Robert Frost made reference to Zeno’s Paradox of flying arrow. According to Aristotle’s record based on a “hearsay” Zeno, some 2000 years ago, already knew that Newtonian Physics was wrong.

[See also The Reenchantment of the World p. 144-145.]

And more interestingly, Frost was saying “physics is a set of metaphors”. Physics, like poetry, is a linguistic art. Frost knew that in 1929. This is remarkable. Yet it is only an honest statement. Scientists who had psychological hang-ups about “Exact Truth” could not admit that, for the admission would destroy their “religious/ideological” superstition/prejudice. Physics inherited the notion of Absolute Truth from Judeo-Christianity.

As F. Capra in Tao of Physics tells, for non-Christians, it is no big deal to say human intelligence is limited in its capacity to know. However, I point out that since non-Christians had no enigma, they did not develop new physics either. To have problems is important, if you are to learn something. If there is no problem, there is nothing to learn. In this sense, even mistakes are valuable. You ought to think of this “dialectics”.

[I bet if your girl/boy friend is totally “predictable”, then you would lose interest.

Passion would become stronger by pains.

Goethe said ones who do not know the taste of tears would not know love.]

7. Now, the statement of Heisenberg, summarized by Frost is simple. (Frost is accurate, however.) But this does not mean that there are no more implications. In fact, there are several serious implications.

One of the implications is that the Uncertainty Principle suggests that “measurement” (knowing) of exact position of a thing affects and changes the state of the thing. It tells that you cannot know people (thing) without changing or hurting the people (thing). Knowing is interactive, not “neutral”. A psychiatrist, social worker, or teacher to know a client is to change the client, either for better or worse. And the psychiatrist, him- or herself, is affected by knowing. Extending this a bit, one can say that if nothing changes, you did not learn anything.

In relation to our question on Time, the above implication of Uncertainty Principle suggests that “knowing” is “irreversible”. By knowing, you change things. Once changed, you cannot get the innocence of the ignorance back. This in turn implies that in the world where “knowers” exist, the Time can only go one way, though there are other interpretations.

[There are other interpretations such as Time is actually consisting of two-way flow, one from the Past to the Present, and one from the Future to the Present. When two flows (waves) of “Event-Fields” meets, “an event” happens.

And, Time could be “circular”. Then, the above means that the orientation of rotation is in one direction on the Time Loop. Left-hand oriented World and Right-hand oriented World would be different. We do have some observational hints to this.]

This is known as “Arrow of Time” (One-direction-ness of Time). Before Quantum Physics, Statistical Theory on Heat Phenomena, etc. suggested this “one-way-ness”. That was known as “Entropy Law”. Since Statistical Theory relies upon human estimate of probabilities, one can take the Entropy Law as a part of Quantum Physics, and related to the “Knowing Interaction”.

That is to say it is “Knowing” that pushes Time. If there is no knowing (learning) like in the Garden of Eden —, there might not have been Time. And, if you apply “Dialectics” here, you would conclude that if there is no Time, there would have been no knowing.

One could possibly try a “Theology”. Namely that the God that does not change must be ignorant and does not have Time. It would be “Eternal God”, only because he/she cannot Learn anything. Learning means Change. Change means “sensitivity”, but it is “ephemerality” as well. “Stability” (of an institution, system) is incompatible with “Sensitivity” (change, learning). But then, you might apply “Uncertainty Principle” to this dialectical pair, and get to an accommodating compromise for the both. Interestingly, Physicists also call the Uncertainty Principle “Complementarity Principle” (Co-operative Dialectics).

[Ref: M. Janner cited above.

F.A. Wolf Taking the Quantum Leap Harper & Row 1981. Lethb. Pub. Lib. 350. 12.

K. Wilber (ed.) The Holographic Paradigm. Shambhala 1982.]

IV. Physics is (or physicists are) crazy. But what it has to do with Eros/Passion?

1. In a book Responsibilities To Future Generations [E. Partridge (ed.) Prometheus Press] 1980 contains, as the conclusion, “Love of Remote” by Nicolai Hartmann. The article is a partial reprint of a paper in a journal Ethics [vol.2. 1932. p. 311-331.]

Hartmann wrote:

“The Platonic Eros — when we strip it of everything else and attend only to its ethical substance, is deeper absorption of the idea, great passion for it, personal commitment to it. Thsi passion brings it about that a man is transported beyond himself and beyond his environment. It is a man’s losing of himself in his work, his inward life in what is not yet, in what is ‘still on the way from Non-being to Being'” it is the abandonment of the present for what is future, uncertain; the sacrifice of his life for another life, for one more valuable, but one that is not his own.”

I do not like words like “Platonic”. One who does not have courage to say “Eros” pure and simple, it is better that one does not say eros at all. It is nonsense to speak of “strip”, Eros is not a stripper. It looks like an “essence” because Eros manifests in everything and anything. But Eros is a Dynamics, not an “essence”. Taking away the contexts, the contingencies, the environment, the flesh and blood, Eros cannot exist. All these are typical in European Intellectual talk.

Eros/Passion does not care if it is “carnal or not”. Need I say anything as to the silly “Platonic”?

And, it is not as if there exists an entity, or “essence” (atom), called “Passion” and that drives people (he and she) to care for the unknown future either. It is the whole relationships and dynamics spanned over the long time dimension that is the Passion. Even the theological notion of Passion in Christianity had the Time Dimensional sense, which is narrated in N. Kazantzakis’s Grek Passion etc.

But the rest is great.

You do not know, but you care. That is Eros/Passion.

It is on the Time Dimension/Duration, that Eros/Passion becomes sensible, feelable.

If I may add anything to the description, I would include the Time in the sense of History. Time Dimension covers both the Future and Past.

It is the “Continuity”, without insisting “Identity”.

That is: Eros/Passion is for “ephemeral beings” to create. It is not things like “immortality” (egoism, megalomania).

Eros/Passion is like “weaving patterns” that emerges in the “networking” of many relationships, including oppositions. Think of each line of thread to be an image of life in time dimension. What many threads make up is the Eros/Passion. (Granted, it could also be a Hell.) That is, in other words, a “Holographic Time Pattern” emerging in the Ephemerals.

How can we “see” it? No, we cannot see by eyes. We can only see actors and actresses on the stage. The “Play” itself is invisible. You can hear “sounds in sequence”, but you can only sense “music”. [E. Husser} The Phenomenology of Inner Time Movements.] It is a kind of flow of life that carries you. Perhaps, when you finish your life, you may be able to say, “I lived a Passion.”

———

I tried to tell you where you might encounter Eros/Passion in terms of Physics. I hope my story made some sense and be of some help to you.