Periodic organization

The Consensus Delusion (Part #9)

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Curiously the key to comprehending "globality" in daily life is the periodicity associated with diurnal cycles. Somehow this recognition is lacking in relation to the consensus delusion. This focuses on the myth of the eternal sunshine of a "positive" worldview -- and the efforts to deny the fruitfulness of periodic "endarkenment" are rejected as "negativity"

The set of religions distinguished by Prothero, arguably an eightfold consensus delusion, raises the question of how they might be ordered more systematically -- as implied by mathematical theology and/or music, or even the dynamics of the Ba Gua pattern. It is curious that no consideration is accorded to geometric possibilities, especially given the importance attached to sacred geometry by many of the religions, and notably with the technical enhancement offered by a web-based global knowledge society (Sacralization of Hyperlink Geometry, 1997; Sustaining the Coherence of Dialogue through Apartness Patterns of systematic configuration of entities through hypertext, 1997).

Especially intriguing is how "one" might be understood as emerging from such patterns -- echoing the "oneness" associated with "global" and the "interactions" within it (Spherical Configuration of Categories to Reflect Systemic Patterns of Environmental Checks and Balances, 1994; Spherical configuration of interlocking roundtables: Internet enhancement of global self-organization through patterns of dialogue, 1998).

Implicit in such geometry is the periodicity associated with symmetry. To that extent the periodic table of chemical elements offers possible clues to another mode of representation, as separately discussed:

• Tuning a Periodic Table of Religions, Epistemologies and Spirituality: including the sciences and other belief systems (2007)
• Periodic Pattern of Human Knowing: implication of the Periodic Table as metaphor of elementary order (2009)
• Towards a Periodic Table of Ways of Knowing -- in the light of metaphors of mathematics (2009)
• Towards a Periodic Table of Questions: strategic opportunities from ordering WH-questions (2007)
• Functional Classification in an Integrative Matrix of Human Preoccupations (1982)

Most curiously, mathematics as the study of relationships and sets has been unable to provide more than a simplistic classification for its own discipline which fails to benefit from insights of the discipline itself -- and its possibilities ,to elicit insight into consensus (Dave Rusin, A Gentle Introduction to the Mathematics Subject Classification Scheme, 2000).

Such periodic organization, potentially honouring and elaborating Prothero's eightfold pattern, also suggest the exploration of a weaving metaphor, as separately discussed (Interweaving Thematic Threads and Learning Pathways, 2010). Especially interesting is the traditional use of the weave as a means of embodying some form of enthralling "magic", as with the legendary magic carpets (Magic Carpets as Psychoactive Systems Diagrams, 2010). Carpet patterning is consistent with recent work of Christopher Alexander (The Nature of Order, as separately discussed (Harmony-Comprehension and Wholeness-Extending, 2010).

As mentioned above, the remarkable elegance of symmetry group theory suggests the possibility of meaningful consensus of a very high order. However its challenging relation to delusion is well-illustrated within mathematics itself in the literature on "moonshine theory" associated with the improbable nature of the correspondences through which some of the most fundamentally integrative forms of symmetry have been discovered. Might non-delusional forms of consensus come to be understood in such terms (Potential Psychosocial Significance of Monstrous Moonshine: an exceptional form of symmetry as a Rosetta stone for cognitive frameworks, 2007)? What is the nature of the "correspondences" between the disparate religions (Theories of Correspondences -- and potential equivalences between them in correlative thinking, 2007)?

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