Implications for directionality of reading from other frameworks

Unquestioned Bias in Governance from Direction of Reading? (Part #7)

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Hemispheric lateralization of the brain: There is clearly a complex of issues to be explored involving reading direction, cognition, handedness and lateralization of brain function (M.K. Holder, What does Handedness have to do with Brain Lateralization? 2005). This has been explored in relation to bias in the spatial-numerical association of response codes (mentioned above).

Laterlization -- especially given the sense of which side is someone on -- currently lends itself to exploration as a metaphor, given the manner in which global society is considered to be diviided into hemispheres whose political economies is it is variously sought to integrate for strategic purposes (Engendering Viable Global Futures through Hemispheric Integration: a radical challenge to individual imagination, 2014).

Axes of bias in reading: A 7-fold set of dimensions is especially interesting in the light of the recognition of 7 of axes of pre-logical bias in discourse, understood as together determining potential debating positions on any theme. The analysis was developed by the philosopher W. T. Jones, using the example of the long-standing iacademic dispute on the nature of the romantic period (The Romantic Syndrome: toward a new method in cultural anthropology and history of ideas, 1961), as discussed separately (Systems of Categories Distinguishing Cultural Biases, 1993).

The pattern of distinctions can be explored with respect to various domains (employment, dialogue, etc, ***).

In summary, the preferential axes of methodological bias distinguished by Jones take the following form:

• Order vs Disorder: Namely the range between a preference for system, structure, conceptual clarity, etc. and a preference for fluidity, muddle chaos, etc.
• Static vs Dynamic: Namely the range between a preference for the changeless, eternal, etc. and a preference for movement, for explanation in genetic and process terms, etc.
• Continuity vs Discreteness: Namely the range between a preference for wholeness, unity, etc and a preference for discreteness, plurality, diversity, etc.
• Inner vs Outer: Namely the range between a preference for being able to project oneself into the objects of one's experience (to experience them as one experiences oneself), and a preference for a relatively external, objective relation to them.
• Sharp focus vs Soft focus: Namely the range between a preference for clear, direct experience and a preference for threshold experiences, felt to be saturated with more meaning than is immediately present.
• This world vs Other world: Namely the range between preference for belief in the spatio-temporal world as self-explanatory and preference for belief that it is not and can only be comprehended in terms of other frames.
• Spontaneity vsProcess: Namely the range between a preference for chance, freedom, accident, etc and a preference for explanations subject to laws and definable processes.

Whatever the extreme, especially intriguing is the sense in which those favouring a particular style of "reading reality" will demonize the contrasting style -- reframing and reclaiming as its own the "positive" features (as they are understood).

Archetypal morphologies: Reverting to the 16 modalities, it is however striking to consider that they may be seen as constituting analogous functions to the distinctions provided by René Thom between "archetypal morphologies" -- notably for semiotic purposes (Esquisse d'une Sémiophysique: physique aristotélicienne et théorie des catastrophes, 1989).

Thom presents the set of 16 indicated below, as discussed separately (Eliciting a Universe of Meaning -- within a global information society of fragmenting knowledge and relationships, 2013). **** , of which 12 merit comparison with the functions indicated by the signs of the zodiac, and possibly even their forms. *********** The first 4 (top left, below) could be considered "primitives". Such a comparison is even more justified by Thom's subsequent consideration of the pattern below in terms of their cognitive implications as processes, following his semiotic generalization (Esquisse d'une Sémiophysique: physique aristotélicienne et théorie des catastrophes, 1989).

Archetypal morphologies from René Thom (Structural Stability and Morphogenesis: an outline of a general theory of models, 1972, p. 307)

As noted by Thom with respect to his approach:

It may seem difficult to accept the idea that a sequence of stable transformations of our space-time could be directed or programmed by an organizing center consisting of an algebraic structure outside space-time itself. The important point, as always, is to regard it as a language designed to aid the intuition of the global coordination of all the partial systems controlling these transformations. (1972, p. 119)

One of the basic postulates of my model is that there are coherent systems of catastrophe (chreods) organized in archetypes and that these structures exist as algebraic entities independent of any substrate, but it must not be forgotten that the substrate does have a part fundamental in the dynamic of these forms. (p. 316)

From where, then, does our feeling of beauty come? From the idea that the work of art is not arbitrary, and from the fact that, although unpredictable, it appears to us to have been directed by some organizing center of large codimension, far from the normal structures of ordinary thought, but still in resonance with the main emotional or genetic structures underlying our conscious thought. (p. 316)

So what I am offering here is not a scientific theory, but rather a method: the first step in the construction of a model is to describe the dynamical models compatible with an empiricially given morphology, and this is also the first step in understanding the phenomena under consideration. It is from this point of view that these methods, too indeterminate in themselves, lead not to a once-and-for-all explicit standard technique, but rather to an art of models. (p. 323)

Many of my assertions depend on pure speculation and may be treated as day-dreams, and I accept this qualification -- is not a day-dream the virtual catastrophe in which knowledge is initiated? At a time when so many scholars in the world are calculating, is it not desirable that some, who can, dream? (p. 325)

The implications of Thom's work, notably in relation to psychological types, are discussed separately Potential emergence of coherent transformational connectivity (in the context of In Quest of a Dynamic Pattern of Transformations: sensing the strange attractor of an emerging Rosetta Stone, 2012). Thom is of course renowned for his work on catastrophe theory, to which the above morphologies are naturally related. This suggests that the creative process is a succession of elementary catastrophes -- phases which can be characterized and denoted by the zodiac signs. Cognitively these catastrophes are potentially related to questions, as discussed separately (Conformality of 7 WH-questions to 7 Elementary Catastrophes: an exploration of potential psychosocial implications, 2006).

Psychological typing: With respect to biases in reading directionality, there is arguably an interplay between psychological types (notably as developed by Carl Jung), and cultural types. Explorations of any such interplay are of course highly controversial, as summarized separately (Systems of Categories Distinguishing Cultural Biases, 1993)

With respect to the table above suggesting 16 reading modalities, this might be fruitfully explored in the light of 16-fold typing theories (notably the 16 Personality Factors of Raymond Cattell and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator).

Pattern language: Recognition that the set of reading directionalities effectively consttitutes a pattern language, recalls the interest of Christopher Alexander as originator of the term (A Pattern Language, 1977). In contrast to the emphasis on a particular pattern of reading, the focus of that study was on the appropriate use of a variety patterns in any undertaking. The implications can be taken beyond his design concerns with the physical environment, as explored separately (5-fold Pattern Language, 1984; Polyhedral Pattern Language: software facilitation of emergence, representation and transformation of psycho-social organization, 2008).

Alexander's work has long been inspired by an interest in Middle Eastern carpet design, as separately discussed (Harmony-Comprehension and Wholeness-Engendering: eliciting psychosocial transformational principles from design, 2010). More fruitful understanding of any table of reading directionalities could be explored in that sense. As discussed there, in contrast to the concern above with 16-fold and 14-fold mappings, in Alexander's later work particular attention is made to the representation of 15 transformations (Tentative adaptation of Alexander's 15 transformations to the psychosocial realm, 2016).

Governance as a martial art? The strategic challenges of governance are currently intimately associated with "martial arts", possibly framed in religious terms as crusades or jihad. There is therefore a case for taking account of strategic options and clues from the martial arts of both West and East, as well as understandings of "spiritual combat" as variously framed by religions. This is especially relevant in a period in which "information warfare" and "memetic warfare" are increasingly considered (Noopolitics and memetic warfare within the noosphere, 2014; Brian J. Hancock, Memetic Warfare: the future of war, Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin, April-June 2010). Such an exploration can be framed in general terms, potentially to be associated with the pattern of reading modalities (Navigating Alternative Conceptual Realities: clues to the dynamics of enacting new paradigms through movement, 2002; Ensuring Strategic Resilience through Haiku Patterns: reframing the scope of the "martial arts" in response to strategic threats, 2008).

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