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Art of integrative cognition


Enacting Transformative Integral Thinking through Playful Elegance (Part #6)

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Varieties of integration: One keynote speech reviewed the varieties of boundaries implying a need for integrative understanding (Varadaraja V. Raman, Variety of Boundary Crossings, 2010). Of relevance to the male-female complementarity, a notable insight introduced into discussion of meta-theoretical frameworks at the Symposium was the value of exploring "weak integration" and the paradoxical strengths associated with it -- and necessarily the paradoxical weaknesses associated with the "strong integration" so typically sought (Ananta Kumar Giri, Towards A New Art of Integration, 2010). This is exemplified as a modality of action by the arguments of F. David Peat (Gentle Action: bringing creative change to a turbulent world, 2008). As a case for "cogntive healing", it is also reflected in the conventionally problematic complementarity between allopathic and homeopathic healing (Remedies to Global Crisis: "Allopathic" or "Homeopathic"? 2009). But, as stated by Giri:

This new art of integration which invites us now is different from the earlier discourses and practices of integration which were imprisoned in a logic and machinery of strong integration. It is an art of weak and gentle integration compared to the telos of strong integration in modern self, society and polity.

The merit of doing so was further associated by him with the need for "mothering spaces" within which such integration could be engendered and cultivated. As noted in the discussion of that contribution, the significance of such polar complementarity is admirably encoded by the Chinese yin-yang pattern, with the added merit of being further articulated into a 4-fold, 8-fold, 16-fold, etc. This was recognized by Gottfried Leibniz to be precisely equivalent to his own binary coding system -- now the basis for computer organization.

The Chinese encoding is distinguished by the metaphoric enrichment of the pattern of associations it represents and their relevance to psychosocial change (Transformation Metaphors -- derived experimentally from the Chinese Book of Changes (I Ching) for sustainable dialogue, vision, conferencing, policy, network, community and lifestyle, 1997). But at the 2-fold level, the metaphoric distinction is indeed between strong and weak, and between fathering and mothering. Might forms of transdisciplinary integration be fruitfully distinguished in this way? (A. C. Graham, Yin-Yang and the Nature of Correlative Thinking. The Institute of East Asian Philosophies, 1986).

Ironically in the 4-fold distinction made by physics between the fundamental interactions (or interactive forces) strong interactions and weak interactions are distinguished from electromagnetism and gravitation. Any art of integrative cognition might then require insight into 4-fold and higher modes of interaction, as envisaged by the Chinese coding system. This is further explored with respect to the "cognitive games" associated with each pattern of distinction and the possibility that these might themselves be ordered into an aesthetic taxonomy based on the Fibonacci spiral (Tao of Engagement -- Weaponised Interactions and Beyond: Fibonacci's magic carpet of games to be played for sustainable global governance, 2010).

Readily to be framed as being "not serious" (as "weak integration"), is the aesthetic art of play to be embedded into such a pattern as the polarity of serious vs not-serious? Or should such an aesthetic be characteristic of the whole -- the gods at play -- in the vedic spirit of Neti Neti and non-duality? More prosaically, if it is only through the playful dynamic amongst participants at an integrative event that a transcendental meta-perspective can emerge, how best to look at more creative understandings of "games that participants play" -- following the inspiration of transactional analysis, as separately explored (Cardioid Attractor Fundamental to Sustainability: 8 transactional games forming the heart of sustainable relationship, 2005). A strong case, relevant to integrative discourse, has been made by (James P. Carse (Finite and Infinite Games: a vision of life as play and possibility, 1994).

Integrative attractors in the light of romantic divergences: Pre-dating the emergence of currently favoured personality typing (MBTI, AQAL, etc), the philosopher W. T. Jones sought to explain the divergences in the academic debate regarding definition of the "romantic period" (The Romantic Syndrome; toward a new methodology in cultural anthropology and the history of ideas, 1961). He identified a set of seven pre-logical "axes of bias" in terms of which any academic perspective could be defined, thereby determining the nature of the debate between any two participants regarding the nature of "romantic". He proposed the generalization of this method to other disciplines and debates. It readily lends itself to such adaptation (Axes of Bias in Inter-Cultural Dialogue, 1993; Axes of Bias in Inter-Sectoral Dialogue, 1992).

The approach could be adapted to distinguishing the variety of biases in the quest for integrative understanding -- the didactic, perspectival flaws of the conference "birds" -- and the consequent thematic organization and dynamics of any such event. The axes identified by Jones, as detailed in those examples, are preferences for:

  1. order vs disorder
  2. static vs dynamic
  3. discrete vs continuous
  4. external vs identification
  5. sharply vs implicitly defined
  6. comprehensible vs incomprehensible
  7. due vs spontaneous process

As noted by Chris Lucas, bridging the gap in understanding which lies behind these distinctions is rather like getting people to understand fuzzy logic as a valid alternative to binary logics. Lucas (Integral Intersubjectivity, 2006) skillfully relates the AQAL framework to the The Fourteen Precepts from Interbeing (2003) of Thich Nhat Hanh.

The art of integration might then lie in the challenge of interweaving discourse associated with all such preferences -- although paradoxically that itself constitutes a bias of the kind explored by Magoroh Maruyama (Mindscapes, social patterns and future development of scientific theory types. Cybernetica, 1980, 23, 1, pp. 5-25). He distinguishes four epistemological mindscapes:

  1. H-mindscape: homogenistic, hierarchical, classificational
  2. I-mindscape: heterogenistic, individualistic, random
  3. S-mindscape: heterogenistic, interactive, homeostatic
  4. G-mindscape: heterogenistic, interactive, morphogenetic

These are explained elsewhere in more detail and compared with other schemas (Systems of Categories Distinguishing Cultural Biases, 1993). It could be argued that any such preferences effectively define aesthetically preferred attractors. In this sense, and in terms of chaos theory, variously preferred human values might then be understood as themselves constituting "strange attractors" (Human Values as Strange Attractors, 1993).

Maruyama's 4-fold pattern could well be clustered into a 2-fold pattern consistent with a distinction between "strong" and "weak" integration. However that pattern could also be fruitfully related to that of another Japanese scholar, namely Kinhide Mushakoji (Global Issues and Interparadigmatic Dialogue: essays on multipolar politics, 1988). He discusses the importance of a quadrilemma: A, not-A, A-and-not-A, neither-A-nor-not-A (summarized in Epistemological challenges: Interparadigmatic dialogue).

Integrative understanding from cultures and languages: Cross-fertilization across boundaries, notably inspired by metaphor, may be closely related to an aesthetic sense. Use of the fertilization metaphor is ironically associated with the aesthetic efforts of plants and animals to render themselves aesthetically attractive in a competitive environment as a means of ensuring the pollination essential to their own survival. There is of course the charming sense in which academics must render their discourse "attractive" to ensure their own professional survival.

Are there indicators in other "languages" regarding modes and understandings of integration to which the dominant ("English", "Western") languages are insensitive? Is there a language of integrative thinking with the sensitivity attributed by urban myth to the Esquimo capacity to distinguish varieties of snow? The Intergative Knowledge and Transdisciplinarity Project profiled 633 variants, mainly in English.

The argument might be further reinforced by the nature of the integrative cognition, variously characterized by so-called indigenous cultures, and its intimate engagement with the environment and understandings of time. A comprehensive compilation resulted from the work of Darrell Posey (Cultural and Spiritual Values of Biodiversity, 1999). Significantly it was a contribution to the Global Biodiversity Assessment of the United Nations Environmental Programme.

Design and discourse: If the challenges of the future are to be understood as challenges of (aesthetic?) design, as previously discussed (Designing Global Self-governance for the Future, 2010) are the corresponding challenges of cognitive integration also to be understood as a matter of design? This possibility follows from the innovative exploration of design by Christopher Alexander (Notes on the Synthesis of Form, 1964, A Pattern Language, 1977, and The Nature of Order, 2003-4), especially his current research emerging from that context (Harmony-Seeking Computations: a science of non-classical dynamics based on the progressive evolution of the larger whole, International Journal for Unconventional Computing (IJUC), 2009; New Concepts in Complexity Theory: an overview of the four books of the Nature of Order with emphasis on the scientific problems which are raised. 2003).

The possibility has been separately explored in relation to the latter work (Harmony-Comprehension and Wholeness-Extending, 2010).

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