Sustaining dialogue of Isdom

The Isdom of the Wisdom Society: Embodying time as the heartland of humanity (Part #14)

The argument above suggests that wisdom is somehow an emergent characteristric of an intensive dynamic within Isdom based on imaginative and playful dialogue having an aesthetic quality. Conventionally dialogue of this type tends to be described as "magical" and "transformative". It is the Holy Grail of dialogue, although little is known of how to evoke it. One lead for philosophers is the notion of the Platonic symposium (as explored, for example, by Owen Barfield. Worlds Apart, 1963). On a a much larger scale, this might be seen as reflected in the dynamics of a body such as the World Congress of Philosophy. But the challenges in the latter case -- as articulated through 23 participant interviews (edited by Michael Tobias, et al. A Parliament of Minds: philosophy for a New Millennium, 2000) -- highlight the disappointing inability of the many schhols of philosophy to address the cognitive ecology of philosophical perspectives as a whole, despite moves towards various forms of "global dialogue", with or without a spiritual dimension.

It could also be argued that, for any integrative dialogue within Isdom to be sustainable, a further self-reflexive twist is required (see also Evaluating Synthesis Initiatives and their Sustaining Dialogues, 2000). Without such a twist these characteristics may only be understood minimalistically and conventionally -- without the degree of challenge that may be vital to sustainability (no risk, no sustainability; no doubt, no dialogue?). There are various clues to reflection on the nature of this twist, including:

Crossing boundaries: Rather than operating within conceptual boundaries, there is a need for a boundary crossing dynamic in dialogue. One relevant exploration is that of Kinhide Mushakoji (Global Issues and Interparadigmatic Dialogue: essays on multipolar politics, 1988) summarized elsewhere (see Epistemological challenges: interparadigmatic dialogue).
Calculus of indications: This was pioneered by G. Spencer-Brown (Laws of Form, 1969) and explores the notion of a distinction, and the consequences of what there would be if there could be a distinction. In his further exploration, Louis H. Kauffman (Virtual Logic: the calculus of indication, 1998) indicates: "Our intent is to explore a number of themes that are related to simplicity and vanishing. As things nearly vanish, we reach regions where apparently distinct domains touch, join and become one. As things come into being, apparently distinct domains appear from an undifferentiated ground. These new domains grow in great profusion and prolixity, sometimes obscuring the simple origins. We are interested in creative growth. It is by returning to the origin that the source of such newness is found. The calculus of indications is a gem retrieved by a descent into nothingness."
Varieties of variety: What forms of variety might emerge in Isdom, as essential to the "pattern that connects"? For Ranulph Glanville (A (Cybernetic) Musing: Varieties of Variety?, 1998) there are several kinds of variety, or ways of considering variety (in a second order world, these are equivalents): "There is the difference that Ashby created in his two uses: variety as the number of states a system can attain (s-variety); and the "entropically inspired" variety as the relationship between the logically possible and the actual number of states a system could achieve (e-variety).... To this confusion I have to add the confusion I find resulting from the need to modify the Law of Requisite Variety that second-order understanding requires and the experience that not only does the variety in a system often increase, but it can (and must) be (re-)defined according to how the included observer chooses to see it. Thus... variety can be seen as needing to be both static and dynamic, both defined by the system and observer determined. Are there other qualities that I have not considered here? I suspect so. Then what are they?" (see also Varieties of Dialogue Arenas and Styles, 1992; Varieties of Dialogue by Number: experimental overview by number of perspectives represented, 1998)
Spacings: For John Sallis (Spacings of Reason and Imagination: in texts of Kant, Fichte, Hegel, 1987), a spacing is a "movement" of the imagination "such as to open the very space in which it occurs", a relation of the space to itself. It "leaves difference open, dis(assembling) the plane of truth so as to set its parts at various angles to one another, reintroducing depth, a new kind of depth... The release of spacing opens reason beyond itself, disrupting that pure self-identity, self-recoverability, self-presence by which spacing would be, was to have been, superseded, suppressed....As such, it is (the movement of ) imagination. Occlusion, the release of spacings, leads from reason to imagination". Sallis distinguishes four "outbreaks of spacings" that disrupt the tranquil space of conventionally reasoned dialogue (but bear an intriguing resemblance to language relating to the navigation of hyperspace or the control of plasma):

Tunnelings: "First an outbreak of what can only appear as metaphoricity, reason metaphorized as tunneling; a metaphorics that serves to expose certain fissures within reason and to space reason out into historicity".
Hoverings: "Second, a certain decentering from reason to imagination; and though a certain recentering supervenes in the end, one can -- perhaps must -- withdraw from that end, withdraw to imagination as the power of hovering between opposities, hence as a different spacing of truth, a spacing also beyond being"
Enroutings: "Third, the spacing of critical reason as a certain eccentricity with regard to the route that reason could follow back to the common root, that is an eccentricity with regard to the enrouting of reason that, though categorically imperative, cannot but disrupt the very spacing of reason and broach a root of reason."
Tremorings: "Fourth, a certain movement that would withdraw nature in its sublimity from assimilation to the supersensible space of reason, the "true world", and that would thereby draw the tremoring imagination out toward an abyss."
Ending(s): "Finally, the slightest eccentricity, traced in the very text in which imagination would be brought to its end...within the most rigorous reduction of spacing in the entire history of metaphysics."

Co-existence of multiple interpretations: As explored by Michael Krausz (Limits of Rightness, 2000): "Might there be more than one admissible interpretation, and under wxhat conditions would they obtain? And under what conditions would it be inappropriate to speak of either one or more admissible interpretation?" [more]. That which is interpreted in dialogue need not always answer to one and only one fully congurent ideally adlmissible interpretation. There may be a one-many match between that which is interpreted and its interpretation, and the interpretations may be opposed but not exclusive.
Oversimplification: In his work, Paul Feyerabend (Against Method, 1975) has explored the limitations of intellectual method in the face of a rich and complex world. Thus (in Conquest of Abundance: a tale of abstraction versus the richness of being, 1999): "The world we inhabit is abundant beyond our wildest imagination... Still many are bothered...and they react accordingly -- they try to "block off" what disturbs them. For them the world is too complicated and they want to simplify it further... The search for reality that accompanied the growth of Western civilization played an important role in the process of simplifying the world... What we find, with very few exceptions, are intellectual leaders repeating slogans which they cannot explain and which they often violate, anxious slaves following in their footsteps and institutions offering or withdrawing money in accordance with the fashions of the day..." (see also Beyond Method: engaging opposition in psycho-social organization, 1981)
Openness vs Closure: Hilary Lawson (Closure: a story of everything, 2001) argues that: "In the new relative, post-modern era, there is no unique history, no agreed morality, and no uncontested knowledge. In their place a mass of alternative and sometimes incompatible theories, from 'chaos' and 'string' theory to 'fuzzy logic' and 'consilience', proposing a theory of everything." For Lawson, "Instead of seeing the world as a thing, a universe whose truths we might uncover through for example the procedures of science...[he]...proposes that we regard the world as open and it is we who close it through our stories." However he acknowleges that Closure is itself just another story that is simply "a pointer to that which is not closure, a pointer in the direction of openness. As such it seeks to undermine the arrogance of theories that suppose they might have uncovered the true nature of reality....It is thus a reflexive theory. Like all other closures it both seeks to be complete, and under scrutiny fails. It is on the one hand the outcome of the desire for closure and on the other hand the outcome of the desire for opennness."

It is preoccupations such as the above which are liable to inform the process of dialogue within Isdom. They are of course echoed in the concerns of certain schools of meditation. [See also Navigating Alternative Conceptual Realities: clues to the dynamics of enacting new paradigms through movement, 2002; Psychology of Sustainability: Embodying cyclic environmental processes, 2002; Future Generation through Global Conversation: in quest of collective well-being through conversation in the present moment, 1997]

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Sustaining dialogue of Isdom