First and Second-Order Epistemologies

First and Second-Order Epistemologies

Gregory Bateson (1991) famously said that we “cannot claim to have no epistemology. Those who so claim have nothing but a bad epistemology” (p. 178).  Bateson is calling for self-reflection in our epistemology.  He wants it to be recursive, so that in our production of knowledge we do not delude ourselves into thinking that...

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Reality, Process, and Mathematics

Reality, Process, and Mathematics

All the qualities of the physical world exist through the interrelations of things to each other. What Moleschott says is correct for physical existence: 'All existence is an existence through qualities. But there is no quality that does not exist through a relation.' Just as everything of a soul nature contains something in itself...

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Goethean Phenomenology, Soul Breathing, and Transformation

Goethean phenomenology acts as a transformative bridge between the researcher and a topic of inquiry.  The method is unique not in that it attempts to work through the subject/object split, but rather in the WAY it attempts to do this. Doing Goethean phenomenological research requires that one be completely open to what presents itself, while...

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Object and Process oriented languages and human development

(Note, the Blackfoot people have a process-oriented language, which is much more strongly verb-based, while English and most other languages are object/noun based.) A friend of mine asked: Do the Blackfoot people go through a phase where they need to have conceptual boxes, and then learn to transcend the need to reify these artificial demarcations,...

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