Dear Harvey,

Very much with you here, and hopeful that through this piece Cherryl has 
brought a sense of peace into our group conversation.

What I am hoping is that inclusionality not only brings to the fore  the 
sense of 'somewhere (local) as an expression of everywhere (non-local)' but 
also helps to place their relationship as inclusions of one another on a 
dynamic footing. By abstracting the 'somewhere' from the 'everywhere' and 
defining 'it' as 'something', rationalistic logic not only prevents deeper 
enquiry into the nature of causation but fixes the inseparable dynamic 
evolutionary relationship of the informational with the spatial so that 
these become regarded as 'something' (material) and 'nothing' (immaterial) 
instead of co-creative aspects of the same fluid possibility field 
('dynamical oneness'/ 'dynamical coherence' / 'dynamical togetherness').

By the same token, I very much like your generalization of the meaning of 
'pregnancy', but not so much as the 'bringing of existence from 
non-existence', more the 'dynamic emergence of somewhere as an expression 
of everywhere'.

In inclusional terms, we are OF Nature, a continual transformational 
process in which the destination IS the journey, rich in complex dynamic 
experience of the kind that we can all recognise in our everyday lives but 
tend through rationalization to reduce into discrete factions and 
fractions, devoid of space.


Best

Alan


--On 16 October 2006 14:16 -0500 Harvey Sarles <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Cherryl et al,
>
> I truly love this piece...but I have some thoughts and wonderments about
> some contextual or actual life-events which seem to aid or help in making
> this close to our experience.
>
> My first question takes us back (in the West) to Aristotle, and the
> nature of "causation." This, like most other gathering principles rings
> of the "self-caused first cause." Not all that bad, but it seems to halt
> further questioning, as if to have "solved" the nature of our being and
> thinking.
>
> The second question: relates to my life-work on the observation of the
> individual, and the noticed/noted fact, that each of us is "attached"
> with some person(s) with whom we are in deep and developing
> relationships. Whatever is "attachment," the question of the individual
> self remains in question, assumed to be the fount of our being - somehow
> by our being. All this thinking omits or doesn't much notice all the
> thought and work of those who take responsibility for our continued being
> - don't they have to have some notion of inclusionality, of existence
> from non-existence (otherwise called pregnancy - for lots of reasons and
> directions) - which they imbue to our being, and further notions that we
> are one with the world?
>
> That is, much of the actual-experiential human condition (which I believe
> is much more "complicated" that we have noted thus far), is active,
> involving others, their (bodily and expressive and contextual being and
> understanding) which they endeavor (often successfully) to visit upon us
> and our becoming...who we are.  Harvey
>
> On Oct 13, 2006, at 6:52 PM, Cherryl Martin wrote:
>
> Dear Alan, Ted, Jack, Karl, Steve et al,
>  
>  
>  
> Reading recent discussions reminded me of the following piece, adapted
> from the Hindu Scriptures, the Chandogya Upanishad. It provides an
> excellent explanation for the concept of Inclusionality using several
> different examples:     
> When Svetaketu was twelve years old, his father Uddalaka said to him,
> “Svetaketu, you must now go to school and study. None of our family, my
> child, is ignorant of Brahman.”  Thereupon Svetaketu went to a teacher
> and studied for twelve years. After committing to memory all the Vedas,
> he returned home full of pride in his learning.  His father, noticing the
> young man’s conceit, said to him: “Svetaketu, have you asked for that
> knowledge by which we hear the unbearable, by which we perceive the
> unperceivable, by which we know the unknowable?”  “What is that
> knowledge, sir?” asked Svetaketu.
> “My child, as by knowing one lump of clay, all things made of clay are
> known, the difference being only in name and arising from speech, and the
> truth being that all are clay; as by knowing a nugget of gold, all things
> made of gold are known, the difference being only in name and arising
> from speech, and the truth being that all are gold?exactly so is that
> knowledge, knowing which we know all.”  “But surely those venerable
> teachers of mine are ignorant of this knowledge; for if they had
> possessed it, they would have taught it to me. Do you therefore, sir,
> give me that knowledge.”  “Be it so,” said Uddalaka, and continued thus:
> “In the beginning there was Existence, One only, without a second. Some
> say that in the beginning there was nonexistence only, and that out of
> that the universe was born. But how could such a thing be? How could
> existence be born of non-existence? No, my son, in the beginning there
> was Existence alone?One only, without a second. He, the One, thought to
> himself: Let me be many, let me grow forth. Thus out of himself he
> projected the universe; and having projected out of himself the universe,
> he entered into every being. All that is has its self in him alone. Of
> all things he is the subtle essence. He is the truth. He is the Self. And
> that, Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell me more about this
> Self,” said the youth again.  “Be it so, my child:
>  “As the bees make honey by gathering juices from many flowering plants
> and trees, and as these juices reduced to one honey do not know from what
> flowers they severally come, similarly, my son, all creatures, when they
> are merged in that one Existence, whether in dreamless sleep or in death,
> know nothing of their past or present state, because of the ignorance
> enveloping them?know not that they are merged in him and that from him
> they came.  “Whatever these creatures are, whether a lion, or a tiger, or
> a boar, or a worm, or a gnat, or a mosquito, that they remain after they
> come back from dreamless sleep.  “All these have their self in him alone.
> He is the truth. He is the subtle essence of all. He is the Self. And
> that, Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell me more about this
> Self,” said the youth again.  “Be it so, my child:
>  “The rivers in the east flow eastward, the rivers in the west flow
> westward, and all enter into the sea. From sea to sea they pass, the
> clouds lifting them to the sky as vapor and sending them down as rain.
> And as these rivers, when they are united with the sea, do not know
> whether they are this or that river, likewise all those creatures that I
> have named, when they have come back from Brahman, know not whence they
> came.  “All those beings have their self in him alone. He is the truth.
> He is the subtle essence of all. He is the Self. And that, Svetaketu,
> THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell me more about this Self.”
> “Be it so, my child:
> “If someone were to strike once at the root of this large tree, it would
> bleed, but live. If he were to strike at its stem, it would bleed, but
> live. If he were to strike at the top, it would bleed, but live. Pervaded
> by the living Self, this tree stands firm, and takes its food; but if the
> Self were to depart from one of its branches, that branch would wither;
> if it were to depart from a second, that would wither; if it were to
> depart from a third, that would wither. If it were to depart from the
> whole tree, the whole tree would wither.  “Likewise, my son, know this:
> The body dies when the Self leaves it?but the Self dies not.  “All that
> is has its self in him alone. He is the truth. He is the subtle essence
> of all. He is the Self. And that, Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please,
> sir, tell me more about this Self.”
> “Be it so. Bring a fruit of that Nyagrodha tree.”
> “Here it is, sir.”
> “Break it.”
> “It is broken, sir.”
> “What do you see?”
> “Some seeds, extremely small, sir.”
> “Break one of them.”
> “It is broken, sir.”
> “What do you see?”
> “Nothing, sir.”
> “The subtle essence you do not see, and in that is the whole of the
> Nyagrodha tree. Believe, my son, that that which is the subtle essence?in
> that have all things their existence. That is the truth. That is the
> Self. And that, Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell me more
> about this Self.”
> “Be it so. Put this salt in water, and come to me tomorrow morning.”
> Svetaketu did as he was bidden. The next morning his father asked him to
> bring the salt which he had put in the water. But he could not, for it
> had dissolved. Then said Uddalaka:  “Sip the water, and tell me how it
> tastes.”
> “It is salty, sir.”
> “In the same way,” continued Uddalaka, “though you do not see Brahman in
> this body, he is indeed here. That which is the subtle essence?in that
> have all things their existence. That is the truth. That is the Self. And
> that, Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell me more about this
> Self,” said the youth again.  “Be it so, my child:
> “As a man may be blindfolded, and led away, and left in a strange place;
> and as, having been so dealt with, he turns in every direction and cries
> out for someone to remove his bandages and show him the way home; and as
> one thus entreated may loose his bandages and give him comfort; and as
> thereupon he walks from village to village, asking his way as he goes;
> and as he arrives home at last?just so does a man who meets with an
> illumined teacher obtain true knowledge.  “That which is the subtle
> essence?in that have all beings their existence. That is the truth. That
> is the Self. And that, O Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  “Please, sir, tell
> me more about this Self.”
> “Be it so, my child:
> “When a man is fatally in, his relations gather round him and ask, ’Do
> you know me? Do you know me? Now until his speech is merged in his mind,
> his mind in his breath, his breath in his vital heat, his vital heat in
> the Supreme Being, he knows them. But when his speech is merged in his
> mind, his mind in his breath, his breath in his vital heat, his vital
> heat in the Supreme Being, then he does not know them.  “That which is
> the subtle essence?in that have all beings their existence. That is the
> truth. That is the Self. And that, O Svetaketu, THAT ART THOU.”  What
> more could possibly be said about self-knowledge?
>  
> In the Christian Gospels, Jesus, who would have been familiar with the
> above Hindu scripture, makes the same points in the Gnostic Gospel of
> Thomas:  He said:  ‘If those who lead you say to you, ‘See, the kingdom
> is in the sky,’ then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say
> to you, ‘It is in the sea,’ then the fish will precede you. Rather, the
> kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know
> yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is
> you who are the sons of the living father. But if you will not know
> yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty.’”   
> Is this helpful?
>  
> Best wishes
>  
> Cherryl
>  
>  
>  
>  
>  
>
> From: Group concerned that academia should seek and promote wisdom
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Karl Rogers  Sent:
> 13 October 2006 11:18 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: inclusionality
>  
> Dear Steve,
>  
> Your post was interesting and I found myself agreeing with much of it,
> including your comments on psychology.   
> I once had the opportunity to interview one of the leaders of the Mapuche
> peoples (of Patagonia) for a documentary before he returned to Chile.
> Like many Mapuche, he was exiled during Pinochet's reign of terror. As
> well as making his living as an electrical engineer and a school janitor
> in the UK, he was a major participant in Amnesty International and the
> United Nations Council of Indigenous Peoples, where he struggled for
> about twenty years for the international recognition of the identity
> and autonomy of the Mapuche people of Patagonia (Argentina and Chile).
> This included establishing the recognition of the infringement of basic
> human rights that had occurred during the so-called "War of Pacification"
> in Chile during the 1970s. During this "war", as well as full scale
> military assaults, bounty hunters were paid per head for killing Mapuche.
> They would receive their bounty when they delivered the heads of Mapuche
> at collecting centres. Truck loads of the heads of men, women, and
> children were delivered and it has been estimated that the Mapuche
> population of Chile was reduced to 800,000 from over 5 million people.   
> When Pinoche was ousted, the killings stopped. But the subsequent
> government did not accept the category of "indigenous". As far as they
> were concerned, all the Mapuche were Chileans and, therefore, had no
> rights to their traditional lands. They accepted that these were
> stolen during the "War of Pacification" and, in order to compensate for
> this they offered them housing, but they would not recognise their
> special status as a distinct people. It has taken a very long struggle
> for the Mapuche to be recognised as an indigenous people and that they
> have land rights to their traditional lands. Very slowly, the government
> of Chile is returning some of their land. No such rights are
> recognised by the government of Argentina and the Mapuche there are in a
> terrible state of poverty, living off rubbish dumps and a trickle of
> charity.   
> It seems to me that for many indigenous peoples around the world, their
> movements and struggles for survival are bound together with ideas of
> conservation, rights to autonomous independence, and, most importantly,
> return of their land-rights and the ownership of land. I simply cannot
> see how they could base their movements and struggles for survival on
> inclusionality. It would undermine them because not only would it
> undermine their claim for land-rights but it would also undermine their
> claim as being an "indigenous people".   
> But, I accept that I may well have misunderstood inclusionality, so,
> perhaps, you will indulge me and answer the following questions:   
> From an inclusional perspective, how could we identify a group of people
> as "indigenous"? Or conversely, who is not "indigenous"? Surely,
> following through on inclusionality, the notion of "indigenous" would be
> an artificial and "anti-natural" imaginary imposition, right?   
> Given that for inclusionality the idea of fixed and enduring ownership of
> "traditional lands" would be as nonsensical and "anti-natural" as any
> claim to own land: How do you think that it would be possible to
> sustain campaigns by indigenous peoples for the return of their tribal
> lands and land-rights on the basis of inclusionality?  Given that the
> idea of "conservation" is nonsensical and "anti-natural" in terms of
> inclusionality: How could we sustain any idea of conservation of land,
> cultures, the environment, languages, traditions, species, wilderness on
> the basis of inclusionality?   
> As I am sure that you are very much aware, we have to be careful about
> lumping all indigenous peoples together. The Maori are not the same as
> the nomads of Lapland.  And, while indigenous peoples tend to identify
> themselves with a family or tribe or their people as a whole, rather than
> adopt the Western individualism, they do have senses of individuality, as
> an emergent property of social being, as all human beings do.   
> And, most indigenous peoples (akin to all tightly closed communities)
> have a strong sense of "outsider" or "other".   
> For example: Recently I helped to establish a crafters cooperative for
> the Wicci (in Northern Argentina). The Wicci are an aboriginal forest
> dwelling people. They have no tradition of metal working and all their
> artifacts are constructed from stone, wood, bone, hide, and grasses. They
> are particularly skilled at weaving materials from fibers produced from
> grass. They are very impressive works of art, as well as surprisingly
> enduring. But, most of their "technology" is extremely primative. They
> are paleolithic.   
> Of course, the story of the close encounter between the Wicci and
> Europeans is another terrible history of slaughter and enslavement. At
> first the British tried to "gainfully employ" them and teach them
> Anglicanism. This "missonary" project was a disaster and so the British
> had to content themselves with torturing, enslaving, and murdering them.
> When the Spanish drove the British and the Anglicans out, they then took
> their turn at slaughter and enslavement, as well as teaching them
> Catholicism.  This "missionary" work was also a failure. The Wicci simply
> do not understand Christianity. The do not have a problem with the idea
> of a God saving them. For the few Wicci who have become Christians, this
> is the basis of their belief, but what they do not grasp is the concept
> of "sin" and how a blood sacrifice by a God was necessary to cleanse
> human beings from their "sins". They seem to have the naive idea that a
> God could have forgiven human beings without the need to sacrifice his
> son and they do not understand why would a God make a sinful being. I
> have a great deal of sympathy for this naivety because I share it.   
> The Wicci are incredibly secretive about their own religion. Outsiders
> simply are not welcome to learn about it. As far as I have been able
> to work out, it is a kind of animism and ancestor worship based "natural
> religion", which given that Wicci society is entirely based on family as
> the basic social unit (each familial group is autonomous and they do not
> recognise any central authority, even among themselves) and they live in
> a forest, seems to make a lot of sense to me. Beyond that, I know
> nothing. But I have made a personal study of animism and I share many
> common animistic beliefs about the natural world, as being a
> "multi-dimensional" conscious world infused with spirits and ghosts,
> having had many experiences of both, so I have a lot of sympathy for
> animism and "natural religions".   
> However, the point that I wish to make is about the secrecy of the Wicci.
> They wish to have their autonomy recognised by the government of
> Argentina. The purpose of the cooperative is to fund a school that
> teaches both Wicci and Castellano Spanish so the Wicci are better able to
> argue their case, which they do so on the basis of the universal human
> right to self-determination and their right to their traditional land.
> While their land is not of any commerical value (the forest trees are not
> made out of the right sort of wood for lumber, their land is
> inaccessible, and there are no known deposits of minerals) the Argentine
> government is authoritarian (like all governments) and is relectant to
> grant the Wicci the autonomy they seek. Even though the Argentine
> government, to its credit, protects the Wicci and the land they live on
> (they are allowed to live without having to pay any rent, but it is
> offically considered Parque Naccional land), but, ironically, the
> Argentine government's case is that the national park and the Wicci are
> an inclusional part of Argentina and should not be considered as
> something separated from the country. The Wicci on the other hand wish to
> be exclusional and for everyone to simply leave them alone. They do not
> want to be a part of Argentina or the world as a whole. They wish to have
> clearly defined borders and for all outsiders (i.e. not Wicci) to stay on
> their side of those borders. They do not see their land in an inclusional
> sense. While, of course, they do not conceive of space in Euclidean
> terms, they clearly consider the land upon which they live as being their
> land, at their disposal, and they have a clearly defined idea of their
> identity and their right to that land. While they seem to have some
> inclusional way of relating to their family members, paralleling the
> description you gave about indigenous psychology, in your post, but they
> see their land as something at their disposal, as being the practical
> basis of their existence. But they identify themselves with family,
> living and spirit, not with trees and monkeys, which they treat as
> something useful, but external. From my point of view, they are not at
> all ecologically minded. They simply do not destroy their environment
> because of their low level of technology, consumption, and production.
> Oddly enough, the Wicci are quite hard nosed instrumentalists about land
> as being a site of resources, which is something that I find quite
> unsatisfactory in their relationship with their land, but I am not a
> Wicci. They also are capable of clearly identifying outsiders -- as a
> fundamental distinction -- and they want to exclude them from their land.
> They wish to be left alone and they have a clear idea what that means.
> And, quite frankly, who can blame them?   
> So, my question is, if you were so inclined, how would you reconcile the
> Mapuche and Wicci demand for autonomy and ownership of their traditional
> lands with inclusionality?   
> all the best,
> Karl.
>
>  
>
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