Hi Alan and others

Great to read your inclusional response, and I'm glad that my honesty about
understanding (or not) your writing has not prompted anger, but rather an
attempt to help me to understand.  In case it helps, I guess I just have a
resistance to writing in ways that some of my friends, for instance, would
not find accessible.  I got feedback after my Masters thesis that some of
them couldn't figure out what the first chapter was about, and it made me
work towards 'simpler' forms of communication. However I remember my chief
supervisor, when I was trying to write in this way at the start of my PhD,
saying "You are writing for an academic audience.  Write the popular novel
next!"  Personally, I find it wonderful when 'academics' write in ways that
are accessible to wide audiences, which is why I really enjoyed your radio
article - I DID find it accessible and intriguing.  And Joan Walton's recent
posting on BERA was exemplary in my mind.

And no worries either about confronting me with the paradox of
wholeness/holeyness! (love that expression).  I will need to go back and
read some of your previous articles to help me wrestle with that one.  Do
feel free to point me in a particular direction, if you know of work that
will help me in that task.  I'm always happy to expand my horizons.

With regard to your response to the mandalas, that doesn't surprise me.
Some of them are quite beautiful, though they've never actually stopped me
breathing - but your response is a GREAT example of the kind of alternative
knowledge presentation that motivated me to write the paper to Research
Intelligence.  I was recounting to some friends recently the story of the
American curator of the "Te Maori" exhibition of carvings, an assemblage of
Maori work - some very ancient - that was taken to New York a couple of
decades back.  One carving, Uenuku, particularly impacted on this curator
but she felt that the whole collection spoke with her in ways that called
her to come back in live in New Zealand.  I'm not sure if she is still here
or not.  But I think there are knowledges and wisdom embedded in the
non-verbal presentations of some indigenous cultures - and possibly also
Western ones that I'm not aware of - that bear much more study, respect and
valuing than they currently receive. Hope I'm not using your words out of
context or inappropriately, but I think we're too wedded to the " hard core
of objective rationality as a habit that is very difficult to break, deeply
embedded in our logical, mathematical, theological, governmental and
scientific foundations."

Off to read the morning papers about the Brave New World with Barack Obama
coming to the helm in the U.S.  May God protect him, his family and the
nation.  Our elections coming up on Saturday; same sentiments to us!  Thanks
for the connecting Alan and hope these thoughts are interesting to others
also.
Warm regards
Pip Bruce Ferguson

-----Original Message-----
From: Practitioner-Researcher
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Alan Rayner
Sent: Thursday, 6 November 2008 12:11 a.m.
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Fw: Evolution

Dear Pip,

Many thanks for this response, which I very much appreciate! I take your
point about the double meaning of expiration, but actually this was
intentional in that I do view death as a vital expiration that sustains the
circulatory natural energy flow of evolutionary life on Earth. I don't
always spell out my intentions as I feel that it can work better for the
reader to discover these for themselves through that very form of
self-enquiry - i.e. 'what does he mean?' - that was induced in you. But I
accept there is a potential difficulty in this if the reader instead regards
the ambiguity/subtlety as due to a lack of precision and hence as a cue for
dismissal, not further enquiry.

I was therefore rather dismayed to read your comment that you don't usually
respond to my postings because you're not sure you've understood my writing
or found it insufficiently accessible. I always find it upsetting on the
many occasions when my attempted communications are regarded in this way -
often associated with an assumption that I am being deliberately
academic/esoteric/high fallutin', which is very far indeed from the truth.

Here is a comment I received from a Jungian psychologist just this morning:

 "I appreciate the  great care you put into the attempt to convey
inclusional ideas in a  language that, ironically, has been shaped
(misshaped, really) by the very paradigm that you  seek to counterbalance
(heal?). It seems to me paradoxical to seek  expression of true wholeness
with an instrument that continually  chops up subject and object, and with
that, normal human attention.  The only systems I know to have been
successful in such a cause are  the more meditative practices -- especially
Taoism and Zen -- which  use simple concepts, simple language and experience
to frustrate and  undo the "rational" mind, raising the potential for the
sort of  lightning strikes of insight which  can help to heal fragmented
consciousness.

I respect you and Ted and the others for stretching yourselves to  find
greater clarity and facility of expression. I especially  appreciate your
work to include  "heart" and "love" -- whatever they  might be."


Yes, I do find it a supremely difficult task to use an instrument designed
within the context of and that serves the purpose of an objective paradigm
in order to introduce a non-objectifying understanding of nature and human
nature. It is like tiptoeing through a minefield of language traps set in a
concrete mindset preconditioned to impose its own order on whatever is
uttered. But I feel that 'there has to be a way' of accomplishing this, if
the communication and practice of 'inclusionality' can be 'more than
esoteric' and begin its healing and creative work. And I have now been
working on this - alongside non-verbal and non-literal (i.e. poetic) forms
of expression - for years.


I therefore hope you won't mind me pointing out that there is one expression
present in both my Jungian friend's and your communication that I do see as
paradoxical with regard to the communication of inclusional understanding,
by way of 'true wholeness'. I don't think there is anything in a natural,
infinite, open space geometry that can amount to 'true wholeness', by way of
a 'totality' or 'completeness' within itself, which implies a finite closed
space geometry. It is the desire for definition, which attempts to impose
non-existent limits on space (the limitless presence of material absence)
that is at the hard core of objective rationality as a habit that is very
difficult to break, deeply embedded in our logical, mathematical,
theological, governmental and scientific foundations. I am always trying to
circumvent this desire for definition in my verbal explications of
inclusionality, by avoiding all kinds of 'totalizing' and hence potentially
stultifying expressions. I therefore speak about 'allness' and 'holeyness',
not 'wholeness'.

Coincidentally, over the weekend I visited an exhibition of 'east Asian
art', which included a collection of mandalas. I was shocked to discover
that as I looked into the imagery, I stopped breathing, and had to look
away. I recognised a fundamental difference between the 'traditional
mandala' and its linkage with a unitary 'One as an inclusion of many', and
some of my own poetic and pictorial imagery of 'holding openness' (see
attached) as a 'dynamical continuum' of 'one in all and all in one'.

So, in one way, I am delighted to hear you say that you don't totally
understand my writing! But I'd rather this lack of totality was a source of
creative inspiration and further enquiry, not dumfounded exasperation!

Infinity rules - we can't rule infinity, notwithstanding biblical desires
for dominion over nature!


Warmest

Alan


--On 05 November 2008 08:58 +1300 "Pip/Bruce Ferguson" 
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hey, Alan and all
>
> I love the way you've expressed this, Alan.  I don't always find your
> writing accessible (my problem, I suspect) and that's why I usually don't
> respond when you post stuff, as I'm not sure I've totally understood it.
> But this is concise, well expressed and some of the expressions (for
> instance "an absence of material presence, but which is really a presence
> of material absence") are quite inspired.
>
> If you were doing it on radio here, I'd suggest explaining 'expires' is
> being used in the respiratory sense of breathing out, as 'expires' here
> would normally be taken to be 'carks it!' and by the time people finished
> processing that you're not actually talking about death, they may have
> lost the next bit of what you're saying.  But people in the UK may be
> more up with the play on inspiration and expiration than I suspect most
> of us would be, just encountering the statements in a radio interview!
> So, for instance, if you started that sentence "Thinking of the body's
> breathing in and breathing out,...." then continue with the
> inspiration/expiration stuff, you'd avoid any misunderstanding.  But you
> may not like the sentence at all, and I may be doing my usual trick of
> rescuing listeners who don't actually need rescuing.
>
> What I REALLY like in the piece is the argument against the fragmentation
> of the individual.  That whole paralysis by analysis stuff hacks me off.
> That's where I think indigenous people often have a better sense of the
> wholeness of the individual than some of the so-called more sophisticated
> cultures.  I have even heard of people weighing bodies before and after
> death to try to discern whether 'the soul' has weight...how bizarre.
>
> Hope the interview goes well!
> Warm regards
> Pip Bruce Ferguson
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Practitioner-Researcher
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Alan Rayner
> (BU)
> Sent: Tuesday, 4 November 2008 10:50 p.m.
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Fw: Evolution
>
> Dear Jack and all,
>
> 'Coincidentally', I have just been asked to do an interview later this
> week for local radio ('Wiltshire Radio') concerning whether 'Nature' or
> 'Nurture' can claim credit for Lewis Hamilton's success in becoming
> Formula One World Champion.
>
> I have written the attached, by way of preparation.
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Warmest
>
> Alan
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jack Whitehead" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, November 01, 2008 10:58 AM
> Subject: Re: Fw: Evolution
>
>
> On 1 Nov 2008, at 09:53, Alan Rayner (BU) wrote:
>
> "I think this short correspondence trail with a biology graduate from
> Bath  may give pause
> for reflection on why it is so important to develop an inclusional
> evolutionary
> understanding and living educational theory."
>
> Hi Alan - I'm looking forward later today to adding to the thread started
> by
>
> Joan on
> Rationale for Living Theory - Looking at your one-liner above I'm
> focusing  on
>
> "..the importance of developing an inclusional evolutionary understanding
> and living
> educational theory".    Some thoughts are coming to mind....
>
> i) The importance of 'using' an inclusional evolutionary understanding in
> the generation of
> living educational theories - I like this because I think we can draw
> insights from the
> inclusional evolutionary understanding you have already helped to
> develop,  in the
> generation of living educational theories.
>
> ii The importance of 'developing' an inclusional evolutionary
> understanding  in the
> generation of living educational theories - I like this because it
> includes  a mutual
> development in the relationship between an inclusional evolutionary
> understanding and
> the generation of living educational theories.
>
> These can be combined in the question:
>
> iii) How am I or how are we using and developing an inclusional
> evolutionary understanding in the generation of our living educational
> theories?
>
> I'm working with a modification of the idea usually attributed to Marx
> that  'Philosophers
> interpret the world, the point however is to change it'. The modification
> I'm working with
> is that 'Philosophers interpret the world the point however is to improve
> it'. Hence I'm
> continuing to explore the implications of asking, researching and
> answering  my question,
> 'how do I improve what I am doing?' in my professional context for the
> generation of my
> own living educational theory. I'm also wanting to participate in
> collaborative enquiries
> with others on the list as we support each other in shared enquiries
> and/or  our individual
> enquiries. Maybe these shared enquiries will emerge from following Joan's
> lead in posting
> our individual rationales for generating our living theories. I'll
> re-read  all the contributions
> to the thread on Rationale for Living Theory in the October postings and
> I'll post my
> rationale later today and make some suggestions for some collaborative
> enquiries as we
> begin the November 08 phase of our e-seminar
>
> Love Jack.