Hammerstep

I saw this act on America's Got Talent.

Run Away

Sarah Jarosz with Alison Krauss

Just Dance

An old favorite.

Time is a given

This post in the OOO thread references Bryant's ealier book, Difference and Givenness: Deleuze's Transcendental Empiricism and the Ontology of Immanence (NW UP, 2008). Some discussion ensued in continuing posts. Of possible relevance in this thread:

The section "time out of joint" in chapter 7 (starting at 185) sounds similar to DeLanda above, but not quite.

"Rather than approaching  time cardinally in terms of succession, we instead seek to determine its ordinal structure...as the immutable form of change conditioning movement.... Put alternatively, conceived transcendentally, the past is that which was never present, the present is that which is only ever present, and the future is that which will never arrive" (186-7).

Speculations on Bergson, Bryant & the Wilber-Combs lattice

The last post reminded me of something I've been working on using Bergson via Bryant. It's not completely thought through yet, with gaps still, but I thought I'd get it down here and then work on it further.

Now where Bryant might be akin to something like the MHC is in his endo-relational organizational structure. Recall in TDOO his distinction between exo- and endo-relations, and its correlation with intensional and extensional relations in a set (212). Endo-relations reside in the structural organization of its elements, the elements themselves not being autonomous entities. Hence the elements of this set cannot be otherwise; they must be in a relatively fixed pattern to maintain an entity's autonomy (214).

Bryant uses Bergon's diagram on memory to show how endo-relations are maintained (232).

The involution of virtuality

Reviewing this of Bryant's posts I came upon the following in comments, #2 by jdempsey. He said the following, relevant to virtuality and envolution (my bolding):

"Kerslake’s DELEUZE AND THE UNCONSCIOUS (2009) has a beautiful description of how humans are able to perceive time in a seemingly unique way:

The limitations of evolutionary meaning-making

Here's an interesting Integral World article applicable in the OOO thread, "The limitations of the evolutionary meaning-making." It deals with how the Real is underdeveloped in kennilingus via the latter's overlooking peak oil. The author is an engineer so he "focus[es] typically on the physical and material world. [...] In integral contexts there is a larger emphasis on meta-theory and perspectives rather than descriptions on reality itself."

Corbett on integral capitalism

The following is from Corbett's Integral World article "The rise of integral conservatism":


He discusses Habermas' instrumental rationality and how it manipulated people and the environment for profit. And that Kennilingam supported this critique in favor of a more integral or postformal rationality. And yet the old adage "what what I do, not what I say" seems apparent. He said:

"That the integral leadership beginning with KW chooses to remain silent and even takes sides favorable to the right-wing austerity bastards (which includes the so-called center-left these days) on this most timely and urgent issue, I think speaks volumes not just about their intellectual bankruptcy but about their own aspirations to power and wealth, the same kind of petty bourgeois opportunism that gets minorities and women into positions of power without really changing anything, those very things that strategic-instrumental rationality can be employed to acquire and accumulate, at whatever the cost. Indeed, there are those including myself who have experienced first hand the interpersonal and institutional manipulations of KW and his inner circle of loyalists who will go to great lengths to avoid and otherwise exclude anyone who questions or challenges the 'party line' of integral ideology and its practices. Of course, the solution to this political corruption within the inner integral circle is to splinter off into a more progressive and open network of integral scholars and practitioners who don't deploy strategic-instrumental manipulations for their own personal systemic benefit within the integral echelon."

And from his article "Ken Wilber, philosopher-king":

Torbert in Integral Review

Here's the link to Torbert's article in the new Integral Review, "Listening into the dark." It is rather precise technically and boring, to me, for the most part. Which I suppose what makes it good 'science' in Edwards' sense. But what caught my attention was including interpretative validity measures into the mix (recall Edwards on this):

"Lather calls these qualitative, Postmodern interpretivist ways of enhancing validity: paralogical validity, ironic validity, rhizomatic validity, and voluptuous validity" (288). He describes each and they sound a lot like several of the themes we've explored in the forum.

This example from the ironic validity reminds me of Cohen stepping down, and I-I's founder syndrome:

"Leadership that relies primarily on unilateral causal power based on the leaders' 'truth' is less likely to cause organizational transformation than leadership that 'listens in to the dark' beyond its current version of truth" (289).

He even suggests that leaders of later action-logics avoid such unilateral power and prefer more mutuality.

Torbert re-tread

I'm more inclined to the post-dialectical thinking of Torbert in this thread. I recall from the Edwards article that he thinks Torbert's model is much more in line with the various modes of a metasystem. My second comment in the thread outlines some similarities to how I agree with Bonnie. I quote Bonnie in the 3rd comment. In this post I ask some of the same questions I asked above, and how Torbert addresses them. A couple posts down he goes into triple-loop awareness, and this sounds more like an answer to my question. We come around again to something like an entirely novel '2nd tier' much more akin to our envolutionary and torusian  triple-loop feedback including virtuality. In the later pages (there are only 3) I bring in DeLanda, Deleuze, Bryant etc., as they're on the same page (so to speak). And how this differs from the Lingam's Causal explanations. I even throw in a bonus neuroscience article at the end validating it! ;)

I'm now going to return to Torbert's article in the new Integral Review, "Listening into the dark."

How to smoke roses

by Cloud Archive, courtesy of Balder.

Buddhism and postmodernity

I've edited some excerpts from Batchelor's essay "Buddhism and postmodernity." This is some rather poetic prose which reminds me of Wilber when he's at his best.

"A postmodern world that takes for granted the plurality and ambiguity of perception, the fragmented and contingent nature of reality, the elusive, indeterminate nature of self, the arbitrariness, inauthenticity and anguish of human existence, would seem to fit Buddhism like a glove. [...] The element of postmodernity that potentially promises Buddhist voices access to contemporary culture is implicit in Jean-François Lyotard’s simplified but seminal definition of ‘postmodern’ as ‘incredulity toward grand narratives.

"If Buddhists find themselves in sympathy with postmodern incredulity towards grand narratives, then they might be compelled to imagine another kind of Buddhism altogether. They will try to rearticulate the guiding metaphors of Buddhist tradition in the light of postmodernity. [...] The key notion in such an endeavour would be ‘emptiness.’ For here we have a notion that shares with postmodernism a deep suspicion of a single, non-fragmentary self, as well as any ‘transcendental signified’ such as God or Mind. It too celebrates the disappearance of the subject, the endlessly deferred play of language, the ironically ambiguous and contingent nature of things.

Rosch's shentong

I think I'll bring some posts over about Rosch from another thread starting in this post. She co-authored The Embodied Mind with Varela and Thompson. She's a good example of the shentong view.

This is also interesting, from footnote 5:

"Here we come to a watershed in Tibetan Buddhist teachings and, in fact, in Buddhist teachings in general. Three of the four major Tibetan lineages (Kagyu, Sakya, and Nyingma) adhere to the shentong (other empty) interpretation of emptiness in which all things are empty of other than wisdom. Put another way, things are empty of self nature but filled with wisdom (filled with the essence). Put in a yet more advanced way, all that things really are is wisdom essence. Historically shentong is traced from the Buddha nature (Tathagatagarbha) schools of Mahayana Buddhism. The fourth Tibetan lineage, the Gelugpa, adheres to the rangtong (self empty) interpretation in which things are simply empty of self nature, a reversion to an earlier Mahayana position. There has been a good deal of conflict in Tibet over this point. Many of the parallels with Sufism that I am exploring in this chapter depend upon the shentong view because it is a view that says there is a way of knowing beyond the limits of the mind. (See Gyamtso, 1986, and Hookham, 1991 for a detailed account of this distinction.)"

Thompson on waking, dreaming and deep sleep

Continuing the recent line of inquiry, one might also find the Thompson thread of interest. His new book investigates waking, dreaming and deep sleep, aka our gross, subtle and causal bodies. A few brief excerpts applicable here:

"But whereas the Advaitin takes this minimal selfhood to be a transcendental witness consciousness, I think itʼs open to us to maintain that it is my embodied self or bodily subjectivity, or what phenomenologists would call my pre-personal lived body. In this way, I think we can remove the Advaita conception of dreamless sleep from its native metaphysical framework and graft it onto a naturalist conception of the embodied mind."

Fight the proposed tax on credit unions

A message from my credit union. The regressives would rather tax them out of existence than tax the giant banks who have all the money? Typical. I've edited it to make it more generic. To support this go to www.DontTaxMyCreditUnion.org/take-action.

I am writing with an important message about the future of your Credit Union, and to request your help. You may have heard politicians in Washington are considering an overhaul of the federal tax code. The discussion includes an idea which could have significant negative impact on credit unions and its members.

As a Member, you understand the credit union is owned by you. Unlike banks that maximize profits for a small group of investors, credit unions exist to serve our Members, including working families, small businesses, and our local communities. Because we are not-for-profit—and therefore, tax-exempt—we are able to return benefits to our Members through higher returns on savings, lower rates on loans, and lower and fewer fees. Our focus is people, not profit, and our mission is to serve your best interests.

Now banks and some politicians in Washington are talking about taxing credit unions, despite the fact that we are not-for-profit. Some claim the budget can be balanced by taxing credit unions, even though credit unions hold only 6% of all financial assets nationwide, and for-profit banks hold the rest.

Envolution

inthesaltmine suggest the term 'envolution' in the involutionary given thread. Continuing my previous posts on my comments in that thread I've added this:

Going back to the Lingam's excerpt G we see from the figure 7 on p. 21, and related text, that the subtle and causal bodies co-arise with material complexification of the brain in evolution. He does want it both ways though. In the section "involution and evolution" beginning on p. 29 he again tells his so-called myth about how evolution is just playing out involution in reverse. He even uses the two truths doctrine to support this, but it too is quite metaphysical as discussed in the Batchelor thread and elsewhere. I'll give him consistency though.

A priori givens? How about non-physical givens?

To return to the initial post and focus of the involutionary given thread, for me the question on 'involutionary' givens relates to apriori metaphysical axioms out of thin air, or the kind of self-defining tautology Layman brought up. And which are based on false reason per L&J. So real reason grounded in embodiment to me leads to more accurate meta-theory, or at least more postmetaphysical given the 'givens' of its definitions explored in the history of this forum.

Perhaps that is one question of inquiry for us? Can a postmetaphysical meta-theory contain apriori or involutionary givens? And I don't mean can we accept that someone at a 'lower' level can see it that way and we have to include their perspective. I'm asking can a postmetaphysical metaparadigm itself accept metaphysical apriori axioms? Most all of the postmeta-paradigms we've explored say this cannot be an axiom.

For example this from Integral Spirtuality, Appendix Two:

Image schema and neuroscience

Check out From Perception to Meaning: Image Schemas in Cognitive Linguistics (Mouton de Gruyter, 2005). See Dodge and Lakoff’s chapter, particularly the section relating image schema to neural structure beginning on 72. That book is from 2005 and more data has likely been acquired since. They conclude:

“While this story seems plausible, it is by no means proven. However, it suggests several directions for future research" (84). They are providing a base upon which to test their hypothesis with neuroscientific falsibility criteria.

Also see Rohrer’s chapter beginning at 165. His abstract is more assertive than the previous reference:

Tautology to nowhere?

Continuing our IPS discussion the following is in response to Joe's recent post.

Let me see if I follow your tautology. The axiom is that we need a meta-paradigm to adjudicate between possibly incommensurate paradigms. And yet there is no way to falsify meta-paradigms so we must return to even those being incommensurate? Please clarify if I have this wrong.

As to your criticism of Edwards, I have yet to carefully read that article. I'll respond to your specific concern after so doing. For now I can say that I’ve made a direct connection between Edwards lenses and image schema and the fit is quite snug. While he hasn’t done so directly he did note in that post “these lens categories tap into some basic relationships that exist in the human experience of reality.” If we ground his lenses with L&J’s non-falsified research we have some validating parameters. I’d also say that he has made meta-theory the work of his Ph.D. dissertation, and it is his continuing project with thousands of hours of research into an apparently quite deep and communally validated branch of study. This is not to say he’s correct on all counts but that he is more likely to have a better handle on the topic.

Falsifying meta-theory

Joe asked about falsifiable criteria for the likes of IT, SR, OOO. I replied:

I suggest Edwards' article in the current IR. He has been a huge proponent of how to falsify meta-theory, which all of the above seem to be. The article goes into how to apply the scientific paradigm to the meta-level. Interestingly he says this of Bhaskar:

"Bhaskar also stresses this capacity of social science and particularly of metatheoretical science to adjudicate on the half-truths and false forms of knowing and acting that emerge from this 'demi-reality' of entrenched ideologies" (179).

Of course he caveats this with the following:

"Metatheorising is the attempt to ground big picture models on extant scientific theory. It is not a philosophical process of working from first principles. Rather, it is a scientifically grounded activity of developing overarching views from the integration of other respected sources of valid cultural knowledge and verified streams of scientific research. Metatheory is essentially the study of other theory and its uses middle-range theory as its source of data" (180).

Take action against the Supreme Court gutting the Voting Rights Acts

From Credo Action:

The Supreme Court just gutted the Voting Rights Act. We must act now.

Become a citizen co-sponsor: "I support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that guarantees the freedom to vote for all." Automatically add your name:

Just hours ago, the United States Supreme Court handed down a decision in the case of Shelby County v. Holder1 that destroyed the Voting Rights Act, ending 40 years of protection for minorities against discriminatory and unfair attempts to limit voting based on one's race.2 It's a shameful decision, and after hearing oral arguments, it sadly comes as no surprise. During the oral arguments in this case, Justice Scalia described the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act as "the perpetuation of a racial entitlement," and other justices questioned whether racial discrimination even still exists. Now that the Voting Rights Act has been gutted, we must act to protect the rights of everyone to vote. That’s why there must be a constitutional amendment that guarantees the freedom to vote for every citizen, regardless of race or where they live. And we’re joining with our friends at Color of Change to help make that happen. Join the movement to pass a constitutional amendment that protects the right to vote for every citizen. Click here to add your name as a citizen co-sponsor.

IPS thread on involutionary givens

inthesaltmine started this thread. My comments so far follow.

Involution is a 'myth' for him [Wilber] only insofar as it holds to actual immutable forms. His postmetaphysics to be consistent cannot allow for that. Hence he updates it to a morphogenetic gradient, which provides the impetus to evolve but he still retains this a priori involutionary thrust from which evolution must 'return.' Just retaining that notion though keeps him hitched to a metaphysical premise, one avoided by the embodied immanentists like SR and OOO.

So I take your point about envolution. I do not though see evolution beginning after the big bang. That is, there was never a time when there was nothing and then magically there was something. Even before the big bang there was something, hence there is an ever present evolutionary (though not necessarily 'progressive') movement. Hence the emphasis on embodied immanence instead of disembodied transcendence.

Comment on Knox, archetype and image schema

From "Convergent dialogues" by Yvonne Lynton Reid at the CG Jung Page. Note that image schema are elaborated into archetypal images by "actual affective experience."

"Jungian analyst Jean Knox suggests that recent work on the human genome, which puts the number of individual genes at closer to thirty thousand rather than the hundred thousand or more expected, makes the inheritance of images and ideas impossible. (Knox, 2003). Her synthesis of current positions of neuroscience, cognitive science and the developments in attachment theory makes a convincing case for the archetype as emergent, based on the presence of genetically catalysed image schemas which are elaborated into images of archetypal complexity by actual affective experience. An example which she cites is the presence of a schematic preparedness for 'containment' which the neonate organism seeks. This image schema would be elaborated into the archetypal representation of the mother. Another such schema is preparedness to register the configurations of a face. In this view, the archetypal aspects of experience, though in no way less influentially powerful, will be subject to cultural determination over a biological substrate, thus socially constructed rather than inherited. The imagery arising from these experiences is not innate, nor is it restricted to responses to physiological events such as hunger giving rise to an image of a ravening object inside the body. To my mind such theoretical revision in no way diminishes the power and ubiquity of the imagery basic to our humanness, imagery which has long been understood by Jungians as collective in its affective elements, thus archetypal."

The consequences of metaphysical givens

The following is in response to Joe here.While I'd agree both view accept givens, the transcendent sees them as timeless and changeless whereas the transcendental sees them as contingent and changeable. And this makes a HUGE practical difference in politics, economics and religion. Bryant is at his best when he lays out the political implications of transcendent principles used as an excuse for hegemony, privilege and abuse. We even see it as a most practical matter in the likes of I-I's organizational structure, and the type of economics they promote (conscious capitalism). See for example the new thread on Cohen waking up to the former, and the integral capitalism thread for how kennlingus perpetuates the inequities of capitalism, conscious or otherwise.

Brit Hume on Snowden's leak: "This hasn't been so damaging."

We know that regressives in general think Snowden committed treason and should be hung in public. One 'reason' we hear is that he revealed State secrets that are endangering lives. So I was surprised yesterday to hear Brit Hume say the following on Fox News Sunday (transcript):

"Well, my first thought is that we need to think about how much damage, if any, the leak of the existence of this program has done. As we’ve talked about here a week ago, this isn't the first time it’s been reported that this program exists. It sort of went unnoticed somehow when it was broken by USA Today and perhaps others back, what, seven years ago. So how much damage has it done that the people were trying to defend ourselves against know that there’s this vast database of phone numbers which can be searched in case they reach out to somebody in the United States by telephone. It would be better they didn't know that. How much better is imponderable at this point. To me, that’s the key question. How much harm has it done? And does whatever information this character has that hasn't come out yet pose a threat of further damage? What came out this week, I think, didn't do that. I just would say that I think that, you know, so far this hasn't been so damaging. Nor has it been all that revelatory, in my opinion."

When you have the most right wing panelist on Fox News saying this we really should pay attention. And the Justice Dept. wants to try Snowden for espionage?

Involution, prototypes and archetypes

The following is in response to Joe's comments here in the ongoing IPS OOO thread discussion.

Image schemas per se are indeed the lowest level of affect/sensation/perception. The example Joe used though about happiness is a metaphoric extension based on the up/down image schema, showing how the base if extended with a higher structure. So yes, image schema in themselves cannot integrate the higher levels. It is the reverse, that the higher levels integrate image schema, and those cognitive scientists like L&J are doing so while also noting how the higher levels are shaped and limited by the lower. Also see this recent post in another thread supporting their brand of embodied cognitive science as cross-paradigmatic.

Actually I think Wilber distinguishes between archetypes and prototypes. I think he'd be more in favor of the involutionary givens as the former and the evolutionary developments as prototypes.* But I don't buy into involution period, seeing it as one of those metaphysical premises of the kind we need to forgo in postmetaphysics. Granted we need metaphyical premises as ontology, but not supernatural planes beyond the physical which precede the physical and upon which it depends.

The arc from body to culture

Returning to the current Integral Review issue, this one looks promising in light of recent posts: "The arc from body to culture: How affect, proprioception, kinesthesia, and perceptual imagery shape cultural knowledge (and vice versa)." The abstract follows.

"This essay approaches the complex triadic relation between concepts, body, and culture from an angle rooted in the empirical cognitive research of the past three decades or so. Specifically, it reviews approaches to how the body gives a substrate to and shapes cultural cognition. One main section examines how the body contributes to cultural learning and another how abstract cultural concepts and reasoning are grounded in sensorimotor experience, perception, and inner somatic states. Both sections’ purpose is to survey and briefly critique different theoretical frameworks, probe into their complementarity, and summarily evaluate to what extent higher cognition is embodied. The third main section outlines elements of an epistemological framework that connects culture, concepts, and the body in a sensible way. The paper closes with a discussion of how the embodied cognition paradigm advances a rapprochement of different areas both within cognitive research and beyond."

From the article, akin to some of my points:

Taibbi on the financial smoking gun

Matt Taibbi appeared on Chris Hayes' show June 20. Hayes starts off with Senator Frankin discussing this cartoon by Tom Toles.

On paradigm assumptions, incommensurability and meta-paradigms

Joe has a good response to some of my posts here. See it for the details. I highlighted though this sentence:

“IMO, a different way must be found - not by conflating two frameworks or reducing one to the other, but by postulating a new framework which is capable of enfolding both of the previous frameworks.” My response:

Obviously each conceptual frame or paradigm by its nature limits what can be investigated in the first place. And has its own methodology, assumptions, axioms, etc. which may be similar to but different from other enacted paradigms. Hence we get the likes of Wilber's principle of nonexclusion. Like you he maintains though that nonexclusion can be superceded by enfoldment:

“However, if one practice or paradigm includes the essentials of another and then adds further practices—such that it 'enfolds' or in cludes the other—then that paradigm can legitimately be claimed to be more integral, which is the enfoldment principle” (Excerpt D, 2).

And when I die

Thinking of my immanent demise today this one popped up for me:

The Restore Our Privacy Act

From my democratic socialist comrade Bernie Sanders, the Restore Our Privacy Act. Click the link if you want to sign the petition.

The Restore Our Privacy Act

Sign your name and support the Restore Our Privacy Act.
Sen. Bernie Sanders  introduced the Restore Our Privacy Act to put strict limits on sweeping powers used by the National Security Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation to secretly track telephone calls by millions of innocent Americans who are not suspected of any wrongdoing.
"We must give our intelligence and law enforcement agencies all of the tools that they need to combat terrorism but we must do so in a way that protects our freedom and respects the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches," Sanders said.
Read the bill here.
What this bill does:

• Reforms Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act (50 U.S.C. 1861) to limit the ability of the government to engage in dragnet data mining.
• Requires that the NSA or FBI have reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, to obtain business records for a terrorism suspect.
• Ends the process of obtaining wide-open orders for data mining; the government would be required to provide reasonable suspicion for each tangible thing to be obtained.
• Removes the presumption that anyone "known to" a suspect is relevant to the investigation.
• Increases Congressional oversight-the Attorney General shall be required to report to the Congress as a whole, not just the members of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees.

- See more at: http://www.sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=a81ea8d9-7ee0-477d-b03e-0c790a6b9aa6&utm_source=berniebuzz&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Sign+the+RESTORE+OUR+PRIVACY+ACT+Petition&utm_campaign=National+Bernie+Buzz+6-22#sthash.bId5wNQi.dpuf

The Restore Our Privacy Act

Sign your name and support the Restore Our Privacy Act.
Sen. Bernie Sanders  introduced the Restore Our Privacy Act to put strict limits on sweeping powers used by the National Security Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation to secretly track telephone calls by millions of innocent Americans who are not suspected of any wrongdoing.
"We must give our intelligence and law enforcement agencies all of the tools that they need to combat terrorism but we must do so in a way that protects our freedom and respects the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches," Sanders said.
Read the bill here.
What this bill does:

• Reforms Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act (50 U.S.C. 1861) to limit the ability of the government to engage in dragnet data mining.
• Requires that the NSA or FBI have reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, to obtain business records for a terrorism suspect.
• Ends the process of obtaining wide-open orders for data mining; the government would be required to provide reasonable suspicion for each tangible thing to be obtained.
• Removes the presumption that anyone "known to" a suspect is relevant to the investigation.
• Increases Congressional oversight-the Attorney General shall be required to report to the Congress as a whole, not just the members of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees.

- See more at: http://www.sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=a81ea8d9-7ee0-477d-b03e-0c790a6b9aa6&utm_source=berniebuzz&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Sign+the+RESTORE+OUR+PRIVACY+ACT+Petition&utm_campaign=National+Bernie+Buzz+6-22#sthash.bId5wNQi.dpuf

The Restore Our Privacy Act

Sign your name and support the Restore Our Privacy Act.
Sen. Bernie Sanders  introduced the Restore Our Privacy Act to put strict limits on sweeping powers used by the National Security Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation to secretly track telephone calls by millions of innocent Americans who are not suspected of any wrongdoing.
"We must give our intelligence and law enforcement agencies all of the tools that they need to combat terrorism but we must do so in a way that protects our freedom and respects the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches," Sanders said.
Read the bill here.
What this bill does:

• Reforms Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act (50 U.S.C. 1861) to limit the ability of the government to engage in dragnet data mining.
• Requires that the NSA or FBI have reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, to obtain business records for a terrorism suspect.
• Ends the process of obtaining wide-open orders for data mining; the government would be required to provide reasonable suspicion for each tangible thing to be obtained.
• Removes the presumption that anyone "known to" a suspect is relevant to the investigation.
• Increases Congressional oversight-the Attorney General shall be required to report to the Congress as a whole, not just the members of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees.

- See more at: http://www.sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=a81ea8d9-7ee0-477d-b03e-0c790a6b9aa6&utm_source=berniebuzz&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Sign+the+RESTORE+OUR+PRIVACY+ACT+Petition&utm_campaign=National+Bernie+Buzz+6-22#sthash.bId5wNQi.dpuf

The Restore Our Privacy Act

Sign your name and support the Restore Our Privacy Act.

Sen. Bernie Sanders  introduced the Restore Our Privacy Act to put strict limits on sweeping powers used by the National Security Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation to secretly track telephone calls by millions of innocent Americans who are not suspected of any wrongdoing.

"We must give our intelligence and law enforcement agencies all of the tools that they need to combat terrorism but we must do so in a way that protects our freedom and respects the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches," Sanders said.

Read the bill here.

What this bill does:

• Reforms Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act (50 U.S.C. 1861) to limit the ability of the government to engage in dragnet data mining.
• Requires that the NSA or FBI have reasonable suspicion, based on specific and articulable facts, to obtain business records for a terrorism suspect.
• Ends the process of obtaining wide-open orders for data mining; the government would be required to provide reasonable suspicion for each tangible thing to be obtained.
• Removes the presumption that anyone "known to" a suspect is relevant to the investigation.
• Increases Congressional oversight-the Attorney General shall be required to report to the Congress as a whole, not just the members of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees.
  

Andrew Cohen, Craig Hamilton and evolutionary enlightenment

Over at IPS Balder started a thread on Cohen stepping down as Guru. I re-posted the following from an '09 IPS Gaia thread on Hamilton's authentic enlightenment program.

Speaking of old posts and threads, recall this one from Gaia on Hamilton and Authentic Enlightenment? I've enclosed my concluding remarks from the thread below, relevant here as well.

Speaking of idealization, recall what Epstein said in the Buddhism & Psychoanalysis thread:

“At the core of the self-representation as agent lies the narcissistically invested ego, an idea which the ego has of itself as perfect and inviolable. The ego ideal involves a sense of inherent perfection…. While concentration practices can temporarily suspend ego boundaries and provide a deep sense of ontological security through the merger of ego and ego ideal, insight practices operate within the ego system itself.

“Concentration practices do indeed evoke the ego ideal and the oceanic feeling in a manner well described by generations of analytic commentators, but the mindfulness practices, which define the Buddhist approach, seek to dispel the illusory ontology of the self encapsulated within the ideal ego.”

Image schema as endo-structural elements continued

Continued from the ongoing discussion in the OOO thread:

Related to Joe's recent post on differance, also recall earlier in this thread how I compared differance with endo-relations, as it is the pre-position from which oppositions arise and through which they are irreducibly entailed. Related to this here's a quote from Issues in Cognitive Linguistics (Walter de Gruyter, 1999):

"The internal structure of image schemata is basic level structure in the sense that it is analyzable but not decomposable, i.e., its elements are inseparable from each other. This is so because they pertain to basic domains, which are not characterizable relative to other domains, but only to themselves. […] For any phenomenon to have a structure, at least two contrasted elements are needed. Since every image schema possesses two such elements […] it is obvious that they have an internal structure. However, it must also be obvious that these structures are irreducible basic gestalts. There is no OUT without IN" etc. (61).

Balder suggested Sallis's work as having related ideas,  mentioning this review of The Logic of Imagination. I quoted from and commented on it:

Image schema as endo-structural elements

Continuing from previous posts on the topic (like here, here and here), recall this post in another thread, linking to another thread, where I brought up image schema. Also recall my reference to Nunez article “What is mathematics” earlier in this thread.  Nunez notes something of interest discussed in this thread, elements in an endo-structure that are not holons because they are not decomposable. He said: “The spatial relations in a given language decompose into conceptual primitives (image schemas) that appear to be universal” (10). Image schemas are decomposable primitives, the bottom ‘turtle’ of embodiment that do not go on in infinite regress. Granted they are not ‘thoughts’ proper like the decomposable elements of Luhmann or Bryant but are thought’s elements!

What is meta-philosophy?

This blog post by Bryant was referenced in the OOO thread. Reading through the comments he said this of relevance in this thread:

"When I approach any philosophical text, I distinguish between its meta-philosophy and its philosophy. The meta-philosophy of a philosophy is how it describes or represents its position. The philosophy of a philosophy is what it actually develops in the body of its work. At the level of DeLanda’s meta-philosophy, you’re absolutely right. He claims not to advocate the existence of units. However, when you look at his actual analyses, he’s intoxicated by units of all kinds and even looks like an actor-network theorist."

And from this post (not Bryant):

Petition for living wages

From SEIU:

 

You know what's happening. Wages have been stagnant for a generation, and the fastest growing jobs in our economy are also the lowest paid. Fast food, retail, home health, childcare and security jobs are growing, they don’t pay enough to even cover all the basic necessities like food, clothing and rent. 

 

It doesn't have to be this way. 

 

The needs of low-wage workers have been ignored for far too long.  This Friday, we’re going to be joining forces with fast food workers in New York City, retail sales clerks in Chicago, and military uniform makers in Tennessee on the Raise Up America Campaign. Members of Congress who are ready to take real action on these issues will be joining workers who are tired of barely getting by. 

 

Want to join our call for action? Click here.

 

Huge corporations like Walmart and McDonald’s need to get this message loud and clear: Raising wages and treating working well isn't just the right thing to do, it also means millions of families will have more money to spend in their communities, helping to strengthen our entire economy. 

 

It’s time for all workers to be making a living wage. Join the fight to Raise Up America right now.

 

In solidarity,

Erik Moe

SEIU

The Wall by The Invisible

Here's another one from the closing credits of Continuum. Here's a blurb on the album.

Hold supreme court justices accountable

From Representative Louise Slaughter via  Organize by Credo:

Tell Chief Justice Roberts: Adopt the Code of Conduct for United States Judges.

Last week it was reported that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia doesn't believe in molecular biology. He also seems to doubt the need for a transparent, accountable and impartial Supreme Court. Earlier this month, we learned that Justice Scalia has once again met with a conservative political group behind closed doors.

No member of the Supreme Court should be meeting behind closed doors with powerful political organizations that seek to change our nation’s laws. That's why today I'm launching a campaign calling on Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts to adopt a binding code of conduct.

My petition, which is to Chief Justice Roberts, asks the following:

More commentary on integral and speculative realist meta-paradigms

Continuing from the last post, a few more comments.

Furthermore, I'm not opposed to big picture meta-theory. It's just that I see the likes of the speculative realists including in theirs this notion of excess, withdrawal or differance at the heart of their meta-paradigm(s). This tends to keep them open and contingent, with much less of the kind of hubris we see in the more 'integral' meta-paradigms that are blind to such excess. It is very much akin to the restricted/general economy and consequent models of restricted/general complexity explored here (and following).* And ironically enough, those SR models seem to me to be more 'integral' than those claiming that title, and more accurately demonstrating the next wave of evolution.

A few comments on the new Integral Review

I linked to it in this post. I tried to read 4 of the articles but go so bored that I ended up skimming and decided this stuff really doesn't hold much interest for me anymore. Even authors I previously prized like Edwards, Gidley, Hampson and Torbert. This stuff is just getting too academic and dry, like having sex without any lubrication. It's just more irritating than informative. Whereas journals like Speculations and O-Zone are for me where the action on the real cutting edge of philosophy resides.

I realized that part of my distaste is from the blatant hubris and superiority complex in these articles, highly reminiscent of kennilingus. Meta this or meta that is the key to the salvation of mankind, and we hold the key to that knowledge. Whereas I'm starting to think of meta more as in meta-data, like with the NSA. It's just organizing records, or in this case paradigms, and in no way has any relevant content.* We're all fascinated by something that is more like a macro in computer science, useful shortcuts but in themselves not much more than that, like meta whatever.

Recap on transitioning from capitalism to P2P

In this IPS thread an American cannot grok how we can move from capitalism to P2P. My response follows, a recap of previous posts and comments:

Are you American by any chance? It seems you cannot see beyond its borders. Have you seen that the northern European countries are the happiest (and here) and the most democratic, and both related to their democratic socialism. Indeed, this form of socialism is the next step toward a kind of communism, but not the kind pilloried by US regressives.

Have you read Christian Arnsperger? He's an integrally-informed economist that was all the rage for a time with the kennilinguists, his essay "integral economics" appearing at kenwilber.com. I did a thread on him here, which also has a link to his website, Eco-Transitions. I've also referenced him extensively in the progressive economics thread. He is also of the opinion that several transition steps are necessary to move out of capitalism, but move out of it we must. Following are a few samples of his comments from the above threads:

Open access and sales

There is a continuing myth that when information is provided for free authors starve.I'm reminded of earlier in the OOO thread, where Bryant commented on how when one publishes open source from the start, like he's done with The Speculative Turn, he's still making a decent profit on sales and providing the information for free to those who choose not to pay. He even said that open source was increasing his sales! From that post:

"From a sales angle, however, I’ve been surprised to discover that open access publishing actually seems to increase sales. The Speculative Turn has been a wild success. It crashed Re.Press’s server the night it was released, and has hovered around the 40-60 thousand sales rank on Amazon consistently since it was released a year ago. This is extraordinary for an academic text, especially given that anyone can access it for free."

The 3rd industrial revolution won't be as easily coopted as the 2nd

I just came upon this recent P2P Foundation article, "The third industrial revolution won't be as easily coopted as the second." Excerpts:

"The new technologies of liberation, if allowed to develop according to their own interior logic, render obsolete the entire material rationale behind the wage system and the factory system, and threaten to destroy corporate power.... But the dominant economic interests of the day are doing their best to stave off this revolutionary threat by domesticating the new technologies, co-opting them into the existing corporate institutional framework, and enclosing their productive potential as a source of rents."

And the following, which echoes some of my own concerns at the beginning of the Rifkin thread and in the progressive economics thread, about including the new tech into capitalism instead of going fully P2P: