Portals to Jean Hans Gebser

You will need to acquaint with new words, and be able to pursue abstract philosophical concepts with these sites.
I am just encountering with Gebser and have recognized in me a quiet inner excitement at a new perspective on a profound subject. He and the blog article introducing him "Diaphainon" are pointed to here, for those interested in the structures of consciousness.

Blog Intro:
"DIA WHAT?

The term diaphainon was coined by Jean (Hans) Gebser to describe the transparency of the aperspectival world. While it is often construed in a spiritual sense, it need not be. According to Gebser, we are transitioning from a mental/rational to an integral (arational, aperspectival, atemporal) understanding of reality. The mode of understanding in the mental/rational structure of consciousness is representation for "only in philosophical thought can the world be represented; for the integral perception of truth, the world is pure statement, and thus verition" [Ever-present Origin, Ohio U Press, 1984, p309]. It is in this latter sense that the variety of topics you will find here are presented."

http://diaphainon.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/systasis-synairesis.html
http://www.gaiamind.org/Gebser.html

Originally posted by Taoman
You will need to acquaint with new words, and be able to pursue abstract philosophical concepts with these sites.
I am just encountering with Gebser and have recognized in me a quiet inner excitement at a new perspective on a profound subject. He and the blog article introducing him "Diaphainon" are pointed to here, for those interested in the structures of ...[text shortened]... inon.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/systasis-synairesis.html
http://www.gaiamind.org/Gebser.html

Is that anything like going form the law of karma to the law of grace?
I've heard someone say that. Cant remember for the life of me who, but I'm sure he was not an adherent to any religion.
(That's a serious question as well)

Originally posted by karoly aczel
Is that anything like going form the law of karma to the law of grace?
I've heard someone say that. Cant remember for the life of me who, but I'm sure he was not an adherent to any religion.
(That's a serious question as well)

I have just encountered this philosopher, Karoly. His philosophical discourses are very academic in expression. He doesn't address such questions directly, but is putting forward an "Integral Philosophy" that seeks to get beyond a consciousness that is caught in either ego binds or egolessness but dwells with them both. Here is a paragraph from a site featuring his ideas, which appears a bit less academic in expression:

"....There is another way, however, which overcomes egoism and leads to the freedom of the ego. That is to say, it leads to a newly-unfolding, truly awake consciousness, free both from attachment to “egoness” and “egolessness”—a consciousness that deliberately integrates the two states. When this is achieved by the individual, something very significant—indeed, saving—happens. His consciousness, and thereby his reality, take on a richness and abundancy of life heretofore not believed possible. A person who has such an Integral consciousness is no longer dependent on his ego: His ego, with all its passions, no longer dominates him; rather, he governs his ego. Then the world as a correlate of ego—a world which confronts us with all its conditions of time and space—becomes a shared world, a world of participation in that which, like the divine or the spiritual, is not linked to time and space because it is, by its very nature, timeless and spaceless. If we succeed in overcoming both egolessness and egoness by consciously integrating them, our mental, ego-centered waking consciousness is transformed into an Integral, fully awake consciousness, free from time and ego. By this means we overcome the fatal danger that threatens our culture today—the danger that we may perish of ego-hardening and the fall into complete materialism."

http://blog.gebser.net/

To me it reflects the age old message of non-dual paths, but from a modern philosophical perspective that appears to be seeking to "update" and integrate the East-West philosophical divide.

As to karma and grace, I do not know of any quoter of that line you mention. It surely is a complete topic in itself.

I see "grace" as another expression of compassion, and karma simply as any "law" of cause and effect. How far that "karma" extends beyond an individual life experience is something I am vague about. At most, currently, I think our lives contribute to the ongoing existence as a whole in seen and unseen ways, which will affect all future lives. Quantum science has some interesting implications for ideas of karma. As our existence is never separate ultimately from the rest, all that we do or don't do has an effect on the whole. Whether this attaches to some specific life or mind "stream" I am unclear and still have conceptual difficulties with.

Source of Journal articles on Gebser...

http://gebser.org/content/publications/IEX.html\
Example of topics in one of the Journals "Integrative Explorations":

Contents
5 Editor’s Word Michael Purdy
6 Cosmos and Atemporality Algis Mickunas
15 Toward A Description of Integral Atonality Elizabeth Behnke
29 The Expression of Lived-Experience:
Toward a Poetic Understanding of Language Patricia Arneson
36 The Twelve Steps of Spiritual Recovery Georg Feuerstein
40 Understanding Co-Constitutional Genesis Eric Kramer
47 Two Poems:
With Commentary by Georg Feuerstein Jean Gebser

Originally posted by Taoman
Source of Journal articles on Gebser...

http://gebser.org/content/publications/IEX.html
Example of topics in one of the Journals "Integrative Explorations":

Contents
5 Editor’s Word Michael Purdy
6 Cosmos and Atemporality Algis Mickunas
15 Toward A Description of Integral Atonality Elizabeth Behnke
29 The Expression of Lived-Experience:
Toward ...[text shortened]... itutional Genesis Eric Kramer
47 Two Poems:
With Commentary by Georg Feuerstein Jean Gebser

"40 Understanding Co-Constitutional Genesis Eric Kramer"

I found the following in Kramer's article.

"As Kierkegaard (1941) suggests, if there was a rationale for divine creation it was god's absolute, unimaginable loneliness. Of course Hegel (1967) too plays on this idea but neither of these great thinkers clearly articulates the co-constitutional logic that dictates that when god created the other, at that instant, "he" created "himself" as that being which is distinct from creation, including of course the devil. The creator is co-constituted by the creation."

http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/K/Eric.M.Kramer-1/download/papers/genesis1993-online.pdf

It makes me wonder, do we create ourselves by what we recognize as other, a process that is not once-and-for-all? It this why some of us stand up against one another, on this little forum and in weightier arenas?

Originally posted by Taoman
I have just encountered this philosopher, Karoly. His philosophical discourses are very academic in expression. He doesn't address such questions directly, but is putting forward an "Integral Philosophy" that seeks to get beyond a consciousness that is caught in either ego binds or egolessness but dwells with them both. Here is a paragraph from a site featuri life or mind "stream" I am unclear and still have conceptual difficulties with.

I find that most people have an innate sense of what karma is. Lots of christians too.
But when pressed to explain what it means it becomes troublesome.
I think karma goes beyond merely a "cause and effect"-type theory.
But like I said, I couldn't expand on it- well not in a way that anyone could really understand - including myself.

But then again there are plenty of words like that - "love" and "good sex" spring to mind. We know exactly what we mean. Trying to explaining it is a nightmare 🙂

Sorry for sidetracking your thread, but I think it's a good one so my ulterior motive for this post is to keep this near the top... perhaps something else will come into mind mind a bit more relevant to your op .

Thanks mate 😉

Originally posted by karoly aczel
I find that most people have an innate sense of what karma is. Lots of christians too.
But when pressed to explain what it means it becomes troublesome.
I think karma goes beyond merely a "cause and effect"-type theory.
But like I said, I couldn't expand on it- well not in a way that anyone could really understand - including myself.

But then ag mething else will come into mind mind a bit more relevant to your op .

Thanks mate 😉

OK I'll try:

"only in philosophical thought can the world be represented; for the integral perception of truth, the world is pure statement, and thus verition"

I can't find the meaning of verition. It sounds akin to truth or the expression of truth. But I am prompted to think of Wittgenstein saying a fact is "that which is the case". A statement, then, is not a fact. A cat being on the roof is a fact, "a cat is on the roof" is not. Some may find this usage of the word fact, to be controversial. But if a fact is not a statement, it is the state of affairs that the statement describes. Whether that state of affairs represents an instance (ie, whether the statement is true) is another matter.

Perhaps I am being too lazy but since the above quote was copied into the OP could a specific link to its context be provided, with page number etc. so I can see how verition is used and what it might mean? I think the thought expressed is worthwhile, but need more guidance.

Originally posted by JS357
"40 Understanding Co-Constitutional Genesis Eric Kramer"

I found the following in Kramer's article.

"As Kierkegaard (1941) suggests, if there was a rationale for divine creation it was god's absolute, unimaginable loneliness. Of course Hegel (1967) too plays on this idea but neither of these great thinkers clearly articulates the co-constitutional logic some of us stand up against one another, on this little forum and in weightier arenas?

Mutual arising and interdependence would be where I would come from, not being a theist. I find theistic inferences, even fantasy ones, unhelpful, because we have the said problem of creator and creation from the start. If there is no "Creator"" creating the problem initially begins conceptually on a more stable base.
The idea that we co-create or the creator and creation bring form to each "other" is, I think a theistic extension of the ideas of mutual arising and interdependence of the phenomenon of existence.

This includes our differentiation of our identities, and I liked what Kramer had to say about how the search for and deadly serious protection of "identity", personal and social, feeds much historic action and drama. Interesting too, what he had to say about the differentiation of European and American identity, with some acerbity. 🙂
Out of all that, how I see it is meanings arising in each moment, in each now. This can of course be an extended historic bound now, but those nows change as much as we do, with associated arising and falling of 'meanings'. The idea of a stretching forward and backward time-bound eternity is foreign to this view. (BTW I am not convinced of the Big Bang theory, and note there is increasing questioning of it from highly informed sources. But that's another discussion.)
Our identities are of course moulded in interaction with the other. But in non-dual thought, these identities are in constant flux and not final and permanent, which includes any notion of a great creating entity. We could say that creation and life creates itself. Thus the concept of the potent Void, indescribable, unable to be defined either as existent or non-existent. And also such is unable to be ultimately time/space-bound.
From one perspective, nothing is "lonely", for there is ultimately no "self" or "Self" to be alone. Yet we know that loneliness is a phenomenon, one of the many meanings that arise and fall in the phenomenons of our changing existence.
Each of us from within is utterly alone, as no-one ever gets truly inside this unique awareness perspective each has. We can seek to communicate and share it but no-one ever gets "inside". Yet because of mutual arising and interdepedence there is another perspective that we are never alone, we are ever part of a rich interacting whole. So also "God" in theistic terms is us, that whole and that individual uniqueness at the same time.

We get left in the same position as we do about separate-of- themselves "selves". We can neither say we are ultimately lonely nor can we say we are not. To experience and live between both loneliness and total connection is found in eastern thought beyond concepts, time and space. Zen comes to mind.

[edits typographical]

Originally posted by karoly aczel
I find that most people have an innate sense of what karma is. Lots of christians too.
But when pressed to explain what it means it becomes troublesome.
I think karma goes beyond merely a "cause and effect"-type theory.
But like I said, I couldn't expand on it- well not in a way that anyone could really understand - including myself.

But then ag ...[text shortened]... mething else will come into mind mind a bit more relevant to your op .

Thanks mate 😉

Thank you Karoly. I just let it float where it wills. One day I'll put together something on my take on karma and re-incarnation. But it is an area I need to be more informed of the fullness of other's views. There is difference in the Buddhist community in its understanding and acceptance too. Buddha himself wasn't as fully clear in his acceptance/non acceptance and appeared to place it of lesser importance.

Originally posted by Taoman
Thank you Karoly. I just let it float where it wills. One day I'll put together something on my take on karma and re-incarnation. But it is an area I need to be more informed of the fullness of other's views. There is difference in the Buddhist community in its understanding and acceptance too. Buddha himself wasn't as fully clear in his acceptance/non acceptance and appeared to place it of lesser importance.

The only important thing about karma from a buddhist view is that one should not strive to accumulate good karma, but to get rid of karma altogether. But you prolly already knew that.
Anyway thats why I (and some others say) that our world is shifting from a world of karma to a world of "grace" .
Lets wipe the slate clean for everyone.
I am happy to go with that, but I have often been accused of being too altruistic and it has also gotten me into trouble - not that I'm going to change or anything 🙂

Originally posted by karoly aczel
The only important thing about karma from a buddhist view is that one should not strive to accumulate good karma, but to get rid of karma altogether. But you prolly already knew that.
Anyway thats why I (and some others say) that our world is shifting from a world of karma to a world of "grace" .
Lets wipe the slate clean for everyone.
I am happy t ...[text shortened]... truistic and it has also gotten me into trouble - not that I'm going to change or anything 🙂

Perhaps its our mind that keeps the slate muddy.
Perhaps there is a "saving grace" available every moment to wipe the slate clean.

We ever need our pound of flesh to keep rotting away
while forgiveness and healing are the only means out of the quagmire.

Perhaps existence is perfect, in the sense of complete.
The drama of existence needs all the players and backdrops,
otherwise there is no play.

To achieve true good, the real freedom to choose evil must exist.
Otherwise, we are automatons.
This does not mean, of course, that so choosing is not without consequence.


Oh, for some more altruism.

Originally posted by Taoman
Mutual arising and interdependence would be where I would come from, not being a theist. I find theistic inferences, even fantasy ones, unhelpful, because we have the said problem of creator and creation from the start. If there is no "Creator"" creating the problem initially begins conceptually on a more stable base.
The idea that we co-create or the creat yond concepts, time and space. Zen comes to mind.

[edits typographical]

Just a thought while viewing "Albert Nobbs" last night.

Much of this movie has to do with who we are.

Some of the references provided in the OP, lead to writings that reflect feminist philosophy...

... which in more ways that mainstream philosophy, touches on identity.

In the movie, which touches greatly on identity, there is this line:

"We are both disguised as ourselves."

worth repeating:

"We are both disguised as ourselves."

When I heard this, I thought of this thread and similar threads...

... that touch on the question of who we really are.

Originally posted by JS357
Just a thought while viewing "Albert Nobbs" last night.

Much of this movie has to do with who we are.

Some of the references provided in the OP, lead to writings that reflect feminist philosophy...

... which in more ways that mainstream philosophy, touches on identity.

In the movie, which touches greatly on identity, there is this line:

"We are this thread and similar threads...

... that touch on the question of who we really are.

It's like there's this central reality and then from there, through misunderstanding, we "walk" away as 3 separate "people".
I experienced this directly once about 15 years ago.
The next time I'll be ready. I can see the illusion playing itself out😵

Originally posted by JS357
Just a thought while viewing "Albert Nobbs" last night.

Much of this movie has to do with who we are.

Some of the references provided in the OP, lead to writings that reflect feminist philosophy...

... which in more ways that mainstream philosophy, touches on identity.

In the movie, which touches greatly on identity, there is this line:

"We are this thread and similar threads...

... that touch on the question of who we really are.

A certain synchronicity about this post.
"We are both disguised as ourselves."
Taken as a bald statement (not knowing who the both in the film refers to - a film I have now a yen to watch) I apply it to the "both" part of human identity as I see it.
There is a sense in which each of those aspects, the greater and the lesser "identity" have such an element of disguise, leaving us unable to define clearly who we finally are, both aspects being somewhat blurred into the other, disguised.

The synchronicity is that I went to bed last night wondering in a much deeper way than I have recently about the illusory aspect of manifested existence, things not being strictly unto-themselves-separated entities and phenomenon, including my very own existence.

It was provoked by a Youtube vid - a maths/physics lecture on the measurement problem in quantum physics - way above my head most of it, but I stuck at it, able to follow the gist. The lecturer argued that "spooky action at a distance" and apparent faster than light communication was an appearance only and gave a solid defense of why that was so, without here going into detail.

I had always been fascinated and somewhat swayed by this spooky idea, but finally agreed it was not likely as usually put forward. However, at the close of the lecture it was vigourously stated that because of recent quantum eraser experiments, it appears that while the faster than light stuff is likely to be wrong logically and experimentally - apparently to do with how quantum entanglement being itself a "measurement" - the corollary of the experiments is that physical existence does indeed appear to be logically an illusion and that the hard edges disappear at the profound level of quantum phenomenon. Obviously this accords with the Buddhist understanding. So it was brought home even more deeply about our apparent existence. I feel so real and separate but at a deep level, "I" don't separately or actually exist.

This is connected to the Process philosophy of Whitehead too, and fits Panexperientialism.

I am an illusion, even to myself. I am, and yet I am not. My identity, my self, our identities, our selves, are an appearance, a very, very real appearance, yet ultimately an illusion. Perhaps this is why so much of our energy and effort - sometimes which separating aggression and hatred - is put into having/keeping/promoting an identity, as nations, as genders, as cultural groups, as persons. A sort of trying to convince ourselves, but unconsciously realizing the unfixed fluidity of it all.

If we could only just float and flow, enjoy the ride more... 🙂

Originally posted by Taoman
A certain synchronicity about this post.
"We are both disguised as ourselves."
Taken as a bald statement (not knowing who the both in the film refers to - a film I have now a yen to watch) I apply it to the "both" part of human identity as I see it.
There is a sense in which each of those aspects, the greater and the lesser "identity" have such an element ...[text shortened]... ps, as persons.

If we could only just float and flow, enjoy the ride more... 🙂

I give compliments to the wrong posters here. Your awesome.