[Xmca-l] Re: Solids and Liquids/Entities and dynamic flows

[HENRY SHONERD]

Gente,

 I wonder if the song by the Beatles “Within You and Without You” is as relevant for others as it is for me. Written by George Harrison and part of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club Band (1967). The final line is “Life flows on within you and without you.”  There’s a line worthy of the containment paradox. Here’s the whole song:
 
"We were talking about the space between us all
And the people who hide themselves behind a wall of illusion

Never glimpse the truth, then it's far too late, when they pass away

We were talking about the love we all could share

When we find it, to try our best to hold it there with our love

With our love, we could save the world, if they only knew

Try to realise it's all within yourself

No one else can make you change

And to see you're really only very small

And life flows on within you and without you

We were talking about the love that's gone so cold

And the people who gain the world and lose their soul

They don't know, they can't see, are you one of them?

When you've seen beyond yourself then you may find

Peace of mind is waiting there

And the time will come when you see we're all one

And life flows on within you and without you"



Ah, love! One might say it doesn’t essentialize :) Though the summer of love (1967) turned out to be terminal euphoria :(


Henry







> On Aug 6, 2016, at 9:45 AM, Rein Raud <rein.raud@tlu.ee> wrote:
> 
> Dear all,
> 
> I think there is a danger here to essentialize something/someone as the container: we should keep note that the people (the cultural community) is not a self-identical and ready-made set of individuals who take on a culture, but that they are to a significant extent themselves formed by the culture they have been raised in. But neither is the culture a power that defines the outlook of the individuals that take it on, as early believers of cultural determinism would have it. I’d say culture could be likened to the climate, in that (1) it is not an identifiable “thing”, but a multitude of relations, tensions, attitudes and processes that are neither entirely compatible with each other nor wholly independent; (2) it predetermines a certain part of the people’s behaviour while itself being influenced by what the people do (and in the case of culture, the changes may be fortunate as well as unfortunate; (3) it has no clear boundaries, thus climate zones form gradients at their edges while being more true to character at their centers; (4) it does not provoke an unequivocal response from its carriers - what may seem to be an awful weather for holiday-makers is the long-awaited rain for farmers, and similarly can the oppressors and the oppressed have different views on cultural texts and practices that they share.
> I have actually written about this in my recent book entitled “Meaning in Action: Outline of an Integral Theory of Culture <https://www.amazon.com/Meaning-Action-Outline-Integral-Culture/dp/1509511253/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1470497870&sr=8-1&keywords=meaning+in+action>", just out from Polity (the link lets you see the introduction and a short summary of the theory, if not, then look here <https://www.academia.edu/27273018/Meaning_in_Action_Outline_of_an_Integral_Theory_of_Culture> , where I treat cultural phenomena - texts and practices - as bids to increase what I call the “cognitive adequacy” of the community (not the truthfulness of its worldview, mind) and look at the various factors that condition their reception and circulation. Again, I believe that essentializing has done and continues to do a lot of damage in the discussion of things cultural, as it somehow presupposes rigid identities, not the flexible and constantly transforming minds that we actually possess.
> 
> With best wishes,
> 
> Rein 
> 
>> On 06 Aug 2016, at 17:56, Lplarry <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Not to loose sight of the theme (entities and dynamic flows).
>> Annalisa noticed *the cup* can be *the container* moving from particular to abstract and this way of moving is meta/phor. 
>> The cup as an image expresses what?
>> An entity? A theme? A causal sequence?
>> 
>> Is the cup is an expression of *a* container* OR is the cup an expression of *contain/ing* and do different cultures and languages give contrasting answers?
>> 
>> Is *a* container (entity) more or less adequate, more or less *right* in contrast to *contain/ing*?
>> 
>> What is this relation of (container & containing).
>> Is the answer causal or metaphorical, or hermeneutical circle, or thematic,  or aggregate (ex: Winter – snow).
>> 
>> Is this a process of persons  who have *minds* constructing the above relations and (relations of relations)?
>> OR
>> Are these relations flows of language *use* in which the language process (itself) is concealed as the use is revealed 
>> OR 
>> Does language itself have two poles ( historical constituents) AND ( aesthetic novelty).
>> 
>> I will mention Umberto Eco whose last book (2014) traces how deeply implicated Western forms of conceiving of thoughts (entity) and thinking (dynamic flows) are historically influenced by the tree metaphor  and the theme of generality, taxonomy, super and sub structures, categorization, classification.
>> This *tree metaphor* is  in contrast to Dogen and Rein who highlight that these ways of conceiving flow as things with higher and lower levels of generality  are historical artifacts *arising* within a tradition (see Eco’s last book).
>> 
>> Entities/essence (including social pychco/LOGY) contrasting with *ity*
>> 
>> Structures of consciousness  developing as processes that may or may not follow a particular universal sequence of steps OR
>> historically situated influences developing through novelty as thematic aggregations without systematic structure.
>> 
>> The 10 or 11 ox frames as icon (vagueness) index (gesturing) and symbol (thirds) of a *way* (path) that is not so focused on *controlled* intentions* which Mead postulated as required and necessary for human transactional thirds to exist as  transactional (instrumental?) *thirds*.
>> 
>> Zygmunt’s latest book is on *managed* liquid modernity.
>> 
>> This word (managed) with Zygmunt’s other book exploring the moral blindness of liquid modernity seems to be critical as we explore the image and meaning *potential* of the cup metaphor.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Sent from my Windows 10 phone
>> 
>> From: Annalisa Aguilar
>