This conversation reminded me an article i read lately.The article was saying something i read many times at other books also.
I am writing what is left in my mind : The problem with sciences, religions, countries, peoples, communities, human being or consciousness is not boxes or paradigm...the problem is that the human being likes putting himself/herself in the middle of any event. He/she percieves, describes and participates life from there. He/ she likes being in the middle and feeling important.Otherwise there is the lose of identity (like death) He/she is the subject and the rest of the world is outside.Even if he/she goes out of the boxes, as long as there is a center, he/she sees something needs to be corrected then comes fear, insecurity, thoughts, actions, efforts, need of power, control and so on....but in fact the picture is perfect including him/her as it is ( i mean i guess so::)) So paradigm shift should be a shift in the attention from "me" to "the rest".....a mind which asks " what is needed now; how can i best fit to the environement?" rather then "how i can manipulate the environment so that it fits me?" This is valid for an "OST facilitator mind as well" And yes, the OST facilitator should be present simply because she/he is present. Funda ----- Original Message ----- From: Chris Kloth To: [email protected] Sent: Tuesday, July 26, 2005 5:38 PM Subject: Paradigms, Resistence, Science, God, Hebrew - a bit long (with cuffs please) Harrison Owen wrote: And reading Wilber and Kuhn wouldn't hurt. Both pretty bright guys. Kuhn doubtless wrote other stuff, but the seminal work is/was "The Structures of Scientific Revolution" -- I think it was published by Princeton, or maybe it was Chicago (University Press). Wilber has damn near buried the world in paper. All of it is good, but some is better than the rest. A good introduction might be something like, "A Brief History of Everything." He is a wonderful writer, great storyteller, totally outrageous, and a massive intellect. Other than that he is pretty run of the mill. And if you are looking for other good stuff to read, you might check out the section on www.openspaceworld.com called "Literature." "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" [by Thomas S. Kuhn, University of Chicago Press, 1962, 1970] had a huge impact on me when I was in school in the early 70s. It is no surprise that Harrison has done a fine job of capturing key points from it. I agree with Harrison that, in Kuhn's role as a philosopher of science and historian at a particular moment in time, he was more concerned with addressing the barriers to breakthroughs, not what would come next. That said, I would like to elaborate on one aspect of Kuhn's work with a slightly different em-PHA-sis. In doing so I also call your attention to Kuhn's earlier work, "The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought" [Vintage Book/Random House, 1957, 1959]. While there is some real astronomy in the book, it is fairly easy to read or skip in order to get to the social implications. He also wrote a book called "The Essential Tension: Selected Studies in Scientific Tradition and Change" [University of Chicago Press 1977]. This one has less "hard science" in it and you will recognize the how science was anticipating the social consequences in our lives today. The reason I think it is important to add The Copernican Revolution is that Kuhn suggests that you know you are facing a paradigm shift when people defending the dominant belief system are prepared to enforce serious sanctions to maintain the status quo. Both Copernicus and Galileo(reference in Scientific Revolutions) faced state enforced death to pursue their new views. They were not "thinking outside of the box." Their thinking, and that of others Kuhn refers to, was so far beyond conventional thinking that they were not even acknowledging a box that one might think outside of. They were laying the conceptual foundations that were needed for Westerners to reframe what we might now call consciousness. As much as we may criticize their linear, mechanistic thinking today, their's was an important step on the way to spiral dynamics and other mental models that we now explore...and which others in the future may look back on with amused curiosity. In my view, Joel Barker's superficial analysis of Kuhn has trivialized what is at stake for people at the time of a real paradigm shift. In both these cases the dominant culture perceived threats to its belief in the existence and power of God, to the power that the church had because of its connection to god and the power of the rich who filled the churches with riches. The official punishment for such heresy was death. As I read Kuhn, that's a paradigm, not a box. I think this is more than just a matter of semantics or an academic debate. Barker also has trivialized the potential depth and force of resistance change agents (referring to people who see the new reality and keep the light on it - be they members of a community or outside consultants - AKA, outside agitators) must be alert to in systems at the time of a real paradigm shift. Not only must change agents anticipate and plan for the resistance, in my view (which I think is consistent with the inclusive values of OST) the change agent needs to understand that the fear rooted in the perception of what is at stake and find a way to embrace the resistance without embracing the beliefs and help create space to discover what will be required to let go and move on. If you think some people will resist an "outside of the box" solution to a problem when people have at least acknowledged there is problem to be solved, wait until you confront their fundamental view of reality...something that they did not invite anyone to do! In situations like this I believe OST facilitators need to be able to create and hold space in a crucible of considerable strength. Hoping people will "think outside the box" ain't gonna get it. On the other hand, the positive side of resistance is that, in my view, it represents and act of "passion and responsibility." It suggests that the person cares about whatever the situation is. I would much rather work with people who are resisting than docile people who will not resist. I wonder whether they will act with passion and responsibility to support the new reality. In the more modern examples provided by Kuhn the proponents did not face state enforced death, but they faced potential professional death through marginalization, loss of livelihood and other community sanctions. As many of you know very well, there are times in civil society around the world today where people may face death for challenging the fundamental order of society. My experience is that the people who propose "thinking outside the box" in such situations are people who have very little insight into what is at stake and are probably not going to have to hang around during the implementation of or living of the change. That does not mean I think people should not engage in the risky work of paradigm shifts. On some level, having discovered the new reality there is no going back. Just know that if it is really a paradigm shift then there will be a lot at stake for the people promoting change and those resisting it. I believe OST can and has helped create a container for working on such change. It is why I honor the process and do not take my role in it lightly. Aside 1 A much newer book I am recommending to everyone doing our kind of work is "Navigating the Badlands" by a futurist named Mary O'Hare-Devereux. While she does not use the term paradigm, she was noticing that, in recent years, her tools were not getting her the kinds of results she anticipated. She goes back thousands of years to compare times when the world seemed to be evolving or developing or stagnating (behaving in predictable ways) and times of transformation...when the whole world seemed to get turned upside down (for many decades or more) before it returned to some degree of predictability. For example, when humans started using alphabets changed the world....not one alphabet or the first alphabet...the worldwide use of alphabets, all kinds of alphabets, changed everything. Anyway, she discovered there was a different set of patterns within the chaos...order emerges from chaos. She then applies this to what she believes is a dramatic change cycle...maybe a paradigm shift...we have all been in for about a decade and will continue in for about a decade. She also provides insights into where to look for both the opportunities and resistance as we try to get through the Badlands...a space where things that look very familiar turn out to be something very different. She suggests we can (did) enter the Badlands of change alone, but we cannot get out of the Badlands alone. Final Aside The term paradigm existed before Kuhn and it did refer to deeply embedded patterns - especially in language. It is interesting to me that one of the examples of how the term was applied prior to Kuhn was the reading of Hebrew. When Hebrew is printed, like in the Torah, the letters that represent what we would call vowels in English are not included. As a result, there are many patterns of Hebrew consonants that, without vowels, look identical yet have very different meanings and pronunciations. However, if you are raised in Jewish culture you "know" the difference. You don't notice anything missing and probably would not know what someone outside the culture, trained in text book or dictionary Hebrew, was confused about. I believe that much about Kuhn described as paradigms, like most of what we experience as culture, operates on this sub-conscious level...invisible to those who are a part of it. It's not in our head or our heart...it's in our blood and DNA. Thus, some levels of resistance are not conscious push back as much as they are confusion, dissonance and fear. Even some of the conscious, intentional resistance may be in reaction to the conscious awareness of beliefs rooted in unexamined deeper beliefs learned at pre-verbal stages of life...when we were forming our senses of reality, not "knowledge" of reality. No wonder they are so hard to let go of! I have rambled on far too long...besides, I feel the urge to watch South Pacific..."you've got to be carefully taught!" ;-) Shalom, Chris Kloth ChangeWorks of the Heartland 250 South Virginialee Road Columbus, OH 43209-2052 USA Phone: 614.239.1336 Fax: 614.237.2347 E-mail: [email protected] URL: www.got2change.com Think Globally, Act locally * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected]: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist * * ========================================================== [email protected] ------------------------------ To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of [email protected]: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs: http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
