Indications in place of reasoned argument

Cognitive Embodiment of Nature Re-cognized Systemically (Part #2)

The focus of this argument does not call for revisiting the many articulations of the cognitive relationship of humans with nature -- whether problematic or otherwise. One overview of the literature is offered separately ("Human Intercourse": "Intercourse with Nature" and "Intercourse with the Other", 2007).

This argument could be elaborated in conventionally reasoned terms, as a further development of previous exercises (En-minding the Extended Body: enactive engagement in conceptual shapeshifting and deep ecology, 2003; Psychology of Sustainability: embodying cyclic environmental processes, 2002).

There is however a case for recognizing the extent to which any such reasoned approach is increasingly unfit for purpose in a "post-truth" world of "alternative facts" in which any reasoned argument is called into question for a variety of reasons -- whether upheld as invalid or inherently suspect. Denial of validity is increasingly a characteristic modality, whether between disciplines, political ideologies, religions, or charismatic leaders (Reframing Personal Relationships between Innovators or Leaders: the unmentionable challenge to sustainable paradigm shifting and social transformation, 1998).

As noted in the first part of this paper regarding "info-death", the emerging condition can be explored in terms of infertility of intercourse and communication (Infertility as a Metaphor Heralding Global Collapse: essential impotence disguised by performance and "being great again", 2018). Similarly the desperate quest for means of "being great again", merits exploration in terms of that for aphrodisiacs, symbolical or otherwise.

Catalytic role of metaphor: A key to an alternative approach is the use of metaphor, previously presented as a new frontier, with all the challenges that implies (Being the Universe: a metaphoric frontier, 1999). The case has been "reasonably" made by Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander (Surfaces and Essences: analogy as the fuel and fire of thinking, 2013), and argued by Aldo Matteucci (Analogies (and metaphors) as mental maps, Diplo, 19 July 2012).

The case can be made otherwise:

Identification with nature/ In one remarkable review of deep ecology and ecophilosophy, the understanding of identification in that context is clarified by Warwick Fox (Toward a Transpersonal Ecology: developing new foundations for environmentalism, 1995). He notes the importance attached to the process in the writings of Arne Naess. Fox argues (pp. 231-232; italic emphasis in original. bold emphasis added) :

When Naess or other transpersonal ecologists emphasize the importance of wider and deeper identification, it is important in interpreting them not to get carried away in flights of imaginative fancy but rather to understand what is being said as far as possible in a down to earth, ordinary, everyday sense. Identification should be taken to mean what we ordinarily understand by that term, that is, the experience not simply of a sense of similarity with an entity but of a sense of commonality.

To pursue this further, one can have a sense of certain similarities between oneself and another entity without necessarily identifying with that entity, that is, without necessarily experiencing a sense of commonality with that entity. On the other hand, the experience of commonality with another entity does imply a sense of similarity with that entity, even if this similarity is not of any obvious physical, emotional , or mental kind; it may involve "nothing more" than the deep-seated realization that all entities are aspects of a single unfolding entity... What identification should not be taken to mean, however, is identity -- that I literally am that tree over there, for example. What is being emphasized is the tremendously common experience that through the process of identification my sense of self (my experiential self) can expand to include the tree even though I and the tree remain physically "separate" (even here, however, the word separate must not be taken too literally because ecology tells us that my physical self and the tree are physically interlinked in all sorts of ways).

Expressing this point in another way, the realization that we and all other entities are aspects of a single unfolding reality -- that "life is fundamentally one" -- does not mean that all multiplicity and diversity is reduced to a homogeneous mush. As Naess says, the idea that we are:

... drops in the stream of life may be misleading if it implies that the individuality of the drops is lost in the stream. Here is a difficult ridge to walk: To the left we have the ocean of organic and mystic views, to the right the abyss of atomic individualism.

Imaginative freedom? Whilst offering an admirable clarification, the expressions in bold are indicative of a form of dogma which is not the intention of the argument made here with regard to the freedom to interpret reality as one so chooses, as previously explored (Being What You Want: problematic kataphatic identity vs. potential of apophatic identity? 2008). It is of course the case that the bold emphasis conforms to one such choice.

The question here is how better to frame this possibility in order to facilitate and enable such exploration. As noted above, this has been variously approached in previous arguments.

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Indications in place of reasoned argument