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Intercourse with the environment as cognitive shapeshifting
Cognitive Embodiment of Nature Re-cognized Systemically (Part #6)
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Cognitive shapeshifting: There are various indications of alternative cognitive possibilities and of "being otherwise" according to circumstance. These have been poorly recognized and explored. One indication is offered by the arguments of Edward de Bono with respect to doffing and donning various cognitive "hats" and "shoes" (Six Thinking Hats, 1999; Six Action Shoes, 1991).
The question is whether the organization and behaviours of biological species are suggestive of alternative cognitive modalities that are relatively accessible to the individual, if not immediately so. The fascination with "extraordinary" species may be indicative of intuitive recognition of this potential. Such possibilities have been poorly recognized and explored in relation to animal behaviours. Is the organization and behaviour of biological species are suggestive of alternative cognitive modalities that are relatively accessible to the individual, if not immediately so.
The ability of human beings to metamorphose into other animals by means of shapeshifting, as recognized in a variety of myths, has been termed therianthropy -- and currently recognized as an attribute of shamans, however deprecated this may be from some perspectives. This is distinguished from clinical lycanthropy as a rare psychiatric syndrome -- a delusion that the affected person can transform into, has transformed into, or is a non-human animal.
Of some relevance is the tale of the education of the iconic King Arthur by T. H. White (The Once and Future King, 1958). His initial training is provided by the wizard Merlyn, who teaches him what it means to be a good king by turning him into various kinds of animals: fish, hawk, ant, goose, and badger. Each such transformation being intended to teach Arthur a lesson, which will prepare him for his future life.
The argument here is that, rather than depending on authorities anxious to ensure that their particular worldview is faithfully reproduced (however ineffectual), individuals may in effect be free to adopt and test cognitive alternative modalities at will. The corresponding challenge for authorities is whether they can prove that their conventional recommendations are of more meaningful consequence to individuals -- who increasingly perceive their effectiveness to be questionable.
Curiously this challenge to authoritarian indications of how to think is reminiscent of the dynamic between the religions and perspectives considered heretical. This has been most evident when framed by the Catholic Church as witchcraft -- of which one purported indication was some form of shapeshifting. It is intriguing to note that European institutions have considered possibilities of "variable geometry" -- a multi-speed Europe -- as providing a more flexible response to strategic circumstances. A similar possibility has been discussed with respect to the United Nations (Alternation between Variable Geometries: a brokership style for the United Nations as a guarantee of its requisite variety, 1985). As a fruitful play on words, the art of shifting between geometries might then be termed "whichcraft".
Of interest in what follows is whether individuals and groups can recognize more consciously the patterns by which their particular behaviour is characterized. Furthermore, how might they "shapeshift" between several such patterns, especially over the course of a life, as a consequence of education and experience (En-minding the Extended Body: enactive engagement in conceptual shapeshifting and deep ecology, 2003). The argument there was developed in the following sections:
How are such patterns embodied in the light of the arguments of cognitive science (George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Philosophy In The Flesh: the embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought, 1999). How do people transform between information patterns, especially when they "reinvent themselves", notably as framed by "conversion"?
Multiple personality disorder vs Multiple species order? Deep concern is evoked by multiple personality disorder, otherwise known as dissociative identity disorder -- characterized by at least two distinct and relatively enduring personality states. Is there another possibility to be envisaged in which an individual, or a group, can switch between modalities according to circumstances (as suggested above with respect to navigating hyperreality).
Rather than understood as a disorder, is their a "higher" or "richer" form of order to be explored through alternation between identification with a variety of species? Is there a case for reframing the sense in which an individual may "reincarnate" in different species in this life -- rather than hypothetically in another?
More existentially challenging may be a question from a psychoanalytical perspective. With which species is it impossible to identify and why? The challenge of snakes, crocodiles, spiders and cockroaches comes readily to mind. Similarly provocative is the question as to which species (of information processing) in nature are (or are not) embodied by (some) humans at least some of the time (at various stages in a life cycle)?
Movement: The argument is taken further with respect to embodiment of the mind in movement, notably by Mark Johnson (The Meaning of the Body: aesthetics of human understanding, 2007; The Body in the Mind: the bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason, 1987) and by Maxine Sheets-Johnstone (The Primacy of Movement, 2011). The process is especially well illustrated by sports involving acrobatics and aerobatics. How might the experience of identity and existence be "radically" reframed by any such practice?
With respect to movement, the question can be raised as to whether individual identity is felt to be intimately associated with movement rather than with conventional understandings of stasis as exemplified for legal purposes by certification, photo-identities and DNA samples.
Such possibilities have been explored separately with respect to both cyclic identity and identification with a wave form (Emergence of Cyclical Psycho-social Identity: sustainability as "psyclically" defined, 2007; Psychology of Sustainability: embodying cyclic environmental processes, 2002; Being a Waveform of Potential as an Experiential Choice: emergent dynamic qualities of identity and integrity, 2013; Being Neither a-Waving Nor a-Parting: cognitive implications of wave-particle duality in the light of science and spirituality, 2013).
From morphogenesis to morphomimesis? Concern with morphogenesis, as the biological process that causes an organism to develop its shape, dates from the notable work by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson (On Growth and Form, 1917). Further insight has been provided through insight into so-called Turing patterns (Alan Turing, The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis, 1952).
Of greater potential relevance to this argument is the approach of René Thom (Structural Stability and Morphogenesis, 1972), notably his concern with the development of biological form in the light of catastrophe theory. He related this to psychological considerations and meaning through a concern with semiophysics (RenÉ Thom, Semio Physics: A Sketch, 1990; David Aubin, Forms of Explanations in the Catastrophe Theory of RenÉ Thom: topology, morphogenesis, and structuralism, 2004).
Given the analogy variously explored between genetics and memetics, some consideration of "morphomimesis" would appear relevant to the cognitive transformations discussed here -- suggesting the need for an exploration of "Structural Stability and Morphomimesis". References to morphomimesis are infrequent, with the exception of Steven M. Lehar (The Schema As A Mental Image, 12 September 2014; The Two Worlds of Reality, 2014; The World in Your Head: a Gestalt view of the mechanism of consciouse experience, 2003). Curiously the process of making memes has been enabled by apps (Taylor Lorenz, As Memes Evolve, Apps Are Struggling to Keep Up: everyone is racing to build a killer meme-making tool. The Atlantic, 1 August 2018). One of these is called Mimesis.
With the intense research on genetic engineering, the potential of memetic engineering has yet to be explored. What cognitive species are yet to be discovered?
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