Hi Team ToK!
My name is Parisa and I'm a  former (but perpetual:) student of Gregg's.
I'm working as a contract clinical psychologist with the US Air Force (in England). 
We work most with trauma, anxiety, and/or depression; but, what I think is neat, and hopeful, is that no matter the diagnosis, there are common things that connect us  all. In that: Power - the feeling of being competent, purposeful, and effective in our work and our ability to provide resources and safety; Love - being able to have relationships where we can laugh and love and feel loved and that we belong, and then to also be free of such connections. Meaning: Freedom - knowing life is a huge interconnected system, but also wanting to be free of this to some degree; feeling autonomous and that life is not just a series of obligations. 

In all transparency, Love, Power, and Freedom are also what I did my dissertation on (Gregg's Influence Matrix), but I happen to believe in them and see them play out each day. I'm also interested in the mind-body connection, and how approaches such as functional medicine guide us to view people as whole and complex system that can heal (vs. diagnoses and symptoms). We live in a giant system, but we also are a giant system (inside:). 

I've always appreciated Gregg giving us ways to conceptualize, whether it be cases, people, or the world. ToK/UTUA promises to be the ultimate in a grand way to think about... well... everything. But where do we start? Isn't a grand theory of everything a kind religion for scientists? In that, a narrative for how things have come to be, what are place is in the world, etc.?

What's a more concrete goal here? Do we think people will stop fighting and hurting each other as much if they had more of a bird's eye view of things? Or is stopping discontent not even the goal; but, rather, the goal is to not feel so alone if we understood how we're all connected in a larger narrative? 

Happy Holidays gang, and I'm glad to be a part of this!:) Parisa

      From: "Henriques, Gregg - henriqgx" <[log in to unmask]>
 To: [log in to unmask] 
 Sent: Sunday, December 24, 2017 3:48 PM
 Subject: Re: Welcome to the Theory of Knowledge!
   
#yiv5611598114 #yiv5611598114 -- P {margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;}#yiv5611598114 Happy Christmas Eve, TOK!
Hope everyone has a good holiday. Thanks, Ali, for your personal introduction. For those on this list who are not clinicians, we clinicians often make a distinction between "content" and "process" talk, with content being about whatever topics are at hand and process being about the "how" of the relationship exchange, as in "How am I feeling? What is my place in this? What are the implied power dynamics?; How would I like it to go?" etc. Given that many of us are clinicians, I am glad that you, Ali, have opened up this kind of talk for us with your introduction. I think it is very appropriate to the scientific and humanistic enterprise in which we are engaged.
I look forward to many interesting content and process discussions going forward!
Best,
Gregg ______________________________________________________________________Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
Professor
Director, C-I Doc Program
Department of Graduate Psychology
216 Johnston Hall
MSC 7401
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
(540) 568-7857 (phone)
(540) 568-4747 (fax)
Be that which enhances dignity and well-being with integrity. Check out my Theory of Knowledge blog at Psychology Today at: https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.psychologytoday.com_blog_theory-2Dknowledge&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=D9RO4Gbw932rIbRvrSZrouvc_ZmbJ3xfGhGt_-KA9k4&s=AXwZUVS4uAIm-6H-RScoDRId1D3AE6nMAkRigmXVLFU&e=  

From: tree of knowledge system discussion <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Kenny, Alexis Catherine - kennyac (Dukes)
Sent: Saturday, December 23, 2017 2:04 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Welcome to the Theory of Knowledge! ToK Society,
Good winter afternoon.
I find myself leaning toward writing in more of a stream of conscious style as a new/young mother and "non-traditional" psychology graduate student at James Madison University's Combined-Integrated Doctoral Program.
Why so many identifiers you may ask? Because I'm an interpersonally-detailed individual I suppose... 
I'm curious (not sensitively curious or curious in a loaded manner in a way that could potentially make people (men?) feel uncomfortable, but just curious) about the space I take up in this conversation as a young woman. 
While I have found a professional home as a clinical psychologist in-training, I will be forever informed by and grateful to my humanities education (English and Spanish undergraduate majors, and a master's degree in Theology).
Lastly, being a new parent has transformed my world as a human being, a complicated and beautifully-laden metamorphosis centered on relationality and the significance of its "exchange frame."
So...identifiers, that's right. I share some of mine with you as I think they pigment the way in which I shall color this conversation with my (as is everyone's) uniquely tinted paintbrush.
As student of Gregg's (and a participant of this listersev), I imagine myself as a Macy's Day Parade balloon handler, a little person holding tightly onto a rope attached to an entity so large and so grand, that for me to keep my feet on the ground requires creative effort; efforts usually driven by a need to make the intellectually abstract meaningful from a certain relational role at a particular moment in time (a mother entertaining her child with finger puppets, a therapist trainee unpacking a salient dream with a client (could use your help here Chance!), a wife trying to support her husband's professional development, etc.).  
I do hope that my introduction does not throw conversations already being had, my intent is not to stymie "thought progress" by any means. Rather, I want to know you all (while acknowledging and honoring the limitations a part of such virtual and content-specific exchanges), and look forward to working together as we take the fruits of intellect and share its sustenance with all others.  
Merry Christmas (for me) and Merry ____________ (for others)!
Warmly,
Ali
Alexis (Ali) Kenny, M.A.Clinical and School Psychology Doctoral CandidateDivision 52 - International Psychology: Membership Committee, Student RepresentativeJames Madison University - Harrisonburg, VAemail: [log in to unmask]: tree of knowledge system discussion <[log in to unmask]> en nombre de Henriques, Gregg - henriqgx <[log in to unmask]>
Enviado: viernes, diciembre 22, 2017 8:53:24 AM
Para: [log in to unmask]
Asunto: Re: Welcome to the Theory of Knowledge! Hi List,  I would like to offer a quick reply to Gary, because he raises and important point about "factoring out language games". The meaning of this was not fully articulated in my opening. I was meaning in a "weak sense"; that is, by using the Justification Hypothesis to see how processes of justification emerge and picture provided by the ToK, then one can account for the (many) of the biases and blind spots that drive language games. I agree that a strong meaning would (such that there would be no language games, would be confusing and not workable). As I have been clear in my writing (e.g., Henriques, 2011), I see my system as a "justification system," as are all human linguistic propositional systems. 
  I would also say that I would place the ToK/UTUA framework at large in the language game of philosophy, as opposed to science, per se. I just started to listen to the book, The Story of Philosophy (https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.amazon.com_Story-2DPhilosophy-2DOpinions-2DGreatest-2DPhilosophers_dp_0671739166&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=D9RO4Gbw932rIbRvrSZrouvc_ZmbJ3xfGhGt_-KA9k4&s=Catvug96PSYuLWW1U-Bz_ZNBpxSm0MI7etJbqFnGCjE&e= ). It opens with a call for philosophical thinking that is very much in the spirit of this list.
Best,
Gregg
 ______________________________________________________________________Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
Professor
Director, C-I Doc Program
Department of Graduate Psychology
216 Johnston Hall
MSC 7401
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
(540) 568-7857 (phone)
(540) 568-4747 (fax)
Be that which enhances dignity and well-being with integrity. Check out my Theory of Knowledge blog at Psychology Today at: https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.psychologytoday.com_blog_theory-2Dknowledge&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=D9RO4Gbw932rIbRvrSZrouvc_ZmbJ3xfGhGt_-KA9k4&s=AXwZUVS4uAIm-6H-RScoDRId1D3AE6nMAkRigmXVLFU&e=  

From: tree of knowledge system discussion <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of nysa71 <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, December 22, 2017 8:08 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Welcome to the Theory of Knowledge! Hello ToK Society,

My name is Jason Bessey. I've been interested in the ToK (since it was first brought to my attention by Steve Quackenbush) and been corresponding with Gregg about it for over a decade now since I was a Psychology under-grad. I have a general interest in the social sciences, and have been particularly interested in macroeconomic issues in recent years. I hope to learn from this group and contribute to it, at least in some small way.

Happy Holidays,
Jason 
On Thursday, December 21, 2017, 4:59:24 PM EST, Gary Brill <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Greetings ToK-Society List,

This is Gary Brill, recently retired from the Rutgers psychology faculty. I've been interested in the Tree of Knowledge System for several years and have been following its development into the UTUA framework and Metaphysical Empiricism.

As Gregg knows, I have strong enthusiasm for the potential of these ideas, but I also have a number of questions and objections. For now, I will limit my comments to an important theme in Gregg's opening introduction to the list (one that Chance McDermott also touched upon in an earlier posting): the notion of "factoring out human language games."

Gregg states that factoring out language games will leave behind the "picture of the universe offered by the Tree of Knowledge System." But if science (along with religion, law, societal customs, etc.) is a justification systems and if justification systems are language games (as stated in the opening introduction), then "factoring out language games" factors out science itself. Nothing is left behind.

It seems to me that the ToK/UTUA must be conceptualized as situatied *within* the language game of science. And if that is the case, then there still remains the need to address various tough criticisms of the scientific approach to psychology, criticisms that have been leveled both by philosophers (e.g., Charles Taylor) and theoretical psychologists (e.g., Brent Slife, Frank Richardson, and many others).

Briefly, the main challenge is that science, the quest to uncover objective, timeless and universal principles (laws), is not appropriate for understanding historically- and culturally-situated beings whose behavior and mental life (including language games) are consituted by their constantly changing, meaningful interpretations of their culture, relationships, and experiences.

I consider the ToK/UTUA a very good attempt at framing things within the science language game, but I don't see how it can be justified on the basis of it being what is left when language games are factored out.

Thanks to Gregg for establishing this group and happy holidays to all,
Gary

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