Hi Folks,
I learned of a new approach to anthropology, called Generative Anthropology and will be speaking to a practitioner of it tomorrow. I will report back. Here is how I summarized the UTOK to him. Figured I would share it because there are
5+ new people to the list and it might be useful for them to see this framing…
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Dear,
UTOK's "place" in the world of knowledge can be understood to be structured to address what I call the
Enlightenment Gap and the problem of psychology. The Enlightenment Gap refers to the failure of modernist systems of knowledge to effectively resolve the proper relationship between (a) matter and mind and (b) scientific
and social knowledge. UTOK is structured in a way that I argue resolves these issues and thus sets the stage for an Enlightenment 2.0 that enables a coherent, consilient or "unified" picture of natural science, psychology, and philosophy.
The first key idea in UTOK is a new map of natural scientific ontology called the Tree of Knowledge System that divides
the ontic reality into Energy, Matter, Life, Mind, and Culture and scientific knowledge into the physical, biological, psychological and social science domains. Matter, Life, Mind, and Culture are characterized by the ToK as different dimensions of complexification
or planes of existence. Life, Mind, and Culture emerge as complex adaptive systemic networks that are tied together by novel information processing and communication systems. Mind on the ToK corresponds to cognitive-neuro-behavioral patterns...essentially
the behavior of animals with brains and complex bodies that emerge during the Cambrian explosion. Thus, it gives a clear ontological referent for the mental as the Animal-Mental plane of existence. This is also the plane where subjective conscious experience
arises (although living things like trees exhibit functional awareness and responsivity, current best evidence is that creatures require a brain for subjective experience of being). However, explicit self-conscious reflection and rationality emerge with the
behavior of persons at the Culture plane.
The UTOK tracks mental evolution through the Cambrian into vertebrates, reptiles, birds, and mammals via
Behavioral Investment Theory. Although the social primates (and many other animals) live complex social lives, ala the work of Michael Tomasello and others, UTOK points to the emergence of a much greater capacity to coordinate
shared attention and intention in our hominid ancestors, say 1 mil to 500,000 years ago.
The Influence Matrix maps the human relationship system, which posits the emergence of an internalized "social space/landscape" of self-other modeling on various process dimensions. Most centrally, there is a "relational
value and social influence" dimension which tracks one's experience of being known and valued by important others and the degree of social influence (i.e., the capacity to influence others in accordance with one's motives). Then there are power/vertical, love/horizontal,
and freedom/dependency/distance/closeness dynamics that are referenced in dynamic "relational recursive relevance realization" patterns, to use John Vervaeke's frame.
The key insight that launched UTOK back in 1996 was a thing called the "Justification Hypothesis/Justification Systems
Theory (JUST)". It is a theory of the structure and function of language as propositional statements that make positive claims of is and ought that can then be questioned (questions open up "negative space" challenging the propositions truth or
practical/moral value). To coordinate influence, humans develop shared justification systems. Moreover, it posits that the human ego emerges from the experiential self as a mental organ of justification. The ego regulates the relationship between the inner/experiential
self and the persona. Such processes give rise to the Culture-Person plane of existence. In UTOK, capital C Culture refers to systems of justification (little c culture refers to shared patterns of behavioral activity/repertoires, and society refers to the
assemblages of groups and technologies and industrial organizations, etc).
UTOK is centered in psychology, and functions at the metaphysical, onto-epistemological, and metatheoretical level to solve something called "the
problem of psychology". The fact is that psychology has never been able to define its subject matter. Rather, mainstream academic psychology is defined by what is called "methodological behaviorism", which is the process of applying the methods
of science to the vague category of "behavior and mental processes". Indeed, behavior here is defined as that which is available to the methods of science. UTOK gives us a psychology based on ontology by clarifying the metaphysical, ontological and metatheoretical
meaning of both animal-mental behavior and human-mental behavior.
Ultimately, UTOK scientifically frames human mental behavior in terms of "JII DYNAMIC NETWORKS," that is networks of justification, investment and influence (see
here for how this maps to folk psychology). UTOK also includes elements that enable us to frame idiographic human subjectivity, mathematics, and a frame for a collective wisdom ethic. I am looking forward to our trialogue,
because I have long been keen to more formally connect UTOK to the social sciences, and its closest relative is clearly anthropology.
Best,
Gregg
___________________________________________
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
Professor
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 the Unified Theory Of Knowledge homepage at:
https://www.unifiedtheoryofknowledge.org/