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02 Jul 13
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Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski ([kɔˈʐɨpski]; July 3, 1879 – March 1, 1950) was a Polish-American philosopher and scientist. He is remembered for developing the theory of general semantics. Korzybski's work argued that human knowledge of the world is limited both by the human nervous system and by the structure of language.
Korzybski thought that people do not have access to direct knowledge of reality; rather they have access to perceptions and to a set of beliefs which human society has confused with direct knowledge of reality. Korzybski is remembered as the author of the dictum: "The map is not the territory".
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Korzybski's work culminated in the initiation of a discipline that he named general semantics (GS). As Korzybski said, GS should not be confused with semantics, a different subject. The basic principles of general semantics, which include time-binding, are described in the publication Science and Sanity, published in 1933. After the publication of Science and Sanity he traveled about teaching briefly in many schools and universities. In 1938 Korzybski founded the Institute of General Semantics in Chicago.[2] The post-World War II housing shortage in Chicago cost him the Institute's building lease, so in 1946, he moved the Institute to Lakeville, Connecticut, USA, where he directed it until his death in 1950.
Korzybski's work maintained that human beings are limited in what they know by (1) the structure of their nervous systems, and (2) the structure of their languages. Human beings cannot experience the world directly, but only through their "abstractions" (nonverbal impressions or "gleanings" derived from the nervous system, and verbal indicators expressed and derived from language). Sometimes our perceptions and our languages actually mislead us as to the "facts" with which we must deal. Our understanding of what is happening sometimes lacks similarity of structure with what is actually happening.
He stressed training in awareness of abstracting, using techniques that he had derived from his study of mathematics and science. He called this awareness, this goal of his system, "consciousness of abstracting".
His system included modifying the way we consider the world, e.g., with an attitude of "I don't know; let's see," to better discover or reflect its realities as revealed by modern science. One of these techniques involved becoming inwardly and outwardly quiet, an experience that he termed, "silence on the objective levels".
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11 Oct 12
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02 Aug 12
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Korzybski's work argued that human knowledge of the world is limited both by the human nervous system and by the structure of language.
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people do not have access to direct knowledge of reality; rather they have access to perceptions and to a set of beliefs which human society has confused with direct knowledge of reality. Korzybski is remembered as the author of the dictum: "The map is not the territory".
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Korzybski was born in Warsaw, Poland which at that time was part of the Russian Empire. He was part of an aristocratic Polish family whose members had worked as mathematicians, scientists, and engineers for generations
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he Polish language at home and the Russian language in schools; and having a French governess and a German governess, he became fluent in these four languages as a child.
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bski served as an intelligence officer in the Russian Arm
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he moved to North America in 1916 (first to Canada, then the United States) to coordinate the shipment of artillery to Russi
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After the War, he decided to remain in the United States,
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time-binding" class of life (humans perform time binding by the transmission of knowledge and abstractions through time which are accreted in cultures)
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human beings are limited in what they know by (1) the structure of their nervous systems, and (2) the structure of their languages. Human beings cannot experience the world directly, but only through their "abstractions" (nonverbal impressions or "gleanings" derived from the nervous system, and verbal indicators expressed and derived from language).
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Our understanding of what is happening sometimes lacks similarity of structure with what is actually happening.
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training in awareness of abstracting, using techniques that he had derived from his study of mathematics and science. He called this awareness, this goal of his system, "consciousness of abstracting".
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with an attitude of "I don't know; let's see," to better discover or reflect its realities as revealed by modern science.
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This was developed into the language "E-Prime" by one of his students 15 years after his death (E-Prime a form of the English language in which the verb "to be" does not appear in any of its forms; for example, the sentence "the movie was good" could translate into E-Prime as "I liked the movie", thereby distinguishing opinion from fact)
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Anecdotes
One day, Korzybski was giving a lecture to a group of students, and he interrupted the lesson suddenly in order to retrieve a packet of biscuits, wrapped in white paper, from his briefcase. He muttered that he just had to eat something, and he asked the students on the seats in the front row if they would also like a biscuit. A few students took a biscuit. "Nice biscuit, don't you think," said Korzybski, while he took a second one. The students were chewing vigorously. Then he tore the white paper from the biscuits, in order to reveal the original packaging. On it was a big picture of a dog's head and the words "Dog Cookies." The students looked at the package, and were shocked. Two of them wanted to vomit, put their hands in front of their mouths, and ran out of the lecture hall to the toilet. "You see," Korzybski remarked, "I have just demonstrated that people don't just eat food, but also words, and that the taste of the former is often outdone by the taste of the latter."[3]
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individuals influenced by Korzybski include Alejandro Jodorowsky,[7] Kenneth Burke, William S. Burroughs, Frank Herbert, Albert Ellis, Gregory Bateson, John Grinder, Buckminster Fuller, Moshe Feldenkrais, Douglas Engelbart, Stuart Chase, Alvin Toffler, Robert A. Heinlein (Korzybski is mentioned in the 1940 short story "Blowups Happen" and the 1949 novella Gulf), L.Ron Hubbard, A. E. van Vogt, Robert Anton Wilson, Alan Watts, entertainer Steve Allen, and Tommy Hall (lyricist for the 13th
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There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to doubt everything; both ways save us from thinking."[
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Dante-Gabryell MonsonThe essence of Korzybski's work was the view that human beings are limited in what they know by (1) the structure of their nervous systems, and (2) the structure of their languages. Human beings cannot experience the world directly, but only through their
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