This link has been bookmarked by 2 people . It was first bookmarked on 21 Nov 2006, by Mike Wesch.
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01 May 11
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an age of synthesis
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hat elite must possess a new paradigm, which means that it must possess, not a new theory or worldview, but a new type of social practice, mode of production, concrete behavioral injunctions, or experimental exemplars. These social practices, injunctions, or exemplars--these new paradigms and methodologies--generate, enact, bring forth, and illumine new types of experiences, occasions, data, phenomena. Around these new experiences, data, or illuminations, there do indeed then grow new theories, new worldviews, new superstructures.
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"Paradigm" refers to the methodologies of enacting new phenomena, not merely to the theories that attempt to explain them, although both new paradigms and new theories swing into play as new and higher waves of consciousness continue to unfold.
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coming age of synthesis
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integral salons
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(For those unfamiliar with the work of some of the leading theorists of consciousness evolution--such as Jean Gebser, James Mark Baldwin, Clare Graves, Jane Loevinger, and Robert Kegan--here is a brief summary. Research indicates that, like all natural living systems, consciousness can undergo evolution, development, or unfoldment. These theorists believe that the general waves of evolution or unfoldment have included archaic, magic-tribal, mythic-traditional, modern-rational, postmodern-pluralistic--all of which together are often called "first-tier" waves--and integral-aperspectival--which is often called "second tier." First-tier waves each believe that their worldviews and values are the best or correct values; second-tier or integral waves attempt to include and integrate the partial truths of all first-tier waves. Because consciousness evolution is still ongoing, some researchers loosely refer to "third-tier" waves, which are even more encompassing but, as yet, are still in their early, formative phases. [When we use the terms of Spiral Dynamics, developed by Don Beck and Christopher Cowan based on the pioneering work of Clare Graves, these are approximately the vMemes or "value memes" of beige (archaic), purple and red (magic), blue (traditional), orange (modern), green (postmodern), yellow and turquoise (second tier).] As suggested earlier, empirical research from several different sources suggests that, in this country, approximately 25% of the adult population embrace traditional values, 40% modern values, 20% postmodern values, and less than 2% are stably at second- or third-tier waves. When we speak of "an integral age at the leading edge," we are focusing on that 2%, particularly as its numbers begin to significantly increase--which is exactly what appears to be happening with the dawning age of synthesis.)
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Put simply, a theory is a map of a territory, while a paradigm is a practice that brings forth a territory in the first place
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The paradigm or social practice itself is called an "exemplar" or "injunction," and the theory is called, well, the theory. The point is that knowledge revolutions are generally combinations of new paradigm-practices that bring forth a new phenomenological territory plus new theories and maps that attempt to offer some sort of abstract or contoured guidance to the new territories thus disclosed and brought forth. But a new theory without a new practice is simply a new map with no real territory, or what is generally called "ideology."
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anchored, not in abstractions but in social practices.
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stabilizes and carries forward until the next set of pesky data arises that refuses to be humbled in the existing scheme of things,
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Modern values, on the other hand, tend to be egalitarian (not hierarchical), individualistic (not conformist), scientific (not mythic-fundamentalist), and place a premium on equality (not slavery).
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Most of these new theories of liberal democracy shared the idea that the only way to integrate individual and social is to have the individual feel that he or she is participating in the laws that govern his or her behavior.
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blue (which will follow the law if it is part of tradition)
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Only at orange does interiority start to demand a hand in the laws that regulate its own behavior.
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red (which will follow the law if it issues from the power leader)
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worldspace
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industrial base that was one of single largest factors in reducing the need for slavery,
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techno-economic
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social practice or paradigms embodying a higher, wider, deeper wave of consciousness unfolding.
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And so it is today, with an integral age at the leading edge. The possibility--and it is only a gossamer possibility at this time--is that a new and wider wave of consciousness--an integral wave, an age of synthesis--is beginning to emerge and push against all of the now-older waves (traditional, modern, and postmodern), throwing each of them (but especially the postmodern) into a legitimation crisis about its own validity--a crisis of legitimacy that can only be resolved by an increase in authenticity, or an actual transformation to the new and wider integral wave of unfolding.
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This new unfolding will involve, in terms of its paradigmatic base, an actual set of social practices, not merely a new theory or set of theories.
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behavioral injunction
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Accordingly, any new paradigm will include a set of exemplars and practices--practices that, if they contain more depth (or Eros) than their predecessors, will throw the old approaches into a legitimation crisis that can only be resolved by a vertical ("revolutionary") transformation--as we said, the crisis in legitimacy can only be resolved by an increase in authenticity. Thus, a new integral paradigm will therefore be a new set of injunctions and practices, not simply theories, not worldviews, not Web-of-Life notions, not holistic concepts--but actual practices.
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21 Nov 06
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