[Neurons] Meta Reflection #9

[meta]

From: L. Michael Hall

2008 Meta Reflections #9

March 3, 2008

(See Info. on Trainings

at end of article)



THE LEVELS OF LIFE


I was recently surprised and delighted as I revisited the writings of Alfred Korzybski and found some new stuff that somehow (!) I missed my first two readings. This happened when I reread the first book that he wrote, The Manhood of Humanity (1921). So in the next couple weeks, I'll be writing some Meta Reflections about this. This is the first one.

Korzybski wrote this book to make one point. Korzybski felt that the biggest problem in all of the soft sciences - psychology, sociology, anthropology, law, economics, philosophy, ethics, religion, politics, government, etc. is the fundamental error in how we define human nature. What is man? What kind of a class of life is humanity? Korzybski saw that if we define man as a mere animal (as did behaviorism, evolutionary theory, Freud, etc.) or as a supernatural being whose functioning does not operate by natural laws but supernatural laws- then we cannot have a solid foundation.

So Korzybski decided to try to hand at describing human nature from a scientific perspective. This led to him creating a logical level system about our kind or class of life using the mathematics of Russell and Whitehead to create his "scientific definition of man" or human nature. This meant that he relied upon the mathematical discriminations between classes, types, dimensions which he noted is "of the utmost importance in the natural sciences."

What resulted is the following logical levels of life distinguishing the different classes of life with respect to dimensionality. Lifeless, Plants, Animals, Man.

Level 0: Lifeless: no life. Nothing moving, ingesting nutriments from the world, responding to stimuli, etc. 

Level 1: Plants: the transformation of solar energy into organic chemical energy. Plants are living things taking, transforming, and appropriating the energies of sun, soil, and air. But they do not have the autonomous power to move about in space. So Korzybski described plants as a chemistry-binding class of life. They bind chemicals into themselves, making the new chemicals and chemistry part of their own life.

Level 2: Animals: a more dynamic class of life. The energy that animals have is kinetic-they have a remarkable freedom and power that plants do not possess. They have the freedom to move about in space. This makes these two-dimensional beings, according to Korzybski, a space-binding class of life. Animals have the autonomous power to move about in space, to creep, crawl, run, swim, or fly. They bind the value and experience of space (movement, going to where food is, etc.) into their being.

Level 3: Humans. We possess a most remarkable capacity, entirely peculiar to us, the capacity to summarize, digest, and appropriate the labors and experiences of the past. We have the capacity to use the fruits of past labors and experiences as intellectual or spiritual capital for the developments in the present, to conduct their lives in the ever increasing light of inherited wisdom. And this is what makes us a time-binding class of life.

"Man is a builder of civilization, whereas animals are not." We are a class of life that can make the past live in the present and the present in time-to-come (the future). In this we can bind time (the value and benefit of what happens in time and over time) into ourselves so that we do not have to start over with each generation, but have the capability-ideally-to start each generation where the last generation ended.

We are time-binders! Time-binding is what we do and so we need a theory of Time-Binding. In fact, and this is something I either forgot or never got in the first place, Korzybski originally intended to entitle his system and the book (Science and Sanity) as Time-Binding. Then on second thought, he decided to entitle it "The Science and Art of Human Engineering." Then someone talked him out of that and it became General Semantics. (And I thought I had problems creating titles for things!)

Now you've heard about time-lines, the time zones that we live in and visit (past, present, and future), but what is time-binding? Binding "time" into ourselves refers to taking what happened in other times in the lives of other people and incorporating those learnings, discoveries, insights, beliefs, etc. into our lives. So an example, what Aristotle learned in 300 BC using what he saw, heard, and felt and what he concluded in his mind and the insights he created about language, ethics, classifications, science, philosophy, etc. does not have to be rediscovered in every generation. You and I can bind into our nervous systems and mind what he learned in his time. In fact, we can start from where he left off and further develop things.

As a time-binder, "we are creators" (Korzybski). We do not just find food as do animals, we create food and shelter (p. 73). We identify seeds, understand soil, water, seasons, and so plant, nurture, and harvest. We manage our environments, we create tools, we discover the governing principles, we experiment, we keep refining our knowledge, we invent language, terminology, hypothesis, and we are never satisfied with our current level of invention. There's always more to create.

We create cultures and civilizations. We create all of this "wealth" and this wealth creation is "the definitive mark of humanity- the power to roll up continuously the ever-increasing achievements of generation after generation endlessly." (p. 110). And without time-binding- 

"... our state would be that of aboriginal man. Civilization is a creature, its create is the time-binding power of man." (p. 123)

We bind-time by our ability to use symbols and by creating semantic contexts and environments. And this time-binding gives us exponential powers for progress, wealth, and meaning. But that will have to wait until next Monday. To the unleashing of your time-binding powers!

--------

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May 30-31, June 1 -- Gold Coast, Australia.   The second Self-Actualization Workshop.

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L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.
Neuro-Semantics Ltd., Executive Director
ISNS - International Society of Neuro-Semantics
P.O. Box 8
Clifton, Colorado, 81520 USA
www.neurosemantics.com 
www.meta-coaching.org
www.self-actualizing.org 

Email: meta @onlinecol.com @acsol.net @mindfocus.co.za
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