[Neurons] Philsophers Series # 10

[Charles DesJardins]

Charles DesJardins

 

The Philosopher's Series #10

 

August 22, 2008

 

 

ARISTOTLE AND NEURO-SEMANTICS

 

Aristotle was a student of Plato. He studied and taught at Plato's Academy
for about 20 years. Aristotle grew up with Philip, the father of Alexander
the Great. When Aristotle left the Academy after the death of Plato it seems
he went on to study politics and biological research, but in about 342 BCE
he was summoned by his old friend Philip to come and tutor his son Alexander
the Great. About seven years later, Aristotle left and went back to Athens
to start his own school called the Lyceum. 

 

There is much discussion over the similarities and differences between the
philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, but it has been said that everyone is
either born a Platonist or an Aristotelian. Given that statement, there must
be areas of divergence between the student and the teacher.

 

One of the key differences between the student and the teacher is that the
student did not see forms as those abstract perfect things that represent
reality while the matter is simply a changing substance of that form. To
Aristotle, matter and substance were what is real, the matter and substance
purpose into the form that they are designed to be. Aristotle saw the things
of the world, the tree, the dog, men, etc. as the real, and not forms as the
real. What difference does this make as it relates to Aristotle's philosophy
and Neuro-Semantics?

 

Because Aristotle saw the real world as a world that is constantly seeking
toward its form or purpose in life, Aristotle developed a philosophy of
potentiality and actuality. To Aristotle, things are either potentials of
something else, that is, that which can be actual. The acorn is the
potential and the tree is the actual. In Aristotle's philosophy, the acorn
has potential and it reaches that potential when it becomes the tree, the
actual. But then, the tree can be used to build a house and so the tree now
becomes the potential for the actual, the house. 

 

This philosophy of potentiality to actuality also applies to people. For
Aristotle, the purpose of the person is to make actual that which is
potential; to live in such a manner that his or her potential becomes
actual. It is a personal philosophy of the development of mankind. People
have a purpose and their goal in life is to take all that is potential and
make it actual, that is the supreme happiness of mankind.

 

Abraham Maslow stated "if you deliberately plan on being less than you are
capable of being, then I warn you that you'll be unhappy for the rest of
your life." Self-Actualization Psychology is the psychology of being, of
becoming that which has the potential to become. Self-Actualization
Psychology, following the Hierarchy of Needs Model, purports that man has
being needs that is won't to appear after the deficiency needs are met. 

 

Abraham Maslow even went so far as to state that if a person does not
potentiate into actuality, he or she will suffer from a certain pathology, a
pathology caused because that person does not actualize that which is
potential in him or her. If the deficiency needs are met and the person does
not find ways to fulfill the self-actualizing needs, he or she will suffer a
form of pathology and thus be unhappy.

 

Aristotle did not understand modern philosophy or science, but he recognized
that for people and society to improve, the man or woman needs to become all
they have within them the potential to become. Aristotle recognized that
each individual would actualize in a different manner and as a unique
person. Aristotle also believed that people cannot fully actualize from that
which they have the potential to become if society does not offer them that
chance. Aristotle believed that for man to reach his full potential society
had to offer those opportunities for full potential. There is thus a
synergistic relationship between individual man and society, and society and
individual man. 

 

In some of the Neuro-Semantic writings and in some of the older works on
Self-Actualization you find a somewhat similar theme, not that man or woman
needs society to change for them to self-actualize, but that good conditions
in that society can support the individual person to develop into his or her
full potential and for the individual's need to develop so that society can
change. This creates a synergy rather than a dichotomy. A man or woman does
not need society to self-actualize, but for society to self-actualize, it
needs self-actualized individuals. Society can be changed by self-actualized
men and women and this engenders a synergy between individual man or woman
and society and self-actualization. 

 

What role do you play as a man or a woman in your personal
self-actualization? Do you see the synthesis between society and your
self-actualization and your self-actualization and the self-actualization of
society? Neuro-Semantics and the Self-Actualization models of the Quadrants
of Self Actualization and the Matrix of Self Actualization offer systemic
ways for you to enter into this system of social and personal synergies for
a bright and better future. 

 

Well over two thousand years ago Aristotle recognized that mankind needs to
grow from that which they have the potential to become into the actuality of
that potential. In the last fifty years or so a few people from the human
potential movement recognized that mankind needs to grow from that which
they have the potential to become into the actuality of that potential.
Today it is called self-actualization and there are now models for the
actualizing one's full potentials. Today it is no less important as it was
over two thousand years ago; the difference, we have the models to make
real, that which was potential, the self-actualization of individual persons
and thus the self-actualization of societies.

 

 

Charles.desjardins at sbcglobal.net

 

 

 

 

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