“Sophia Speaks” introduces a grammar-based expansion of the Integral model. While Ken WIlber’s Integral is situated in a pronounal View (I, We, It, and Its), Bruce Alderman utilizes six parts of speech as the metaphysical “lenses” or “views” from which philosophies are envisioned: pronouns, nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, and prepositions. Alderman writes “(j)ust as the pronouns in Integral Theory yield a postmetaphysical, perspectivist onto-epistemology, and provide an elegant framework for integrative metatheory, the other parts of speech may serve (and, historically, often have served) similar philosophical functions: supporting substantialist, aspect-oriented, processual, modal, and relational ontologies, respectively, and in some cases giving rise to alternative metatheoretical approaches.” In this Café the group takes Bruce’s neologism “onto-choreography” and coordinates a playing around with serious languaging.
Reading
“Sophia Speaks” by Bruce Alderman
Supplemental Material
2017 IPS Reading Group Discussion on “Sophia Speaks”: #1 and #2
A slide collection for “Sophia Speaks” download (681.1 KB)
Sophia Speaks Ning thread
Seed Questions
What are the six basic grammatical-metaphysical orientations? Why could they be important to know? Which orientation do you most often identify with?
As we live in a hyper-complex world with wicked problems, can the understanding of these six basic orientations create conditions for connecting diverse theories and practices in your life or the life of anyone you care about? If not, why not?
And when the understanding of these six basic grammatical-metaphysical orientations becomes a new style of thinking, what happens to unfulfilled potentials, master-slave relations, reductive harmful ideologies, and aesthetics?