Just spent a happy few days at the Festival of Words and Ideas at Dartington. Hard to know whether the talks are more fascinating than the audience. Am sated with stimulating conversation. Heaven on earth to spend time with other writers and avid readers, people of passion.
On Resurgence Day we were treated to talks by Brian Goodwin and Satish Kumar. Goodwin says he is ‘embedded in the evolutionary process’ and his desire is to articulate that ‘culture is embedded in nature’ not something separate, a construct, apart from it.
He emphasizes that, at Schumacher College, study is focussed on the ‘meaning’ in the natural world, which is different from studying the natural world in order to control it. In nature, all is death and transformation.
His argument that meaning tends to be associated with language and culture rather than the existence and life of things implies a chasm between the two, that thought and the intellect have moved to inhabit a separate sphere from nature. He says ‘we are trying to control the uncontrollable – the basis of creativity.’
Instead he suggests we participate, and go into the heart of what is going on in any system: in our bodies for health, in our environments, and the economy or businesses. At Schumacher the idea is to analyze the whole of any organization, whether that be the study of beauty, health, wellbeing – the holistic vigour of a system.
Goodwin is a Biologist and says that qualities such as happiness or pain have usually been discounted in scientific studies as these are not easily quantifiable. But, he affirms, these are important indicators of complex systems, and we must not ignore them.
We need to ‘do science in a more complete way.’ It must be analytical, qualitative, measurable, quantitative, but it must also study emergent qualities. He says the traditional form of knowledge, pre-Enlightenment, was Shamanic, that is with regard to the regulation of rhythm. Rhythms are everywhere in nature and in all systems; we can see this in flowers and plants, but can we test for them?
He believes that mechanical causality is useful but a deeper principle is more important. He suggests that ‘people need to be become invisible, as do other organisms, through integration and participation,’ and that this ‘will bring meaning back into our lives big time.’ This reminds me of an exercise children are sometimes asked to do in primary school – to sit, silent and motionless, amongst foliage, and simply ‘be’ to see how it feels and what they notice. A very powerful exercise if you can get the child to understand why he is there.
Returning to language and culture, he seeks to remind us that ‘conversation goes on in nature all the time,’ that language is everywhere, metaphorically and literally.’
His message is a very optimistic one: that we are recovering a sense of our role which, although not easy is so worthwhile. Although we may have no clearly defined objective we can feel the direction, become engaged, embedded. He calls this our ‘transition culture’ and says he welcomes this ‘age of meaning.’
It’s an interesting reversal. How long it has taken for a general shift away from the empirical, scientific ways of understanding the world. He says that our ‘new way of seeing the world is also the old way – which had become fragmented.’ This puts me in mind of agriculture. Farming was always carried out in rhythm with the seasons until science analyzed it to death.
Since the 1960s food production has become increasingly isolated from peoples’ lives and supermarket shopping is the result, with animal welfare, haulage and chemical sprays being the obvious concerns.
He emphasizes that ‘local is where the power is,’ that civil society is in transition, and we have a new respect for place. Community, co-operation and communication are the answer.
Satish Kumar adds that Art and Science meet in the same place. He believes that they will cease to exist separately. He also believes that intuition – our organ of perception – needs to be developed, along with our feelings.
Nature, death, transformation. All is circular. Beauty and creativity is central to life. This is not to say that the Enlightenment principles must be thrown out with the bathwater, but knowledge must be integrated with intuition and creativity. Hallelujah.
Let’s hear it for the small, local producers, theatre collectives, small businesses, community vegetable growing co-operatives, and team-work. Way to go. I so prefer this positive, life-affirming approach to the current, brow-beating, guilt-inducing, minute-by-minute assault by the whole range of media about the dangers of climate change.
For a whole hour I did not hear the dreaded phrase which makes me want to rebel, turn all my electrical equipment on and fly around the world. Goodwin and Kumar make me want to plant vegetables and share them with my neighbours.
On Resurgence Day we were treated to talks by Brian Goodwin and Satish Kumar. Goodwin says he is ‘embedded in the evolutionary process’ and his desire is to articulate that ‘culture is embedded in nature’ not something separate, a construct, apart from it.
He emphasizes that, at Schumacher College, study is focussed on the ‘meaning’ in the natural world, which is different from studying the natural world in order to control it. In nature, all is death and transformation.
His argument that meaning tends to be associated with language and culture rather than the existence and life of things implies a chasm between the two, that thought and the intellect have moved to inhabit a separate sphere from nature. He says ‘we are trying to control the uncontrollable – the basis of creativity.’
Instead he suggests we participate, and go into the heart of what is going on in any system: in our bodies for health, in our environments, and the economy or businesses. At Schumacher the idea is to analyze the whole of any organization, whether that be the study of beauty, health, wellbeing – the holistic vigour of a system.
Goodwin is a Biologist and says that qualities such as happiness or pain have usually been discounted in scientific studies as these are not easily quantifiable. But, he affirms, these are important indicators of complex systems, and we must not ignore them.
We need to ‘do science in a more complete way.’ It must be analytical, qualitative, measurable, quantitative, but it must also study emergent qualities. He says the traditional form of knowledge, pre-Enlightenment, was Shamanic, that is with regard to the regulation of rhythm. Rhythms are everywhere in nature and in all systems; we can see this in flowers and plants, but can we test for them?
He believes that mechanical causality is useful but a deeper principle is more important. He suggests that ‘people need to be become invisible, as do other organisms, through integration and participation,’ and that this ‘will bring meaning back into our lives big time.’ This reminds me of an exercise children are sometimes asked to do in primary school – to sit, silent and motionless, amongst foliage, and simply ‘be’ to see how it feels and what they notice. A very powerful exercise if you can get the child to understand why he is there.
Returning to language and culture, he seeks to remind us that ‘conversation goes on in nature all the time,’ that language is everywhere, metaphorically and literally.’
His message is a very optimistic one: that we are recovering a sense of our role which, although not easy is so worthwhile. Although we may have no clearly defined objective we can feel the direction, become engaged, embedded. He calls this our ‘transition culture’ and says he welcomes this ‘age of meaning.’
It’s an interesting reversal. How long it has taken for a general shift away from the empirical, scientific ways of understanding the world. He says that our ‘new way of seeing the world is also the old way – which had become fragmented.’ This puts me in mind of agriculture. Farming was always carried out in rhythm with the seasons until science analyzed it to death.
Since the 1960s food production has become increasingly isolated from peoples’ lives and supermarket shopping is the result, with animal welfare, haulage and chemical sprays being the obvious concerns.
He emphasizes that ‘local is where the power is,’ that civil society is in transition, and we have a new respect for place. Community, co-operation and communication are the answer.
Satish Kumar adds that Art and Science meet in the same place. He believes that they will cease to exist separately. He also believes that intuition – our organ of perception – needs to be developed, along with our feelings.
Nature, death, transformation. All is circular. Beauty and creativity is central to life. This is not to say that the Enlightenment principles must be thrown out with the bathwater, but knowledge must be integrated with intuition and creativity. Hallelujah.
Let’s hear it for the small, local producers, theatre collectives, small businesses, community vegetable growing co-operatives, and team-work. Way to go. I so prefer this positive, life-affirming approach to the current, brow-beating, guilt-inducing, minute-by-minute assault by the whole range of media about the dangers of climate change.
For a whole hour I did not hear the dreaded phrase which makes me want to rebel, turn all my electrical equipment on and fly around the world. Goodwin and Kumar make me want to plant vegetables and share them with my neighbours.
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