Open Source Integral?

[BrightAbyss~]

We've been getting a lot of questions about the concept of "open source integral", so I will say a few things about it:

The term "open source" comes from the history and language of computer programming. The 'open source' movement provided an alternative to Microsoft software - promoting the free and flexible exchange of knowledge and applications.

The Open Source Integral (OSi) Network is similarly designed to help facilitate the flow of information, knowledge and dialogue. We want to promote growth & provide a forum where alternative "integral" thinking can develop.

The term "integral" has a wide range of meanings. Hopefully many will be explored on this site. We suggest 'integral' signifies at least three overlapping phenomena:

- an emergent human capacity for more complex modes of being-in-the-world
- a particular subcultural event
- a growing set of ideas & practices connected by shared understandings of health and development

The purpose of the OSi Network is to help facilitate a critical rethinking of integral theory, practice and discourse. We are providing a 'space' for dialogue and personal expression within a growing culture of creative people, movements & ideas.

OSi is for people who want to build a community where people can meet, discuss, collaborate & co-create alternative "integral operating systems" and applications. For this reason we support a variety of 'integral' projects and approaches.

We know this kind of re:evolution in thinking is not the task of any single person. Research indicates that advanced human intelligence manifests collectively. And we would like Open Source Integral to help cultivate the necessary worldspaces for such growth - together in ways and forms still unknown.

As you will see, this site has numerous opportunities for self expression, through blogging, images, videos, music, creating sub-groups and customizable personal pages.

In short, the OSi Network has the potential to support a whole subculture of alternative 'integral' visions. But this network will only be as fruitful as its members are creative. Potential without action means little.

So the 'floor' is open. We want to hear from you! We are "open" to all kinds of input. We suggest members start with joining in on the discussions. Get to know each other, express your ideas, develop your personal pages - the more each of us participate, the more unexpected things will happen.

Thank you so much, and don't hesitate to contact me any time.

Michael~

[gRaYsAm]

“what if ad hoc, provisional strategies, without an overarching structure with ‘high principles’, something that is more practical in the real-world of everyday politics, is in fact what a post-formal, integral approach might look like? It remains spontaneous to creative (ad hoc) solutions while acknowledging the provisional and specific nature of each individual and social context.”

-- from Edward Berge (open integral blog, Dec 4, 2007)

[BrightAbyss~]

REPOST from KRIS TINER
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Do we need an "integral evangelism"?

Been reviewing some of Maslow's ideas on creativity and self-actualization for a paper I'm working on about Integral Music, and I ran across this gem (from Toward a Psychology of Being), it seems relevant:

Every age but ours has had its model, its ideal. All of these have been given up by our culture; the saint, the hero, the gentleman, the knight, the mystic. About all we have left is the well-adjusted man without problems, a very pale and doubtful substitute. Perhaps we shall soon be able to use as our guide and model the fully growing and self-fulfilling human being, the one in whom all his potentialities are coming to full development, the one whose inner nature expresses itself freely, rather than being warped, suppressed, or denied.

To do that successfully in today's world is, of course, a fully heroic act of cultural defiance and deviance from the mainstream.

On the next page he adds:

Sick people are made by a sick culture; healthy people are made possible by a healthy culture. But it is just as true that sick individuals make their culture more sick and that healthy individuals make their culture more healthy. Improving individual health is one approach to making a better world.

So here are some practical questions: how does one engage a self-fulfilling/self-actualizing life practice that remains empathic with the surrounding culture, balances agency with communion, and is accepting of (and interactive with) greater levels of holism?

How to go about blending such an integral worldview with decisive non-participation in that which is deemed to be either individually damaging, pathological or culturally regressive? (plenty to choose from, right?)

How to measure that kind of spiritual discernment against material necessity (i.e., eating, working, paying the rent)?

And finally, when it seems that the clash of dogmatic belief systems is the most destructive force in today's world (and yesterday's, for that matter), do we really need an institutional, integral evangelism or something else? How indeed does the "fully growing" human being attempt to "guide" the culture at large?

I have my own answers, Maslow of course has his, but I'm interested in yours...

[M Alan Kazlev]

Hi everyone

Mike thanks for the invite :-)

I come from a rather different space to most of you guys, because my starting point is Aurobindonian rather than Wilberian, Esoteric/Metaphysical rather than Exoteric/post-postmodern, Integral Yoga rather than Integral Movement. Even the word Integral can be misleading, implying as it does a juxtoposition of two very different, almost diametrically opposite, systems of thought and methodology, which is why I have become more partial now to the term "evolutionary allies", which doesn't come with so much intellectual or memetic baggage. The word "Integral" has two primary focal points - Aurobindonian and Wilberian, whereas "evolutionary allies" includes many more perspectives.

In terms of practice, Inegral Yoga is primarily individual; the idea being you transform yourself and through attuning to the Supramental Consciousness the world is also transformed (IY is not interested in a transcendent nirvana). There is also application to the outside world - e.g education and Whereas the Integral Movement is more about things in the world, e.g. politics or socuial change or business management

[Bill]

I tend to think you haven't defined "open source integral" clearly enough and with the right degree of elaboration.

In fact, I think it would be worthwhile to apply an open source approach to perfecting a definition for this idea.

Something like a series of numbered statements (numbered so we can refer to them easily, dissect them, prune them, and reform them), perhaps? Or a mind map, in the sense of a tree of keyphrases?

Then, in theory, the open source group would want to be able to keep coming back to the definition again and again, with new elaborations and refinements.

And it should also be constructed in such a way that it's easy to understand, despite the need to use some technical language. And easy to check the references and sources.

[MetroPunk]

Very good point Bill. How would you suggest we move forward on this?

Do you have ten tennants, or statements that you would include in an open source "Integral Operating System" (IOS), or "worldview"?

I would like to add four:

1. An acknowledgement of 'deep' Evolution primarily through ecological processes (as opposed to some metaphysical process)

2. An awareness of the humna life cycle, and its developmentary character (how people develop, decrease and die). This might include some flexible way to discuss "stages".

3. Experience: as the qualitative dimension of overall awareness (phenomenology and existentialism proper)

4. Methodological Pluralism: multiple ways of knowing with and eclectic approach to investigation.

I could add more but its early and I haven't had my coffee yet :-) I don't know? Is this a start?

[Bill]

Well, I would say that first of all we would want to gather more inputs, especially from the owners of this space, as to wether or not "open source integralism" needs to be better defined, or if the intention is to use the keyphrase as a kind of undefined psychological hook.

If it's decided that it should be more strongly defined, then start a definition tree. I would suggest a form like this:

"OPEN SOURCE INTEGRAL" definition statement .5 beta

1. A second generation version of integral theory and practice.
1.1 "second generation" means integral thinkers elaborating and reviewing and critiqueing the first generation source material created by Ken Wilber and ???

etc etc.

The things you mention I would consider elaborations, belonging further down the definition tree. First you have to establish the core definition set, then define the main structure of the 'tree' a bit, then start placing the elaborations, the main branches, sub branches, and leaves of the definition tree.

There are other approaches. My initial post was just a reaction to reading the initial entry, and realizing that while I git the "open source" metaphor easily enough, after reading, I still wasn't sure what I was supposed to think "open source integral" was intended to be.

[M Alan Kazlev]

Hi all

I'll just chip in here with my own comments (and play devil's advocate as well)

Regarding Mike's definition

o "an emergent human capacity for more complex modes of being-in-the-world" - this is an aspect of the current evolution of consciousness, not a movement but a process

o "a particular subcultural event" - in the sense of Wilber, Beck etc yes. But what about the second locus, Integral Yoga? To say nothing of other "evolutionary allies". So we have a cluster of events, not just one

o "a growing set of ideas & practices connected by shared understandings of health and development" - this is actually a good definition of the New Age :-) It shows how problematic it is to separate the New Age and the IM

regarding Metro's 4 points

"1. An acknowledgement of 'deep' Evolution primarily through ecological processes (as opposed to some metaphysical process)" - to me this is very much New Story (Berry and Swimme) with Wilber's phobia of metaphysics added. Actually I would refer to "Deep Evolution" (nice term btw) as precisely a Metaphysical Process :-)

2. "An awareness of the human life cycle, and its developmentary character" - this is fine in the context of IM (Wilber & SD)'s roots in developmental psychology. But Laszlo has a different interpretation (he is inspired by David Bohm and by complexity theory)

3. "Experience: as the qualitative dimension of overall awareness (phenomenology and existentialism proper)" - i suppose this refers to or leads to the nondual state - all is awareness / Self . Intrigingly Sri Aurobindo saw the nondual as only the first of many possible realisations

4. "Methodological Pluralism: multiple ways of knowing with and eclectic approach to investigation." This is Wilber's graet contribution and i think it is a good one

Bill suggests a META- definition:

1. "A second generation version of integral theory and practice." But what standards do we use to define "integral theory and practice"? I have no problem with using my definitions in my essay "Redefining Integral", but others may have different definitions

1.1 " "second generation" means integral thinkers elaborating and reviewing and critiqueing the first generation source material created by Ken Wilber and ???" Beck, Integral Institute, Cohen, etc. But it doesn't have to be limited to them alone, only considering them among others. Wilber of course also uses Sri Aurobindo, Gebser, (who both used the term integral long before him, but weren't part of the modern Integral Movement). So Second Generation could even be someone like myself coming from an Aurobindonian perspective, it could be someone from a Gebserian perspective, etc. Or it could be Teilhard, Whitehad, Steiner, Plotinus... the important thing is to broaden out.

So Second Generation also means breaking free of the literalism and other limiting structures of the first generation IM, while at the same time acknowledging and incorporating their positive and authentic insights

[MetroPunk]

WOW Alan, this is a lot to take in.

One quick comment though is that I think your distinction between Eso and Exo with re: to wilber is kind of a 'straw-man' project.

Wilber fully integrates the Eso with talk of "One Taste", Big Mind, Ever Present Awareness, and his many discussions of emptiness and form, but also with his inclusion of states (all the way to nondual).

I think Joe Perez pointed out to you that Wilber includes this "supermentalization" business in his 3 tier levels, from indigo to clear light.

anyway, just some thoughts. i like your overall work.

[M Alan Kazlev]

hi Metro!

True KW advocates a nondual position, but this is a New Paradigm/Rising Culture Westernised adaptation of original Advatin and Mahayana tradition. As Sri Aurobindo has shown, there are many stages beyond nondual, all the way to Supramentalisation. And the same with involution, the nondual is relatively low on the scale (but still transcendent of phenomena). I will be discussing all this in my book Integral Metaphysics and Transformation

Wilber gives only very cursory mention of Plotinus (although i'm happy he mentions and thus helps to popularise him!), and either little or nothing at all on Iamblichus, Proclus, ibn Arabi, Rumi, Isaac Luria, the Pratybhijna tradition, Western Hermeticism, Fourth Way, and otehr authentic esoteric teachings. Although he has the greatest respect for Sri Aurobindo, his interpretation of him is also extermely misleading and superficial, and he totally ignores The Mother (so does Michael Murphy), despite the fact that Mother's Agenda is the most profound document on transformation of the body and of the world ever written (i know the title is very off putting, i guess that's due to Satprem (her close disciple and the compiler of the material)

Joe is a great guy, I like him a lot! But unfortunately he makes all the same mistakes Wilber does. I reply to his critique of my essay here www.integralworld.net/kazlev14.html Also see www.integralworld.net/kazlev3.html where i show where KW misinterprets Sri Aurobindo (who even in terms of KW's own AQAL philosophy is more integral than Wilber himself is, not less), show how his developmental series is actually based on Adi Da's Seven Stages of Life, and contrast nondualism and transcendence (the Yoga of Ascent) with Supramentalisation (the Yoga of Descent)

[BrightAbyss~]

This in an old thread that might help with stimulating ideas for the OSI book...