0117 Of course, humans are not like cows. Nor are humans like who we think they are. They are… um… the products of complicated evolutionary feedback loops.
0118 In section six, the author lists more than a dozen publications on the subject, setting the stage to propose his own heuristic framework.
0119 Fortunately, the author has the excuse of not being familiar with Razie Mah’s masterwork, The Human Niche,available at smashwords (and other e-book venues) in 2018.
Unfortunately, he already tried to reverse engineer Bourdieu’s concepts of “habitus” and “structure” into a framework reductive enough to fit the basic requirements of current evolutionary theorists. Current evolutionary theorists? These are the highly-credentialed academics who have yet to figure out that adaptation2H is not the same as phenotype2V even though both labels apply to the same entity2.
0120 I mean, really, current evolutionary theorists make fun of the proponents of intelligent design while sitting on an intersection as mysterious as the improbability of life itself. If a species2b‘ niche1b and its2b genome1b are made possible by an actuality independent of the adapting species2a and DNA2a, respectively, in the normal contexts of natural selection3b and body development3b, respectively, then exactly what rules out a Creator God from operating within the realms2a underlying the situation-level possibilities1b or within the situation-level possibilities1b themselves?
It is something to gag over.
0121 Meanwhile, this examination has already fumbled upon domestication-entanglement co-evolution as a possible manifestation of what the author is talking about.
The author proposes three components, or “nodes”, that influence one another: individual, group and community. With the manifestation at hand, “individual” labels both the ethnographer and the person as matter. The “group” corresponds to the narod. The “community” goes with civilization and the academies within it.
0122 Then, the author proposes that these mutual influences engage in feedback.
Then, the author illustrates the feedback using the example of sexual partnering.
The author chooses the term, “sexual partnering”, because the terms “mating” or “sexual activity related to reproduction”, are too blatant and annoying.
Nevertheless, even with the bland label, the example should pique the curiosity of any undergraduate.
“Sexual partnering”, indeed.
0123 This examiner will stay the course with the current paradigm of domestication and entanglement, modified by ambiguity, because the role of the cow and the role of the human now play out as mirrors of one another.
Even though this paradigm is not as… sexy… as the author’s example. It has the benefit of shedding light on the nature of the first singularity, where hand-speech practicing ethnos become speech-alone talking narods, thereby making the passage from the Lebenswelt that we evolved in to our current Lebenswelt.
0124 Section seven is titled, “Sexual Partnering and the Human Niche Framework”.
This section is accompanied by figures.
No, not those types of figures.
Rather, these figures illustrate the mutual influence of the “nodes” of individual, social group and community.
0125 That author starts with the individual.
Figure 1 is roughly re-illustrated here.
0126 The driver is an ecological or environmental danger or opportunity2a.
I suppose the niche is the circle, representing that the danger or the opportunity2a has the potential to produce adaptations (in development, morphology and behavior)2b.
So, the adaptation2a is portrayed as the threefold element within the circle (niche1b) and corresponds to how individuals adapt over generations.
So, the big arrow must associate to the environment of evolutionary adapatation2a, as well as natural selection3b.
0127 Can I associate this figure to the two-level interscope for Darwinism?
Here are my guesses.
The normal context of natural selection3b brings the actuality of individual adaptations (in development, morphology and behavior)2b into relation with a niche1b, where the niche is defined as the potential of ‘something ecological’1b.
0128 The only caveat falls into the perspective-level potential1c. The adaptation2b potentially applies to the individual2a.
So, there are two double associations.
The big arrow associates to both natural selection3b and the actuality independent of the adapting species2a.
The big circle associates to both the individual (as the focus of inquiry)1c and the niche1b.
0129 Figure 2 (re-illustrated here) adds the social group (the second “node”) to the framework.
0130 So, let me start with the smallest social circle. While the chimpanzee roves in bands, the social circle under the greatest social pressure is family and friends. Family concerns maternal care, under conditions of individual foraging. Friends engage in grooming, literally picking bugs off one another. Plus, friends are allies in fights.
Three phenotypic features turn out to be adaptive to the social circle of family and friends. Personal bonding assists in questions of pecking order and who to look for at times of confusion. Cognitive space includes the ability to read signs calling for assistance, as well as signs of danger. Finally, both personal bonding and the ability to read the other hominin play roles in the organization of behavior of family and friends.
0131 The theory that male-female pair-bonding co-evolved with bipedalism applies here. Even though all hominin societies have some degree of promiscuity, the coincidence of male provisioning and female fidelity offers an opportunity for reproductive success for both sexes. Male provisioning makes food available for his female and her children. Female fidelity assures that the children are his (therefore contributing to his reproductive success).
These are difficult adaptations, because they engage a style of semiotics that really pays attention to intentional cues, the raw material of language. When a young male consistently offers food to a female, and expects fidelity in return, cultural feedback loops established within the band are crucial. The semiotics of long-term male-female pair bondingare vastly different than the semiotics of maternal care.
0132 Bipedalism is an adaptation to mixed forest and savannah. So, the hominids who can walk turn out to be best adapted to this new ecology, while hominids who retain the current chimpanzee style continue in tropical forests, where individual foraging does not conflict with walking long distances.
0133 This brings me to a crucial idea, implicit in figure 2, but not discussed in this article. The social circle under the most significant selection pressure changes during hominin evolutionary history.
0134 Here is a picture.
0135 The list on the left contains four evolutionary epochs. The first three define the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. The last labels our current dilemma.
Current dilemma?
You know, ours is a time when one civilization sends ethnographers into diverse narods, because there are no longer any ethnos to send them to.
0135 The reference is Comments on Michael Tomasello’s Arc of Inquiry (1999-2019), by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues. Michael Tomasello’s productive research years significantly overlap with Augustin Fuentes, so it is not surprising that both evolution-minded anthropologists are discussing similar ideas.
Razie Mah’s semiotic-oriented masterworks appear in this timeframe. An Archaeology of the Fall is first uploaded in 2012. How To Define the Word “Religion” is uploaded in 2015. The Human Niche is uploaded in 2018. These three works offer a Peircean vision of human evolution.
0136 The question that I failed to address is this, “Does the author’s figure 2 comport with the two-level interscope for natural selection?”
0137 What if I replace “natural selection” with “cultural selection”?
Here is a picture.
0138 The normal context of cultural selection3b brings the actuality of social adaptations (including social bonds, cognitive spaces and cooperative interactions)2b into relation with a social niche1b, defined as the potential1b of individuals facing natural selection pressures in the environment of evolutionary adaptation (EEA)2a.
0139 Of course, these social adaptations2b potentiate the social group1c, which, as noted earlier, includes the social circle that is under the most significant selective pressure.
At the same time, I may say that the potential of the social group1c creates the situation where social beings2b are adaptive.
0140 Next, imagine that the salient social circle is the team (15). Over generations, the team1c encourages social adaptations2b that rewards individuals with phenotypes that are appropriate to that team2a. In other words, successful teams2a, as the medium responding to evolutionary pressures associated with obligating collaborative foraging,produces a selection pressure3b on the individual2b.
One of the social adaptations2b is protolinguistic hand-talk2b. The semiotics of protolinguistic hand-talk2a become the actuality independent of adapting individuals (species)2a. Individual adaptations2b encourage sensible constructionduring team activities. Hand-talk facilitates sensible construction.
0141 Next, imagine that, during the domestication of fire, cooking changes everything. Cooking with fire unlocks hitherto sequestered nutrients. More teams can be successful. More teams means larger brains and larger groups. Bands (50) grow into communities (150). Communities are teams of teams.
Enough versatility exists among teams that ecological pressures are mediated by organizational capacity.
In short, the salient social circle is now the community (150).
0142 The author’s next set of feedback loops is collective action, which roughly corresponds to the interactions within a community and its environment.
0143 This set of feedback loops demands that a perspective level comes into play. The situation-level might be family (5), friends (5), team (50) and band (50), as well as mega-band (500) and tribe (1500). A perspective-level adapts to the community (150).
After all, that is what Robin Dunbar’s correlation between human brain size and group size predicts. Human brains are adaptive for groups with a size of 150. But, a community contain smaller groups, so one of the jobs of the community is to bring harmony among the teams, friends and families. One of the other jobs is to face outwards towards other communities (that is, mega-bands and tribes).
0144 Well, if I add a perspective level to the two-level interscope, then a whole new typology of social bonds, cognitive spaces and cooperative interactions2c manifests. If Dugin is correct, these actualities2c fall under the label, “ethnos”, for the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
0145 Here is the three-level interscope.
On the perspective level, the normal context of hominin flourishing3c brings the actuality of the ethnos2c into relation with the potential of harmony among all social circles, including those smaller and larger than the community1c.
On the situation level, the normal context of cultural selection3b brings the actuality of social groups2b into relation with the social niche2a, consisting of the potential of individuals in community2a.
On the content level, the presence of need3a brings the individual in community2a into relation with the potential of meeting a challenge1a.
0146 One question is, “Who constructs this content-level normal context3a and potential1a?”
Plus, how are these normal contexts3 and potentials1 constellated in niche construction?
0148 What situation-level potential1b’ are these individuals in community2b’ manifesting?
What is the actuality independent of the individual in community2a’ that defines the human niche1b’ in the normal context of natural selection3b’?
The answer is the thesis of Razie Mah’s masterwork, The Human Niche.
The answer is triadic relations.
0149 Section eight of this article seeks to establish that aspects of the author’s conceptual framework are already in practice.
0150 Indeed they are. The author offers Figure 4, concerning human capacities to modify local ecologies. The figure is re-illustrated here. But, be warned. Organizational capacities significant enough to change local ecologies (other than the selective use of fire and some other tricks, like laying stones that encourage animals to migrate into a trap) are not that relevant to the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. They are relevant to our current Lebenswelt, because the organizational capacity of humans is no longer constrained after the first singularity.
0151 Remember the Genesis condemnations leveled by God to Adam after the Fall, while still in the Garden of Eden?
God’s curse is the law of diminishing returns.
Why does God level such a curse?
Adam is a mythical figure that is created in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, but transmogrifies into a creature that introduces all humanity to our current Lebenswelt.
The law of diminishingreturns applies to the times when humans are so organized that they can transform the ecology and environment.
That is our times.
0152 “The first singularity” is the label that I apply to the transmogrification of the ethnos to the narod, at the dawn of history.
0153 See The First Singularity and Its Fairy Tale Trace (for a brief presentation) and An Archaeology of the Fall (for the dramatic exposition) for more information. Both are by Razie Mah and available at smashwords and other e-book venues.
Or, the inquiring person may explore Razie Mah’s blogs.
0155 Recall that the full title of the article is “The Extended Evolutionary Synthesis, Ethnography, and the Human Niche: Toward an Integrated Anthropology”.
The proposition of an integrated anthropology and the title associate to a category-based nested form.
0156 The problem?
Anthropology2 does not constellate under the normal context of the human niche3 and within the potential of ‘the niche-construction version of an extended evolutionary synthesis’1.
Instead, ethnography2 is anthropology’s adaptation to the normal context of community3 operating on the potential of ‘communal cognitive spaces’1.
0157 This makes sense, in terms of Aristotle’s causalities, which are cleverly re-imported from philosophy into scientific inquiry by the academic discipline of Anthropology.
0158 Yes, humans evolve. So, it seems that contemporary anthropology2 should be contextualized by a need for integration3 with the potential of ‘evolutionary science’1.
0159 This expectation brings in a second problem, corresponding to the Greimas square of Dugin’s typology in Comments on Alexander Dugin’s Book (2012) The Fourth Political Theory (by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues).
0160 This examination of Augustin Fuentes’s article adds value by elaborating the elements within this Greimas square.
0161 The people (A) are here represented by the ethnographer, operating within an institution (of “the people”), that manifests its organizational objectives in terms of contemporary political theories (including notions (B) on how the discipline of anthropology should train ethnographers capable of receiving (and mapping) the cognitive spaces within a narod (C)).
0162 In other words, the ethnographer as anthropologist (A) contrasts with the various theoretical apparatuses (B) that sustain the academic discipline.
Plus, these various theoretical social constructions (B) are what makes a people capable of practicing a level of social complexity that appears as wealth and power in the view of the limitations of any particular community or narod (C).
Finally, the narod (C) is a traditional society in our current Lebenswelt that cannot return to a corresponding ethnos (D) that would exist in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.
0163 Consequently, a pattern of domestication and entanglement is an appropriate darwinian model for the adaptations involved in discipline of ethnography.
0164 On one hand, the ethnographer is an emissary from a society with wealth and power and serves as an actuality independent of the adapting narod-folk2a.
The potential of intergroup competition1b says that fear should be the appropriate adaptation2b, in the course of natural and cultural selection3b.
0165 But this does not happen. Instead, the narod-folk3b,1b adapt by losing their fear of the ethnographer’s society2b. This is the nature of domestication.
0166 On the other hand, the narod-folk2a are the actuality independent of the adapting species for anthropologists within Western academies3b who are trained by (and train) ethnographers on the methods of mapping the cognitive spaces of narod-folk1b. The very act of mapping the cognitive spaces of a narod (whether historically given or spontaneously generated) exhibits the anthropology of substantiation and entanglement.
0167 I conclude by returning to the snarky comment at point 119 and apologizing.
Yeah, semioticians have teeth.
0168 The author notes, in the final paragraph, that the human niche is a basal framework that enables the inquirer to include the salient features, forces and processes at multiple levels of… um… organization. Surely, that description fits the idea of using the purely relational structure of the category-based nested form as a tool for inquiry. All that this examiner has done is transpose elements from the author’s argument into the empty slots of a category-based nested form.
This suggests that category-based nested forms satisfy Bourdieu’s enigmatic phrase, of “structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures”. Category-based nested forms are purely relational (triadic) structures that gather material through the intuitive use of association, followed by an exploration of the implications.
0169 My thanks go to the author of this article, who undoubtedly has published more academic literature since this work from 2016, without the value that this examination adds. Perhaps, this 2026 review may add to a re-illustration of the envisioned integrated anthropology.
0744 The article before me is published by Sign System Studies (volume 45(3/4), 2017, pages 263-283) by Mihhail Lotman in the Department of Semiotics at Tartu University, Estonia. The full title is “History as Geography: In Search for Russian Identity”. This particular volume is dedicated to semiotics and history.
0745 The year is 2026. Hundreds of thousands of young men from the currently sovereign states of Ukraine and Russia are now buried in the geography of their sovereign states. The war is senseless to anyone who is not moving money or armaments. A theoretically defensive NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) covets a vulnerable ember of the former USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics). Or is this a proxy war between the USDB (Unsuspecting Subjects Dominated by Bigilibs) and the CCP (Communist Chinese Party)?
Bigilib?
Big-government (il)liberal.
0746 Is Estonia’s geography its history?
Surely, the way the map of sovereign territories alters over the past few centuries is a sign of historical turmoil.
But, do not expect the corporate media to broadcast any information that does not comport with the interests of their clients.
You know, the ones moving money and armaments.
History appears to be irrelevant. Geography and client interests are all that matter.
The form is war.
0747 And, the most important territory to be occupied seems to be what people say.
Corporate broadcasters talk about territory. Territory establishes that we all agree upon the ideology. If we speak the same rhetoric about geography in a time of war, then we must all think the same. How obvious is that?
The hylomorphe, where what I say (as form) is substantiated by what I think (as matter), turns out to be very useful for empirio-normative domination. See Razie Mah’s three part e-book, Original Sin and the Post-Truth Condition, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.
0748 So, what are the interests of the citizen?
Who is the citizen?
The citizen is the subject (the empowerer) and the object (the um… “subject”) of sovereign power.
The truth serves the interests of the citizen.
0749 If truth serves the interests of the citizen, then what serves the interests of the unelected bureaucrats?
Oh, it must be the will of the citizen.
0750 Is the citizen reasonable3a,when allowing experts to decide which tidbits of what I say2afshall be ascribed to um… the citizen’s will1a?
Here is the category-based nested form.
If perplexed, consult Razie Mah’s e-books, A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction.
0751 I ask, “What is the author, Mihhail Lotman, searching for?”
Intellect3a conveys identity. There are two types of identity. One is potentiated by truth1a. The other is potentiated by my will1a.
Notice, that the term, “identity”, which labels myintellect3a based of the potentials of truth or my will1a, cannot be pictured or pointed to. Like all normal contexts and potentials, identity is crucial for understanding. But, what is understanding?Understanding comes when an actuality2 is placed into its proper normal context3 and potential1.
0752 Identity3a is a style of understanding. Is3a it not?
After all, it3a changes with potential1a. Does it3a not?
One cannot picture or point to identity3a.
If one searches for it3a, it3a will always prove elusive, because it3a contextualizes3 and potentiates1what I think2am and what I say2af.
0753 So, we talk about one thing (geography) and search for another (identity).
Each spoken term is a placeholder in a system of differences.
At least, that is how Ferdinand de Saussure (1859-1913 AD) characterizes spoken language.
Spoken language consists of two arbitrarily related systems of differences:parole (speech act) and langue (mental act). The contiguity between langue as matter2am and parole as form2af is purely arbitrary, that is, based on habit and convention.
In contrast, for hand- and hand-speech talk, the contiguity is motivated, not arbitrary. Each parole (gestural word) pictures or points to its langue (referent) (except, of course, for word-gestures that have purely grammatical functions, then the referent is purely relational).
0754 The implications?
Oh, that must be a topic for future semiotic inquiry.
0755 Instead, I ask, “If each parole is a placeholder in a system of differences, then is there a semiotic tool that illuminates adjacent parole in that system?”
0756 One answer is provided by the Greimas square. The Greimas square consists of four elements, represented as four corners of a box.
The first corner, A, is the term under consideration.
The second corner, B, contrasts with A.
The third term, C, contradicts (or “speaks against”) B and complements A.
The fourth term, D, contrasts with C, speaks against A and complements B.
0757 Here is a picture.
0758 I now ask, “Does the postmodern ground for “geography” associate to Greimas square?”
Well, I suppose that my Russian identity3a is the term under consideration (A).
In contrast (B), what I think2am takes geography as matter.What I say2af forms geographic indexes that are contextualized by my identity3a operating on my will1a (or maybe, the truth1a of me). The indexes2af tell me where I am.
0759 My Russian will1a (C) speaks against the dyad (B) of {geography as matter2am [substantiates] indexes as form2af}. How so? My will1a can potentiate a diversity of dyads, all taking the structure of {what I think2am[substantiates] what I say2af}. As such, my will1a complements my identity3a.
Finally, standing against my will1a is the truth (that is, the truth1a that should potentiate my identity3a, but obviously does not).
How do I know this?
Since when does geography2am determine identity3a?
0760 Here is a picture that answers that question.
0761 In the abstract, the author contends that spatial parameters constitute one of the most important constants in Russian history. Furthermore, this constant does not depend on ideology. Instead, ideology evaluates this constant. No one contests the dominance of spatiality. Russian ideologies have articulated all theoretical options for contextualizing geography through identity.
0762 What does this imply?
Geography2am goes with what I think2am and serves as matter in B, the contrast to A.
But, what is geography2am doing?
It is speaking to me. Not in spoken language. Rather, it speaks in the words of the divine2af.
0763 Geography2amgives substance to the ways that I orient myself in the world2af.
Or are binary models more than what they seem on the surface?
The author mentions two kinds of dualisms.
0766 One is obvious.
Two, equally powerful options prevail, such as the ideologies of “capitalism” and “communism”. Like identities, these are normal contexts and belong to Peirce’s category of thirdness. The logics of thirdness are exclusion, alignment and complement. The two mentioned ideologies appear to be exclusive. But, if they are formatted by scientific methodology, then one has difficulty seeing the signs of their exclusivity. Under this circumstance, can they align?
0767 The other is ontological.
Ontology is the logos of “ontos” or… for Peirce’s formalism… actuality2. Ontologies are real, no matter what people say or think. At least, that’s what I think and so I am saying it.
The author’s example for the ontologicalbinary is Russian culture. Russian culture is substantiated before Christianity. Yet, now, everyone says that Russia is a Christian nation as opposed to what it just recently was, an officially atheist Marxist nightmare.
0768 Here is the thing.
Before 800 AD, the Slavs were a narod, a traditional culture, speaking Slavic languages. They were not a “tribe”. They were not an “ethnos”. They were not a “people”. The term, “narod”, is employed by Alexander Dugin to describe traditional cultures, before and after adoption of Christianity. In short, the Slavs remain a narod after converting to Byzantine Orthodoxy.
0769 If I follow the author, the archaic images and indexes of pre-Christian Slavic culture are like matter. Geography is intrinsic to this picture… er… archaic imagery. Indeed, the matter of geography and its iconography2a substantiates the form of Russian identity3a and will1a.
Consequently, an actuality2a provides matter to the form of a normal context3a and its potential1a.
0770 So here is a picture of the original thing.
0771 This thing is called an “incorporation”. A thing is incorporated (as matter or form) into another hylomorphic actuality.
B corresponds to the actuality2a in the category-based nested form. The geography thing appears as a dyadic structurefor originating matter.
A and C constitute the original form (that will go on to entangle matter). To a degree, this constitution reifies the co-opposition between A and C.
0772 Co-opposition?
Imagine will3a becoming a normal context and identity serving as its potential1a.
Identity and will are co-opposed.
0773 I suppose that a modernist may object.
How can a normal context3a and its potential1a (A and C) occupy a slot that is reserved for a form?
Aren’t forms typically actual2?
After all, Aristotle’s hylomorphe of {matter [substantiates] form} is an exemplar of Peirce’s category of secondness. Secondness (the realm of actuality) consists of two contiguous real elements. For Aristotle, the real elements are matter and form. The contiguity, placed in brackets, is [substance]. The noun and the verb are interchangeable in this regard. The contiguity is both noun and verb.
0774 A scholastic note appears on each side of the hylomorphe. Esse_ce brings the Latin term, esse, into English. Esse_ce is matter substantiating. In contrast, essence is substantiated form.
So, let me rename the hylomorphic actuality2a (B) as a thing that occupies the slot for matter.
In the following figure, the esse_ce of archaic pagan imagery substantiating binds to the essence of substantiated Russian identity and will.
0775 During the sovereignty of the USSR, the Union of Soviet Social Republics, this original Russian thing entangles Marxist atheism as matter. For decades, the confounding almost resolves in favor of entanglement. Russia stood on the verge of the dyad, {Marxist atheism as matter [substantiates] Russian identity and will as form}. But, society buckles starting in 1989.
This only goes to show how dangerous confoundings can be.
0776 The civilizational struggle is not between the matters of atheism and Christianity. The struggle is between Marxist atheism and archaic pagan imagery. If Marxism (as matter) ends up substantiating Russian identity and will (as form), then it will have to take the place of archaic pagan imagery (that is, of originating matter).
During the Third Battle of the Enlightenment Gods, the Hot War Among Fraternal Ideologies (1937-1945), Adolf Hitler’s matter of The German People substantiates German identity and will (as form), by taking on the attributes of the archaic pagan imagery of the German narod. The resolution of the confounding in favor of entanglement stuns Christendom. Some of that pagan imagery turns out to be truly nasty.
0777 The lesson?
A confounding is one form standing in relation to two matters,one originating and one entangled. The originating matter and form are one thing. The entangled matter and form have the capacity to become a palpably different thing,even though the form is the same.
According to the author, archaic pagan imagery infuses the Russian thing, which starts centuries before 1000AD, and includes the conversion of the kingdom of Rus (centered in Kiev, composed of Scandinavian rulers and Slavic subjects, who undoubtedly do not care about who rules them). I think that the Slavs like Christianity. Saints Cyril and Methodius hale from Byzantium and represent a branch of Christianity that never loses touch with Aristotle’s tradition.
0778 Here is a picture.
0779 Here is a confounding that is highly rewarding.
Some claim that, over the past thousand years, the confounding resolves in favor of Christianity. Others would contest that proposition, saying that the Russian identity belongs in Heaven or White India or somewhere in the East or somewhere in the West. This reminds me of archaic pagan imagery, weirdly sanctified through its confounding with Christianity (and, for a lifetime, weirdly corrupted by its confounding with Marxist atheism).
0780 Indeed, the author claims that, the Viking Kiev-Rus tended to reject and censor Byzantine culture, even while allowing Orthodoxy to spread. Then, Rus sovereignty fell to Mongol domination. For the next few centuries, Russian… Church Slavonic… culture is encapsulated by the… um… archaic pagan imagery of the Mongols.
0781 What does that imply?
Does it mean that the pagan imagery of the Mongols became an esse_ce to the Russian essence?
This is a historical question.
0782 After the fall of Constantinople, Russia becomes an Orthodox stronghold.
This means that the confounding resolves in favor of Christianity, as shown below.
0783 But, I don’t believe it.
Why?
The geography of Russia itself figures into its archaic pagan imagery2a.
0784 So, there are two models of the binary in Russian theory.
0785 One model conforms to the West, consisting of two equipotent elements, such as Wilhelm Hegel’s trope of thesisand antithesis. As long as the potential of synthesis is suppressed, then a thesis (as matter) will substantiate its antithesis (as form). Perhaps, antagonism is perpetual, because the thesis (as matter) cannot substantiate its antithesis(as form). So each accuses the other. The thesis says, “You are the wrong form.” The antithesis says, “You are the wrong matter.”
0786 The other model suggests that Russia and other Slavic civilizations embody one form relating to two matters,one substantiating and one entangled. The confounding is dangerous because, unlike equipotent thesis and antithesis (both interested in suppressing the possibility of synthesis), there are two matters that will vary in potency, especially with respect to one another.
The author tells a personal tale where, as an intellectually inclined youth, in rebellion from his academically renown father, considered binarism as a methodological device.
0787 Binarism is a scholarly illusion, so to speak.
Boris Uspenskij argued with the youth, offering the following historic example where the archaic primal imagery of reform characteristic of Peter the Great ends up literally building a new capital, St. Petersburg, as an icon of the new Russian Identity and Will. However, at the moment when the vision is realized, the capital thing gets entangled with allusions to the Vatican and Rome.
0788 Yes, Moscow… er… St. Petersburg is the Third Rome, but exactly how Vatican-like can it be?
Oh, the St. Petersburg coat of arms clearly alludes to the Vatican’s coat of arms.
Coincidence?
0789 The author goes on to say what happened next.
To many, the confounding resolved in favor of entangled matter.
The form (of the capital of St. Petersburg, as well as Moscow) remains the same, more or less.
But now, the form is substantiated by “the czar” (the Russian word for the Latin “Caesar”). The Tsar is a fusion of spiritual and spiritual authorities. I figure that such a fusion characterizes the narod, the prepolitical Slavs, whose rulers spontaneously manifest as both spiritual and physical winners before… you know… the Vikings arrive with their shallow-hulled boats and their ferocious swords. Talk about identity and will!
0790 Yet, the allusions to Vatican (spiritual) and Roman (political) imagery makes it seem like the form of the Russian capital is substantiated by Christianity as matter.
0791 And what gets entangled?
Does the Vatican and the capital of Rome constitute Christianity?
Protestant churches preached against the Czarist’s Christian thing. They, along with the freemasons and other private circles, get entangled as matter.
0792 At this point in the article, the author slides into the methodology of typology, which attaches labels with the goalof “to name it is to know it”.
The typology labels three types of oppositions.
The thesis and antithesis type is “equipollent”.
The confounding and its resolution type is “privative”, “gradual” or (may I add?) “explosive”.
0793 Sometimes the labels are confusing.
Otto Mandelstam (1891-1938) offers a short story where a criminal (as thesis) and his victim (as antithesis) are regarded as the same. The crime remains as long as justice (as synthesis) never arrives.
While the criminal and victim are equipollent (in terms of matter), they are different when the story is cast as “privative”. The criminal is originating matter. The victim is entangled matter.
The form is the crime.
0794 Of course, the author does not detail the above diagrammatic conceptual apparatus.
Instead, he explains the semiotics in ways that are descriptive, rather that diagrammatic.
Diagrams assist in illuminating the inherent relationality in both semiology and structuralism.
0795 Perhaps, this examination will assist in constellating a second incarnation of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics.
