11/15/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 11 of 22)

0099 Here is where I left off.

0100 The first singularity (A) is the focal term.

0101 Our current Lebenswelt (B) contrasts with the first singularity, because it follows the event. Our current Lebenswelt (B) is characterized by speech-alone talk. Speech-alone talk allows explicit abstraction, along with implicit abstraction. Explicit abstraction involves symbolic labels (spoken words) and the mental manipulation of such labels (symbolic operations). Implicit abstraction does not require spoken words and is very difficult to explain using spoken words.

0102 The Lebenswelt that we evolved in (C) contradicts our current Lebenswelt (D). The Lebenswelt that we evolved in(C) is characterized by hand-talk and hand-speech talk. Hand talk relies on sign-processing, which is the fundament for implicit abstraction. Implicit abstraction has nothing to do with labels and symbolic operations. Rather, implicit abstraction engages sign-processes, starting with sensation, opening to perception and (eventually) initiating judgment. Implicit abstraction allows us to understand actualities₂ by intuitively recognizing the appropriate normal context₃ and potential₁. This is what we evolved to do.

The Lebenswelt that we evolved in (C) complements the first singularity (A), in so far as scientists, in our current Lebenswelt (B), who cannot imagine the first singularity (A), also cannot imagine the ultimate human niche as the potential of triadic relations (C).

0103 Human evolution (D) contrasts with the Lebenswelt that we evolved in (C), speaks against the first singularity (A), and compliments our current Lebenswelt (B).

Human evolution (D) is a scientific construct. The Lebenswelt that we evolved in (C) is the world of signification of our distant ancestors. Scientists do not want the construct of human evolution (D) to have a discontinuity (A). Why? They rely of the principle of uniformitarianism in order to understand the prehistoric past. If there is a twist (A) in human evolution (D), then this principle does not apply. Scientists are thrown in the same basket as the rest of us (B), wondering whether the labels that we use to perform symbolic operations are as good as we presume they are.

0104 Of course, Loke takes us into the next Greimas square.

Here is where Loke’s theoretical construction begins.

11/14/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 12 of 22)

0105 Here is the first applied Greimas square appearing in this examination of Loke’s book (point 0011).

0106 The title, “Image Bearer of God”, is the focal term (A). God makes him in His image. Male and female He creates them. Does this sequence reflect some chauvinistic attitude of the ancient Near East? Is this an artifact of translation? Right after the Creation Story, God directly fashions Adam from the earth and Eve from Adam’s side. Theologians may debate, but the debate somehow does not recognize that the Genesis Creation Story is distinct from the Primeval History. In the creation story, the humans are images of God. In the stories of Adam and Eve, two people are fashioned in order to hold the title, “Created in the Image of God”.

Loke cites John Stott’s 1984 book, Understanding the Bible, and proposes a way to appreciate how there is no incompatibility between evolution and the Bible. If Adam is the first human, then he is simply the first person to be labeled, “created in the image of God”. Stott calls Adam, Homo divinus. I call him, “Earth man”, in acknowledgement of his humble beginnings. Loke calls him, “Image Bearer of God”.

In the end, we are talking about a label. This label may be placed on any individual in the Homo genus. Plus, this label may be applied to other humans along various lines of descent, including those outside of biological generation.

0107 Other titles have been given to humans (B). Aristotle calls us, “political animals”. Porphyryr calls us, “rational animals”. Saint Paul calls us, “inheritors of Adam’s sin”. Rene Descartes calls us, “thinking things”. Biologists name us, Homo sapiens. John Deely calls us, “semiotic animals”.

0108 None of these appellations are as grand as the title, “Image Bearer of God” (C), awarded to Adam and Eve. This title (C) stands against all other titles (B).

0109 Here I consider that Adam, as the first bearer of the title (C), stands in the same position as the world of original justice (formulated for Adam before the Fall, by medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas) (C) as well as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in (C), 1.8Myr to .78Myr (C) and the uplands of De Nile (C).

0110 Humans, in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, practice hand-speech talk, which embodies the semiotic qualities of hand talk. Language evolves in the milieu of hand talk, long before our species appears. Speech is added to hand talk at the dawn of our own species, Homo sapiens.

0111 Hand talk manifests the semiotic qualities of icons (images) and indexes (indicators). This facilitates sign-processing because referents (which are things that can be pictured or pointed to) are natural sign-objects. I call the cognitive processing that proceeds through sensations (content) to perceptions (situation) to judgment (perspective), “implicit abstraction”. Today, this cognitive cascade is intuitively obvious and is difficult to put into spoken words.

0112 How does this apply to Loke’s concept that Adam is the first to receive the label, “Image Bearer of God”?

There are no gestural words in hand talk for “image” or “God”. Certainly, there is a term for “bearing”, as in “carrying”. But, there is no hand talk word for “bearing”, as in “holding a title”.

0113 The task is easy for speech-alone talk, since speech-alone talk is purely symbolic. One can attach a label to anything.

Similar labels apply to humans in our current Lebenswelt, as evidenced by the philosophical debates on how to describe humans (B).

0114 What does this imply?

The endowment of the appellation onto Adam (C) occurs in a world that practices speech-alone talk (hence, the explicit abstractions can be uttered). However, this world is not aware that speech-alone talk is any different than hand-speech talk (C). Why? No civilized person practices hand-speech talk. So, how would anyone know?

It is as if Adam stands at the bottom of the falls, looking up, and not realizing that he has tumbled from a world that no longer exists. Or, it is like Adam, standing at the top of the falls, does not recognize that one more step…

0115 God warns Adam. Do not eat from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

0116 The divine comedy is brought to pure what-if-ness when theologians, after the revelation of Christ, try to come to terms with how God labels Adam and Eve. They do so by committing the error embodied in the spoken words. They think that there must be truth in labeling. They attempt to figure out the meaning, presence and message behind the term, “image of God”, as it applies to Adam and Eve… um… before the tumble over the watery edge.

Early theologians characterize the Biblical “image of God” as one who exercises rational powers, moral sensitivity, fellowship with God, a sense of beauty and, of course, language… that is… speech-alone talk, which characterizes our current Lebenswelt.

0117 Adam names the animals. Surely, that seems like the way that hand-speech talk works. The gesture-word images or indicates its referent.

Note that Adam does not name that tree in the middle of the Garden. The name of that tree is full of explicit abstractions,such as “knowledge”, “good” and “evil”. These terms cannot be conveyed using manual-brachial gestures. But, they can be uttered by a talking snake.

0118 Thus, the hypothesis of the first singularity assists me in showing that adam as humanity (D), contrasts with Adam, the one who is created to fit the title (C), contradicts the title of “the Image Bearer of God” (A) because Adam (and really, most humanity, even today) innately thinks in terms of implicit abstractions rather than labels, and complements “human” as defined by philosophers in our current Lebenswelt (B), because speech-alone talk allows reflection and analysis not available to hand-speech talk.

11/13/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 13 of 22)

0119 The stories of Adam and Eve, plus the naming of Adam as “an Image Bearer of God”, are tightly knotted word-games.

0020 Adam and Eve are commanded to obey only one rule. Do not eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. What can we say about the name of the fruit, rather than the name of the tree. Can the fruit be called either “intelligent” or “stupid”?

Surely, Adam and Eve would not eat a fruit called “stupidity incarnate”, because they are intelligent.

But, what about a fruit called, “intelligence incarnate”?

Surely, they would eat such an admirable morsel, if only to discover their stupidity.

0121 Once in prison, Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945 AD) discovers a label for all the incredibly well-educated and academically certified people who bought into the charisma of the National Socialists of Germany. He calls them, “Dummheit”, too stupid for words.

The so-called “Fuhrer” has a way with words. So do his propaganda-saturated followers, with advanced degrees in symbolic enumerations, deification studies and medical codification. They are sophisticated and up to date. They know how to label people, not as image-bearers of God, but more like… bodies with tattoos. Everyone can recognize the explicit abstraction. Here are the tattoo-bearers of a God that does not recognize the Fuhrer’s authority.

0122 That is the crux. It is all about spoken words. Speech-alone words do not picture or point to their referents, like the gesture-words of hand-talk and hand-speech talk. Speech-alone talk attaches labels to all sorts of parts and wholes. These labels promote explicit abstractions, which may seem logical, yet be totally in error. Yes, spoken labels can create cognitive structures that are completely internally consistent, hence logical, hence intelligent, yet unfathomably stupid. Thus, explicit abstraction (B), the stuff of intelligence and stupidity, stands in contrast to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (A).

0123 Here is a picture of the next Greimas square.

0124 God labels the tree of knowledge of good and evil using speech-alone talk (A).

In contrast, speech-alone talk allows explicit abstractions (B), yielding either stupidity or intelligence.

Next, the implicit abstractions characteristic of hand-speech talk (C) contradicts the explicit abstractions potentiated by purely symbolic terms (B) and complements the idea that an adequate name for the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is “intelligence” and “stupidity”.

Um… how come there are two names attached to the same fruit?

0125 Consider Adam’s implicit abstraction in the Genesis story. He implicitly abstracts a message. When put into spoken words, this message does not sound precisely intelligent. Adam says (more or less) “The woman that you made for me, she gave me the fruit and I ate.”

If I were God, I would have replied, “I gave you the title of Image Bearer of God, and you behave this stupidly?”

0126 The set-up for the drama of the Fall (D) lies in the fruit. The explicit idea that Adam and Eve will die when they eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (B) supports the implicit abstraction that the fruit is poisonous (C). The fruit (D) sets Adam and Eve up for the drama of the Fall, because it is not poisonous. Rather, the fruit (D) speaks against the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (A) in the same way that a fruit (D) causes one to ignore the tree(A), along with that ridiculous commandment.

In short, the fruit (D) is not the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (A).

Rather, the fruit (D) is “intelligence incarnate”.

11/3/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 20 of 22)

0169 Even though the theological implications of the coincidence between the stories of Adam and Eve and the Ubaid archaeological period of southern Mesopotamia may seem far removed from Loke’s proposal that Adam and Eve are the first ancestors to receive the label, “image of God”, the distance is not so great.

0170 First, the Lebenswelt that we evolved in associates to the creation of humans in the image of God (in the first chapter of Genesis).

Second, our current Lebenswelt associates with Adam and Eve receiving the spoken honorific, “Image Bearers of God”, and then promptly disobeying the only commandment that God gives them.

0171 Section 5.8.2 discusses an awkward difficulty that arises with Adam getting awarded the appellation, “Image Bearer of God”, that presumably passes to his sons, Cain and Abel. Okay… let me correct that… to their (at the time) only remaining son, Cain.

Cain runs away, finds a wife, then moves off to start a city. Loke wonders whether Cain’s wife is merely an animal that happens to be an anatomically modern human. Or, is she created as an image of God, yet is not aware that God could give someone the spoken honorific, “Image Bearer of God”?

0172 Razie Mah’s masterwork, An Archaeology of the Fall (available at smashwords and other e-book venues), treats the awkward issue as follows.

After Cain murders Abel, he complains to God that others (the ones without the rapidly devaluing honorific, “Image Bearer of God”) will kill him. So, God puts a mark on Cain. That mark happens to be the body paint of high-ranking warrior in the village harboring Cain’s wife-to-be.

Of course, when Cain walks into the village wearing such marks, everyone freaks out. The shaman tries to put an end to Cain, but ends up accidently killing the number one warrior in the village. Then, the shaman falls face down before Cain and Cain impetuously kills him.

In order to celebrate, Cain’s future bride (along with her team mates) take the body of the dead warrior and cook up a batch of delicious porridge. She is proud of herself and is disappointed when Cain (after realizing that the meat in the porridge comes from the dead warrior) decides to not finish off his bowl.

0173 Yes, communication in speech-alone talk can be treacherous.

Tell someone, “Get that body out of here and bring me something to eat.”, and see what gets served.

11/2/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 21 of 22)

0174 In chapter six, Loke considers Noah. Noah receives the tarnished title, “Image Bearer of God”, through descent from Adam. The title passes through the doctrine of Traducianism, so the lineage must be genetic. However, the tarnished title also seems to pass beyond Seth’s family line, so to speak, into those animals who are anatomically humans, who laugh at and ridicule Noah for imagining that God would or could punish them. Here, the passage must not be genetic. Maybe it is genealogical. Maybe it is the acquisition of speech-alone talk instead of hand-speech talk.

0175 Does Noah’s flood cover the whole earth?

It depends on how you define the word, “earth”.

0176 Here is a Greimas square that seems appropriate.

0177 The “earth” is the focal word (A). It is what is covered by Noah’s flood.

In contrast to the Genesis use of the word, “earth” (A), is the world of southern Mesopotamia (B). To everyone ridiculing Noah, the world of southern Mesopotamia is all there is. It is their “earth”. So, Noah’s flood destroys this “earth”.

The genealogies (of sorts) immediately following the flood (C) speak against the idea that southern Mesopotamia is the entire earth. The table of nations makes sense when Noah’s children are accepted into the royalty of other peoples based on the celebrity of Noah’s achievement. As far as Genesis is concerned, nations are founded because they receive direct descendants within the Image Bearer of God lineage. It is as if these jurisdictions are not relevant until then.

0178 What does this imply?

Southern Mesopotamia is the center of the world, if not the entire “earth”, until that catastrophic flood, which is noted as a break in the Sumerian king list (D).

This list (D) contrasts with the Genesis table of nations (C) because it represents the records of a public institution. It is entirely possible that the family of Seth lives entirely within public institutions in the Ubaid and Uruk (and later, Sumerian) traditions. So, the Genesis story of Noah’s flood is an insider’s view of a very public shaking of the Uruk political order.

The Sumerian king list (D) suggests that Noah’s flood (A) is indeed, not planetary, since the kingship descends (from heaven) soon afterwards. In this, the list (D) speaks against a literal reading of the Genesis story (A). Also, the list (D) supports the notion (what Loke calls Type C concordism) that Genesis belongs to the literature of the ancient Near East.

This list (D) complements the world of southern Mesopotamia (B), because the king list represents the establishment of order within the Sumerian world. The Sumerian king list is written centuries after the flood. The flood marks a break. The flood denotes the end of a Plutonic year, so to speak.

0179 What else does this imply?

Consider the following Greimas square.

0180 Speech-alone talk and Adam’s lineage starts in the Ubaid (A). Speech-alone talk spreads out from southern Mesopotamia to nearby hand-speech talking cultures.

The subsequent Uruk period (B) contrasts with this beginning. Uruk clearly differentiates from surrounding Neolithic cultures, who now practice speech-alone talk, but are far behind in terms of realizing the creative potential of this new tool of the intellect.

0181 Noah’s flood marks an ecological catastrophe, partially brought about by deforestation in northern Mesopotamia and partially brought about by (what modern insurance policy makers call) divine intervention. During the Uruk archaeological period, speech-alone talk floods into other lands. Egypt, Iran, the Indian subcontinent, China, the Mediterranean, eastern Europe and the lands north of the Caspian Sea, manifest social changes due to exposure to speech-alone talk.

Noah’s flood covers the “earth” of southern Mesopotamia.

The speech-alone talk flood covers the entire Earth.

This “flood” of speech-alone talk (C) speaks against Uruk as composing the entire earth (B) and complements the origination of speech-alone talk with the Ubaid (A).

0182 Consequently, the conditions for the table of nations, following Noah’s flood, are set (D) as the lands surrounding the Uruk, each in its own way, start to undergo trends towards unconstrained social complexity. These trends (D) contradict the exclusive claim of Sumeria as the only place where labor and social specialization increase wealth and power (A). At the same time, these trends (D) complement the achievements that already have occurred in southern Mesopotamia (B).

By the time that the Sumerian Dynastic coalesces, at 2800 U0′, dynastic civilization begins in Egypt and unconstrained social complexity is seeded along the Indus River Valley and the great rivers of China. On the Russian steppes, the proto-Indo-European cultures are already undergoing a transformation into formidable migratory chiefdoms. The Bronze Age is apparent in the Aegean. Even in the Americas, there are indications that speech-alone talk has arrived, on the western coast of what is now Ecuador.

0183 The entire Genesis sequence of stories and genealogies, stretching from Adam to Terah, coincides with the period from the start of the Ubaid (0 U0′) to the end of Ur III (3700 U0′).

If that is the case, then why isn’t the text longer and more elaborate? Why don’t the first eleven chapters of Genesis clearly blend in with the written historical material of the ancient Near East?

One suggestion is found in chapter 13C of An Archaeology of the Fall.

On one hand, when Abram starts his journey, he leaves Sumerian civilization behind. Not all of it, but nearly all of it. The story of the Tower of Babel is no accident. After Ur III, Sumerian is a dead language, known only in writing.

On the other hand, Sarai, remembers the fairy tales that her mother taught her.

11/1/23

Looking at Andrew Ter Ern Loke’s Book (2022) ” The Origin of Humanity and Evolution” (Part 22 of 22)

0184 In chapter seven, Loke concludes.

The concept of Adam and Eve as the “Image Bearers of God” stands at the core of this book.

0185 As much as the author tries to capitalize on the idea that Adam and Eve receive a title, and that this title passes to all humanity through a genetic… oh, a not genetic mechanism, Loke does not arrive at his destination, the answer to the question of the Fall.

How is Original Sin passed from Adam to us?

Why is Jesus the New Adam?

0186 Before Traducianism is challenged by the science of genetics, these questions are easy to answer.

Afterwards, Traducianism itself becomes an example of langue, the mental processing that is arbitrarily related to parole, that is, speech-alone talk.

0187 Yet, there is hope. The first singularity coincides with the fall of Adam and Eve. What is old is made new again.

0188 Future inquiry will extend beyond the book-ends of total depravity and the loss of original justice, into the natures of true versus false and honest versus deceptive.

0189 Who are we?

The behavior of humans in our current Lebenswelt is so different from the behavior of humans in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, that we might as well label ourselves a different species.

0190 Here is my suggestion.

We should call all humans living in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, Homo sapiens.

We should call all humans living in our current Lebenswelt, Homo boobiens.

0191 Only Homo boobiens can acquire specialized knowledge so exclusive that it makes them unbelievably stupid. In our world of unconstrained complexity, high intelligence empowers profound Dummheit. Just ask the experts. They will tell you that their recipes for disaster are utterly sensible and moral.

0192 Perhaps, in future academic controversies, the coincidence of the fall of Adam and Eve and the hypothesis of the first singularity will inspire evolutionary scientists to compete with Christian theologians in accounting for the Pascal sacrifice.

The Christian theologian says, “Christ dies for our sins.”

The scientist replies, “No, Christ dies for our stupidity.”

Sin results in death. So does stupidity.

Plus, we are never so stupid as when we play word games in order to lie to ourselves.

0193 The attraction of Loke’s theoretical framework, that Adam and Eve are the first to receive the God-given honorific, “Image Bearer of God”, is that the title is immediately spoiled in the Genesis 2.4-4 narrative, where Adam and Eve demonstrate that, while they are certainly created in the image of God, they cannot live up to the title. None of us can.

0194 There is good reason. Our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. So, we cannot even live up to who we evolved to be. We are tempted to believe that our own spoken words picture or point to their referents, when they are really placeholders in systems of differences (at least, according to Ferdinand de Saussure, the founder of modern language studies). We can place a label on anything, then use those labels to manufacture a coherent network of relational elements that seems totally convincing, because every element of the relational structure is occupied by a label.

0195 Inadvertently, the author reveals this in his defense of Traducianism.

In his innocence and earnestness, Loke demonstrates how we may use spoken words to confuse ourselves. Can we label the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, “intelligence” and “stupidity”? The moment that we do, some customers will demand the “intelligent” fruits and leave the “stupid” fruits for the less choosy.

Are the picky customers ahead of the game?

Or, are the less choosy correct in concluding that the fruits are all the same?

Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

0196 With that said, I conclude my examination of this work, full of intelligence and stupidity, just as one expects from a descendant of Adam and Eve. My thanks go to the author. The arguments offered in this book tell me that we stand on the verge of a new age of understanding, where everything old is made new again.

10/2/23

Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) “Semiotic Animal” (Part 22 of 22)

0172 Deely concludes with a sequel concerning the need to develop a semioethics.

The meeting of the two semiotic animals in the previous blog is a case study.

Surely, that brief clash of objective worlds entails ethics, however one defines the word, “ethics”.

Perhaps, the old word for “ethics” is “morality”.

0173 Deely publishes in 2010.

Thirteen years later, his postmodern definition of the human takes on new life. This examination shows how far semiotics has traveled, swirling around the stasis of a Plutonic publishing world where Cerebus guards the gates. Please throw a sop to the editors in order to publish, rather than perish. While academics guard the way to the underworld of professional success, Deely looks down from the heavens above.

And what does he say?

Humans are semiotic animals.

0174 Okay, I have to correct myself.

I don’t know whether Deely is looking down from a heavenly perch.

Surely, many will sheepishly testify to his devilish, as well as his angelic, qualities.

As a shepherd, he is always trying to lead his rag-tag flock of semioticians, explorers and Thomists. He gets so far as to impress upon every one in his flock the validity of his claim that humans are semiotic animals.

0175 Razie Mah takes that lesson to heart and asks, “If humans are semiotic animals, then how did they evolve?”

The resulting three masterworks are available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

An Archaeology of the Fall appears in 2012, followed by an instructor’s guide.

How to Define the Word “Religion” appears in 2015, followed by ten primers.

The Human Niche appears in 2018, along with four commentaries.

As it turns out, no contemporary scientist takes Deely’s claim seriously. Yet, the implications are enormous. If humans are semiotic animals, then triadic relations must be key to understanding human evolution.

0176 This examination of Deely’s book takes that lesson one step further.

The specifying and exemplar signs step out from Comments on John Deely’s Book (1994) New Beginnings as expressions of premodern scholastic insight.

The interventional sign steps out from Comments on Sasha Newell’s Article (2018) “The Affectiveness of Symbols” and establishes a postmodern life of its own.

0177 Humans are semiotic animals and how we got here shines like a revelation.

08/31/23

Looking at Glenn Diesen’s Book (2019) “The Decay … And Resurgence…” (Part 1 of 21)

0001 The book before me is Dr. Glenn Diesen’s contribution to Routledge’s Series, Rethinking Asia and International Relations. The text carries the full title of The Decay of Western Civilization and the Resurgence of Russia: Between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. The series editor is Emilian Kavalski, the Li Dak Sum Chair in China-Eurasia Relations and International Studies at the University of Nottingham in Ningho, China. At the time of publication, Dr. Diesen is a Visiting Scholar at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow and Adjunct Research Fellow at Western Sydney University. Diesen’s research interests are in international relations, political science, international political economy and Russian studies. Say nothing of history.

0002 So… um… how does this book overlap with my interests?

I am interested in civilization. The persistent question that arises in Razie Mah’s masterwork, An Archaeology of the Fall,is, “What potentiates civilisation?”

0003 Consider the hypothesis of the first singularity.

The evolution of talk is not the same as the evolution of language. Our capacities for language evolve in the milieu of hand talk. The ancestor to our own species practices fully linguistic hand talk. Very successfully, I might add. The voice is recruited to assist in synchronizing large groups (plus, a little sexual selection gets thrown in). Once the vocal tract is under voluntary neural control, speech is added to hand talk at the start of our own species, Homo sapiens.

Homo sapiens practices a dual-mode of talking, hand-speech talk, for over 200,000 years before the first singularity. The first singularity starts with the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia.

As the ocean levels rise at the start of our current interglacial, two hand-speech talking cultures in the then dry Persian Gulf are forced into the same territory. One is a Mesolithic fishing culture occupying the river ravines and coast. The other is a Developed Neolithic culture (agriculture mixed in with stockbreeding). These two cultures meld, forming a pidgin then a creole language. That creole language turns out to be the first instance of speech-alone talk.

0004 The semiotic qualities of speech-alone talk are significantly different than hand-speech talk (and hand-talk). I won’t get into the details, but the consequences are enormous.

Hand-speech talk facilitates constrained social complexity (which, to me, calls to mind Diesen’s term, “gemeinschaft”, literally translated into the “rod of generality”, coinciding with tradition, intuition and, what modern scientists deride as “irrational thought”).

Speech-alone talk permits unconstrained social complexity. Spoken words can be used to label things that cannot be pictured at pointed to, such as the term, “gesellschaft” (another one of Diesen’s key terms, literally translated into the “rod of the journeyman”, coinciding with specialization, analysis and, what scientists misleadingly call “rational thought”).

0005 The Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia starts, say, 7800 years ago, which I label 0 Ubaid Zero Prime (0 U0′ or “zero uh-oh prime”, with “uh-oh” expressed as if reacting to an accident or a mishap).

At 0 U0′, the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia is the only culture in the world practicing speech-alone talk. All the other Neolithic, Epipaleolithic and Mesolithic cultures of the time practice hand-speech talk.

Today, all civilizations practice speech-alone talk. The only (now dying) cultures that remember their hand-speech traditions are the Australian Aborigines and the North American Plains Indians. Both are losing the hand-component of their hand-speech talk, due to exposure to speech-alone talking cultures and civilizations. The receding of original justice, when all social circles work in harmony towards human flourishing in a world of signification, is nearly complete.

0006 Weirdly, that recession lies beneath the surface of recently examined books in anthropology.

Consider the following reviews, appearing in the Razie Mah blog.

Looking at Ian Hodder’s Book (2018) “Where Are We Heading?” (June 2023)Looking at David Graeber and David Wengrow’s Chapter (2021) “Why The State Has No Origins” (March 2023)

08/3/23

Looking at Glenn Diesen’s Book (2019) “The Decay … And Resurgence…” (Part 21 of 21)

0180 Postmodernists recoil from grand narratives.

Yet, they embrace parlor games.

Perhaps, for their amusement, they may consider contemporary figures as stand-ins for the theodrama of the second civilisational cycle just imagined.

Or, they may ridicule the concept of a Plutonic year or the relevance of Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions as a clock on the Celestial Earth.

In their distraction, they ignore the grand narratives that Diesen’s time-honoring Greimas square potentiate.

Isn’t imagination what we need?

0181 In several points in this book, Diesen says that the Russian… well… even more broadly… the Eurasian resurgence needs an ideological vision that organizes gesellschaft. The same statement-of-need is found other books on contemporary international politics.

In Comments on Daniel Estulin’s Book (2021) “2045 Global Projects At War” (available at smashwords and other e-book venues), the commentary concludes with a sequence of interscopes that prepare a vision for the Chinese Datun, the conclusion of and the start of an opening of the Celestial Heavens (occurring in the years 2044 and 2045, respectively). This 2250 year cycle ties back to the passage of the first singularity through eastern Eurasia (now China), sometime after 1000 U0′.

The passage of the first singularity into northern Eurasia (now Russia) occurs around the same time, seeding the Kurgan culture, who tames horses and runs on wagons. Later, these migrating chiefdoms flood into western Europe and northern India in an exercise in elite dominance. The event is called “the Indo-European language expansion”.

The passage of the first singularity into western Eurasia winds through the Aegean, giving rise to late copper and bronze age civilizations. Do monuments such as Stonehenge signify the last efflorescence of hand-speech talking cultures or the adoption of speech-alone talk?

The passage of the first singularity into the Indian subcontinent initiates the settlement of the Indus floodplain, giving rise to the Harappan civilization.

The passage of the first singularity through Persia, directly east of Mesopotamia, occurs much earlier, seeding the Susa culture, which rises and then is overwhelmed by the neighboring Uruk culture. Doesn’t that sound like an original imprint for Iran, located at the crossroads of Eurasia?

0182 What am I saying?

I am interested in civilization. The persistent question that arises in Razie Mah’s masterwork, An Archaeology of the Fall,is, “What potentiates civilisation?”

0183 The answer is the hypothesis of the first singularity.

This hypothesis calls for creative, interdisciplinary and altogether fantastic anthropological and archaeological inquiry into the potentiation of civilization throughout Eurasia (as well as the Americas).

What a research project!

Eurasia is home to the first civilisations, as well as early language expansions, such as the Indo-European and the Austronesian.

Eurasia is currently home to many distinct civilisations which, like Russia, are about to enter a new spring of sovereignty, as the summer of geoeconomics ends with the demise of the world’s reserve currency, shorter (and perhaps more expensive, but definitely more reliable) supply chains and respect for borders.

0184 Glenn Diesen is on target, in calling for a novel ideology, supporting neopragmatist approaches.

A research project based on the hypothesis of the first singularity responds to that call.

Likewise, Alexander Dugin is on target by envisioning a fourth political theory that is not a theory at all, but a pragmatic and tradition-cultivating being there. Dasein!

To me, nothing conveys Dasein, better than the realization that our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

Both Diesen and Dugin, in their own ways, call for a new imagination, one that addresses the gesellschafts of all Eurasian civilizations with a series of questions, asking, “Where does the world come from? Where do humans come from? What went wrong? What is the solution?”

0185 Today, the natural and social sciences of the West are accepted by all the Eurasian civilisations, not as absolute truths, but as methods of inquiry. They set the stage for the mind-boggling hypothesis of the first singularity. But, because of their materialist and instrumental inclinations, they never proposed the obvious. The human niche is not a material or instrumental condition.

The first tool of the intellect for our species, Homo sapiens, is hand-speech talk.

The second tool of the intellect for our species is speech-alone talk.

Ten thousand years ago, all Paleolithic, Epipaleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic cultures practice hand-speech talk.

Today, all civilizations practice speech-alone talk.

The transition from the Lebenswelt that we evolved in to our current Lebenswelt is called the first singularity.

The first singularity begins with the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia and spreads on the wings of mimicry.

0185 Keep that research project in mind.

Razie Mah offers, in his blog on the date of Oct 1, 2022, “A Fantasia in G minor: A Speech Written for Gunnar Beck, MEP”. The “G” stands for Germany. The “minor” stands for its location in the grand expanse of Eurasia. The speech is intended to be read in the European Parliament, currently an expression of BG(il)Lism and vassal of… chuckle… American Judeo-Pagans. But, in this speech, the Parliament is the stage for the declaration of something more important than the identity of the hidden operators behind the destruction of gas pipelines running beneath the Baltic Sea. Gunnar Beck needs only to stand up and give a 15 minute speech that calls for an act of imagination.

0186 My thanks to Glenn Diesen for his interesting and provocative book. I pray for his continued work in these challenging fields of inquiry.

07/10/23

Looking at Lesley Newson and Peter Richerson’s Book (2021) “A Story of Us” (Part 16 of 16)

0135 Chapter eight brings the reader to modern times.

What has the first singularity wrought?

Need a visual?

Newson presents a photograph (Figure 8.1) of a steampunk skull cyborg sculpture.

Here is an example of how speech-alone talk operates.

Unlike hand-speech talk, speech-alone talk permits explicit abstraction. In this sculpture, a resin-based human skull is explicitly extruded… oh, I meant to say… abstracted and converted into the foundation of what appears to be an audio-headphone machine. Body (skull) and mind (machine) fuse into a monstrosity.

0136 What are the authors not saying?

They do not say that this work of art initiates implicit abstraction. An innate relational structure for sensible constructiontells the viewer that social construction is needed. I know this from my visceral reaction to the photograph.

(See Razie Mah’s Comments on Religious Experience (1985) by Wayne Proudfoot, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.)

0137 Here is a picture of the failing sensible construction.

0138 This disturbing work of art characterizes modernity. Newson and Richerson tell a story in two interludes. Culture, originally defined as “shared information”, is now disorienting. The consequences? Throughout the world, fertility declines. Only local cultures, consciously avoiding modern urban cities, now have numerous children.

Surely, today, there are enough people.

The problem is that children are becoming more and more rare.

0139 Is this a problem of sign-processing? Does today’s “information” trade “something that adorns us” for children? Is there a foundational difficulty with speech-alone talk? What happens when words no longer picture or point to their referents, as they once did in hand-speech (and hand) talk? What happens when we construct artifacts in order to validate our spoken words? What happens when the artifacts fail to deliver?

These types of questions are raised in Razie Mah’s masterwork, An Archaeology of the Fall, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

0140 All the words that we use today in public discourse seem to have two meanings: a traditional one and a new-fangled technical one.

Need an example?

Consider the new-fangled, yet technical terms, “phenotype” and “adaptation”, in the following figure.

Compare that to the simpler scientific use of the terms in points 34 through 38.

0142 The new-fangled terms cross categorical levels within a complete three-level interscope. The aesthetics of such conjunctions make this book very attractive.

The old-fashioned scientific terms cannot be reconciled. Adaptations associate to the discipline of natural history. Phenotypes associate to the discipline of genetics. Each biological discipline would seem to be independent except for one awkward fact. Both sciences deal with a single entity, which one may call an individual, a species or a genus.

0143 In the epilogue, the authors proclaim (more or less), “Let us abandon the idea of ‘human nature’.”

Why?

“Human nature” is just a spoken term. The traditional meaning loads the term with political messages and connotes the presence of immutability. The new-fangled meaning looks at the term in the same way that a traditionalist gazes upon a steampunk cyborg sculpture. Surely, there is something wrong with this term.

Here is how the category-based nested form, which may be an innate cognitive principle for humans, understands how to define the term, “human nature.

0144 Perhaps, abandoning the idea of “human nature” will free us from the notion that our gut feelings, our hearts, and our minds can help us mate and raise a family.

But, abandoning “human nature” would leave us open to cultural influences.

0145 Cultural influences?

Psychological researchers investigate how social interactions [stimulate] hormonal responses and how culture [informs] brains. Do these actualities sound vaguely familiar? The corporate sponsors of these psychological researchers want to learn how to make their products more addicting and more real that they otherwise would be.

Ah yes, cultural influences need brains to inform.

0146 Consider the three-level interscope that guides the authors. The beauty of their intuition is that a completed three-level interscope is inherently intellectually satisfying. Satisfaction gives a feeling of completeness and accomplishment. The reader says, “Yes, here is a story about us. Here is a new look at human evolution.” The reader cannot put spoken words to the feeling that the book provides. Here is the arc of human evolution and history, in content, in situation and in perspective.

0147 These comments add value to Newson and Richerson’s book by introducing an option that the authors do not know. Humans adapt to sign-processing. Yes, human evolution manifests culture-gene co-evolution. But, the human niche is the potential of triadic relations, such as signs, mediations, judgments and category-based nested forms.

Surely, this book is somewhat addicting. Surely, this production seems more real than it otherwise would be. Why? The authors offer a new look at human evolution. So what if the new look is in terms of style, rather than substance. The authors offer something that other books on human evolution do not.

They offer acts of imagination.

An Archaeology of the Fall

A Horror Story by Razie Mah

Category Archives: Our current Lebenswelt is not the Lebenswelt that we evolved in