Thesis #6 - Paradigm/Symbol/Archetype

PARADIGM, SYMBOL, ARCHETYPE

The seasick feeling, as Thomas Kuhn describes it, that we often feel in our cultural environment, as we get rocked back and forth from one extreme reaction to another, is indicative of the paradigm shift we are experiencing. The old and new paradigms have been given many names. The old one has been called mechanical and materialist while the new one has been referred to as organic and holistic. The old paradigm assumes that everything in the world is dead while the new paradigm presupposes that everything is alive.

Christopher Alexander writes that when one paradigm seeks to replace another, it is on an emotional, intellectual, and social level. Pain is created on all levels simultaneously. Alexander believes that this paradigm shift, rather than the adoption of any particular design or specific building technique, is the most serious difficulty for us. Paradigm shift is at the essence of all our current challenges. In this regard, Alexander feels that we must push the ecological idea further to go beyond the narrow mechanistic biological view most common today. Dennis Klocek states our task in another way: to transform materialistic thinking into imaginative cognition.

History

The old mechanical paradigm developed out of the scientific and industrial revolutions which overcame the previous religious feudal order between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries. The science and industry that developed during this time were so powerful that they took over, almost completely, the imagination of European people. For example, Francis Bacon advocated an experimental science that put Nature ‘on the rack’ and ‘tortured her’ to ‘reveal her secrets’, while Rene Descartes and Isaac Newton extended this view to mathematics and physics.

The older religious feudal worldview of Europe, although strictly hierarchical, could be described as vitalistic. This view acknowledges that a special life force exists, often called ether, that animates the organic world. The Catholic and Orthodox Christian Churches supported and promulgated this view. Monasteries and their cloistered gardens were often places where these organic theories could be investigated. Even after the feudal world had mostly dissolved, alchemists continued researching vital force and elemental properties as a minority tradition.

Although the old religious view was organic, it was only as holistic as the vision of the Church allowed. Unfortunately, this was not far. Native Americans and other indigenous people were not considered to be human unless they were ‘saved’ by missionaries. This attitude allowed European colonization of the world to proceed quickly. Native Americans, for their part, could have benefitted from a more holistic understanding as well. Rather than warring amongst themselves, a reality which the colonizers thoroughly exploited, if American Indians could have seen themselves as a whole group and worked together cooperatively, then it is possible they would have more successfully defended their aboriginal lands.

So as this new paradigm emerges, its most important aspect may be holism, the belief that the Universe is correctly seen in terms of interacting wholes, that are more than just the sum of their elementary parts. Except for the recent phenomenon of industrialism, most world cultures have seen the world as living. For the health of our Earth, it is critical that we return to an organic model, yet to ensure peace among humans, it may be of even higher importance to broaden our notion of holistic as widely as possible to include all nations and cultures. Such an extension of holism would go a long way toward encouraging constructive cooperation, rather than destructive competition, among people and nations. We all share this one unique planet.

Definitions

Paradigm is defined as ‘an outstandingly clear or typical example or archetype’. Synonyms include example and pattern. Although it is not often noted by authors, the connection between paradigm and archetypal pattern is evident here. What makes a paradigm ‘outstandingly clear’ is its elucidation through words. This is the major difference between paradigms and archetypes, the latter being wordless and generally unreachable to the rational mind.

Deborah DuNann Winter offers an example of a ‘dominant social paradigm’ in Ecological Psychology:

(1) natural resources are ample for all human needs,

(2) mankind was created to rule over the rest of nature,

(3) plants and animals exist primarily to be used by humans,

(4) humans need not adapt to the natural environment because it can be remade to suit our needs.

This paradigm is referred to as dominant because it illustrates the modern worldview held by many generations. This worldview can be thought of as a ‘code of conduct’ upon which decisions for action are based. It continues to be widely held in our present time.

While a paradigm can be expressed through words, it seems that archetypes need to be approached through shapes. Rudolf Steiner called geometry the intermediate stage between archetype and physical image. Christopher Alexander says that we need a better understanding of the deep geometric order of reality. Maureen Belle believes that presenting knowledge in a simplified form helps to keep its sacredness intact. She feels that the wheel demystifies principles that are difficult to articulate and clarifies interactions that defy logic.

Mandala is simply the Sanskrit word for circle. Anthony Lawlor defines mandalas as ‘depictions of innate archetypes’. Donald Swearer describes a mandala as a cosmogram designed to be a cosmic circle, epitomizing the organic relationship between humans and the world. Marko Poga…nik, a geomancer, defines cosmogram as an archetypal pattern transposed into geometric, symbolic, or anthropomorphic form that stands in unambiguous relationship to its corresponding archetype. He further describes cosmograms as ‘chakra-like centers of life’ that effect and direct energies and information from lower emotional planes.

Matila Ghyka reports that certain circular diagrams, mandala-symbols, have a “quasimagical relaxing action.” Anthony Lawlor states that the symbol shows unity between different levels of reality. Vishu Magee writes that mandalas record our inner experiences in the language of image and emotion. He gives the zodiac as an example of a mandala that depicts universal laws connecting our psyche with the Cosmos. Indeed, seen in this way, the zodiac has much greater value in our quest for wholeness than simply as a horoscopic tool for prediction. In the Native American tradition, a prospective leader would need to ‘travel’ in every direction to experience each way of being and thus gain wisdom. The animals of the zodiac describe twelve different complimentary ways of knowing. Rather than cling to a fixed assumption about ourselves, we can explore each awareness in its own time and thus expand, rather than limit, our consciousness.

As for archetypes, Joseph Campbell referred to themas elementary or ground ideas. He believed that they come from the deepest roots of our most unconscious ancient intuition. Magee describes archetype as an original pattern or model, a first form, or prototype. Archetypes, he continues, are primordial forms and patterns of energy which provide templates for all outward form. They are both images and emotions that dwell beyond intellectual inquiry. Magee believes that archetypal symbols have an enormous potential for harmonizing our inner and outer natures, for uniting our conscious with our unconscious. Archetypes not only create living nature but are alive themselves and the designs that they give rise to are also alive. Magee claims that these living designs are capable of communicating at the deepest nonverbal preconscious level. He believes that the house, as a living design, can play this role of bridge between holotropic (ordinary) and hylotropic (expanded) consciousness.

Archetypes, then, are living energetic forces that give rise to symbols which are then interpreted as paradigms. These symbols, in turn, are also able to bring our consciousness down into contact with the archetypal realm. As such, this process mirrors the biophilia- biognosis-biophilia spiral discussed in the previous chapter. The house can thus play the role of a symbol as understood by alchemy: a living supersensible being of great power and majesty. The house itself can be the mandala, icon, or cosmogram that unites our upper and lower worlds.

One example of an earth archetype returning within us is the Gaia Hypothesis as developed by James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis. This archetype shifts the paradigm of conventional science by suggesting that the Earth is alive. We, here at New College, have been affected as well. Witness our twin mantra: we are working for a world which is more just, sacred, and sustainable, while emphasizing culture, ecology, and community. Notice how these words appeal to our sense of wholeness. A mandala based on a six petaled flower could be drawn as a graphic representation, a symbol, of these ‘ground ideas’.