You’re describing perception as a trained stance — the mind meeting the world in a way that lets form show itself. That relational contact is what makes intelligibility possible. What appears to us depends on the stance we bring. The world shows itself, but only to a perceiver trained to receive it.
An important essay, and one of considerable contemporary relevance.
I was particularly struck by your argument that faculties develop in relation to the realities they are cultivated to apprehend. It left me wondering whether the underlying developmental principle might be even more general.
One possible extension is the concept of normogenesis as the ongoing ontogenetic organisation of organism–world relations, whereby developmental history progressively—and path dependently—reshapes the future capacity for reorganisation itself. If so, the same developmental dynamics may extend beyond theōria to the historical development of science, professional formation and practice, institutions, ethics, governance, and even Kuhnian scientific paradigms themselves.
This sounds right to me. In a much earlier phase of this inquiry, I was actually focusing on just this kind of organism-environment relation (Jacob von Uexkull’s notion of umwelts and contemporary notions of niche construction, where organisms don’t just adapt to a niche but actively create them and intervene on their own circumstances of activity). Askēsis is, I think, rooted in this kind of organism-world relation, except it opens out into the possibility of a certain organism’s ability (the human’s) to radically transform itself through its own transformational exercises. The reference to Kuhn is also apt, insofar as he explicitly notes how paradigm shifts bring different “worlds” to presence through the theoretical advance of the sciences.
It's rare that I come across an essay, or any written work, in which I can agree with everything written. I'm stunned by the breadth and precision here. Simply brilliant piece. To my mind, your argument about theōria is analogous to the verse in Proverbs, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." That is, if we substitute "the reality of Forms" for the Lord and the Holy One, then the verse signifies, in parallel with your argument, that first attending to the reality of Forms uncovers an important kind of perception, and puts us on a path towards developing true knowledge of the reality perceived. The one thing I would add, in view of this parallel, is that the focus of the verse is on the initial act of faith in the reality of Forms themselves, whereas the focus of your argument seems to be on the loss of the skill of perceiving Forms and how this loss is correlated to indifference or antipathy to the notion that Forms exist. I do think the more crucial focus is the former, as the act of faith really is the conceptual turn required to place any stock in developing the putative skill. But I like your notion that "contemplative receiving [openness to Form] stands in circulation with cultivated sensation and perception [skilled perception of Form]," and I think this emphasis on the process of development can serve to illuminate the horizon of reward offered by the initial leap faith.
You’re describing perception as a trained stance — the mind meeting the world in a way that lets form show itself. That relational contact is what makes intelligibility possible. What appears to us depends on the stance we bring. The world shows itself, but only to a perceiver trained to receive it.
And now I know and can explain what the wood does to me and me to it.
I think my own perception is stated here.
An important essay, and one of considerable contemporary relevance.
I was particularly struck by your argument that faculties develop in relation to the realities they are cultivated to apprehend. It left me wondering whether the underlying developmental principle might be even more general.
One possible extension is the concept of normogenesis as the ongoing ontogenetic organisation of organism–world relations, whereby developmental history progressively—and path dependently—reshapes the future capacity for reorganisation itself. If so, the same developmental dynamics may extend beyond theōria to the historical development of science, professional formation and practice, institutions, ethics, governance, and even Kuhnian scientific paradigms themselves.
This sounds right to me. In a much earlier phase of this inquiry, I was actually focusing on just this kind of organism-environment relation (Jacob von Uexkull’s notion of umwelts and contemporary notions of niche construction, where organisms don’t just adapt to a niche but actively create them and intervene on their own circumstances of activity). Askēsis is, I think, rooted in this kind of organism-world relation, except it opens out into the possibility of a certain organism’s ability (the human’s) to radically transform itself through its own transformational exercises. The reference to Kuhn is also apt, insofar as he explicitly notes how paradigm shifts bring different “worlds” to presence through the theoretical advance of the sciences.
It's rare that I come across an essay, or any written work, in which I can agree with everything written. I'm stunned by the breadth and precision here. Simply brilliant piece. To my mind, your argument about theōria is analogous to the verse in Proverbs, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." That is, if we substitute "the reality of Forms" for the Lord and the Holy One, then the verse signifies, in parallel with your argument, that first attending to the reality of Forms uncovers an important kind of perception, and puts us on a path towards developing true knowledge of the reality perceived. The one thing I would add, in view of this parallel, is that the focus of the verse is on the initial act of faith in the reality of Forms themselves, whereas the focus of your argument seems to be on the loss of the skill of perceiving Forms and how this loss is correlated to indifference or antipathy to the notion that Forms exist. I do think the more crucial focus is the former, as the act of faith really is the conceptual turn required to place any stock in developing the putative skill. But I like your notion that "contemplative receiving [openness to Form] stands in circulation with cultivated sensation and perception [skilled perception of Form]," and I think this emphasis on the process of development can serve to illuminate the horizon of reward offered by the initial leap faith.