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Subject: Thomas Kuhn Author: HDT [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] Date Posted: 13:15:19 04/11/01 Wed I've been reading up on Thomas Kuhn. I was wondering, is there anything out there that might point out current paradigm shifts. Like examples of societal changes? [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

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[> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Anthony [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:19:23 04/11/01 Wed That's a good question. Not sure about that. Wait, what are you looking for? A publication or web source or what? I think one can point out examples of societal changes, but I don't have a PhD so my ideas might be looked upon skeptically by the elites. Like look at kids and guns. There seems to be a paradigm shift in the "subculture" of school aged children (roughly junior high to end of high school) towards the acceptance of gun violence to resolve interpersonal problems. Something like that. Paradigms are everywhere. The main paradigms of our culture have sub-paradigms, if you want to make a strict definition of what a paradigm is: a pattern or system of belief. We all have our personal paradigms while at the same time living within the overarching paradigm(s) of our culture. Paradigms within paradigms. Maybe I am seeing paradigms everywhere. I can't keep track of this, I need a chart or something. ;-) What I really need to do is brush up on my Capra and delve into Kuhn. Look at the societal change from Victorian society both in England and America and its preoccupation with death to our Post-Modern culture and its preoccupation with death's opposite, life, in the form of sex. There are many shifts, in my opinion, and these little shifts bring about the shifts in larger and larger paradigms that encompass the smaller ones. How does all this sound? I have been toying with this variation on the concept for a while. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: HDT [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:20:56 04/11/01 Wed I dunno. I mean yes I am looking for stuff already written on current shifts, but I was wondering if these publications, websites, etc. point out that these are paradigm shifts. Furthermore, I wonder if they recognize that these smaller incidents that you pointed out are part of a greater shift, or an overlooking new paradigm. All the examples you mentioned are good and indeed are indicators, but indicators of what. What is the underlying philosophy? Capra seemed to think that science changed the world. We now have that as a backbone to our culture, and all the smaller shifts you pointed out are being justified, or at least explained by terms and ideals that science helped create. So I guess I am wondering if they are really shifts, or just new incidences in our already dying paradigm. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Anthony [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:22:23 04/11/01 Wed Okay, we are going on the assumption that our paradigm is dying here, according to your thoughts. I guess that Capra seemed to think so, right? That is why you say that it is dying, right? Has been dying for how long, hundreds of years? What is the paradigm, the overarching paradigm? I guess it is the mechanistic Newtonian worldview, right? A sensate worldview lacking in spiritual concerns? Maybe that is why we have these religious right backlashes as evidenced in the Army of God. And why we have the lack of consideration for human life as evidenced in the school shootings and even the use of abortion as birth control. So in the Western culture, we have been running on the sensate, industrialized, science and rational thought-driven paradigm. And the things we are talking about, all the little shifts, are then signs of this paradigm's decay, right? I suppose these "negative" changes in mentality can be called paradigm shifts as well....a paradigm shift does not alway have to be positive, I suppose... [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: HDT [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:24:10 04/11/01 Wed I guess I was not clear enough, which is always possible with my writing. What I am trying to say is that these indicators of a changing world are not necessarily paradigm shift indicators. They are just symbols of a dying or soon to be irrelevant paradigm. I see these negative aspects of our culture as problems that the old paradigm just cannot solve. Meaning all of our scientific thoughts and processes do not bring actual relevant answers that can solve these things. I would therefore assume that what we need would be a new paradigm that would allow us to think in a different way, spiritual, mechanical, whatever. One of the main problems I have is that all of the ways we have mentioned do not really strike me as original. Meaning, we are in the midst of a mechanical world and have seen through historical study that there have been spiritual worlds. Say what you will, but we are still a product of the industrial revolution and age. This information age melarchy is just an offshoot of that industrialization, based on, and brought about by our reliance on the scientific method. We have seen both types of worlds, and I do not see humanity going back to either. (Maybe we are in need of a duality in our paradigm?) I want to know if there is anything new out there that anybody has noticed, what would Fritjof say is new and has potential. For I do not think these negative examples of changing society are shifts, they are a resemblance of the crumbling old shift. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Anthony [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:25:12 04/11/01 Wed I totally agree. Let's not overcomplicate things, right? By that I mean I stood the chance of overcomplicating things by calling the changes in behavior due to the dying overarching paradigm by the name "smaller paradigms". But I suppose, buy the strict definition of paradigm, we could say that there are personal paradigms that belong to the people inside the larger paradigm, right? But anyway, this is all semantics, I think we are saying the same thing. I totally agree with all that you have said, no matter what terminology you and I are using that may differ. Remember that Capra mentioned the idealistic paradigm, which was a balance of the ideational paradigm type and the sensate paradigm type, if I am not mistaken. I wonder if there is evidence of such a paradigm emerging? [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Anthony [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 06:54:48 04/16/01 Mon Hey, you want another "symptom" of our dying Western paradigm that is so dependant on the Scientific Method, reason, logic, and lacking is spiritual focus (or rather a balance with the spirit)? The televangelists!!! People are so starved for spiritual nurishment in America that they turn to these con men in droves! I see the televangelist, the people that literally take up snakes and drink poison, and all other RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISTS as a violent backlash resulting from hundreds of years of dependance on the sensate and the lack of attention to spiritual concerns. That's my opinion. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Zisel ben [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 11:09:56 04/16/01 Mon Hmmm. I like your opinion. But, ummm...what's wrong with taking up snakes and drinking poison? I think you're being a bit prejudice against us religious fundimentalists suckers. ;-) People are indeed starving. I think it might be because they want someone else to nourish them. They want to depend on some other spiritual icon to worship instead of looking into themselves and realizing the beauty that is there, that has always been there, that they need to continue to develop on their own. Like Nelson Mandela said in that snazzy little quote I posted. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Zisel ben [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 11:37:45 04/16/01 Mon "Up on Housing Project Hill It's either fortune or fame You must pick up one or the other Though neither of them are to be what they claim If you're lookin' to get silly You better go back to from where you came" Shabtai Zisel ben Avraham v'Rachel Riva 1965 [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: icky-icky [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 12:44:38 04/16/01 Mon Ummm, but Anthony, I have always beleived that that is how religion started. In a sense, it was a response to misunderstanding of the neatural world. Over time as scince started to explain more of what we did not understand, religion became the safety net to which we all would eventually fall (there are no athiests in foxholes right?). SO now we have movements, incomprehensible to us hwo people can really take them seriously, but maybe that is not the appropriate question. I mean are these people looking for a new found faith in the current paradigm, or do they want a new one. Afterall most people who are disenfranchised from a system only want inclusion, not necessarily revolution....... [ Post a Reply to This Message ]

[> [> [> Subject: Re: Thomas Kuhn Author: Anthony [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:34:44 04/16/01 Mon I agree to a point. Remember that myth was created to explain the unexplainable, and that myth and religion were often synonymous (but not necessarily always, I think). In my book and within my belief system, myth and religion are intertwined. I think they always have been to a certain degree. Anyway, I agree that religion serves as the "opiate", but I also believe in the spirit, so I guess I am biased. I agree. BUT...I believe that these modern times there is a certain desperation that was never felt before. But then again, I was never witness to any but this era in history. But I believe that there were always those who were charismatic, who were able to manipulate the willing, the desperate...but there is just something about what I see that makes me think that times are different now. I don't know. Call it instinct, call it whatever...I concede that I could be coming to the conclusion that best suits my worldview. In the end, I suppose there are many answers. The reason why there is intolerance and such is that people are often baffled by too many choices and eventually beg to be told that there is only one "true" way. God, I am rambling!!! Anyway, I think that these people, the ones seemingly so easily entranced by the televangelists, are looking for a "new and improved", more MIRACULOUS religious experience. Belief and faith are not enough, they need proof in the form of miracles to show them that God exists. I think that is definitly the fault of the overly-rational world view. [ Post a Reply to This Message ]