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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2>This conversation
reminded me an article i read lately.The article was saying something
i read many times at other books also. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I am writing what is left in my mind :</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>The problem with sciences, religions, countries,
peoples, communities, human being or consciousness is not boxes or
paradigm...the problem is that the </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>human being likes putting himself/herself in the
middle of any event. He/she percieves, describes and participates life
from there. He/ she likes being in the middle and feeling </FONT><FONT
face=Arial size=2>important.</FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2>Otherwise there is
the lose of identity (like death) </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>He/she is the subject and the rest of the world is
outside.Even if he/she goes out of the </FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2>boxes, as
long as there is a center, he/she sees something needs to</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>be corrected then comes fear, insecurity,
thoughts, actions, efforts, need of power, control and so on....but in fact
the picture is perfect including him/her as it is </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>( i mean i guess
so::)) </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>So paradigm shift should be a shift in the
attention from "me" to "the rest".....a mind which asks " what is needed now;
how can i best fit to the environement?" rather then </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>"how i can manipulate the environment so that it
fits me?"</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>This is valid for an "OST facilitator mind as
well" </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>And yes, the OST facilitator should be present
simply because she/he is present. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Funda</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=chris@got2change.com href="mailto:chris@got2change.com">Chris
Kloth</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A
title=OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
href="mailto:OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU">OSLIST@LISTSERV.BOISESTATE..EDU</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Tuesday, July 26, 2005 5:38
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Paradigms, Resistence, Science,
God, Hebrew - a bit long (with cuffs please)</DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><BR></DIV>
<DIV class=moz-text-html lang=x-cyrillic>Harrison Owen wrote:<BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE cite=mid001e01c5912f$6fb46170$1f6c2745@holaptop type="cite">
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>And reading Wilber and Kuhn wouldn't hurt. Both pretty
bright guys. Kuhn doubtless wrote other stuff, but the seminal work is/was
"The Structures of Scientific Revolution" -- I think it was published by
Princeton, or maybe it was Chicago (University Press). Wilber has damn
near buried the world in paper. All of it is good, but some is better than
the rest. A good introduction might be something like, "A Brief History of
Everything." He is a wonderful writer, great storyteller, totally
outrageous, and a massive intellect. Other than that he is pretty run
of the mill. And if you are looking for other good stuff to read, you might
check out the section on <A
href="http://www.openspaceworld.com">www.openspaceworld.com</A> called
"Literature."</FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial><BR><BR><FONT
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif"><BR>"The Structure of Scientific
Revolutions" [by Thomas S. Kuhn, University of Chicago Press, 1962, 1970] had
a huge impact on me when I was in school in the early 70s. It is no
surprise that Harrison has done a fine job of capturing key points from
it. I agree with Harrison that, in Kuhn's role as a philosopher of
science and historian at a particular moment in time, he was more concerned
with addressing the barriers to breakthroughs, not what would come
next.<BR><BR><BR>That said, I would like to elaborate on one aspect of Kuhn's
work with a slightly different em-PHA-sis. <BR><BR><BR><BR>In doing so I
also call your attention to Kuhn's earlier work, "The Copernican Revolution:
Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought" [Vintage
Book/Random House, 1957, 1959]. </FONT></FONT><FONT
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">While there is some real astronomy in the
book, it is fairly easy to read or skip in order to get to the social
implications. </FONT><FONT face=Arial><FONT
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">He also wrote a book called "The
Essential Tension: Selected Studies in Scientific Tradition and Change"
[University of Chicago Press 1977]. This one has less "hard
science" in it and you will recognize the how science was anticipating the
social consequences in our lives today.<BR><BR><BR><BR>The reason I think it
is important to add The Copernican Revolution is that Kuhn suggests that you
know you are facing a paradigm shift when people defending the dominant belief
system are prepared to enforce serious sanctions to maintain the status
quo. Both Copernicus and Galileo(reference in Scientific Revolutions)
faced state enforced death to pursue their new views. They were not
"thinking outside of the box." Their thinking, and that of others
Kuhn refers to, was so far beyond conventional thinking that they were not
even acknowledging a box that one might think outside of. They were
laying the conceptual foundations that were needed for Westerners to reframe
what we might now call consciousness. As much as we may criticize their
linear, mechanistic thinking today, their's was an important step on the way
to spiral dynamics and other mental models that we now explore...and which
others in the future may look back on with amused curiosity.<BR><BR><BR><BR>In
my view, Joel Barker's superficial analysis of Kuhn has trivialized what is at
stake for people at the time of a real paradigm shift.
</FONT></FONT><FONT face=Arial><FONT face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">In
both these cases the dominant culture perceived threats to its belief in the
existence and power of God, to the power that the church had because of its
connection to god and the power of the rich who filled the churches with
riches.</FONT></FONT><FONT face=Arial><FONT
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif"> The official punishment for such
heresy was death. As I read Kuhn, that's a paradigm, not a
box.<BR><BR><BR><BR>I think this is more than just a matter of semantics or an
academic debate. Barker also has trivialized the potential depth and
force of resistance change agents (referring to people who see the new reality
and keep the light on it - be they members of a community or outside
consultants - AKA, outside agitators) must be alert to in systems at the time
of a real paradigm shift. Not only must change agents anticipate and
plan for the resistance, in my view (which I think is consistent with the
inclusive values of OST) the change agent needs to understand that the fear
rooted in the perception of what is at stake and find a way to embrace the
resistance without embracing the beliefs and help create space to discover
what will be required to let go and move on. <BR><BR><BR><BR>If
you think some people will resist an "outside of the box" solution to a
problem when people have at least acknowledged there is problem to be solved,
wait until you confront their fundamental view of reality...something that
they did not invite anyone to do! In situations like this I
believe OST facilitators need to be able to create and hold space in a
crucible of considerable strength. Hoping people will "think outside the
box" ain't gonna get it. <BR><BR><BR><BR>On the other hand, the
positive side of resistance is that, in my view, it represents and act of
"passion and responsibility." It suggests that the person cares about
whatever the situation is. I would much rather work with people who are
resisting than docile people who will not resist. I wonder whether they
will act with passion and responsibility to support the new
reality.<BR><BR><BR><BR>In the more modern examples provided by Kuhn the
proponents did not face state enforced death, but they faced potential
professional death through marginalization, loss of livelihood and other
community sanctions. As many of you know very well, there are
times in civil society around the world today where people may face death for
challenging the fundamental order of society. My experience is
that the people who propose "thinking outside the box" in such situations are
people who have very little insight into what is at stake and are probably not
going to have to hang around during the implementation of or living of the
change.<BR><BR><BR><BR>That does not mean I think people should not engage in
the risky work of paradigm shifts. On some level, having discovered the
new reality there is no going back. Just know that if it is really
a paradigm shift then there will be a lot at stake for the people promoting
change and those resisting it. I believe OST can and has helped
create a container for working on such change. It is why I honor the
process and do not take my role in it lightly.<BR><BR><BR><BR>Aside
1<BR><BR><BR>A much newer book I am recommending to everyone doing our kind of
work is "Navigating the Badlands" by a futurist named Mary
O'Hare-Devereux. While she does not use the term paradigm, she was
noticing that, in recent years, her tools were not getting her the kinds of
results she anticipated. She goes back thousands of years to compare
times when the world seemed to be evolving or developing or stagnating
(behaving in predictable ways) and times of transformation...when the whole
world seemed to get turned upside down (for many decades or more) before it
returned to some degree of predictability. For example, when humans
started using alphabets changed the world....not one alphabet or the first
alphabet...the worldwide use of alphabets, all kinds of alphabets, changed
everything.<BR><BR><BR><BR>Anyway, she discovered there was a different set of
patterns within the chaos...order emerges from chaos. She then applies
this to what she believes is a dramatic change cycle...maybe a paradigm
shift...we have all been in for about a decade and will continue in for about
a decade. She also provides insights into where to look for both the
opportunities and resistance as we try to get through the Badlands...a space
where things that look very familiar turn out to be something very
different. She suggests we can (did) enter the Badlands of change alone,
but we cannot get out of the Badlands alone.<BR><BR><BR><BR>Final
Aside<BR><BR><BR><BR>The term paradigm existed before Kuhn and it did refer to
deeply embedded patterns - especially in language. It is interesting to
me that one of the examples of how the term was applied prior to Kuhn was the
reading of Hebrew. When Hebrew is printed, like in the Torah, the
letters that represent what we would call vowels in English are not
included. As a result, there are many patterns of Hebrew consonants
that, without vowels, look identical yet have very different meanings and
pronunciations. However, if you are raised in Jewish culture you "know"
the difference. You don't notice anything missing and probably would not
know what someone outside the culture, trained in text book or dictionary
Hebrew, was confused about. <BR><BR><BR><BR>I believe that much about
Kuhn described as paradigms, like most of what we experience as culture,
operates on this sub-conscious level...invisible to those who are a part of
it. It's not in our head or our heart...it's in our blood and DNA.
Thus, some levels of resistance are not conscious push back as much as they
are confusion, dissonance and fear. Even some of the conscious,
intentional resistance may be in reaction to the conscious awareness of
beliefs rooted in unexamined deeper beliefs learned at pre-verbal stages of
life...when we were forming our senses of reality, not "knowledge" of
reality. No wonder they are so hard to let go of!<BR><BR><BR><BR>I have
rambled on far too long...besides, I feel the urge to watch South
Pacific..."you've got to be carefully taught!" <SPAN
class=moz-smiley-s3><SPAN>;-)
</SPAN></SPAN><BR><BR></FONT></FONT></DIV><BR>Shalom,<BR><BR><BR>Chris
Kloth<BR>ChangeWorks of the Heartland<BR>250 South Virginialee
Road<BR>Columbus, OH 43209-2052<BR>USA<BR>Phone: 614.239.1336<BR>Fax:
614.237.2347<BR>E-mail: <A class=moz-txt-link-abbreviated
href="mailto:chris@got2change.com">chris@got2change.com</A><BR>URL: <A
class=moz-txt-link-abbreviated
href="http://www.got2change.com">www.got2change.com</A><BR><BR><BR>Think
Globally, Act locally<BR><BR>* *
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