Everything is connected Global warming, global terrorism, food crises, water crises, oil conflicts, culture wars - "civilisation" seems to be accelerating towards self-destruction. These are circumstances in which art and artists tend to get political or, alternatively, resign themselves to insignificance. In literature, the phenomenon is exacerbated by the difficulty many people have reading for anything beyond content and immediately communicated emotion. At such a moment, it may be worth looking at the work of a man who had a rather unusual take on the relationship between art and politics, who saw the two as intimately related and mutually conditioning, art being allowed a certain, perhaps even pervasive, influence, but not in the crass sense of grinding an axe, or even exploring controversial situations; on the contrary, art might be most "useful" when, to all intents and purposes, most "irrelevant". Gregory Bateson (1904-80) was born into a family with a history of spirited scientific controversy.
Petrichor Petrichor (/ˈpɛtrɨkɔər/) is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. The word is constructed from Greek, petra, meaning ‘stone’ + ichor, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology. In 2015, MIT scientists used high-speed cameras to record how the scent moves into the air.[5] The tests involved approximately 600 experiments on 28 different surfaces, including engineered materials and soil samples.[6] When a raindrop hits a porous surface, small bubbles form that float to the surface and release aerosols.[5] Such aerosols carry the scent as well as bacteria and viruses from the soil.[5] Raindrops that move at a slower rate tend to produce more aerosols; this serves as an explanation for why the petrichor is more common after light rains.[5] Some scientists believe that humans appreciate the rain scent because ancestors may have relied on rainy weather for survival.[7] References[edit] Jump up ^ Bear, I.J.; R.G. External links[edit]
Our Story | Mapping The Human Story The purpose of Mapping the Human Story is to explore and curate humanity’s traditions, wisdom and knowledge to sustain us today and give us every possible resource in the future. Simultaneously we are creating a Cultural Vault, a meta-library of culture to hold in trust and make accessible humanity’s heritage, wisdom and knowledge. Founder Dr. Elizabeth Kapu’uwailani Lindsey (pictured above, with Mau) is the first Polynesian Explorer and female Fellow in the history of the National Geographic Society. Elizabeth’s keen insight and first-hand accounts from the world’s most fragile regions make her international speaking engagements an inspiring call-to-action. On Elizabeth’s most recent expedition, she journeyed to Satawal, Micronesia where she recorded the traditions of the palu, Micronesian non-instrument navigators.
Slippery slope In logic and critical thinking, a slippery slope is a logical device, but is usually known under its fallacious form in which a person asserts that some event must inevitably follow from another without any rational argument or demonstrable mechanism for the inevitability of the event in question. A slippery slope argument states that a relatively small first step leads to a chain of related events culminating in some significant effect, much like an object given a small push over the edge of a slope sliding all the way to the bottom.[1] The strength of such an argument depends on the warrant, i.e. whether or not one can demonstrate a process which leads to the significant effect. The fallacious sense of "slippery slope" is often used synonymously with continuum fallacy, in that it ignores the possibility of middle ground and assumes a discrete transition from category A to category B. Modern usage avoids the fallacy by acknowledging the possibility of this middle ground. Examples[edit]
Cultural universal General[edit] The emergence of these universals dates to the Upper Paleolithic, with the first evidence of full behavioral modernity. List of cultural universals[edit] Among the cultural universals listed by Brown (1991) are: Language and cognition[edit] Language employed to manipulate othersLanguage employed to misinform or misleadLanguage is translatableAbstraction in speech and thoughtAntonyms, synonymsLogical notions of "and," "not," "opposite," "equivalent," "part/whole," "general/particular"Binary cognitive distinctionsColor terms: black, whiteClassification of: age, behavioral propensities, body parts, colors, fauna, flora, inner states, kin, sex, space, tools, weather conditionsContinua (ordering as cognitive pattern)Discrepancies between speech, thought, and actionFigurative speech, metaphorsSymbolism, symbolic speechSynesthetic metaphorsTabooed utterancesSpecial speech for special occasionsPrestige from proficient use of language (e.g. poetry)PlanningUnits of time Society[edit]
Arthur Tansley Early life and education[edit] Tansley was born in London to businessman George Tansley[6] and his wife Amelia. Although a successful businessman, George Tansley's passion had been education after he started attending classes at the Working Men's College when he was 19. George Tansley later went on to be a volunteer teacher, retiring from his business in 1884 to dedicate himself to teaching at the college. He married Amelia Lawrence in 1863 and had two children – the older a daughter, Maud, followed by Arthur seven years later, in 1871.[2] Tansley's interest in science was sparked by one of his father's fellow volunteer-teachers, who was described as "an excellent and enthusiastic field botanist". Professional career[edit] Tansley taught at University College London from 1893 until 1907. Major contributions[edit] In 1913, the British Vegetation Committee organised the British Ecological Society (BES), the first-ever professional society of ecologists. Personal life[edit] Notes[edit] Hugh M.
27th Sept - An Ecology of Mind, with Nora Bateson | Gaia Foundation An Ecology of Mind is a film portrait of Gregory Bateson, celebrated anthropologist, philosopher, author, naturalist, systems theorist, and filmmaker, produced and directed by his daughter, Nora Bateson. The film includes footage from Bateson's own films shot in the 1930s in Bali (with Margaret Mead) and New Guinea, along with photographs, filmed lectures, and interviews. His youngest child, Nora, depicts him as a man who studied the interrelationships of the complex systems in which we live with a depth motivated by scientific rigor and caring integrity. Nora Bateson's rediscovery of his work documents the vast - and continuing - influence Bateson's thinking has had on the work of an amazingly wide range of disciplines. This film hopes to inspire its audience to see our lives within a larger system - glistening with symmetry, play, and metaphor.
THE GHOST DANCE: THE ORIGINS OF RELIGION BY La Barre, Weston Author Paperback on 03 , 2010: Amazon.co.uk: Weston La Barre The Ghost Dance: The Origins of Religion by Weston La Barre (1915-1996) is a classic search for the origins of religion, employing psychology and anthropology to explain elements of Greek, Egyptian, Jewish, Christian, shamanic and Native American religion. The Ghost Dance offers a fascinating exploration of the history and origins of religious belief from earliest times to the present day. The Ghost Dance takes its place beside other great studies of religion, such as those by Sigmund Freud, Geza Roheim or Mircea Eliade. Weston La Barre is best known for his work in anthropology and ethnography, in which he drew on the theories of psychoanalysis and psychiatry.
Weston La Barre Raoul Weston La Barre (13 December 1911–March 1996) was an American anthropologist, best known for his work in ethnobotany, particularly with regard to Native-American religion, and for his application of psychiatric and psychoanalytic theories to ethnography. Education and early career[edit] La Barre was born in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, the son of a banker. After matriculating from Princeton University in 1933 he began field work with the Yale Institute of Human Relations. In 1937 La Barre was made a Sterling Fellow at Yale, and conducted field work in South America with the Aymara of Lake Titicaca region and the Uros of the Rio Desaguadero. In 1938 his first book, The Peyote Cult, was published, and was immediately hailed as a classic, on the cutting edge of psychological anthropology. La Barre married Maurine Boie in 1939; she was a social worker and the editor of the social-work journal Family. From 1939 until 1943 La Barre taught anthropology at Rutgers University. Literature[edit]
Neuroanthropology Neuroanthropology is the study of culture and the brain. This field explores how new findings in the brain sciences help us understand the interactive effects of culture and biology on human development and behavior. In one way or another, neuroanthropologists ground their research and explanations in how the human brain develops, how it is structured and how it functions within the genetic and cultural limits of its biology (see Biogenetic Structuralism and related website). “Neuroanthropology” is a broad term, intended to embrace all dimensions of human neural activity, including emotion, perception, cognition, motor control, skill acquisition, and a range of other issues. See also[edit] Further reading[edit] Arbib, Michael A. (1989) The Metaphorical Brain 2: Neural Networks and Beyond. External links[edit]
Thoughtform Tulpa (Tibetan: སྤྲུལ་པ, Wylie: sprul-pa; Sanskrit: निर्मित nirmita[1] and निर्माण nirmāṇa;[2] Japanese: タルパ tarupa;[3] "to build" or "to construct") also translated as "magical emanation",[4] "conjured thing" [5] and "phantom" [6] is a concept in mysticism of a being or object which is created through sheer spiritual or mental discipline alone. It is defined in Indian Buddhist texts as any unreal, illusory or mind created apparition. According to Alexandra David-Néel, tulpas are "magic formations generated by a powerful concentration of thought." It is a materialized thought that has taken physical form and is usually regarded as synonymous to a thoughtform.[7] Indian Buddhism[edit] One early Buddhist text, the Samaññaphala Sutta lists the ability to create a “mind-made body” (mano-maya-kaya) as one of the 'fruits of the contemplative life'. Tibetan Buddhism[edit] Tulpa is a spiritual discipline and teachings concept in Tibetan Buddhism and Bon. Alexandra David-Néel[edit] See also[edit]
Alfred L. Yarbus Yarbus pioneered the study of saccadic exploration of complex images, by recording the eye movements performed by observers while viewing natural objects and scenes. In this very influential work, Yarbus showed that the trajectories followed by the gaze depend on the task that the observer has to perform. The gaze tends to jump back and forth between the same parts of the scene, for example, the eyes and mouth in the picture of a face. Books[edit] A. See also[edit] References[edit] External links[edit]