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Chapter 8 - The World of the Terribly Obvious
Contributor: Ken Wilber 
The scientific world has brilliantly (perhaps too much so) described that which occurs in the Upper-Right (exterior individual) quadrant. What began as a healthy differentiation of arts, morals, and science during the Renaissance became an unhealthy dissociation within a hundred years, as the supremacy of science challenged the very legitimacy of phenomena in the other quadrants. The absolutization by modernity is one mistake that can be made with the UR; the other is the outright denial of the UR that postmodernity tends to commit.
As we have noted previously, all of manifestation has an external aspect and an internal aspect. This distinction, combined with the distinction between the individual and the collective, results in the four quadrants; the two right-hand quadrants refer to exteriors. We can make the further distinction that reality can also be viewed from the inside or from the outside. This further results in 4 zones (zones 5 thru 8), each with the corresponding methodologies that disclose them.
The scientific world has brilliantly (perhaps too much so) described that which occurs in the Upper-Right (exterior individual) quadrant. What began as a healthy differentiation of arts, morals, and science during the Renaissance became an unhealthy dissociation within a hundred years, as the supremacy of science challenged the very legitimacy of phenomena in the other quadrants. The absolutization by modernity is one mistake that can be made with the UR; the other is the outright denial of the UR that postmodernity tends to commit.
Zone-#6 is the view from the outside of the exterior of the individual; this zone is disclosed by classic methodologies such as behaviorism and empiricism. Zone-#5, the inside view of the exterior of the individual, was pioneered by Maturna and Varela and their biological phenomenology, or autopoesis (literally, self-making). Their aim was to examine not the phenomenology of a given organism, per se, but rather, what was available in the subjective-cognitive world of the organism, objectively speaking.
Maturna and Varela’s “view from within” was originally developed for individual organisms, with the assumption that social systems were simply the next level in their hierarchy of autopoesis. However, Niklas Luhmann pointed out that what is internal to a social system (or social holon) is not its members, but rather, their exchanged communications. That being said, it is nonetheless possible to take the autopoetic perspective and apply it to the internal system of communications of a collective; this yields the zone-#7 approach of social autopoesis, the exterior of the collective, as viewed from the inside. By contrast, classic systems theory takes the outside view of the exterior of the collective, a zone-#8 approach. Chaos/complexity theory is another example of a zone-#8 approach.
The “world of the terribly obvious,” as the right-hand quadrant view—taken by itself—is sometimes called, is in fact terribly vulnerable to what is variously referred to as the myth of the given, monological empiricism, the philosophy of the subject, and the philosophy of consciousness. The myth of the given includes the belief that reality is simply given to me, that the consciousness of an individual will deliver truth, that “the mirror of nature” (or reflection paradigm) is an adequate methodology, and a failure to understand that the truth a subject delivers is constructed in part by intersubjective cultural networks. This “myth” has been thoroughly devastated by the postmodern critique; only an integral approach can transcend and include the truths of the right-hand quadrant views, taken together with the postmodern insight.
Here is the introduction to the "World of the Terribly Obvious" call. Ken discusses what an enormous leap the emergence of rational consciousness was. But, he points out, modernity was simply unable to withstand the criticisms of postmodernity. As always, the Integral approach seeks to transcend and include them both....
"Synchronicity" is a word that is rarely used in Integral circles, largely because of its susceptibility to the Pre/Trans fallacy. But in this gem from the "World of the Terribly Obvious" call, Integral Naked Managing Editor Corey deVos engages Ken in a lively, and provocative discussion of the topic. The truth is out there....
"The myth of the given" takes many forms in contemporary thought. Angela Rizner asks Ken about the particular version which is referred to as "the mirror of nature."
Ken and Angela Rizner discuss evolutionary consciousness (perhaps the single most important insight of Integral spirituality) and how it relates to the Bodhisattva vow.
Bruce Aldernan asks Ken about person-perspective spaces. He points out that most altitudes observed in the world today (e.g. from amber to turquoise) still inhabit a general "mental" person-perspective space, which presupposes that we are isolated, knowing subjects at some ontological and epistemological distance from both objects and other knowing subjects. How can we begin to shift into a soul- or spirit-level person-perspective space?
Where does art fit in with "The World of the Terribly Obvious?" Seth Rowanwood and Ken discuss how right-hand quadrant artifacts can be used to profound effect in left-hand quadrant expressions.
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In listening to a great conversation between C de Vos and Ken Wilber (IN, Dec 07)... (more)
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