Quadrant Absolutism and Integral Absolutism

We must never forget that criticism in a given instance is primarily a criticism of ourselves, and not of others.  By ignoring this simple fact which frequently happens today precisely because of its simplicity, many people are led unintentionally to become traitors to themselves.  Yet this same fact can be of inestimable worth to someone with an open mind.

--Jean Gebser, The Ever Present Origin, Manifestations of the Aperspectival World (I): The Natural Sciences

What Gebser is referring to above is the charge by many disciplines of approaching our task in a subjective, psychological, or philosophical-speculative manner.  For example: in trying to "transcend and include all 'perspectives'" (including empirical right-hand perspectives)--we are prone to "understanding the perspective of the scientist" in a condescending, sympathetic, or psychologizing manner by speculating about their interiority, their stage, their quadrant, or their intentions rather than looking to the actual results or contributions made by the specific disciplines themselves.  By doing so, we run the risk of trying to psychoanalyze the first-person subjectivity of the scientist in third-person singular or plural rather than in trying understand and integrate the actual science.  It's like a scientist is pointing at something, and Integral looking at the scientist's finger, instead of the "thing."  A common strategy for handling such kinds of criticisms leveled at Integral is making a blanket accusation that these critics or disciplines are "first tier" and now, "quadrant absolutists."

Ken and Sean are rightly critical of "quadrant absolutism" (why I joined the Integral Life community).  But by the same token--there is still much merit in the arguments of critics who accuse the Integral movement of cultishness and "Integral absolutism" (so to speak): whereby specific quadrant understandings--particularly those concerned with empirical science--are being ignored and excluded because of their partiality, lack of subjectivity ("things" don't have perspective), and lack of integrality.  In Integral Ecology (a book I am beginning to appreciate the more I read--yet still a book that appears to exclude science altogether), the following is given in its introduction to 200+ Perspectives on NATURE: Major, Minor, and Emerging Schools of Ecology, Environmental Studies, and Ecological Thought:

We have not included schools of ecology defined by organisms (e.g., redwood ecology), biomes (desert ecology), or geographic areas (arctic ecology).  Nor have we included natural sciences such as zoology or geology.  In general we did not include environmental sciences such as bioclimatology, ecostratigraphy, geosociology, hydrology, petrology, phytogeography, plant sociology, zoogeography.  However, such fields of research are valuable to an Integral approach to ecology.

Climatology, oceanography, and glaciology are critical to understanding the ecological crisis in empirical and relative terms but they too are excluded as schools of ecology or "perspectives."  And while I do understand how interior quadrants are being undervalued in objective science, I do not understand the exclusion of science itself in an Integral approach.  Gebser devoted many chapters to natural and hard sciences so I do not understand why Integral Ecology and the Integral movement cannot.  No reason was stated why in the book, except that interiority was being excluded from objective science and underrepresented as truths.  This to me is no reason to turn around and to do the same to objective science.  Because when that happens, you wind up not with an integral ecology but the psychology of ecology or philosophy of ecology instead.  Gebser did not exclude natural science: so why must Integral feel that it must?

Suprisingly, many of these "quadrant-understandings" throughout many different disciplines in all different quadrants reveal a common theme which, to Gebser--disclose a "new mutation" (integral).  Not by looking at these scientists', artists', musicians', poets', "perspectives" (alone) and merely classifying them into quadrants or levels by their subjectivity but rather by becoming the scientist, musician, and so on and taking their contributions and seeing what these contributions can impart insofar as the newest consciousness structure.

As for myself--I come from a liberal-arts background yet I try to be multidisciplinary in my approach (in addition to multiperspectival) ¹ by incorporating the truths of hard sciences as well.  But all too often what I see is lack of awareness of science and an inability to differentiate good from bogus science by those who self-identify as being "Integral."  On three different occasions I have encountered people of this community who questioned the existence of my neurological disorders (Asperger Syndrome, ADHD, and Sensory Processing Disorder) without understanding anything about it and tried to offer me a spiritual or psychological (shadow) prescriptive for a cure.  Not to say that those prescriptives cannot help but only that those who question the reality of my diagnoses do not understand that these are fundamentally neurological and pervasive developmental disorders which I've had all my life, so are not caused by adult-onset personality disorders and shadow-elements.  Just "born that way."  But doesn't really bother me.  Don't think I'd want to be a "normie." 

This is also apparent to me in music theory (not in those who participated with me--who were musicians themselves and could appreciate what I had to share in my blogs about Gebser and new music) but especially so in my blogs and comments on climate change.  I also see it happening in Ken Wilber (audio discussion with Crichton and elsewhere) and in Integral Ecology's section on "The Integral Ecology Advantage."  In this section, a number of important aspects are defined in its overall approach, an example of one being "Integral Ecology Cautions Environmentalists Against Ecofascists" and a brief discussion of that, along with a number of other key considerations for Integral by heading.  One key concept that was altogether omitted in their considerations was "Integral Ecology Cautions Environmentalists Against the Orange Inquisition" (the Green Inquisition (but not in those terms) is discussed throughout the book and in "Integral Ecology Cautions Environmentalists Against Ecofascists"). 

What I suspect may do the integrity of Integral more damage is not the Green Inquisition or ecofascism but rather the Orange Inquisition.  Good science is being convicted and executed by the court of public opinion. However, no mention of this was made in these key considerations of an Integral Ecology which I consider to be a serious problem.  An example of an Orange Inquisitor can be found on Robb Smith's "10 Myths on Climate Change" where a conservative pundit, Andrew Bolt, makes all kinds of outrageous and ignorant claims that are symptomatic of a wider misperception from which Integral is not immune.  Not to say that Robb is being sympathetic with the outrageous claims of Bolt, but the article he shares is an example of the Orange Inquisition at work.  

And I do find that many who self-identify as Integral are sympathetic to Orange Inquisitors and share such viewpoints for fear of being "Green," their revulsion to left-wing ideology, and because of their lack of understanding of science.  So in that sense I am not sure what an Eco-Sage "means," if s/he cannot differentiate good from bogus science (although the "always already" concept is fine, just as it is--so long as it is coupled with a grasp of certain relative and empirical right-hand knowledge in addition to the absolute).  This I find to be a weakness in the Integral movement and something that should seriously be addressed.  I have no vested interests in Integral as a corporation yet do care about this "movement," so am free to express whatever is on my mind as a free and independent agent.  I hope that others are free, as well, to be honest and candid in their viewpoints.

 ¹ Shalk Shalk raised an interesting point that prompted me to elaborate on the differences between "multiperspectival" and "multidisciplinary," which is located below Shalk's comment.