KARL JASPERS FORUM FOR TARGET ARTICLES
SUMMARY OF INFORMAL NOTES 1 BY FORUM PARTICIPANTS
7 August 1997

by F.Abraham, R.J.Callahan, P.Morgan, M.Szirko

 

re. Target article 1, 'Is the Mind Real ?'.

(I have received a number of short comments from several participants who for various reasons did not want to send in a formal commentary. These communications cannot be included as formal commentaries, but since they contain some interesting points, I do not want to simply discard them. Thus I will briefly summarize what they wrote. Evidently I cannot do justice to their opinions in these brief statements. In case they want to amplify on this, I would still like to invite them to send in more formal statements, either as commentaries, or as target articles if this serves their purpose better. Aside from this, those interested can communicate directly with them; I include their e-mail addresses.

I hope that this way of proceeding meets with the approval of the participants, please let me know. If there are further short communications, I intend to proceed in a similar way in the future.
HFJM)
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Fred Abraham: draws parallels to the chaos theory of Larry Vandervert, and his own related theory as available at http://godel.psy.uwa.deu.au/dynapsyc/dynapsyc.html and at www.blueberry-brain.org/dynamics/np.htm
( Fred Abraham PhD, is Professor, Dept. of Psychology and Interdisciplinary Research Group, Silliman University, Dumaguete City 6200, Phillippines )<abraham@mozcom.com>

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Roger J Callahan: 'as I look around me it is hard to see things which are not the work of human minds - carpeting, chairs, television sets, radios, etc. Crick's Astonishing Hypothesis: DNA is mental coding - a mental coding that exists independently in nature - not put there by human mind but obviously a mind or meaning function. ... Arthur M. Young in his 'Geometry of Meaning', etc.: the presumed objectivity of reading pointer readings is not tangible - say for knowing that a current is going through a wire - to make it tangible you must touch the wire and get the shock. ... Young provides a matrix for understanding that coheres both with Jung and with Newton.'
( Roger J Callahan is a clinical psychologist, interested in psychotherapy, and in Thought Field Therapy )
<72733.734@compuserve.com> Web http://www.tftrx.com

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Peter Morgan: states that he likes my presentation, but 'why should I accept the nihilism of the 'zero structure reference' ... since there is so much that is rich and useful out there (as Jaspers acknowledges in his discussion of the 'encompassing')? -- this is a word that is probably ubiquitous in the work of that philosopher ... 'nihilism' the Oxford English Dictionary suggests to me is probably too strong, but I ssociated your 'zero' with 'nothing', 'nihil'. ... Is there 'an unstructured source ?' ... A 'structured positive anchor' is needed (TA section 48). ... Reference: Karl Jaspers, Basic Philosophical Writings, ed Ehrlich et al 1986. .. Suggest that Henry Maudsley, 'Body and Mind' 1870, might make a good subject of discussion.'
( Peter Morgan is a retired Professor of English, with interest in the 19th century critic Ruskin, and he has made some studies of Husserl and Heidegger. )
<pmorgan@chass.utoronto.ca>

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Mariela Szirko: writes that she cannot analyze my paper because it is tributary of monopsychism ... 'I am writing from a scholarly tradition in neurobiology and psychophysics which is rather secluded ... Conceptually the main difference is made by our hylozoist stance ... Among the peculiarities of our stance is the emphasis on semoviency in psychisms. This term, semoviency, probably an acceptably-founded neologism in English, may be best described as 'exemption of reactivity' or 'starting causal physical series 'a novo' '. This special kind of self-activation collides with standard cultural expectations regarding what happens in supraquantum nature ... a stealthy collision very influential on our work.' She is interested in discussion with physicists. - She refers to a monograph by Alicia Avila and M.F.Crocco, 'Sensing: A new fundamental action of nature', working manuscript, Ctr. Neurobiological Res., Ministry of Health and Welfare, Buenos Aires, 1996, and to her own postings in JCS-online, earlier in 1997.
(Mariela Szirko is Professor, Centro de Investigaciones Neurobiologicas, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Argentine Republic, Buenos Aires)
<postmaster@neubio.sld.ar>

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I would appreciate receiving opinions about this format of short presentations. And as I mentioned above, if some the authors want to elaborate on their material, please let me have your formal commentaries or articles.

With best regards to all,
Herbert Muller

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PS. I am working on responses to various commentaries. This will take me some time, because this is a rich harvest, and I have to find my way around various frames of reference - please be patient.
HFJM