LO is an idea or goal? LO29535

From: AM de Lange (amdelange@postino.up.ac.za)
Date: 11/20/02


Replying to LO29517 --

Dear Organlearners,

Andrew Campbell < ACampnona@aol.com > writes:

>Ficino's work is sometimes called poetic theology -- as
>originally suggested by his pupil Pico della Mirandola
>(author of one of the earliest articulations of human
>rights: On the Dignity of Man). Moore suggests that it
>is effectively poetic psychology or a psychopoetics --
>his insights being expressed imagistically rather than
>discursively, precisely because the purpose was to nourish
>and educate the imagination to enhance the qualitative
>experience of the moment.

Greetings dear Andrew,

Thank you very much for bringing the Florentine Marsilio Ficino
(1433-1499) under our attention.

The Catholic Encyclopedia at
< http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06067b.htm >
have a nice, short biography on Ficino. See also the Philosophy
Lexicon (in German) at
< http://www.philosophenlexikon.de/ficino.htm >
Ficino had a stratified philosophy. See for example
< http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/Classes/US310/Ficino-Ascent.html >
< http://www.ogdoadic.com/texts/magic-science.html >
It is only in the twentieth century that stratified philosophies came to
the foreground.

The Rennaissance (the rediscovery of learning) was not just a
serendipitous event in time. It was something which had to happen
because of a peculiar "entropy profile" preceding it. This "entropy
profile" looks as follows for Italy:-
Francesco Petrarch 1304-1374
Dante Alighieri ("Divine Comedy") 1365-1421
Leonardo Bruni 1369-1444
Marsilio Ficino 1433-1499
Leonardo da Vinci 1452-1519
Michelangelo 1475-1564

The "entropy profile" in wider context is:-
Peter Abelard 1079-1142
Wolfram von Eschenbach ("Parsival") 1170-1220
Geoffry Chaucer 1340-1400
Johannes Huss 1369-1415
Johannes Gutenberg 1400-1468
Nicholas of Cusa ("On Learned Ignorance") 1400-1464
Desiderius Erasmus ("In Praise of Folly") 1469-1536
Nicholaus Copernicus 1473-1543
Sir Thomas More 1478-1535
Martin Luther 1483-1536

Our modern civilisation is heading towards a self-made catastrophe.
Individual learning cannot cope anymore with the overwhelming amount of
fragmented information. Organisational learning fostered in the Sengian
Learning Organisation is required. When i considered the number of LOs
which i know compared to the number of OOs (Ordinary Organisations), they
are so few that the LO can be seen as an ideal rather than a goal. But in
terms of the changes which organisations world wide soon will have to
make, a Second Renaissance (the rediscovery of learning once again) is
needed.

>Moore focuses strongly on Ficino's concern with "soul"
>-- as the essential quality of existence -- an approach
>that is the focus of Moore's own writings. This descriptor
>appeals to many but is also alienating to many others --
>due to its many associations with perspectives that have,
>for whatever reason, often proven less than helpful to
>enhancing self-experience in daily life.

Were it not for Ficino's immense awareness of the soul, he would not have
set it into action by dignifying and loving his fellow humans. The
dignification of fellow humans in modern civilisation is almost nil,
except for a few enigmatic personalities like Mother Theresa and Nelson
Mandela.

>Objective experience is transformed through imagination
>into subjective experience -- effectively cultivating the
>world to nourish experience in the moment. The external
>world provides a reservoir of images for this process.
>"All our actions, in fact, involve us in deep mysterious
>themes and plots." For Ficino, the essential point is to
>make connections between everyday experience and the
>deeper life of the soul.
(snip)
>Imagination must also be applied to oneself -- to provide
>an imaginative awareness of oneself, one's strengths and
>one's vulnerabilities, especially restrictive tendencies to
>a particular mode of awareness limiting expression of
>other modes.

I agree. It was first Pasteur and later Einstein who emphasised that this
subjective experience is essential to prepare the mind for making new
objective discoveries in things which other people are obvlious to.

Imagaination is not merely something for the individual. Children show
clearly when playing together that an imaginative play is for them like
entering heaven. What has become of collective imagination? Is it not one
of the activities which need to be revived in a LO?

With care and best wishes

-- 

At de Lange <amdelange@postino.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South Africa

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