Dear organlearners,
> At, I very much appreciate your thoughts on trust.
Thank you very much Edwin for your kind words. As I have said, it is not
easy to write on trust because it elicit so much intense feelings.
However, as I have tried to argue, trust plays a central role in
creativity in general and learning in particular. Trust has a poweful
influence on the dynamics of creativity. Were it not for this, I would
have rather prefered not to write about trust in this diverse LO
community.
> I do not imply that this is a rationale for an
> anthropocentric view of creation, only that humanity has a
> unique and specific role, not necessarily the central role.
> More about that at another time, if anyone is interested.
[anthropos is the greek word for man (humankind)]
I am very much interested to learn what you have to say. As I have
indicated in a previous contribution, one of the roles of humans are to
let non-spontaneous things happen - to show the other side of creation
which the rest of nature cannot do.
As you all know, Charles Darwin shattered the anthropocentric view on
life, just as, for example, Roger Bacon shattered the anthropocentric view
on empirics, or Copernicus shattered the anthropocentric view on
astronomy, or Einstein shattered the antrhopocentric view on referance
systems. Whenever an anthropocentric viewpoint has become shattered, it
led to great upheavels. Why?
Anthropocentrism is, in a certain sense, a trust in humanity that it will
ensure that a particular viewpoint is true, good and and right. Since
'true', 'good' and 'right' are concepts of humans, it seems to be almost
nonsense to think that entities (Creator and creations) other than humans
can play a role in determining what is 'true', 'good' and 'right' about
viewpoints which, after all only humans posess. In fact, in many
religions, often including christianity, such thoughts have been
considered to be heresy.
The christian religion (and to a certain extend Islam also) has a unigue
position whith respect to anthropocentrism. The Son of Man which is also
the Son of God, namely Jesus Christ, is central to christianity.
Unfortunately, many christians use this God-humanship of Jesus Christ as a
licence for anthropocentric thinking. However, like on trust, the Bible is
very clear on this point: humans should not misuse this unique role of
humanity in creation. We have no better example to follow than Jesus
himself.
Despite the immense advancements in many other branches of science, we
have only scratched the surface of knowing what creativity amounts to. For
example, there are surpisingly few books on creativity, except for the
past decade or two. There is no institution of learning, as far as I could
ascertain, which has a School or Faculty of Creativity in which creativity
is studied as a general property of the universe. How many universities
offer a degree in creativity (and not merely a degree in some creative
art)?
I think that anthropocentrism was the main reason for inhibiting
advancements into knowing creativity. While wrting my book, I was
immensely aware of the present anthropocentrism with regard to creativity.
In fact, in my book you will find the following (wierd?) definition of
creativity: creativity is the result of entropy production. I suspect that
my book will shatter this anthropocentrism with regard to creativity.
Hence it is very important for us not to become caught up in the upheavals
which will follow. Therefor, as I have argued earlier, it becomes very
important to understand where trust enters the picture.
I will say nothing more than to note that the role of anthropocentrism on
the spontaneity of creations is extremely important. Maybe we can discuss
this role somewhere in future.
> There is one other piece that I think touches on trust, and that is
> respect. Trust is the active expression of respect. For me, it is more
> important whom I work with, than what I do. Why? Because I want to work
> with people I respect, admire, in whom I can learn new things, and they as
> well.
How right you are. Trust and respect commute intensely. However, we should
never, never confuse respect with trust. For example, we should have
respect for the Creator and all creation, but we should trust only the
Creator. However, let us go some other time into this thread of Learning
and Respect, one which is just as important as the present thread. We will
then again see that creativity is central to the understanding of respect.
Respectfully yours,
--At de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre for Education University of Pretoria Pretoria, South Africa email: amdelange@gold.up.ac.za
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