Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Mastery in Living
What It Takes
(PDF file of PowerPoint Slides)
Originated 16 April 2010, Originally posted 16 January 2011, Updated 30 May 2013
WERNER ERHARD
Independent
werhard@ssrn.com
MICHAEL C. JENSEN
Jessie Isidor Strauss Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus, Harvard Business School
mjensen@hbs.edu
JOSEPH J. DIMAGGIO, MD
Director of Research and Development, Landmark Worldwide
jdimaggio@landmarkworldwide.com
FAIR USE: You may redistribute the URL for this document freely, but please do not post the electronic file on the
web. We welcome web links to this document at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1720884
We revise our papers regularly, and providing a link to the original ensures that readers will receive the most recent
version. Thank you for doing this, W. Erhard, M. Jensen, J. DiMaggio.
Versions of some of the material in this presentation are found in a leadership course (Being a Leader and the
Effective Exercise of Leadership: An Ontological/Phenomenological Model) authored by Werner Erhard, Michael
C. Jensen, Steve Zaffron, and Kari Granger. Versions of some of the material presented in this paper are also found
in the consulting and program material of the Vanto Group, and in certain programs offered by Landmark
Worldwide, and are in part based on or derived from the work of an international, interdisciplinary group of
scholars, consultants and practitioners working under the name of The Barbados Group. The ideas and the
methodology created by Werner Erhard underlie much of the material.
Copyright 2010-2013. Werner Erhard, Michael C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved
Comments welcome 2 30 May 2013
Abstract
Note that this paper is a copy of the slides presented in a talk for the general public. That talk
and this paper present a way of accessing life, living, and who one is for oneself, based on
studying masters (e.g., master athletes, master physicists, master physicians, and master
educators).
Like masters of any specialized area, while masters of living are innately ordinary people, they
do perceive and comprehend life (experience life) the world, others, and themselves
differently than most of us do. As a result, they interact with the world, others, and themselves
differently than most of us do. And, it is the way in which they interact with life and with
themselves that makes them extraordinarily effective in dealing with life while enjoying an
exceptionally high quality of life. This paper spells out the way masters of living access life,
living, and themselves, and does so in words that make mastery in living accessible to the rest of
us ordinary people.
Copyright 2010-2013. Werner Erhard, Michael C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved
Comments welcome 3 30 May 2013
Acknowledgements
Disclosure Statement
Jensen has received financial support from the Harvard Business School Division of Research.
Erhard and Jensen are associated with the non-profit Erhard-Jensen Ontological /
Phenomenological Initiative (from which the authors receive no financial benefit other than a
reimbursement of travel expenses when dealing with the Initiatives activities). The purpose of
the Initiative is to stimulate and support research into and the application of the ontological /
phenomenological perspective on human nature and behavior, and the impact of such a
perspective on life, living, and self. Various management consulting and public program delivery
firms (some from which Erhard and Jensen derive a financial benefit) utilize some of the ideas
presented in this paper in their consulting activities or programs. DiMaggio has received
financial support from the division of Research and Development of Landmark Worldwide.
Copyright 2010-2013. Werner Erhard, Michael C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved
Mastery In Living
What It Takes
FAIR USE: You may redistribute the URL for this document freely, but please do not post the electronic file on the web. We welcome web links to
this document at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1720884
We revise our papers regularly, and providing a link to the original ensures that readers will receive the most recent version. Thank you for doing
this, W. Erhard, M. Jensen, J. DiMaggio.
Versions of some of the material in this presentation are found in a leadership course (Being a Leader and the Effective Exercise of Leadership: An
Ontological/Phenomenological Model) authored by Werner Erhard, Michael C. Jensen, Steve Zaffron, and Kari Granger. Versions of some of the
material presented in this paper are also found in the consulting and program material of the Vanto Group, and in certain programs offered by
Landmark Worldwide, and are in part based on or derived from the work of an international, interdisciplinary group of scholars, consultants and
practitioners working under the name of The Barbados Group. The ideas and the methodology created by Werner Erhard underlie much of the
material.
Copyright 2010 2013 W. Erhard, M. C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved. 30-May-2013
The Way You And I
Will Work Together
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3 THE WAY WE WILL WORK TOGETHER
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6 THE WAY WE WILL WORK TOGETHER
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Glossary Of Terms
1. Conversational Domain
2. Way of Being
3. Way of Acting
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What Is Meant By The Term
Conversational Domain
And Its Relation To Being A Master
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10 GLOSSARY CONVERSATIONAL DOMAIN
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11 GLOSSARY CONVERSATIONAL DOMAIN
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12 GLOSSARY CONVERSATIONAL DOMAIN
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13 GLOSSARY CONVERSATIONAL DOMAIN
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What Is Meant By The Term
Way of Being
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21 GLOSSARY WAY OF BEING
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26 WHO YOU KNOW YOURSELF TO BE IS JUST A WAY OF BEING
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34 GLOSSARY WAY OF ACTING
1. What Is Meant By
Conversational Domain
The conversational domain for mastery in life is made
up of
specialized terms that are
networked together in a specific way to form the
linguistic domain through which a master
perceives, comprehends, and interacts with
life
that is, with the world, others, and himself
or herself.
So far we have explicated the following specialized
terms: Conversational Domain, Way of Being,
You Are Not Who You Think You Are, Way of Acting
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38 GLOSSARY WAY OF BEING
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42 WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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47 WAY OF BEING DOES NOT CAUSE ACTION
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48 WAY OF BEING DOES NOT CAUSE ACTION
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51 WAY OF BEING DOES NOT CAUSE ACTION
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54 WAY OF BEING DOES NOT CAUSE ACTION
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57 WAY OF BEING DOES NOT CAUSE ACTION
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59 SUMMARY
Summary So Far
So far we have explicated the following specialized
terms:
Conversational Domain
Way of Being
You Are Not Who You Think You Are
Way of Acting
While Your Way of Being and Your Actions Are
Consistent With Each Other, Your Way of Being
Does Not Cause Your Actions
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60 SUMMARY
Summary So Far
1. The world of mastery is constituted by a unique
conversational domain (linguistic domain), from
which a master lives and interacts with life.
As is the case with a master physician or master
plumber, the conversational domain for mastery in
life is also made up of specialized terms that are
networked together in a specific way to form the
linguistic domain through which a master perceives,
comprehends, and interacts with life that is, with the
world, others, and himself or herself.
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61 SUMMARY
Summary So Far
2. While you may have a typical way of being, and
may even be resigned to that way of being, that is
just a Way of Being, it is not who you are really.
You are not who you know yourself to be, that is,
you are not who you think you are. Who you know
yourself to be, who you think you are, is nothing
more than a Way of Being.
This is the first critical point about the way a master
experiences life.
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62 SUMMARY
Summary So Far
3. While your Actions from moment to moment are
consistent with some combination of the aspects of
your Way of Being in those moments, your Actions
are not caused by your Way of Being (what is going
on with you internally) your Actions and your Way
of Being come together as one package, that is they
arise together.
Your Way of Being (what is going on with you
internally) and your Way of Acting are networked
together and arise as though one thing.
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63 SUMMARY
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66 SUMMARY
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Glossary Of Terms
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69 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
What Is Meant By
What You Are Dealing With
What You Are Dealing With includes:
1. The circumstances on which you are acting.
2. The circumstances in which you are acting.
3. The way in which you occur for yourself
in acting on whatever you are acting on
in the circumstances in which you are acting.
Before we leave this section, get clear for yourself
that when you are engaged with life there is nothing
else to be dealt with. Those three things are all that
there is.
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70 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
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71 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
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72 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
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75 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
Summary Of
What Is Meant By What You Are Dealing With
What You Are Dealing With includes each of the
following:
1. The circumstances on which you are acting.
2. The circumstances in which you are acting
on whatever you are acting on.
3. The way in which you occur for yourself
when acting on whatever you are acting on
in the circumstances in which you are acting.
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76 GLOSSARY WHAT YOU ARE DEALING WITH
Summary Of
What Is Meant By What You Are Dealing With
On the following slides we will always put the term
the circumstances you are dealing with
in quotes to help you remember that
what you are dealing with always includes
1) the circumstances on which you are acting,
2) the circumstances in which you are acting on
whatever you are acting on, and
3) the way in which you occur for yourself when
acting on whatever you are acting on in the
circumstances in which you are acting.
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What Is Meant By The Term
Occur
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78 GLOSSARY OCCUR
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80 GLOSSARY OCCUR
Correlated
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83 GLOSSARY CORRELATED
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84 GLOSSARY CORRELATED
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85 GLOSSARY CORRELATED
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87 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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91 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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93 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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95 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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96 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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97 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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99 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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100 THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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Access
To The Source Of
Your Way of Being And Acting
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102 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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105 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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106 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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109 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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110 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
What Is Difficult?
When someone says that what they are dealing with
is difficult, I sometimes take a page out of the Zen
Masters handbook and say, Ive never seen that.
Bring me some difficult so I can see it.
Of course difficult does not exist in the circumstances
themselves difficult exists only as an interpretation
constituted in language. The circumstances are
whatever they are what we might call whats so.
When you add the interpretation difficult that
becomes the context through which you attempt to
deal with whats so.
Whales exist in a challenging environment, but I
doubt that for whales life ever occurs as difficult.
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112 ACCESS TO THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
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116 FACTS CONTRASTED WITH INTERPRETATIONS AND STORY
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120 FACTS CONTRASTED WITH INTERPRETATIONS AND STORY
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122 THE WAY A MASTER USES THE POWER OF LANGUAGE
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125 SUMMARY
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126 SUMMARY
A Caution
As we said, what we have discussed tonight is not
about positive thinking (what we might call woo-woo
thinking). That is, what we have discussed tonight is
not about glossing over, or attempting to see what you
are confronted with in life more positively than it
actually is (and by the way, equally woo-woo, not
more negatively than it actually is).
A master sees what he or she is confronted with as it
is, without embellishment one way or the other. What
makes a master a master is what we earlier termed
honest thinking coupled with a context the master
creates through language that allows the master to see
possibilities in whatever he or she is confronted with.
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132 SUMMARY
A Caution
The other thing to watch out for is fantasy thinking
(more woo-woo thinking). Specifically fantasy
thinking is wanting (wishing for) something that has
no possible reality when looked at from the
perspective of being-in-the-world.
You dont need to know how to get there, but there
has to be in the realm of the possible when looked at
from the perspective of being-in-the-world.
Fantasy thinking is illustrated by an old joke which
appears on the next slide.
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133 SUMMARY
A Caution
Two brothers are confronted by a room full of horse
shit.
One brother walks away from the room to seek
something with more possibility for achievement.
The other brother gets into the room with a shovel
saying with all this horse shit there must be a pony in
here someplace.
Every once in a while, there is a pony buried in a
room full of horse shit, and if you like the odds, go for
it. But honest thinking about what you are confronted
with is likely to leave you with more possibility and
power.
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A Personal Experiment
To Reveal A Masters
Source Of Power
A Note To Our Readers: In the public talks this
experiment was done as a real-time back and
forth interaction. What is on the coming slides
is designed to give readers an opportunity to
conduct this experiment on their own with no
such interaction. To be able to do the
experiment by reading it, you actually have to
be doing it to get anything out of it not just
reading it and thinking about what you read.
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135 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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138 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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140 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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143 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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147 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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154 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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157 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
Out-Here
Maybe who you are is not located in here with life
located out there. Rather, as life is actually lived,
who you are is located where what a master calls
out-here out where life (the world, others, and
who you are referring to when you say I or me)
actually happens for you.
This is where a master lives: out-here, living where
life actually happens.
As lived, you are the clearing in which the world,
others, and the you that you refer to when you say I
or me, show up for you. And to bring us back to
where we started in this presentation, your actions in
that clearing are correlated with the way in which
what is in the clearing occurs for you.
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161 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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163 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
The Choice
You can go on choosing to take yourself to be and
experience living in-here, with life out-there.
Or, based on your experience (examination) of where
life actually shows up for you, you can take yourself
to be and experience living out-here where life
actually happens.
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164 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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166 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
The Truth
Which is true, I am in-here or I am out-here? Neither
is true as a matter of fact.
It is a fact that most people live the unexamined
assumption that where they are located is in-here
with everything else located out-there. However, it is
also a fact that given a chance to get beyond their
assumption and get in touch with their actual
experience, they will find that their perception of the
world, others, and what they refer to when they say
I or me is actually happening for them out-there
where they said they are not. That is, as lived, life
shows up in the clearing that one is out-here.
But to say that either in-here or out-here is the
truth is not true. Neither is to be believed.
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167 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
A Declaration:
The Stand You Take On Yourself
That you are located in-here with life out there, or
that you are located out-here where life actually
happens, is not something one gets right.
While for most people I am in-here is at first nothing
more than an unexamined assumption, in the face of
the facts, one must choose. And, what one chooses
is nothing more than, but also nothing less than, a
declaration a stand one takes on oneself.
Whichever choice declaration, the stand you take
on yourself it will determine the way you encounter
and comprehend (make sense of) life, and as a
consequence the way you interact with life.
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168 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
In Summary
We are not arguing that one of these (being in-here
or out-here) is right and the other wrong. Rather we
are saying that you have a choice.
People who practice being aware of where their
experience of objects and situations in the world, and
of other people in the world, is actually happening,
report a breakthrough in their effectiveness in dealing
with the world and with others.
In addition, the access one has to I or me is
greater when your relation to I and me is that I
and me show up in the clearing you are. This
allows you a certain detachment from your automatic
way of being that leaves you free to be.
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169 A PERSONAL EXPERIMENT
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171 SUMMARY
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172 SUMMARY
Appendix A
Action representations can be viewed as a
component of a predictive system that includes a
neural process, which simulates through motor
imagery the dynamic behavior of the body in relation
to the environment (Grush, 2004; Jordan, 1995;
Wolpert et al., 1995). This view suggests that the
presentation of a visual stimulus [the occurring] may
evoke automatically a potential motor action L
(Jeannerod, 2003) (Delevoye-Turrell et al. 2010, p.224)
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175 RESEARCH ON THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
Appendix A (Contd)
The data presented in this chapter underline the importance of
processing visual information [the occurring] in relation to one's
action possibilities L It is in fact essential to recognize that the
possibilities of action subtend the perceptual process of the
basic organization of the external world. This is similar to the
sense of spatiality developed in phenomenological philosophy
by authors like Heidegger, Husserl, or even Merleau-Ponty who
suggested that 'locations within space are not to be defined as
objective positions in relation to the objective position of our
body; rather, they inscribe around us the variable reach of our
intentions or of our movements' (Merleau-Ponty, 1945). L In
line with this perspective, we have provided in the present
chapter arguments suggesting that motor representations may
be viewed as a component of a predictive system that includes
a neural process which simulates through motor imagery the
dynamic behaviour of the body in relation to its environment.
(Delevoye-Turrell et al. 2010, p.236)
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176 RESEARCH ON THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
Appendix A (Contd)
Since Berkeley's famous essay on vision, theorists of perception
have defended the idea that the experience of spatiality proceeds
from an interpretation of sensory information through reference to
the possibilities of action (Berkeley, 1709[1985]). ... According
to [Merleau-Ponty (1945)], locations within space are not to be
defined as objective positions in relation to the objective position
of our body; rather they inscribe around us the variety of reaches
that our limbs can produce. Space is thus not uniform but
depends on our past experiences about opportunities, effects
and costs of acting in a given environment, with our own body
parts (Previc, 1998; Proffitt 2006b). L It is also necessary to
consider that possibilities of action may subtend the process of
constitution of the perceived external environment. Indeed, in a
social context, it seems necessary to define those spatial areas
that surround our body according to the specific possibilities of
functional interactions with objects and/or individuals within these
areas. (Delevoye-Turrell et al. 2010, p.218)
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177 RESEARCH ON THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
Appendix A (Contd)
To help bring the claims of the actionist [one who holds the
position that L perceptual consciousness depends constitutively
on perceivers practical grasp of the significance of movement
and action for perceptual experience (No 2010, p.245)],
sensorimotor view, into focus, and to get a feel for its significance
and reach, lets consider a well-known but poorly understood
phenomenon: the effects of inverting or reversing goggles. L
Individuals who wear the lenses for lengthy periods of time, and
who are made to engage dynamically with the environment
around them as they do so, eventually recover normal perceptual
experience (Kohler, 1951; Taylor, 1962). Such individuals
experience the position and layout of things as they are, even
though they continue to wear the reversing goggles, and L
continue to receive inverted patterns of stimulation. Once again,
how things look depends less on the discrete, individual, intrinsic
character of stimulation, than it does on the way that stimulation
is governed by patterns of sensorimotor contingency. (No 2010,
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178 RESEARCH ON THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
Appendix A (Contd)
According to the sensorimotor or, as I shall call it,
actionist approach, perceiving is an activity of
exploring the environment making use of this kind of
knowledge of the sensory effects of movement.
(No 2010, p.245)
Appendix A (Contd)
L having a perspective means that what you
experience and perceive depends systematically on
what you do, as well as vice versa. (Hurley 1998, p.86)
His [man's] perception is dynamic because it is
related to action - what can be done in a given space
... (Hall 1966, p.115)
Integration of Perceiving and Moving and Higher
Order Serial Organizations Is Dialectic Coherent
Subprocesses Arise Together Not Via Linear
Causality or Parallelism: Perceiving, thinking, and
moving always occur together, as coherent
coordinations of activity (Dewey, 1896/1981a).
(Clancey 1993, p.91) Copyright 2010 2013 W. Erhard, M. C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved. 30-May-2013
180 RESEARCH ON THE SOURCE OF YOUR WAY OF BEING AND ACTING
Appendix A (Contd)
These global patterns of neural activity are at all
times locked into both sensory and motor patterns of
input and output. These findings are interpreted to
cut against computational accounts of olfaction as
requiring decompositional structure and context-
independent symbols (Skarda and Freeman 1987,
pp. 172-73, 184, etc.; Freeman 1991, pp. 36-37, 41,
etc.).
In sum, neurophysiological evidence at both the
single-cell and cell population levels suggest shared
coding for perception and action: that the contents of
both perceptions and intentions can depend on
neural processes that blend sensory and motor
features. (Hurley 1998, p.415)
Copyright 2010 2013 W. Erhard, M. C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved. 30-May-2013
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Copyright 2010 2013 W. Erhard, M. C. Jensen, Landmark Worldwide. All rights reserved. 30-May-2013