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The Semiotics of the Yi Jing (The Book of Changes) Copyright © 1999 C.J.Lofting |
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| Semiotics is the study of signs and their meaning. The Book of Changes is an ancient Chinese text
that has strongly influenced the development of Chinese culture including the development of Taoism and Confucianism. The Book of Changes is made-up of a set of symbols which encode general meanings that can then be creatively applied to particular situations and so used for prediction purposes; the symbols supply a general meaning that the user then particularises through the use of local feedback, both external in form as well as internal in form (i.e. memories). This process of deriving meaning is the source of our use of metaphors in that metaphors help us to flesh-out meanings through the use of expressing a 'thing' in terms of another 'thing' but already known. Thus metaphorcation acts to identify something by establishing a network of associations that become entangled with the 'thing', they form a coat, a facade, that is used to add colour to the 'dry' brain-based identifications of 'object' and 'relationship' (the application of the 'what/where' dichotomy) It is more often the case that this facade, this mask, if it fits well can cause the metaphor to be taken literally, something to even die for. This fleshing-out process is a form of particularisation but in the context of brain can be seen as a generalisation in that the metaphor is never the 'thing', thus the 'true' identification of something cannot be done using words, at best we can only point. ("The way that can be spoken of is not the true way.." Lao Tsu) Fundamental to the Book of Changes is the concept of T'ai Chi (an object, a whole) and the concept of yin and yang where the yin/yang dichotomy is applied recursively. Thus the yin/yang is used to flesh-out aspects of an object and in doing so refines our understanding of the object (as compared to our brain's understanding that is limited to 'objects' and 'relationships'.). An additional property of this is the emergence of 'new' objects resulting from novel configurations of yin and yang. Through an analysis of The Book of Changes, together with an analysis of Western civilisation's use of dichotomies in the mapping of reality, this site presents a model of meaning-generation that is applicable across the species (at least). This generator is in the form of a template, sourced in our neurology and neurochemistry, that utilises the recursive application of the what(object) / where(relationship) dichotomy; a dichotomy we find used throughout the human brain. This template is the source of all meaning in that meaning is expressed in the form of metaphors that help to flesh-out the recursion-derived what/where distinctions. The use of recursion leads to the generation of patterns of emotion that elicit a sense of meaning and these patterns serve as the source of fundamental (prime) meanings that we then combine through recursion into more complex forms. These complex forms are then used as the start point for further development; thus each level serves as the context for the development of the next, making it difficult to view earlier levels in their original light once we have moved on, thus we can confuse levels of analysis by putting too much, or too little, into a reflection-based interpretation. From the yin/yang perspective, the dichotomy perspective, the primary distinction in a relational context is that of opposition/cooperation where the initial structural analysis of an object has an oppositional bias, where every aspect must be in the 'correct' position. Over time this sets the structure for a more co-operational emphasis, variations on a theme. We see this development process in the interpretations of evolution where the Darwinian model stresses reactive, oppositional/neutral perspective compared to Lamarckian model which stresses a more proactive, co-operational perspective; The Darwin/Lamarck dichotomy applied recursively leads to the revelation of a continuum that seems to be a property of all analysis where we move from a reactive, 'chance' state to an increasingly proactive, 'determinist' state; the latter manifesting an increase in determinations when object and context become so entangled as to seem to manifest some sort of teleological element present. This is of course illusion in that the natural complexity-based development , strongly based on feedback processes, leads to the perception of these entangled states where 'true' wholeness includes the object's relationship with both local and non-local context. The above described development process is found in the Book of Changes in the form of different modes of interpretation where the 'FU HSI' method is based on archetypal structuring and this becomes the foundation for the 'KING WEN' method that is typal in form and allows for cooperations. The same developmental process is found in the Semiotics of Charles Peirce where we move from a 'firstness' state through 'secondness' to 'thirdness'. In general we start with an object oriented emphasis that is thus archetypal in that all objects are 'pure' in form and cannot become entangled with other objects. In this context reproduction is asexual, androgyne rules. Once a structure has been established so we naturally move to considering the space in-between objects, relational space and so context, and from there comes a transformation in analysis where we start to see relationships, dependencies that lead to a more typal emphasis where the immortality and purity of the archetype gives way to the mortality but also diversity of the typal. These distinctions, of objects and the space in-between, relational space, are traceable down to the level of fundamental particles, the fermions (object bias) and the bosons (relational bias). Presented at this site is a full analysis of the Book of Changes together with various essays etc covering the development of the template concept. The primary conjecture is that we have adapted to our environment by internalising fundamental development techniques used 'out there', mainly that of recursive dichotomisations. This method is then used by us to map 'out there' where a fundamental dichotomy-derived metaphor is Mathematics. The price for this is we sometimes confuse properties of the method of analysis with properties of the things under analysis, for example implied wave interference patterns are a property of the method and it is possible that this is the source of wave/particle duality concepts. I hope you enjoy the site and if you find the Book of Changes useful then return and use it more! On the right are a number of links to various pages in the site which will extend this discussion. Chris Lofting |
Dichotomies Yin and Yang Aristotle and A/~A Charles Peirce What & Where Financial Markets Left Brain,Right Brain Dreams & Randomness Trichotomies Charles Peirce Sigmund Freud Jacques Lacan Karl Popper Typologies MBTI© HBDI The BIG-5 The Esoterics Fundamentals Maps Quantum Mechanics Relativity Mathematics Complexity/Chaos Template+overlay |
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