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When we tease apart the structure of our higher frames-of-references (or meta-states) from the primary experiences we do so to create clarity about the inherent structure within complex states. In actual practice, however, primary and meta levels of experiences or states merge into one unit. Research scientist Arthur Koestler introduced the term “holons” to describe reality as composed of “whole/parts.” These whole/parts holons refer to any “entity” that is itself a whole and yet simultaneously a part of some other whole.
“To explain the observed phenomena we always have to consider the wider context of the learning experiment.” Why? “The larger context may change the sign of the reinforcement proposed by a given message, and evidently the larger context may also change the mnode – may place the message in the category of humor, metaphor, etc. … The context (or meta-message) classifies the message, but can never meet it on equal terms.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 246-247)
This means several things. First as holons, we experience our “states” as a whole. We experience confidence, courage, commitment, playfulness, joy, flow, etc. as a whole experience and not as the various variables that make up the experience. Yet second, each exists as a part of some larger whole. Within the holistic experience there is a part/whole structured experience — inner contexts and contexts-of-contexts.
As a system, we now have systemic properties arising. We have the emergence of new qualities. By transcending the current state or experience and including it, we put the experience within a higher frame.
In systems, the new gestalt is “more than and different from the sum of the parts.” Merely adding all of the parts together does not, and cannot, explain what emerges. Emergence occurs as new properties arise and there is a leap upward to a higher form of organization.
“So there are both discontinuties in evolution —mind cannot be reduced to life, and life cannot be reduced to matter; and there are continuities ..” (Ken Wilber, 1996, p. 24)
Each higher level embraces and engulfs the lower. When you take a primary state like anger or confidence and set various frames on it, you create the possibility for new emergent properties to emerge.
Imagine embracing your anger with acceptance, appreciation, and then wonder. Imagine engulfing it in love, respect, and honor. Imagine applying mindfulness, values, and patience to it. Imagine bringing ecology concerns, moral uprightness, and honor to it. Mix well. Put into the oven of your mind, let it bake for awhile…
“To explain the observed phenomena we always have to consider the wider context of the learning experiment.” Why? “The larger context may change the sign of the reinforcement proposed by a given message, and evidently the larger context may also change the mnode – may place the message in the category of humor, metaphor, etc. … The context (or meta-message) classifies the message, but can never meet it on equal terms.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 246-247)
This means several things. First as holons, we experience our “states” as a whole. We experience confidence, courage, commitment, playfulness, joy, flow, etc. as a whole experience and not as the various variables that make up the experience. Yet second, each exists as a part of some larger whole. Within the holistic experience there is a part/whole structured experience — inner contexts and contexts-of-contexts.
As a system, we now have systemic properties arising. We have the emergence of new qualities. By transcending the current state or experience and including it, we put the experience within a higher frame.
In systems, the new gestalt is “more than and different from the sum of the parts.” Merely adding all of the parts together does not, and cannot, explain what emerges. Emergence occurs as new properties arise and there is a leap upward to a higher form of organization.
“So there are both discontinuties in evolution —mind cannot be reduced to life, and life cannot be reduced to matter; and there are continuities ..” (Ken Wilber, 1996, p. 24)
Each higher level embraces and engulfs the lower. When you take a primary state like anger or confidence and set various frames on it, you create the possibility for new emergent properties to emerge.
Imagine embracing your anger with acceptance, appreciation, and then wonder. Imagine engulfing it in love, respect, and honor. Imagine applying mindfulness, values, and patience to it. Imagine bringing ecology concerns, moral uprightness, and honor to it. Mix well. Put into the oven of your mind, let it bake for awhile…
A word that is a close synonym of meta is frame. A frame is a perceptual filter, it sets a category or a class, it is an interpretative schema as a structure whereby we attribute meaning to things. And similar to meta, it does many things simultaneously. As such it manages meaning, governs attention, controls responses, creates an orientation, orders (organizes) perception, punctuates a series of events, etc.
“Within dream or fantasy the dreamer does not operate with the concept ‘untrue.’ He operates with all sorts of statements but with a curious inabiity to achieve meta-statements. He cannot … dream a statement referring to (i.e., framing) his dream.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 185)
“The first step in defining a psychological frame might be to say that it is (or delimits) a class or set of messages.” (p. 186)
“While the analogy of the mathematical set is perhaps over abstract, the analogy of the picture frame is excessively concrete. The psychological concept which we are trying to define is neither physical nor logical. … Psychological frames are exclusive, i.e., by including certain messages within a frame, certain other messages are excluded. Psychological frames are inclusive, i.e., by excluding certain messages certain others are included. …” (187)
“A frame is meta-communicative. Any message, which either explicitly or implicitly defines a frame, ipso facto gives the receiver instructions or aids in his attempt to understand the messages included within the frame.” (188)
“Within dream or fantasy the dreamer does not operate with the concept ‘untrue.’ He operates with all sorts of statements but with a curious inabiity to achieve meta-statements. He cannot … dream a statement referring to (i.e., framing) his dream.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 185)
“The first step in defining a psychological frame might be to say that it is (or delimits) a class or set of messages.” (p. 186)
“While the analogy of the mathematical set is perhaps over abstract, the analogy of the picture frame is excessively concrete. The psychological concept which we are trying to define is neither physical nor logical. … Psychological frames are exclusive, i.e., by including certain messages within a frame, certain other messages are excluded. Psychological frames are inclusive, i.e., by excluding certain messages certain others are included. …” (187)
“A frame is meta-communicative. Any message, which either explicitly or implicitly defines a frame, ipso facto gives the receiver instructions or aids in his attempt to understand the messages included within the frame.” (188)
Structurally, a meta-state stands in special relationship to a state. The second state relates to the primary state as a higher awareness about the lower state. The junior state functions as a member of the class defined by the higher state. The higher or meta-state functions as a category for understanding and feeling about the lower.
That’s why “fear of our anger” (fearful anger) differs in texture so much from “respect of our anger” (respectful anger).
That’s why “shame about getting angry because it only turns things nasty” differs so much in texture to “appreciation of my powers to get angry because it informs me that some perceived value or understanding feels violated and allows me to respectfully explore the situation anger.”
As a higher logical level, the mental and emotional frames that we bring to our primary experiences represent the governing influences of beliefs, decisions, identities, etc. The higher frame, as a message about the lower experience, modulates, organizes, and governs it. It functions like a self-organizing attractor in the mind-body system. In your meta-states, you will find values, beliefs, expectations, understandings, identifications, etc. Some will be obvious and explicit, others will be hidden and convert.
That’s why “fear of our anger” (fearful anger) differs in texture so much from “respect of our anger” (respectful anger).
That’s why “shame about getting angry because it only turns things nasty” differs so much in texture to “appreciation of my powers to get angry because it informs me that some perceived value or understanding feels violated and allows me to respectfully explore the situation anger.”
As a higher logical level, the mental and emotional frames that we bring to our primary experiences represent the governing influences of beliefs, decisions, identities, etc. The higher frame, as a message about the lower experience, modulates, organizes, and governs it. It functions like a self-organizing attractor in the mind-body system. In your meta-states, you will find values, beliefs, expectations, understandings, identifications, etc. Some will be obvious and explicit, others will be hidden and convert.
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Two Worlds: Newtonian (Substance) and Communication (Form)
metanymous в посте Metapractice (оригинал в ЖЖ)
Two Worlds: Newtonian (Substance) and Communication (Form)
Bateson constantly spoke about two worlds which operate by different principles and “dynamics.” He emphasized that while the term “dynamics” can be used literally for the Newtonian wolrd, it can only be used metaphorically for the inner world of communication.
“The difference between the Newtonian world and the world of communication is simply this: that the Newtonian world ascribes reality to objects and achieves its simplicity by excluding the context of the context — excluding indeed all meta-relationships —a fortiori excluding an infinite regress of such relations.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 250, italics added)
“The explanatory world of substance can invoke no differences and no ideas but only forces and impacts. And per contra, the world of form and communication invokes no things, forces, or impacts but only differences and ideas.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 271, also p. 489)
For the world of communication, we use our self-reflexivity to move up a logical level to set a frame-of-reference about our experience in the Newtonian world. Doing this creates a meta-level state, an inner context of understanding, which then defines the pattern — “a contextual structure, a set of rules for how to put the information together” (Bateson, p. 276). Together all of these variables make up the human mind-body-emotion system. This gives us a holistic system with feedback and feed-forward communication loops.
Bateson constantly spoke about two worlds which operate by different principles and “dynamics.” He emphasized that while the term “dynamics” can be used literally for the Newtonian wolrd, it can only be used metaphorically for the inner world of communication.
“The difference between the Newtonian world and the world of communication is simply this: that the Newtonian world ascribes reality to objects and achieves its simplicity by excluding the context of the context — excluding indeed all meta-relationships —a fortiori excluding an infinite regress of such relations.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 250, italics added)
“The explanatory world of substance can invoke no differences and no ideas but only forces and impacts. And per contra, the world of form and communication invokes no things, forces, or impacts but only differences and ideas.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 271, also p. 489)
For the world of communication, we use our self-reflexivity to move up a logical level to set a frame-of-reference about our experience in the Newtonian world. Doing this creates a meta-level state, an inner context of understanding, which then defines the pattern — “a contextual structure, a set of rules for how to put the information together” (Bateson, p. 276). Together all of these variables make up the human mind-body-emotion system. This gives us a holistic system with feedback and feed-forward communication loops.
1) Classify. “The context (or meta-message) classifies the message…” (Bateson, 1972, p. 247). “In human life … there occur signals whose major function is to classify contexts” … context markers (Bateson, 1972, p. 289). With each new frame we simultaneously set an internal context for our experience. Each meta-level is simultaneously a meta-state, named by some meta-term, a frame, an inner context.
2) Qualify. “All messages and parts of messages are like phrases or segments of equations which a mathematician puts in brackets. Outside the brackets there may always be a qualifier or multiplier which will alter the whole tenor of the phrase.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 232). As a higher level is set to classify members of the set, it modulates and qualifies their members.
3) Govern. “… in the process of therapy, there must have been communication at a level meta to these rules. There must have been communication about a change in rules.” (Bateson, 1972, p. 191). The higher modulates the lower as the bias set in a thermostat controls the range of flexibility of temperature in a room.
4) Expand Perspective. The process of moving up to a meta or higher level simultaneously expands one’s perspective. When a person moves from a particular to more general and abstract level (the class or category), the person at the same time gains a broader perspective of a large horizon.
5) Gestalt and Emergence. The process of “going meta” is not always additive, in fact, it is more typically exponential. It multiples things so that a gestalt experience arises. Then something “more than and different from the sum of the parts” arise. This is an emergent property in a system of multiple variables. Many complex states (courage, forgiveness, self-esteem, seeing opportunity, etc.) are gestalt states.
Lots of things happen simultaneously in the meta process. By “going meta” you 1) classify an item. You put it in a certain category and this delimits what’s in that category. 2) Qualify or texture the items in that classification. 3) Govern the experience as it sets up the “rules” for how the experience now operates.
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The Multiple and Rich Significance of Meta-Levels
metanymous в посте Metapractice (оригинал в ЖЖ)
Given all of this, when you move to, or create, a meta-level, you are doing multiple things simultaneously. You are creating a frame that classifies the experience, setting an internal context that controls the meaning of the test, establishing a “game” that has inner rules, etc.
Start with a second thought about a first thought. This creates a frame-of-reference for the first thought and within that frame are multiple understandings. We call them by various meta-terms: beliefs, understandings, identity, memories, imaginations, permissions, etc.
An example: Access a thought-emotion of joy (delight, fun, playfulness) about learning. This joy (second thought or emotion) is about the state of learning (being receptive, changing perception, etc.). In doing this, you set a frame of joy about learning. The joy also becomes your inner context about learning. Learning now becomes a member of the class of Joyful things. Now you probably believe in learning as being fun. You might even define yourself as a joyful learner.
This is where terminology, critically important becomes challenging. Because the abstractions we use are reified (treated as a real thing and coded as nominalizations). This terminology itself makes understanding and clarity difficult. Bateson note how much language restrains us and creates problems for clear thinking when we move to this realm.
“These signals are evidently of higher Logical Type than the messages they classify. Among human beings this framing and labeling of messages and meaningful actions reaches considerable complexity, with the peculiarity that our vocabulary for such discrimination is still very poorly developed…” (Bateson, 1972, p. 203).
Speaking about abstractions in language such as “hostility,” “love,” “dependence,” etc. as if real things, he noted that “this is epistemology backwards,” and says—
“We are so befuddled by language that we cannot think straight…” (p. 275)
Start with a second thought about a first thought. This creates a frame-of-reference for the first thought and within that frame are multiple understandings. We call them by various meta-terms: beliefs, understandings, identity, memories, imaginations, permissions, etc.
An example: Access a thought-emotion of joy (delight, fun, playfulness) about learning. This joy (second thought or emotion) is about the state of learning (being receptive, changing perception, etc.). In doing this, you set a frame of joy about learning. The joy also becomes your inner context about learning. Learning now becomes a member of the class of Joyful things. Now you probably believe in learning as being fun. You might even define yourself as a joyful learner.
This is where terminology, critically important becomes challenging. Because the abstractions we use are reified (treated as a real thing and coded as nominalizations). This terminology itself makes understanding and clarity difficult. Bateson note how much language restrains us and creates problems for clear thinking when we move to this realm.
“These signals are evidently of higher Logical Type than the messages they classify. Among human beings this framing and labeling of messages and meaningful actions reaches considerable complexity, with the peculiarity that our vocabulary for such discrimination is still very poorly developed…” (Bateson, 1972, p. 203).
Speaking about abstractions in language such as “hostility,” “love,” “dependence,” etc. as if real things, he noted that “this is epistemology backwards,” and says—
“We are so befuddled by language that we cannot think straight…” (p. 275)
Given that we can create communication-about-communication, and states-about-states, and these states merge and permeate to generate gestalt states (or experiences). What was meta or higher does not stay higher because, as the system operates, it eventually becomes incorporated within the state. When you transcend and include, you apply higher levels to the lower levels and eventually the higher levels permeate the lower levels — they coalesce.
Responsibility coalesces into commitment to a goal in a situation of fear and so “courage” then emerges as a gestalt state — more than and different from the sum of the parts.
Conversely, we can tease out the higher levels by simply inquiring about the quality of a state.
What’s the quality of your anger? That is,when you feel anger, what is that like for you? Do you like yourself when you are angry? Are you respectful and thoughtful when you’re angry? Do you lose your head and go ballistic when you get angry? Can you maintain civility and patience when you’re feeling upset or angry? Or do you become impatient and insulting?
Asking about the quality of a state flushes out the higher level frame that’s governing the state. Inside that “frame” are thoughts, understandings, beliefs, identifications, decisions, memories, imaginations, etc. These meta-states are the states that you have previously brought to the experience, the experience now is a member of these frames.
Responsibility coalesces into commitment to a goal in a situation of fear and so “courage” then emerges as a gestalt state — more than and different from the sum of the parts.
Conversely, we can tease out the higher levels by simply inquiring about the quality of a state.
What’s the quality of your anger? That is,when you feel anger, what is that like for you? Do you like yourself when you are angry? Are you respectful and thoughtful when you’re angry? Do you lose your head and go ballistic when you get angry? Can you maintain civility and patience when you’re feeling upset or angry? Or do you become impatient and insulting?
Asking about the quality of a state flushes out the higher level frame that’s governing the state. Inside that “frame” are thoughts, understandings, beliefs, identifications, decisions, memories, imaginations, etc. These meta-states are the states that you have previously brought to the experience, the experience now is a member of these frames.
Bateson noted that the term meta creates a hierarchic series whether we are speaking about “change,” “learning,” “contexts,” etc.
“Within the field of pure communication theory, the steps of an hierarchic series may be constructed by successive use of the word ‘about,’ or ‘meta.’ Our hierarchical series will consist of message, meta-message, meta-meta-message, and so on.” (1972, p. 247-8)
He also noted that with the meta level structures that’s within communication and consciousness there are inherent complications.
“Further complications are added … by noting that message may be about (or ‘meta’ to) the relationship between messages of different levels. … In human relations another sort of complexity may be generated; e.g., message may be emitted forbidding the subject to make the meta connection. … The hierarchy of messages and contexts thus becomes a complex branching structure.” (1972, p. 248)
“Within the field of pure communication theory, the steps of an hierarchic series may be constructed by successive use of the word ‘about,’ or ‘meta.’ Our hierarchical series will consist of message, meta-message, meta-meta-message, and so on.” (1972, p. 247-8)
He also noted that with the meta level structures that’s within communication and consciousness there are inherent complications.
“Further complications are added … by noting that message may be about (or ‘meta’ to) the relationship between messages of different levels. … In human relations another sort of complexity may be generated; e.g., message may be emitted forbidding the subject to make the meta connection. … The hierarchy of messages and contexts thus becomes a complex branching structure.” (1972, p. 248)
Nor does it stop at one level. Korzybski said that humans can “go meta” infinitely, that is, it is a process without end. With animals, the reflecting back onto one’s experience ends, not so with humans. With the reflexive consciousness of humans, whatever you think and/or feel, you can step back and think yet another thought/feeling about that.
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