Science, Culture and Integral Yoga

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Tuesday, July 15

United States Federal Reserve Bank Is Now in Panic Mode

by ronjon on July 15, 2008 12:55PM (PDT)

...
Fed in Panic Mode

While he is getting praise in the financial media for his “innovative” and quick reactions to the un-raveling crisis, Fed chairman Ben Bernanke in reality is in a panic mode with little short of hyperinflationary tools at hand to deal with the crisis. Yet, his room to act is increasingly bound by the soaring asset price inflation in food and oil which is pushing consumer price inflation to new highs even by the doctored “core inflation” model of the Fed.

If Bernanke continues to act to provide unlimited liquidity to prevent a banking system collapse, he risks destroying the US corporate and Treasury bond market and with it the dollar. If Bernanke acts to save the heart of the US capital market—its bond market—by raising interest rates, its only anti-inflation weapon, it will only trigger the next even more devastating round in Tsunami shock waves. ...
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Wednesday, July 2

General Grammar and the Mutation of Consciousness

by Rich on July 2, 2008 03:25PM (PDT)

A final post in this series on language concerns the mutation of consciousness triggered by the shift away from the word as signature of the thing in the world, to word as signfier. I again use Foucault's Order of Things as reference, (even though it like all other text has its critics).

According to Foucault's history this shift from words as signature of the thing, or as pure representation occurs through the advent of “General Grammar” in the 17th and early 18th century. He traces the shift through the work of such Grammarians as Bopp and Rask Foucault's method here is different than most historians who trace history through the linearity of ideas or the impact of individuals by establishing historical continuity. Rather he follows a method he calls an Archaeology. The study of Archaeology proceeds with the analysis not of individuals or specific events, but rather through the systems of thought and apprehension present in a given era which determine its discourse. He calls these eras epistemes. Moreover, Foucault says : “Archaeology is much more willing than the history of ideas to speak of discontinuities, ruptures, gaps, entirely new forms of positivity, and of sudden redistribution (Archaeology of Knowledge)

Foucault does not treat the history of grammar - later to become the science of philology and linguistics - in isolation but rather excavates it in the episteme of the Classical Age. He connects the history of Grammar with the study of Natural History -which will later become Biology - and the History of Wealth -which will later become the science of Economics-. Its probably not to much of a stretch to see this threefold study of history in comparative terms to Sri Aurobindo's method of analysis as follows: biology (physical) economics (vital) linguistics (mental)

Here Foucault describes the interrelatedness of these three domains:

The history of grammar is not the projection into the field of language and its problems of history that is generally that of a reason or of a particular mentality , a history in any case that it shares with medicine, mechanical services, or theology but that it involves a type of history -a form of dispersion in time, a mode of succession of speed of deployment or location,- that belongs to it alone even it is not unrelated to other types of history, (Archaeology of Knowledge) and here is how he traces back the origins of the study of general grammar:

.. the practice of the history of comparative grammar was to rediscover -beyond Bopp and Rask- earlier research into the filiation and kinship of language it was determined how much Anquuetil-Duperron contributed towards the composition of the Indo-European domain it was to uncover the first comparison of Sanskrit and Latin Conugations it may even lead back to Harris or Ramus (Archaeology of Knowledge)

One must first understand how Foucault perceives the episteme of the Renaissance which precedes the Classical Age in which General Grammar emerges to fully appreciate the mutation of consciousness that occurs. Knowledge in the Renaissance was concerned with knowledge by Resemblance and Similitude, while the Classical age is annunciated through an knowledge of Difference.

( It may be worthwhile to explore the similarities and differences between knowledge by Resemblance and Similitude in the European tradition and Sri Aurobindo's metaphors, tropes, discourse, and the Indic sources he draws on, in speaking of a knowledge by Identity)

The divergence of epistemes of the Renaissance and the Classical Era is explored below. Its annunciating figure is Don Quixote who reads the world through a book.

“The four modes of resemblance are pretty straightforward: 1) convenience = spatial proximity, which relies upon and breeds resemblance; 2) emulation = resemblance at a distance; 3) analogy = resemblance of relation; man is center of world; 4) sympathy = resemblance provoking spatial and qualitative change.... more »

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Tuesday, July 1

Democratic Congress signs off on Funding Major Escalation of Iranian Covert Operations, Seymour Hersh (Alternet)

by Rich on July 1, 2008 10:14AM (PDT)

Well just when you thought the Bush War Machine was winding down, news comes out of the ramp up for covert military/intelligence operations in Iran. What makes the matter so much more disgusting is that the Democratic Leadership has signed off on the funding for their project. The following interview with Seymour Hersh - the Pulitzer Prize winning dissident journalist - details the story which he just broke in the New Yorker Magazine.... more »

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