Musings of a Mad Man Muddled in Mire

A Personal Reflection on the Emergence of an

Interdisciplinary World

Questions???????

• What is knowledge?• What is a discipline?• What is interdisciplinarity?

Guiding Principle

Search for the patterns that connects.

Gregory Bateson

Drivers of Change

• unsolvable problems• compression of time/space• challenges to authority (knowledge)• reclaiming experience and authority• shifts in governance• knowledge production/construction• modes of production and social organization• structures of governance• our relationship to nature• organizing metaphors

Contemporary Drivers of Change• Challenge to science (positivism)• Compression of time-space continuum• Postformal Operations• Dialectical Logic • Government to Governance• Bureaucracies to networks• National modes of production and ownership to

global modes of production and ownership• Continuous with nature• Sustainable development

My Assumptions and Beliefs

• humans are part of the evolutionary project

• the noosphere (realm of consciousness) is an active part of the evolutionary project

• the evolution of consciousness is characterized by modes of knowing the world that are increasingly inclusive

My Assumptions and Beliefs

• the evolution of human consciousness is in response to changing environmental circumstances, with a particular emphasis on encountering difference

• modes of knowing the world are institutionalized

• Eventually things change and existing modes evolve into a new mode of knowing the world and the whole cycle starts again

The Pattern that Connects Modernism and Postmodernism• confronted with problems which

existing knowledge system could not deal with

• refutation of existing canon • a reclaiming of experience • the emergence of a new way of

knowing the world • technological developments

The Pattern that Connects Modernism and Postmodernism• new modes of production• changing relationship with nature• changing social structures and

structures of governance• emergence of a new metaphor for

understanding the human journey

The Pattern that Connects

Transition to Modernism

Transition to Postmodernism

Unsolvable problems

Black plague and agricultural crises,Urbanization

Ecological crisis and increasing poverty

Challenge to authority

The “Church” and scholasticism

The Cult of Expertise and “Scientism”

Source of Challenge

Merchant class and science

Those on the margins

The Pattern that Connects

Transition to Modernism

Transition to Postmodernism

Experience and Knowledge

Experience reclaimed (empiricism)

Experience reclaimed (the margins)

Modes of Production

Artisan to mass production

Mass production to post-fordism

Structures of Governance

Representational democracy

Dialogic democracy (?)

The Pattern that Connects

Transition to Modernism

Transition to Postmodernism

Mode of Knowing

Empiricism and disciplinary knowledge

Epistemological pluralism and Interdisciplinary Knowledge

Organizing Metaphor

Progress Sustainability

Relationship to Nature

Dominance Over

Embedded within

What is a Discipline?

• a constellation of topics, perspectives and methods

• dominance of a particular approach (along with critical perspectives)

• institutional recognition • a community of self-proclaimed

scholars• methods for compelling adherence to

the discourse of the discipline

The Cognitive Foundation of Disciplinary Knowledge• no longer need to be grounded in the

actual but can begin with the theoretical (abstract)

• can ponder situations contrary to fact• develop hypotheses, propositions

and test them • invent imaginary systems• conscious of one’s own thinking

The Cognitive Foundation of Disciplinary Knowledge• reflect on one’s thinking in order to

provide logical justifications• based upon the assumption of a fixed

reality, basic elements and immutable laws

• takes place within the context of a bounded system

The Psychology of Disciplinary Knowledge• self is characterized by self-

authorship• need confirmation of psychological

autonomy• need to construct boundaries to

preserve one’s self system (self’s standards must prevail)

• there is an unwillingness to compromise one’s values, beliefs or purpose

Limitations of the Psychology of “ This” Self• unable to examine assumptions for to do

so is to threaten one’s own identity and requires getting out of the system

• unable to integrate differing systems of thought

• coordination of action through assimilation and the use of coercive power

• operates on an either/or or dualistic logic

Approaches to Interdisciplinary Knowledge: An Instrumental Approach• viewed as a practical solution to

unsolved problems• borrow tools and methods from other

disciplines to address the needs dictated by the problem

Approaches to Interdisciplinary Knowledge: Creating New Disciplines• fissioning of knowledge into more

specialties (at the borders – biochemistry)

• rejection of the unification of knowledge or the ideas of comprehension and breadth

• any integration and synthesis is a collective by-product

Approaches to Interdisciplinary Knowledge: Critical Interdisciplinary Knowledge• disciplines seen as fragmenting and have

no bearing on real social problems

• linked with the ideals of scientific objectivity and scientism

• disciplines serve the status quo and knowledge is the power to maintain the social order

Approaches to Interdisciplinary Knowledge: Critical Interdisciplinary Knowledge• a quest for critical and

transformative knowledge• concerned not only with the content

of knowledge but the process of knowledge construction

• responsive to political and social needs

• characterized by communication among different knowledge domains

Building a Model of Understanding Interdisciplinary Knowledge

Interior Individual intentional I

Exterior Individual behavioral it

Interior Collective Culture (Worldspace) we

Exterior Collective Social or Communal its

A Working Model of Interdisciplinary Knowledge

Individual-Subjective• truthfulness (sincerity, integrity, and trustworthiness)

Individual-Objective• truth (correspondence, representational, propositional)

Collective-Subjective• justness (cultural fit, mutual understanding)

Collective-Objective• functional fit (systems theory, social networks)

Interdisciplinary Knowledge as Process

Interior Individual• introspection and reflection

Exterior Individual• observation

Interior Collective• interpretation and dialogue

Exterior Collective• observation

Implications

• The actions of individuals cannot be understood independent of the systems in which they are embededded within (ecological understanding).

• The actions of individual and the development and action of systems cannot be understood independent of the cultural systems of which they are part (cultural understanding).

Implications

• Within in any cultural system individuals will have a unique constellation of differing experiences (gender, class, etc.) that result in unique perspectives on any one phenomenon or issue (stakeholders).

• The unique constellation of experiences gives rise to differing individual actions within any system.

• Therefore changes in one quadrant require changes in the other quadrants.

Implications

• What we see and how we act in light of “empirical” evidence will be dependent upon the cultural system of which we are a part and our position within that cultural system.

• Challenges and changes from various positionalities can alter cultural systems (new or alternative worldviews) that then alter what we see in the empirical world.

• Knowledge of the “empirical” world can facilitate reflexivity and reflectivity which results in the development of new worldviews and ways of being in the world (individual and collective).

Implications

• Knowledge is a process of construction and negotiation and not discovery.

• Knowledge is always embedded within power relationships.

The Cognitive Foundations of Interdisciplinary Knowledge Self• the ability to structure inherently logical

formal systems• the acceptance of more than one logical

system pertaining to a given event• the commitment to one set of a priori

beliefs of many sets• awareness that the same manipulation of

the same variable can have varying effects due to temporal and environmental contexts

The Cognitive Foundations of Interdisciplinary Knowledge: The Inter-Individual Self• awareness that the concept of causal

linearity is erroneous when reality is multicausal

• an understanding that contradiction, subjectivity, and choice are inherent in all logical objective observations

• the need to take into account that contradictory multiple causes and solutions can be equally correct in real life within certain limits

• an awareness that an outcome state is inseparable from an outcome process-leading-to-state

The Psychology of the Inter- Personal Self • identity is no longer bound by the

system• exists outside the systems rather

than feeling a need to choose a system

• develops a capacity to reframe perspectives, problems or solutions

The Psychology of the Inter-Personal Self• tolerates negative feedback• understand that other perspectives are

logically justifiable• a tolerance of difference and actively

moves towards integration of perspectives• assumes no universal order but that orders

arise as a result of history and culture and across time

Dialectic Reasoning: The Foundation of the Inter-Individual Self• dialectic reasoning is the process

whereby one creates more inclusive categories in response to the perspective of others

• knowledge is local and contextual• dialoguing across difference becomes

an important activity for knowledge construction

Challenges to an Interdisciplinary Program• What is the role of theory?• What constitutes quality?• What are “valid” and reliable

methods?• What constitutes a contribution?• What are the implications for training

interdisciplinary researchers?