1. Context

This section is concerned with the forms through which new concepts and insights could be presented or communicated in response to the global problematique. It is based on the recognition that the public information programmes developed by intergovernmental and non-governmental agencies have tended to concentrate on a limited range of forms of presentation, often used such that they do not complement each other or reinforce each others effects.

This section provides commentaries related to the significance of Patterns and Metaphors, a section of the Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential

Related Sections

1. Significance

Although frequently used in international debate through which strategies are defined, the advantages of metaphor have not been deliberately explored to assist in the implementation of such strategies. Each development policy may be considered a particular "answer" to the global problematique. No such answer appears to be free from fundamental weaknesses. A shift to an alternative policy becomes progressively more necessary as the effects of these weaknesses accumulate.

Profiles

Scope

Any form of international "mobilization of public opinion" (using the conventional military metaphor), to engender the much sought "political will to change", is dependent upon communication. This is especially the case when the insights required to guide that change are complex, counter-intuitive or simply not clearly communicable within any one conceptual language.

Metaphors are a special form of presentation natural to many cultures. They are of unique importance as a means of communicating complex notions, especially in interdisciplinary and multicultural dialogue, as well as in the popularization of abstract concepts, in political discourse and as part of any creative process. They offer the special advantage of calling upon a pre-existing capacity to comprehend complexity, rather than assuming that people need to engage in lengthy educational processes before being able to comprehend.

1. System of Maruyama (Epistemological mindscapes)

(a) H-mindscape (homogenistic, hierarchical, classificational): Parts are subordinated to the whole, with subcategories neatly grouped into supercategories. The strongest, or the majority, dominate at the expense of the week values, policies, problems, priorities, etc). Logic is deductive and axiomatic demanding sequential reasoning. Cause-effect relations may be deterministic or probabilistic.

1. Unarticulated "holism" as a conceptual trap

In the desperate search for meaningful forms of conceptual integration, some simplistic forms of holism have exerted a hypnotic effect. The "holographic paradigm" and the concept of "Gaia" have performed a useful function in focusing attention on the possibility of forms of integration beyond the fragmentation of the disciplines. This tends to be achieved at the expense of any means of articulating variety and detail within such perspectives.

1. Tuning the pattern

The ordered collection of statements presented in Section KP (see document) raises a number of interesting questions. It is necessarily imperfect, and is even more so as a first draft. Its current status can best be compared to an untuned musical instrument. Only when it is tuned, to the extent possible, will it be possible to determine whether it can be realistically applied as a guide to operations.