| Title & Author | Abstract | |
|---|---|---|
| 10(077) | MAPS OF MEANING: THE ARCHITECTURE OF BELIEF
[Routledge, 1999, 544 pp. ISBN 0415922224] Precis of Peterson on Meaning-Belief Jordan B. Peterson Department of Psychology University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 3G3 http://psych.utoronto.ca/~peterson/mom.htm peterson@psych.utoronto.ca |
Abstract:
It is not clear that either the categories "given" to us
by our senses, or those abstracted for us by the processes of
scientific investigation, constitute the most "real" or even the
most "useful" modes of apprehending the fundamental nature of being
or experience. The categories offered by traditional myths and
religious systems might play that role. Such systems of apprehension
present the world as a place of constant moral striving, conducted
against a background of interplay between the "divine forces" of
order and chaos. "Order" is the natural category of all those
phenomena whose manifestations and transformations are currently
predictable. "Chaos" is the natural category of "potential" - the
potential that emerges whenever an error in prediction occurs. The
capacity for creative exploration - embodied in mythology in the
form of the "ever-resurrecting hero" - serves as the mediator
between these fundamental constituent elements of experience.
Voluntary failure to engage in such exploration - that is, forfeit
of identification with "the world-redeeming savior" - produces a
chain of causally interrelated events whose inevitable endpoint is
adoption of a rigid, ideology-predicated, totalitarian identity,
and violent suppression of the eternally threatening other.
Keywords: aggression, cybernetics, mythology, natural category, neuropsychology, peace, religion, war |
| 11(124) | THE PSYCHOLOGY OF WHAT IS AND WHAT SHOULD BE: AN EXPERIENTIAL
AND MORAL PSYCHOLOGY OF THE KNOWN AND THE UNKNOWN Review of Peterson on Meaning-Belief Maxine Sheets-Johnstone Department of Philosophy University of Oregon Eugene, OR 97403 msj@oregon.uoregon.edu |
Abstract:
Jordan Peterson's "Maps Of Meaning: The Architecture Of
Belief" is an original, provocative, complex, and fascinating book,
which is also at times conceptually troubling, unduly repetitive,
and exasperating in its format. The positive values of the book far
outweigh its detractions; the detractions, however, warrant
specification, and although detailed, are offered only as spurs to
strengthen, deepen, and/or elaborate the timely, fine, and
painstaking analysis Peterson presents.
Keywords: aggression, cybernetics, mythology, natural category, neuropsychology, peace, religion, war |