“In the age of the internet attaching a famous name to your personal opinion to give more weight to it is a very valid strategy.” — Benjamin Franklin

Quote posted by Anonymous in a comment to a blog post of Bruce Schneier about a misquote.

Breathe!

Added by Siona van Dijk. Or in my mother’s words: Schnaufn nid vagessn (Austrian dialect for “Don’t forget to breathe”). Thus, in a daring attempt to get the feel of an eyes’ glimpse of the air she is breathing, I scurried over to Siona’s profile where she writes

I trust uncertainty, don’t care for irony, and believe that paradox is a profound measure of truth.
— Siona van Dijk

Paradoxes only! Can you see the tree? On the path from trust to truth and back, the very grounds for liars to let trees flourish (trees with leaves of words) what more could we ask for? — Coffee! Of course, yes, but that’s again another story (though the same as above). — Simplification? — This is going to be complicated.

However, in the list of Siona’s bookmarks I found a link leading us to a list of Ten Commandments for a Simpler Way of Life (maybe we should make a list of lists, Juliet, please) where one can find (further) advices such as

II. You shall laugh on a daily basis.
VII. You shall turn off your technology.
VIII. You shall be spontaneous.
X. You shall learn what is ‘enough’.
— Ririan, 2007-04-05

An interesting list of commandments as only no liars could ever compile. A liar, though, cannot resist to add: For to lead a simple life You shall simplify simplification!

Sure, we “believe that all this could very well be wrong” (Siona van Dijk).

Having found the eyes, I’ll now go and look for roots.

But before I gonna move on, one more advice from yours truly rattus rattus: Answer for yourself what advice means to you.

sometimes we do not care, those are the good times.

And because it is not right what you say I so much trust your words.

[X] [X]

O me, man of slack faith so long!
Standing aloof—denying portions so long;
Only aware to-day of compact, all-diffused truth;
Discovering to-day there is no lie, or form of lie, and can be none, but grows as inevitably upon itself as the truth does upon itself,
Or as any law of the earth, or any natural production of the earth does

(This is curious, and may not be realized immediately—But it must be realized;
I feel in myself that I represent falsehoods equally with the rest,
And that the universe does.)

Where has fail’d a perfect return, indifferent of lies or the truth?
Is it upon the ground, or in water or fire? or in the spirit of man? or in the meat and blood?
Meditating among liars, and retreating sternly into myself, I see that there are really no liars or lies after all,
And that nothing fails its perfect return—And that what are called lies are perfect returns,
And that each thing exactly represents itself, and what has preceded it,
And that the truth includes all, and is compact, just as much as space is compact,
And that there is no flaw or vacuum in the amount of the truth—but that all is truth without exception;
And henceforth I will go celebrate anything I see or am,
And sing and laugh, and deny nothing.

Walt Whitman, All is Truth. First published in ‘Leaves of Grass’ 1855.

If I was in need of self-affirmation, I would just do the same. Critical thinking is all good and praiseworthy. Indeed. Please criticize! Them, me, and don’t forget yourself!

Double binds and Catch-22s might be fun as part of brain-teasers, and they build grounds for game theoretic prisoner’s dilemmas. Though, some might want to keep in mind that double binds have also long been discussed in the context of schizophrenia. As much as they are versatile means of breaking one’s personality and self-esteem they are essential not only to modern techniques of torture.

On no side’s side:
You want feedback? — You got it.

Every sentence that I utter must be understood not as an affirmation, but as a question.

– Niels Bohr (Danish physicist, 1885-1962)

Assumption

The basic assumption (or condition) is that there is you. From this it follows that there’s something which — or somebody who — is not you.²

Corollary

In order to know you need to know about what is not you. Thus, whatever you want to know about what is not you needs to find some way into you.

The English language has a huge number of terms for these “ways”: Learn, observe, perceive, watch, hear, realize, comprehend, get, … you name it. Their essential aspect is that something is happening (on the way). Let’s call this the “process of perception” (but you may call it whatever you prefer).

That’s it.

In other words, constructivism acknowledges that — if you assume that there is you and something or somebody who is not you — there is something in between. For instance, a medium (that needs to be passed), some time (that goes by), an act of observation, sensory receptions, a recognition, maybe a translation, a calculation, or a memorization, and probably some thinking. Or else, you wouldn’t be able to know about what is not you.

The visual system (like of human beings), as well as any other sensory system, or a close look into a human eye illustrates the multitude of processes which is involved with the “process of perception”.

Varieties of constructivism

The specifics of the “process of perception” are interpreted and described in varying ways by the many facets of constructivism. Also, some forms of constructivism confine their theories to less general distinctions of you versus what is not you (e.g. social constructivism examines mostly social relations like you and a friend, groups of people, or societies, and how those perceive each other and everything else).

[Radical constructivism] starts from the assumption that knowledge (…) is in the heads of persons, and that the thinking subject has no alternative but to construct what he or she knows on the basis of his or her own experience.
– Ernst von Glasersfeld³

Concluding

Constructivism offers ways of perceiving perception.
If you prefer other perceptions of constructivism, welcome aboard.

—-

1) The presented text is no explanation apart from the fact that you might view it as a plain representation flattened out on a computer screen or paper.
2) If for whatever reason you cannot agree here, either because you think there is only you, or because you think nothing exists independently of you, then you can stop reading since you are already thinking in a most constructivistic manner.
3) Ernst von Glasersfeld: Radical Constructivism. A Way of Knowing and Learning. London: Falmer Press 1995. Page 1.

Curiously enough, this is some hint if you consider the fact that many people who by others are referred to as being constructivists never did so themselves. This applies to me as well as to this blog. I shall always happily refer to myself as a liar.

Then again, I do not know what Zeuch means by constructivism. In fact, I cannot know what goes on in Zeuch’s head at all, can I? Heck, I have no idea of what goes on in my own head. Does Zeuch? — Anyway, this not-knowing is part of (radical) constructivism according to Ernst von Glasersfeld who should know (1).

Even if I wanted to avoid using the label constructivism I would have a hard time letting you know. Though, if there is constructivism then it doesn’t matter anyhow. Or so, many think (as if it does matter if it doesn’t).

So, what is constructivism? — It’s a lie! Constructivism is the lie that makes understanding feasible. And because of this, I shall happily explain to you constructivism. Watch out!

—-

1) Ernst von Glasersfeld: “We Can Never Know What Goes On In Somebody Else’s Head”: Ernst Von Glasersfeld On Truth And Viability, Language And Knowledge, And The Premises Of Constructivist Education; An interview conducted by B. Pörksen. Cybernetics and Systems 35 (2004) 4: 379-398.

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

– Walt Whitman, Song of Myself in Leaves of Grass