The New Agenda of Praxis

THE NEW
AGENDA OF PRAXIS

ZVI LANIR AND GAD SNEH

Beyond Post-Modern De-Construction

Introduction

Knowledge encompasses some of the most puzzling and persistent issues that have engaged philosophers since ancient times. Our intellectual odyssey begins with a frustration with the modern program, set against the background of the pre-modern worldview. It proceeds with great expectations for a breakthrough resulting from the insights of the postmodern stance. Next comes the realization of the strengths as well as the severe limitations of this stance. Our odyssey eventually arrives at acknowledging the need for the reconstruction of a new theory and method adequate to the intricacies of post-postmodern existence, and unfolds the fundamental starting points for a new agenda of Praxis.

We contend that following the modern emphasis on the construction of strict disciplinary knowledge with its inhibitory and degenerative tendencies, and the postmodern insistence on the deconstruction of knowledge with its devastating effects, there is an urgent need nowadays for the reconstruction of our epistemology.

The need for reconstruction is apparent, for instance, in the confusion between knowledge and information. Baddeley (1997, p. 233) notes that "there is nothing more frustrating than looking up a word in the dictionary only to find it referred to another word, which in turn is defined in terms of the first word." Indeed, the entry information in The Oxford English Dictionary reads, among other definitions, "the sum of what is known;" the entry knowledge reads "a person's range of information." This circular definition resembles the following conversation found in Joseph Heller's Catch 22: "'What does the fish remind you of?' 'Other fish.' 'And what other fish remind you of?' 'Other fish.'"

This symptom is also apparent in the professional literature. Thus, for instance, in a book titled Organizing Knowledge: An Introduction to Information Retrieval, the author explains that "the organization of knowledge is concerned with establishing systems for organizing documents and information so that they can be retrieved by the user as required" (Rowley, 1992, p. xviii). According to Laura Empson (Financial Times, October 4, 1999), "most of what consultants are selling as knowledge management... is simply re-branding of information management... Most IT based 'knowledge management systems' are merely sophisticated and efficient mechanisms for filing and disseminating information."

The determination that we live in an information age rather than in a knowledge age is not trivial. It is rooted in the confusion left by postmodern thought. When there is no test of functionality or pragmatism, "nobody ever knows anything about anything" (Unger, 1974); when we cannot endow data with both coherence and relevance, even the determination of an information age, not to speak of a knowledge age, is questionable.

Postmodern thought lacks an elaborate methodology and appropriate mechanisms to devise new knowledge constructs, after the shattering of the old foundations. It is therefore difficult for its followers to propose a new agenda for a knowledge age.

Pre-modern roots

Our first station on the way to Praxis is the ancient world of Greek philosophy; for here are found the roots of the modern program and the way it has conceived the nature of scientific understanding and practical knowledge.

We may say that early pre-modern epistemology was based on the revelation of a Divine Plan, the related dualistic notions of the pure forms in God's mind, the imperfect approximation in human behavior in the material world, and the superiority of the ideal over the real.

Plato was the first Western philosopher to consider in some detail the nature of knowledge and the way in which it is obtained. Plato saw true knowledge as lying in the forms - abstract, generic (universal), unchanging (eternal), non-physical realities. This approach is known as the "traditional" analysis of knowledge.

The Socratic method is essential for Platonic philosophy, and is still predominant in Western scientific endeavors. To Socrates, truth was absolute, abstract, generic and context-free. In contrast to the Sophists, Socratic skepticism was tentative and provisional; Socrates' doubt and assumed ignorance were an indispensable first step in the pursuit of knowledge. Socrates believed that there are truths upon which all men can agree, and proceeded to uncover such truths by discussion or by questions and answers. The Socratic dialectic method was the art of intellectual midwifery, causing other men's ideas to be born. It was also conceptual or definitional in that it set as the goal of knowledge the acquisition of concepts such as justice and wisdom. Socrates assumed that truth was embodied in correct definitions. The Socratic method is empirical or inductive, in that the proposed definitions are criticized through reference to particular instances, as well as deductive in that these definitions are tested as their implications are being drawn out.

Plato's follower, Aristotle, departed from the idealism of his teacher and became increasingly concerned with science and the phenomena of the world. Aristotle claims that all knowledge begins with sensory perception of concrete, particular, changeable, physical things. Natural forms (the true, unchanging essences of things), and all other basic categories with which we think and comprehend things, are abstracted from images we receive through sensory experience from particular things, or inferred and elaborated on the basis of these. Forms do not exist apart from a particular thing; therefore, the mind has no inherent intellectual access to them apart from abstracting them from sensory perception. Complete knowledge involves the construction of a systematic hierarchy of valid syllogisms that demonstrate and explain the truth of its conclusions, on the basis of generic premises known to be true.

Aristotle's ideas and methods were enormously influential on all subsequent thought, and set the stage for the modern scientific understanding as described below.

The usual meaning of the Greek term praxis roughly corresponds to action or doing, and is frequently translated into English as practice (as we shall use the term below, unless we speak of our own unique mode of Praxis).

Practice is view by Aristotle as the sphere of thought and action comprising the ethical and political life of man - of doing, of free activity in the polis, or of living well. It also signifies for him the sciences and arts that deal with the activities characteristic of man's ethical and political life. Conversely, theory is viewed as knowledge or wisdom for its own sake (Bernstein, 1971, pp. ix-x).

Aristotle's work, as variously interpreted over the ages, generally came to be understood as justifying the dominance of theory over practice: practice could not be entirely understood or rightly conducted without attention to theory. At the root of this dual reading of Aristotle is his basic association of theory with the "divine" and practice with the "human" (Shapiro & Decew, 1995). Jonsen and Toulmin note (1988, p. 28):

The "atemporal" world of intellectual reflection and certain knowledge was set apart from the "temporal" world of practical actions and corrigible opinions; and the timeless insights of intellectual theories were esteemed above the workaday experience of the practical craftsman. Eventually the "atemporality" of Theory was even interpreted as implying that its subject matter was Immutable and its truths Eternal, and it became associated with the unchanging celestial world. Meanwhile, the temporality of Practice was equated with Transitoriness and linked to the changeableness of terrestrial things.

The rise and fall of the modern program

One of the prominent figures overshadowing the modern era was the French philosopher Ren? Descartes (1596-1650). His influence aroused what is termed by Bernstein a Cartesian Anxiety, that hunted modern thinkers ever since:

Descartes' Meditations is the locus classicus in modern philosophy for the metaphor of the "foundation" and for the conviction that the philosopher's quest is to search for an Archimedan point upon which we can ground our knowledge... Descartes [demands] that we should not rely on unfounded opinion, prejudices, tradition, or external authority, but only upon the authority of reason itself. Few philosophers since Descartes have accepted his substantive claims, but there can be little doubt that the problems, metaphors, and questions that he bequeathed to us have been at the very center of philosophy since Descartes... (Bernstein, 1983, pp. 16-17).

The modern program is based on the eighteenth century European intellectual movement known as the Enlightenment. Its carriers shared a belief in emancipation and progress by means of the amassing of knowledge, assuming a logical and ordered universe whose laws could be uncovered by empirical scientific research.

The fundamental premises of the modern program are further elaborated by Flax (1990, p. 41): (1) There is a stable, coherent, knowable self that is conscious, rational, autonomous, and universal. (2) This self knows itself and the world through reason, or rationality, posited as the highest form of mental functioning and the only objective form. (3) The mode of knowing produced by the objective rational self is "science," which can provide universal truths about the world regardless of the individual status of the knower. (4) The knowledge produced by science is "truth," and is eternal. (5) The knowledge produced by science (by the rational objective knowing self) will always lead toward progress and perfection. All human institutions and practices can be analyzed by science (reason or objectivity) and improved. (6) Reason is the ultimate judge of what is true, and therefore of what is right and what is good (what is legal and what is ethical). Freedom consists of obedience to the laws conforming to the knowledge discovered by reason. (7) In a world governed by reason, the true will always be the same as the good and the right (and the beautiful); there can be no conflict between what is true and what is right. (8) Science thus stands as the paradigm for any and all socially useful forms of knowledge. Science is neutral and objective; scientists - those who produce scientific knowledge through their unbiased rational capacities - must be free to follow the laws of reason, and not be motivated by other concerns (such as power). (9) Language, or the mode of expression used in producing and disseminating knowledge, must also be rational. To be rational, language must be transparent; it must function only to represent the real or perceived world that the rational mind observes. There must be a firm and objective connection between the objects of perception and the words used to name them (between signifier and signified).

The modern program acknowledges the capabilities of the human mind to discover all the laws of nature in order to allow human beings ultimate control over it. The last waves of this thinking (of encapsulating all the laws of nature in one Grand Unified Theory that would explain everything) were felt as late as the 1970s.

Alvin Toffler remarked that "one of the most highly developed skills in contemporary Western civilizations is dissection: the split-up of problems into their smallest possible components" (Toffler, 1984, p. xi). One of the most common ways of dissection is that of dichotomy. Modern Western thought is indeed entangled in dichotomies, polarities and binary opposites. Thus, for instance, modern civilization relies on continually establishing a binary opposition between order and disorder, so as to assert the superiority of order (Klages, 1997).

One such prominent binary opposition is that of theory vs. practice, which has been central to almost every major Western philosopher since Aristotle. While suggesting a mutually exclusive distinction between the two terms, the modern program considered scientific understanding to be of a higher standing and of more value than practical knowledge. This position is epitomized in the philosophical approach of logical positivism.

The French positif, which served as the basis of Comte's coining of the term for the purpose of his philosophy, signifies "based on facts or experience." The principal aims of logical positivism, developed by the Vienna Circle, are "to provide a secure foundation for the sciences... [and] demonstrate the meaninglessness of all meta-physics... [by the method of] the logical analysis of all concepts and propositions" (Weinberg, 1936, p. 1). Such aspirations leave but little room for non-scientific practical knowledge.

A huge wave of criticism generally known as postmodern thought shattered the modern program. Its devastating effects are still apparent today, although the ruins of the modern stronghold of reason still emerge in different corners of the contemporary scenery.

The promise and limitations of the postmodern stance

The Postmodern stance proclaims that we cannot have a certain epistemological "foundation" or Archimedan point upon which we may ground our knowledge. Human knowledge is the outcome of interpretive cognitive schemes that produce a recognizable order in and meaning of experience. We do not have access to pure impressions and sensations. Consequently, human awareness does not contain images reflecting an independent reality but consists of constructions based on human organizing capacities (Rorty, 1979).

The postmodern stance represents a celebration of the diverse and ephemeral. It asserts that the real is not a single, integrated system, but a disunited, fragmented accumulation of disparate elements and events. While the modern program attends to regularities, postmodernism focuses on differences and uniqueness. Each movement or change is the consequence of the coming together at a particular place and time of a unique set of multiple forces. Knowledge should be concerned with these local and specific occurrences, not with the search for context-free general laws (Polkinghorne, 1992).

The postmodern stance represents a move from positivism toward an interpretive perspective, from the knower toward the known, from the knowing subject toward the subject known, from the psychology of cognitive processes toward epistemological investigations of the nature of the knowledge sought (Kvale, 1992).

Von Glasersfeld defines radical constructivism by the following two basic principles: (1) knowledge is not passively received either through the senses or by way of communication, but is actively constructed by the cognizing subject. (2) The function of cognition is adaptive and serves the subject's organization of the experiential world, not the discovery of an objective ontological reality.

One of the most influential twentieth century schools of philosophy, closely related to the general postmodern stance, is that of deconstruction. It was originated by the French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930-), and has been applied in literature, linguistics, philosophy, law and architecture.

Deconstruction is concerned with the structure of our thought, particularly with the binary opposites or dichotomies upon which this structure depends. The term dichotomy (Greek dich-, in two + temnein, to cut) is defined as "a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as being opposed or entirely different" (The New Oxford Dictionary of English, 1998). This notion of dichotomies of oppositions is indeed most prevalent in modern thought.

According to Derrida, literary meaning is constructed through contrasts between binary opposites, which are in fact mini-hierarchies. One term (e.g., theory) is dominant or prior, the opposite (e.g., practice) subordinate and secondary.

Deconstruction contends that universal concepts and the conventional boundaries between binary opposites such as theory vs. practice must be taken apart, or deconstructed, showing the way to "conceiving difference without opposition."

It is worth noting that the binary opposition of theory vs. practice has also left clear traces in postmodern thought. Even the attempts that some thinkers have made to break away from this mind-frame have all too frequently regressed into these standard opposites (Bernstein, 1983, p. 1). If they have introduced any change at all in theory-practice, it was restricted to shifting the balance in the hierarchy: postmodern thought often elevates the practical embodied knowledge of everyday life above theoretical or scientific knowledge. Science is therefore looked upon as another construct of the human mind, a subjective rather than an objective abstraction of some external reality.

Postmodernism questions universal certainties and concepts, and celebrates the end of "totalizing" grand narratives such as humanism and realism. The postmodern stance removes the necessity of foundations and of choosing one position over the other, and allows us the freedom to construct our own positions.

Only within postmodern relativist discourse was a cognitive space created, enabling us to justify philosophically and ideally subjective knowledge-in-context and to legitimize our quest for it. It thus paves the way for our understanding of Praxis.

The postmodern stance, however, is first and foremost a critique of the modern program; a reaction against rationalism, scientism and objectivity. The underlying themes of the postmodern stance are loss of faith (Polkinghorne, 1992), incredulity (Lyotard, 1993), ambivalence (Bauman, 1993), and disbelief (Anderson, 1990) towards the modernist program. As such, it is negative by nature.

Postmodernism thus subverts the modern program that afforded man intellectual confidence and optimism, for the sake of skepticism about foundations, methods, and rational criteria of evaluation. It shatters the Cartesian quest for some fixed point, some stable rock upon which to secure our lives against the vicissitudes that constantly threaten us. Instead of the grand narratives, it proposes a new vocabulary, a new language game which serves as a pragmatic, localized and tentative basis for knowledge. Meanings in such a game are evolving and changing. In the midst of this flux and dynamism, we have to redefine ourselves and regain our stability. Postmodern critiques lack the necessary methodology for such a critical task.

In its extremity, the postmodern stance represents a radical rejection of the possibility of knowledge. It is expressed by seemingly nihilistic attitudes or by reductio ad absurdum, stating that there are no hard "facts of the matter," that "anything goes," and that it is impossible to formulate any criteria of evaluation. Derrida's radical philosophical position has been ironically summarized by Anderson (1990, p. 87) as follows: "wrong you are whatever you think, unless you think you're wrong, in which case you may be right - but you don't really mean what you think you do anyway."

The new agenda of Praxis

Following the crucially important transitory phase of the negative postmodern epistemology, a new affirmative or reconstructive epistemology is called for. This should be achieved without the need stressed by Descartes "to demolish everything completely and start again right from the foundation", complementing modern constructivism with post-modern deconstructivism.

Some first steps have been taken in this direction by affirmative postmodern epistemology. Neopragmatism (unlike the earlier pragmatism) accepts the postmodern assumptions about the foundationlessness and fragmentariness of knowledge. It does not, however, accept that a postmodern discipline must be solipsistic and relativistic (Rorty, 1991). Neopragmatism shifts the focus of knowledge generation from the modern attempts to describe the real as it is in itself (theoretical knowledge and "knowing that"), to programs for collecting descriptions of actions that have effectively accomplished intended ends (practical knowledge and "knowing how"). Pragmatic knowing concentrates on understanding how to do an act, rather than on knowing what laws of nature allow it. The test for neopragmatic knowledge is not whether it produces a picture that corresponds to the real, but whether it functions successfully in guiding human action towards fulfilling intended purposes.

A neopragmatic body of knowledge thus consists of a collection of examples of actions that have succeeded in bringing about desired ends; a summary of generalizations of the types of action that have been successful in prior similar situations. These summaries are always unfinished, and are in need of continual revision as newly effective actions are discovered.

Neopragmatism does not suppose these generalizations to be predictive of what actions will work in new situations. Rather, the generalizations have only heuristic value as indicators of what may be tried in similar situations. Because neopragmatism incorporates the postmodern understanding of fragmentariness, it holds that each situation is different and contains the uncertainties of its specific location and time. Neopragmatism recognizes the functionality of cognitive processes in understanding responsive regularities of the world. It maintains that our comprehension consists of drawing from our embodied interaction with the world enough of a sense of its regularities in order to accomplish our purposes. The more open we are to increasing and re-framing our patterns, and the greater variety of organizing schemes we have at our command, the more likely we are to capture the diversity of organization that exists in the world (Polkinghorne, 1992, pp. 149-150).

Some of the premises on which such a new affirmative epistemology may be founded are: (1) Knowledge can indeed be generated; (2) Such generation is the responsibility of each and every individual; (3) Human beings have the capability to construct and reconstruct their own existential survival out of their direct personal experience; (4) Knowledge should be part and parcel of the sphere in which human beings think and act in daily life; (5) Self-generation of knowledge must always occur within context, (6) Knowledge-in-context must enable individuals and groups to cope with fuzzy problems and rapid fundamental changes; (7) Knowledge claims must comply with some test of functionality - of usefulness or fruitfulness (rather than of truth) - that will enable us to trace alternative courses of action and then make sense of feedback from experience.

In recent epistemologies, it is increasingly fashionable to conceive of knowledge in terms that leave little or no room for epistemic commitment. Perry (1970, p. 258) defines commitment (in the context of intellectual development during the passage from adolescence to adulthood) as:

An affirmation of personal values or choices in relativism. A conscious act or realization of identity and responsibility. A process of orientation of self in a relative world.

Thinking-in-Context and Re-Framing

Gadamer noted that every act of understanding involves relating what is to be understood to the concrete situation or context of the interpreter. The context thus contains a moment of self-understanding (Baynes, Bohman & McCarthy, 1996, p. 322).

People continuously create new worlds, new alternatives for thought and action (Gergen, 1992), by the power of interpretation and re-interpretation. Having a preliminary sense of this intricate issue, Montaigne already noted that "we need to interpret interpretations more than to interpret things." This essential process of the "interpretation of interpretations" can only be achieved by thinking-in-context and by skillfully fusing general meaning and particular sense - abstract and context-free theories along with local and context-laden practices.

The constructing power of thinking-in-context is of high merit in our age of the dramatic "acceleration of just about everything" (Gleick, 1999). The main problem faced by post-postmodern man is the growing gap between the accelerated fundamental technological and social changes and his capability to re-conceptualize material objects, others and himself. We refer to this phenomenon as the conceptualization crisis. The problem of conceptual survival is becoming universal, and we must all learn to participate in the language game of concept construction.

The practical meaning of this new agenda is the necessity to develop in human beings the capabilities to construct knowledge in context and to ever reframe or reinterpret their thinking. Such re-constructive thinking is essential in at least three main situations:
(a) When we are confronted with a new, complex or intricate issue whose "proper" categorization among the available categories is not known to us;
(b) When, as a result of changes, we lack the proper categorical concepts to interpret the new development or phenomenon;
(c) A conception formed represents a subjective interpreting perspective - as there is no a-priori true interpretation, and as "[reality] makes itself or it unmakes itself, but it is never something made" (Bergson, 1911, p. 272), we must always be proactive towards and sensitive to moving beyond the immobile.

Praxis strives to integrate rather than disseminate thinking constructs, and to reconstruct the holistic nature of complex systems comprised of Complementary Divergence within the context in which they are embedded (Further elaboration in the following paper "Systemic Thinking and Complementary Divergence"). Moreover, it tends to transcend the traditional metaphysical hierarchies imbued in them. In this, we concur with Derrida's idea of totality as the wholeness or completeness of a system. We are likewise in agreement with recent deconstructionist approaches, indicating that what is usually grasped as dichotomous oppositions is in fact interdependent - the oppositions derive their meaning from a particular construct rather than from some inherent or pure antithesis. Deconstruction aims to demonstrate how the subordinate or secondary term in each pair has an equal claim to be treated as a condition of possibility for the entire system. In the pair theory-practice, theory obviously has the upper hand. Numerous attempts have been made to rebalance the total system, and thus the scales have often tipped to the other side.

We suggest, moreover, that while theory provides coherence, practice provides relevance. Theory and practice should therefore be brought together into a single learning cycle - starting with the declared conception via the experience to re-framing of the conception, and so on.

As we extend the concept of Praxis beyond the original meaning of action or doing and see it as the life-giving locus of dynamism and change, we go but one step further along a paved intellectual road. As Bernstein notes:

Using Aristotle's paradigm of praxis, we can say that Marxism, existentialism, and pragmatism have, in radically different ways, attempted to extend this paradigm to the entire range of man's cognitive and practical life. It is not only Marx who thinks that the point of understanding is no longer just to 'interpret' but to 'change'; this basic orientation is shared by both existentialists and pragmatists (Bernstein, 1971, p. 316).

Conclusion
The massive negativistic onslaught on our structures of knowledge, which was indeed necessary for shattering the fortified positivistic strongholds, must be complemented today by a reconstruction effort that will ensure a new affirmative foundation. This foundation must, however, be qualitatively different from that suggested by the modern program. It is now apparent that we cannot have a certain epistemological foundation upon which we may ground our knowledge as propagated by Descartes.

Human awareness does not contain objective images reflecting an independent reality. Instead, knowledge is the outcome of the subjective interpretation of human experience within given contexts, structured by intricate mutual relationships as well as tensions between (context-free) theory and (context-bound) practice. In their cohabitation within Praxis, they ensure that our thought will be both coherent and relevant.

Our intellectual odyssey thus took us from a frozen and rigid conception of knowledge in the modern program through its de-freezing into a state of flux in the postmodern stance towards a kaleidoscopic, always tentative de-freezing - albeit complex, dynamic, self-organizing and emerging - in Praxis.

Praxis is indeed post-postmodern in the sense that it has developed - beyond the negativistic epistemology of postmodern thought - a unique, affirmative systemic construct of theory and method that complement each other and yet ever maintaining their constructive tensions. The theory-method construct of Praxis is supported by advanced computerized auxiliaries, which not only facilitate mental processes but also fundamentally shape and transform them. Altogether, they constitute a sound foundation for human being-in-the-world as well as for human creative becoming.

References

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Systemic Thinking and Complementary Divergence

Introduction
In "Beyond Post-Modern De-Construction," we proposed to view theory-practice as a holistic, non-hierarchical system of complementary divergence. We have labeled the total new construct Praxis. In this sense, Praxis is the meeting point between theory and practice in concrete contexts of personal human existence.

In this depiction of Praxis, we implicitly introduced two concepts that constitute fundamental steppingstones in our approach: systemics and complementary divergence. In order to point to the interrelations between them, and to their explanatory and transforming potency, we should like to introduce herewith a third concept, that of mental constructs.

A construct is defined as "a hypothetical variable or system which does not purport to accurately represent or model given observations but has a heuristic or interpretive value concerning them" (Principia Cybernetica, 1992).

Mental constructs are varied and diverse. For practical purposes, we shall focus especially on one such construct: dichotomy or duality. This construct is known by many names: polarity, dialectics, symmetry, opposition, contrariety, etc. It has been asserted that duality is an integral property of self-reflective thought (Banathy, 1985), and that "thought would be impossible without it" (Voorhees, 1986).

Dualities or dichotomies are most often viewed as mutually excluding terms, denoting general and non-contextual meaning. They differ from concepts, which denote particular and contextual sense. Zerubavel (1993) illustrates how language allows us to detach mental constructs from their surroundings and to assign to them fixed, decontextualized meaning.

The uncritical adoption of mental constructs or categories may have far reaching consequences upon our modes of thinking. Mills (1963, p. 433) summarized this issue: "By acquiring the categories of a language we acquire the structured 'ways' of a group, and along with the language, the value-implicates of those 'ways'." An anecdote that well illuminates this last point is told by Huxley in his novel Chrome Yellow (1921, Chap. 5). It tells of an old farm-hand. "'Look at them, sir,' he said with a motion of his hand towards the wallowing swine. 'Rightly is they called pigs'."

However, dualities and dichotomies do not necessarily always point to rigidity and fixity, manifested by unbridgeable polarity. They may also contain the creative potency of changingness, and afford useful means for reframing our mental constructs. Instead of viewing dichotomies as simple systems in which "the whole is the sum of its parts," they may be viewed as complex systems in which "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."

The psychologist George Kelly, who prepared the ground for cognitive constructivism in his teaching of personal construct psychology, made a big step towards such a conception of dichotomies. Kelly grasps the dichotomous constructs as having two ends or poles. However, he assumes that "the differences expressed by a construct are just as relevant as the likenesses. Unlike classical logic, we do not lump together the contrasting and the irrelevant. We consider the contrasting end of a construct to be both relevant and necessary to the meaning of construct" (Kelly, 1955, p. 63).

Kelly intuitively realized that dichotomous elements of experience could be similar to and at the same time different from other elements. Going a step beyond Kelly's constructs, in the direction pointed by some of his critics adhering to Gestalt psychology, we claim that we must strive to reconstruct the holistic nature of mental constructs. Thus a new, more complex system of complementary divergence was created.

Our concept of complementary divergence is set within the milieu of an organic, non-linear, complex, self-organizing, dynamic and emergent system that combines both surprise and regularity. In our view, this concept should avoid reductionism in the methodological sense that a phenomenon of interest is best addressed by breaking it down into its constituents. Instead, it should treat mental constructs in their totality, complexity and dynamics.

The elements of this system of complementary divergence should be grasped as non-hierarchic and interdependent, yet maintaining a creative tension between them. In this sense, we may see polar divergence as related but yet distinct, or - in Varela's term (1976, p. 62) - as trinities rather than just one or two distinct elements.

Systems embodying complementary divergence are seen as internally seething and bubbling with change, disorder, and process. Thus, any attempt to understand such systems in mechanistic terms is doomed to failure (Toffler, 1984, p. xv). Moreover, it is apparent that in their interaction with other systems outside of themselves, such systemic constructs must be understood within given experiential contexts. Therefore, our concept of complementary divergence is in accord with Popper's (1974) concepts of organicism and contextualism.

In order to get to the roots of this new thinking and discuss its implications, let us first briefly survey and illustrate the operative usefulness of the concepts systemic thinking, mental constructs and complementary divergence.

Systemic thinking
Systems and their properties
Webster's dictionary defines system as "a regularly interacting group of items forming a unified whole." In spite of the seemingly strong emphasis on regularity, systems approaches leave considerable room for surprise, especially in the context of complex rather than simple systems.

Since the seventeenth century, such prominent scholars as Galilei, Descartes and Newton developed the approach still used in most sciences, referred to as the mechanistic, rational or analytical approach, or reductionism. We term this approach in short linearity. The constitutional features of linearity include replication and demonstrability of cause and effect. Linearity seeks to reduce a system to its elementary forms, in order to study in detail the types of interaction existing between them and understand them. The linear principle of additivity also provides that "the whole is equal to the sum of the parts." Simple systems are characterized by linear change, in which there is an apparent sequence of events affecting each other as they appear.

Since the mid-twentieth century, a new approach has emerged in various disciplines, which we term non-linearity. It covers such concepts as chaos theory and complexity theory, and does not conform to those qualities found in linearity. Rather than reducing an entity to the properties of its elements, non-linearity focuses on the arrangement of and relations between elements, that connect them into a whole. While the mechanistic approach invokes the laws of additivity of elementary properties, this law does not apply in non-linear systems, composed of a large diversity of elements linked together by strong interactions. These systems must be approached by new methods viewing a system in its totality, complexity and dynamics. We may characterize this approach generally by stating that "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."

Fundamental to an understanding of non-linearity is an understanding of complex systems. A complex system is any system that involves a number of elements, arranged in structures that can exist on many scales. These go through processes of change neither describable by a single rule nor reducible to a single level of explanation. As noted by Johnson (1997), "an idea that runs through this kind of research is that complexity lies somewhat between order and disorder, predictability and surprise."

Chaos theories have proposed that complex systems seem to have a natural tendency to be caught in tensions, falling under the influence of different attractors that ultimately define the context in which a detailed system behavior unfolds. Some of these bring a system into states of equilibrium or near-equilibrium as a result of loops of negative feedback that counteract destabilizing functions; others tend to flip a system into completely new configurations (Morgan, 1997).

The unpredictability inherent in the evolution of complex systems may yield unpredictable results, based on knowledge of the original conditions. Such results are called emergent properties: properties of the whole, not possessed by any of its constitutive elements. These properties are a logical result, yet not a predictable one. Thus, they point to the way in which complex systems are inherently creative, sustaining a constructive tension between surprise and regularity.

Linear and non-linear approaches are more complementary than opposed, yet neither is reducible to the other. Linear approaches, epitomizing regularity, isolate the elements of the system and then concentrate on them; study the nature of the interaction between the systemic elements; emphasize precision of details; and modify one variable at a time. Non-linear approaches, epitomizing surprise, unify the elements of the system and then concentrate on the integration between them; study the effect rather than the nature of the interaction between the systemic elements; emphasize global perceptions; and simultaneously modify groups of variables.

Linear approaches are especially suited to homogeneous systems, composed of similar elements and maintaining weak interactions among them. The laws of statistics readily apply here, enabling one to understand the behavior of the system. Non-linear approaches are especially suited to heterogeneous, complex systems, in which the additivity of elementary properties does not apply. Here, one must apply new methods that consider a system in its totality, complexity, and internal dynamics. However, even in such complex systems, analysis is directed towards the determination of some regularities that can modify the system or design other systems (de Rosnay, 1977).

The emergence of a creative system: an illustration

The following illustration of the emergence of a creative system derives its inspiration from complexity theory:

Imagine a symphonic orchestra arriving in a park to perform an open-air concert. The audience has already gathered and the musicians are ready, but the conductor has not yet arrived. Meanwhile a breeze blows, and the musical scores are blown away by the wind...

As time passes, the audience loses patience, and the musicians start to feel uncomfortable. One member starts playing something; others join in. Initially, it is not clear whether they are only tuning their instruments or responding to the tunes being played. Gradually, all groups of players join in the improvised musical discourse. The players, as individuals and groups, "converse" in tunes and develop a musical language that they relate to and simultaneously construct as they try to make sense of the given and evolving context.

What at first seems as a cacophony, soon sounds in the ears of the players and the cheering audience as a symphony - a creation of the mutually related trends of surprise and regularity. The music evolves through recurring cycles of interpretation and re-interpretation. Eventually, a complex system emerges, with no overall direction or prescribed form. The orchestra is operating as a self-organizing and evolving system of creativity (i.e., thinking up new things) and innovation (i.e., doing new things).

The emergent system is neither describable by a single rule nor reducible to a single level of explanation. We cannot locate one factor determining the evolutionary process of this creative and innovative complex system. Many dynamic processes with different tendencies evolve within the system itself, creating new systemic attractors that ultimately define the context in which the system behavior unfolds. At specific instances in this evolving system, we may identify one player or a group of players determining the overriding theme and the others adaptively responding to it, until a new overriding theme arises. None of these themes, or the sub-groups that have originated them, determines the overall direction of the symphony. In this non-linear interplay of configurations, the evolving creation leads to a differentiation into multilevel hierarchic sub-systems. Individual players and groups of instruments are interwoven in an unpredictable arrangement connecting them into a whole - qualitatively different from the sum of its parts.

To the ears of a skilled non-linear listener, the interplay between order and disorder, between regularity and surprise, may seem fascinating and wonderful. To the ears of an ignorant linear listener, used to a clear logical sequence of cause and effect, the implicit order of the emerging complex system may be interpreted as sheer disorder or chaos. Indeed, as noted by Maturana (1978, p. 63), "an unknown system is, for the ignorant observer, a chaos, however deterministic it may appear to the knowing observer who sees it as a structure-determined system."

We may note that those who generate the complex system have no grand or unified theory upon which they think and act. They respond adaptively to the context, and therefore have only partial mini-theories that are derived from and deeply embedded in their immediate and ever evolving context.

Moreover, the context is not "out there" for them to perceive and adapt to, but is constructed by their proactive cognition. In a dialectical manner, they construct and re-construct themselves and their "world" as they make sense of the different contexts of their life, since "to live is to know" (Maturana & Varela, 1988, p. 174). As maintained by social constructivism (see Gergen, 1985), knowledge is generated by people interacting and collectively negotiating a set of shared meanings, as is the case with our orchestra players.

We may conclude that people create new worlds, new alternatives for thought and action (Gergen, 1992), by the power of interpretation and re-interpretation. Having a preliminary sense of this intricate issue, Montaigne already noted that "we need to interpret interpretations more than to interpret things." This essential process of the "interpretation of interpretations" may only be achieved by thinking-in-context and by skillfully fusing general meaning and particular sense - abstract and context-free theoretical knowledge along with local and context-laden practical knowledge.

Mental constructs as complex systems of complementarity

Mental constructs have been described in various terms, among them scripts, prototypes, templates, scenes, and modules. The most common terms are perhaps schemes (schemas or schemata) and frames.

In his classical book Remembering (1932), Sir Frederic Bartlett proposed an interpretation of memory that assumed that subjects remember new material in terms of existing structures that he termed schemas or schemata. To Bartlett, a schema referred to an organized structure that captures our knowledge and expectations of some aspect of the world. It is, in other words, a model of some part of our experience (Baddeley, 1997, p. 240).

Ever since its introduction by Gregory Bateson in A Theory of Play and Fantasy (1954), the term framing has influenced thinking about language in interaction. Bateson demonstrates that no communicative move, verbal or nonverbal, can be understood without reference to a metacommunicative message, or metamessage, about the frame of interpretation that applies to the move (Tannen, 1993, p. 1). Goffman (1974, pp. 10-11) defines frames as "principles of organization which govern events - at least social ones - and our subjective involvement in them."

The term frame, or schema, does not necessarily denote a rigid and closed structure. As concluded by Norman (1986, p. 536):

Schemas are not fixed structures. Schemas are flexible configurations, mirroring the regularities of experience, providing automatic completion of missing components, automatically generalizing from the past, but also continually in modification, continually adapting to reflect the current state of affairs. Schemas are not fixed, immutable data structures. Schemas are flexible interpretive states that reflect the mixture of past experience and present circumstances.

We shall henceforth refer to mental constructs as complex systems, which comply with non-linearity as depicted above. The path towards a more open and dynamic conception of mental constructs, viewed as systems of complemetarity, was already paved for us by George A. Kelly and F. J. Varela.

Kelly's theory is based on his philosophical position of constructive alternativism: the assumption that any one event is open to a variety of interpretations. According to him, a person's construction system is composed of a finite number of dichotomous constructs. All elements of experience are situated on a bipolar axis of opposites. No matter how one's experience is constructed, it will always be interpreted within such a dichotomous framework. In making an interpretation about an event or a person we not only make an assertion about it, but also indicate that the opposite quality is not characteristic of it (Engler, 1999, p. 406).

Varela (1979, p. 84) notes that "one of the most fundamental of all human activities is the making of distinctions." Much like Kelly, he suggests to subsume contrasting elements under a construct by considering them in a relation of complementarity. However, while for Kelly this represents the way people actually think, Varela sees it is a possibility offered by a transition from dualities to trinities. By trinity, Varela means (1976, p. 62) "the complementation of the ways in which pairs (poles, extremes, modes, sides) are related and yet remain distinct: the way they are not one, not two" (Chiari & Nuzzo, 1987).

Valera explains that his view of complementarity signifies a departure from the classical way of understanding dialectics:

In the classical (Hegelian) paradigm, duality is tied to the idea of polarity, a clash of opposites... The basic form of this kind of duality is symmetry: Both poles belong to the same level. The nerve of the logic behind this dialectics is negation...
In this presentation [the cybernetic or post-Hegelian], dualities are adequately represented by imbrication of levels, where one term of the pair emerges from the other... The basic form of these dualities is asymmetry: Both terms extend across levels. The nerve of the logic behind this dialectics is self-reference... Pairs of opposites are, of necessity, on the same level and stay on the same level as long as they are taken in opposition and contradiction. [Such pairs] make a bridge across one level of our description, and they specify each other (Varela, 1979, pp. 100-101).

Complementary Divergence as a fertile soil for creativity

Our notion of complementary divergence breaks away from static and rigid frames of mind, and offers instead a dynamic and emerging construct of systemic reframing. The process of reframing primarily refers to the imposition of a qualitative new framework upon a particular domain, a new "lens" for seeing and understanding. Reframing is a qualitative, discontinuous, second-order or double-loop shift in the understanding of some domain (Bartunek, 1988, p. 139).

Kelly (1955) already suggested the idea of a creative cycle. He realized that when we are being creative, we first loosen our constructions. When we find a novel construction that looks like it has some potential, we focus on it and tighten it up, thus giving it substance or form (Boeree, 1997). This is, in essence, the continuous creative cycle of framing-reframing.

The property that facilitates this creative process is that of non-linearity, by which when change is introduced into the system, it does not generate a predictive sequence of events affecting each other as they appear. Thus, the system is open to its own intricate dynamics.

We must note that our notion of creativity by itself encompasses the concept of complementary divergence. In this sense, we agree with Boden's urge of the importance of balancing surprise and regularity in the conception of creativity: "Unpredictability is often said to be the essence of creativity. But unpredictability is not enough. At the heart of creativity lie constraints: the very opposite of unpredictability. Constraints and unpredictability, familiarity and surprise, are somehow combined in original thinking" (Boden, 1995).

The centrality of complementarity in the creative process was also recognized by other scholars. Thus, for instance, Jung wrote that "every creative person is a duality or a synthesis of opposite or contradictory attitudes." Coleridge noted that the power of the poet "reveals itself in the balance or reconciliation of opposite or discordant qualities." Koestler suggested in the same vein that the basis of creativity is the "perceiving of a situation or an idea in two self-consistent but habitually incompatible frames of reference" (see Wilkins, 1988, pp. 351, 352).

Reframing is, in fact, a higher order of thinking that involves active control over our cognitive processes. In this sense, it is essentially metacognitive. Biggs and Moore (1993, p. 527) define metacognition as "awareness of one's cognitive processes rather than the content of those processes together with the use of that self awareness in controlling and improving cognitive processes." In order to achieve this kind of awareness, we must first "[give] prominence to distinctions which our ordinary forms of language easily make us overlook" (Wittgenstein, 1953, no. 144, no. 132).

Complementary Divergence based frames can serve us as useful means for self-regulation and executive control of our cognitive processes. They offer us most convenient conceptual spaces. Boden (1991) suggested that we think of creativity in terms of the mapping, exploration, and transformation of conceptual spaces. She explains that a conceptual space is a style of thinking. Its dimensions are the organizing principles that unify, and give structure to, the relevant domain. In other words, it is the generative system which underlies that domain and which defines a certain range of possibilities. The limits, contours, pathways, and structures of a conceptual space can be mapped by mental representations of it. Such mental maps can be used to explore as well as to transform the spaces concerned.

Rogers (1961, p. 158) suggests that in the "flowing peak moments of therapy... the person becomes a unity of flow, of motion. He has changed, but what seems most significant, he has become an integrated process of changingness." "Unity of flow;" "Integrated process of changingness".

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Recapitulation

A need for re-construction has emerged - constructing a conception that maintains relevancy through contextual changes. A complying quest was set forth searching for a way of conducting a thinking process in light of a context without dismantling it into components (thus losing the holistic perspective of investigation), together with the ability to break the fixated static thinking schemas through which we usually interpret the context with, thus achieving systemic re-framing.

Postmodern thought lacks an elaborate methodology and appropriate mechanisms to devise new knowledge constructs, after the shattering of the old foundations. It is therefore difficult for its followers to propose a new agenda for a knowledge age. This is the great challenge that Praxis has taken upon itself. Thus, instead of being concerned with information processing, Praxis delves into the issues of meaning construction and sense making. In order to confront this challenge, a new theory, methodology and tools have been developed over the years, which offer a new holistic system for the continuous reconstruction of human knowledge in an age of swift technological and social changes.

An elaborated and practical means for such an exploration and transformation of deliberation spaces has been developed as part of the Praxis endeavor, where deliberation spaces comprise of conceptual trinities interrelating in complementary divergence, evoking an ongoing structuring process of re-interpretation in-context. It allows the active use of complementary divergence as a mental construct that enables us to unleash powerful metacognitive reframing processes. In this way, it holds the promise of discharging our creative energies while at the same time providing to our thinking processes the necessary validity, adaptability, coherence and relevance, which assure their usefulness and fruitfulness.