01/1/26

Looking at Melinda A. Zeder’s Article (2025) “Unpacking the Neolithic” (Part 1 of 4)

0001 If I may present my conclusion at the beginning, “I suggest the following motto: First the bauplan, then the twist.”

0002 The full title of the essay under examination is “Unpacking the Neolithic: Assessing the Relevance of the Neolithic Construct in Light of Recent Research”. The article appears in the Journal of World Prehistory (2025) in volume 38:11, pages 1-58 (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10963-025-09198-0). The author is affiliated with the Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C.

0003 The author’s argument follows the Greek tradition of (A) setting out prior propositions, (B) adding further information and assessments and (C) proposing one’s own solution.

Prior propositions (A) are covered in the section titled, “The Origin of the Term ‘Neolithic'”.

Further information (B) includes sections on neolithic emergences in southwest Asia and other regions, including China, Japan, eastern north America, Mesoamerica and the northwest America.

The author’s proposal (C) appears in a section titled, “Repackaging the Neolithic”.

0004 I examine each movement in the sequence A, C then B.

0005 In regards to the historical origin of the term, “neolithic” (A), the word appears in the 1850s in the context of prehistoric lithic technology. A distinction between old “paleolithic” and new “neolithic” tools reflects a fairly recent change in the human condition. The Paleolithic extends very far back into the evolution of the Homo genus. The Neolithic is fairly new and applies only to Homo sapiens. By “new”, I mean, say, starting less that 20,000 years ago.

0006 As it turns out, stone tools and fossilized bones are the most recoverable items from the distant past. So, the idea that our kind evolves will of course rely of this type of data. The implications are significant. If lithic technologies are like matter, then the archaeologist may speculate on forms of prehistorical human (or “hominid” or “hominin”) conditions.

0007 For example, the earliest paleolithic stone tools are labeled “Oldowan”. These tools can be made on the fly. If I strike one rock with another, I can fracture off a shard and expose a sharp edge. Of course, one must choose the right rocks for this trick. Plus, technique is important.

Later stone tools are labeled “Acheulean”. These stone tools are made ahead of time, by the same technique of hammering off shards to reveal an intended form that… somehow… is intrinsic to the original rock.

0008 So, what am I suggesting?

Is the actuality of matter and form intrinsic to rocks, and ancestral hominins learn to tamper with one real element (matter) in order to sculpt the other real element (form)?

0009 I am suggesting more than that.

Aristotle’s hylomorphe (hylo = matter, morphe = form) is an exemplar of Peirce’s category of secondness. Secondness consists of (at least) two contiguous real elements. For paleolithic hominins, a rock (matter) could be sculpted into a stone tool (form). From the point of view of the archaeologist, the hylomorphic structure still applies. The question is, “How?”

Paleolithic stone-tool technology “sculpts” prehistorical human conditions.

0010 Of course, the word, “sculpts”, serves as an aesthetic metaphor for the contiguity between paleolithic technology as matter and hominin conditions as form.

0011 The challenge for nineteenth-century anthropology is clear. Propose a better, more scientific, or at least, less metaphysical, label for the contiguity.

With only geological strata, stone tools and fossilized bones as evidence, proposals were necessarily speculative. But, archaeologists continued digging, and by the 1850s could make the distinction between paleolithic and neolithic. Also, they figured out a reason for why the advance from Oldowan to Acheulean stone tools “sculpted” more advanced hominin conditions. Man was making himself.

0012 What do these evidential and rational developments suggest?

For a Peircean, secondness is the dyadic realm of actuality. Secondness is only one of Peirce’s three categories. The other two are thirdness (the triadic realm of normal contexts, judgments, signs, mediations and so forth) and firstness (the monadic realm of possibility).

Each of these categories manifests its own logic. Also, each higher numbered category prescinds from the adjacent lower category. Thirdness prescinds from secondness. Secondness prescinds from firstness. Prescission allows the articulation of the category-based nested form, as described in Razie Mah’ e-book, A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form.

0013 Thirdness bring secondness into relation with firstness.

A triadic normal context₃ brings a dyadic actuality₂ into relation with the possibility of ‘something’₁.

0014 Now I can slide the above dyad into the slot for actuality₂ for the category-based nested form intimated by the title of V. Gordon Childe’s 1936 book, Man Makes Himself.

0015 The slide clarifies the contiguity, paleolithic technology constellates a substance, which I label, “technique”, that manifests an essence for the conditions of evolving hominins (that is, a substantiated form).

Consequently, the appearance of a new stone tool technology indicates a change in techniques as well as a change in the essence of the prehistoric human condition.

0016 According to Childe (1892-1957), the “neolithic” label encompassed more than a change in lithic technology. The prehistoric human condition gets entangled with all sorts of other matters, including sedentary communities, economies of delayed returns, various modes of storage and so forth. A long list of material arrangements gets entangled.

0017 As it turns out, once matter substantiates form, then form can entangle other matter, which is a confounding. Here, “confounding” is a technical term, precisely labeling one form originating from one matter and entangling another matter.

Historically, a confounding is an idea that belongs to Aristotle’s tradition. It is stumbled upon long after Aristotle’s campus went out of business. It is the brainchild of the Byzantine and Slavic civilizations.

0018 Here is a picture of Childe’s confounding.

0019 The upper three lines presents the neolithic thing. Neolithic stone-tool technology [substantiates] the prehistoric human condition. The nature of the [substance] is labeled, “technique”.

The lower two lines presents the entangled matter. The [entanglement] is difficult to label, because its nature is.. well… a long list of material arrangements.

0020 A list of material arrangements appears in Table 1 of the article. Even the social components of social mechanism, magico-religious sanctions and trade can be shoved under the rug labeled, “material arrangements”.

0021 As such, the “neolithic” may serve as an adjective to a noun, “revolution”, that appeals to academics sympathetic to Marxist formulations. Yes, they are the ones who only promote academics with similar sympathies. Also, Childe was… um… a sympathizer.

The question is not about whether prehistoric folk are “communist” or “fascist”, even though these labels may apply to this or that anthropologist of the 1930s.

The question is whether the Marxist formula applies to prehistoric folk.

0022 The answer becomes obvious, when Childe’s confounding resolves into the following hylomorphic structure.

0023 The above figure depicts a Marxist version of Aristotle’s hylomorphe, {matter [substantiates] form}. Childe’s hylomorphe lasts for nine decades (that is, until the present day at the start of 2026). Man makes himself through a standard Marxist formulation. Soon, Soviet era archaeologists adopt the stance that the appearance of pottery is a hallmark of neolithic emergence. Pottery is a material arrangement. The emergence of the neolithic is a human condition.

01/1/26

Looking at Melinda A. Zeder’s Article (2025) “Unpacking the Neolithic” (Part 4 of 4)

0056 Okay, I will continue drinking my cocktail in the following exposition.

I regard the last two figures, along with the figures that appear in the article under examination.

0057 There is something in B that suggests two bauplans₃. Early Neolithic Bauplan 1 marks the terminus of the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. Late Neolithic Bauplan 2 denotes the start of our current Lebenswelt.

0058 Bauplan 1 looks like this.

The early Neolithic bauplan₃ does not permit untrammeled social and labor specializations. Rather, all social circles_2m (family (5), friends (5), teams (15), bands (50), and community (150)) are optimized_2f in the pursuit of the final cause of ‘settling down’₁. It is the same way that different organs and organ systems are optimized for ‘settling down’ into an individual.

Details of optimization will be specific to each location (because efficient causes differ), yet produce something ‘general’, that manifests in excavation sites as varied as Catal Hoyuk and Tepe Gobekli. Domestication includes the local geography, plants and animals. Domestication may even include settlements more than a day’s walk away. Domestication may include the heavens.

0059 Once rendered in this manner, the slow, seemingly reversible, spiral into the neolithic thing₂ gets depicted as thin dotted horizontal lines along the axes of arrangements versus time.

0060 The late Neolithic bauplan₃ permits individual social and labor specializations. Something significant has changed. The key final cause of ‘settling down’ remains relevant. However, another key final cause cannot be ignored. The optimization of the early Neolithic somehow breaks down and the late Neolithic initiates a search for order₁ that continues to this day.

0061 Here is a picture of what Bauplan 2 might look like.

0062 It is as if an individual, having been formed by a bauplan 1 gestation, gets born.

What a rude awakening.

0063 What about the timeline?

If I replace the increasing boldness of the horizontal dotted lines with a slowly rising bauplan 1 slope, and if I depict the most bold horizontal dotted lines as a bauplan 2 phase transition, then I get the following graph.

0064 What does this imply?

Obviously, bauplan 1 ends in a twist, that is, bauplan 2.

I noted this slogan at the start of my examination.

0065 Less obviously, the Neolithic revolution is not in the actuality of {material arrangements [substantiating] the neolithic condition}₂.

“The Neolithic Revolution” involves a transition from the Lebenswelt that we evolved in to our current Lebenswelt.

0066 Fortunately, for the author, the American Marxist academic candle is about to exhaust itself, just as the Soviet Marxist illumination did decades ago.

Yes, the crisis begins.

0067 The impending change of cognitive grounds will be at least as great as the following transition from Karl Marx (1818-1883) to Juri Lotman (1922-1993). This transition goes sigmoidal in 1989.

0068 The following hylomorphic transition is derived in Razie Mah’s blog for December 2025, titled Looking at Igor Pilshchikov and Mikhail Trunin’s Article (2016) “The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics”.

0069 Marx’s actuality₂ is supposed to arise from the potential of scientific models₁, even though the actuality₂ served as doctrine, rather than a mechanical or mathematical formulation. Remember, Marx’s actuality₂ conforms to the structure of Peirce’s secondness. Secondness is the realm of actuality. How easy is it to confuse this actuality with the realness of a mechanical or mathematical model? Yet, they are not the same.

0070 Lotman’s actuality₂ arises from the potential of the semiosphere₁, the universe of sign-relations. Semiotic arrangements are not the same as material arrangements. They are not even close.

0071 So, what am I saying?

The author senses that ‘something’ is coming and she figures out that it must concern a bauplan.

After all, bauplan is a term that is familiar to evolutionary biologists.

0072 Happily, the semiotician, Razie Mah, has already explored human evolution from the point of view of Peirce’s categories. The human bauplan is an adaptation to the niche (or the potential) of triadic relations. Plus, human evolution comes with a twist.

Here is a list of works by Razie Mah that pertain to Bauplan 1 and Bauplan 2.

0073 Surely, this is a lot to unpack. But, that is precisely what Melinda Zeder’s article calls for.

My thanks to the author for publishing this thought piece.

Happy New Year.

11/29/25

Looking at Dennis Venema and Scot McKnight’s Book (2017) “Adam and the Genome” (Part 1 of 22)

0001 This essay comments on a 2017 book by biologist, Dennis Venema, and theologian, Scot McKnight. The title is Adam and the Genome: Reading Scripture after Genetic Science. The publisher is Brasos Press in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

The book consists of two equal parts. The geneticist shows that Adam and Eve cannot be a single pair who founded the human species. The theologian wrestles with how to read Genesis in light of modern archaeology.

0002 My goal is to supplement these arguments in two ways. I will re-articulate ideas about evolutionary biology using the specialized language of the category-based nested form. I will present a scientific hypothesis that re-images the Adam and Eve stories as ancient Near Eastern fairy tales.

Perhaps, at the end of these comments, I can declare, “The old historical Adam is dead. Long live the new historical Adam.”

0003 Before I begin, I attend to some housekeeping items.

‘Words that belong together’ are denoted by single quotes or italics.

Suggested readings include Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form (#1), Primer on Sensible and Social Construction (#2), and the chapter on message in How to Define the Word “Religion”. These works, by Razie Mah, are available at smashwords and other e-book venues, along with the compilation of this blog, titled, Comments on Dennis Venema and Scot McKnight’s Book (2017) Adam and the Genome.

0004 In order to see where many evangelicals are coming from, consult the September 2010 issue of Perspectives in Science and Christian Faith. This particular journal of the American Scientific Affiliation presents a snapshot of some of the difficulties posed by the early chapters of Genesis.

0005 The 2017 book, Adam and the Genome: Reading Scripture after Genetic Science, addresses one conundrum with a simple admission: Adam and Eve cannot be the progenitors of all humans, as proposed by Saint Augustine, 1600 years ago. The admission rebukes Christians striving to locate the primal couple in a genetic bottleneck event between 50 and 150 thousand years ago.

0005 Unfortunately, their solution provides little defense for Christian doctrine. Big government (il)liberals (BGilLs) claim that evolution disproves the second creation story in Genesis, just like the mercantilists, fascists and communists before them. BGiLs also insist that the Bible is the stuff of myths.

0006 Evangelical communities continue to bleed students.

Why?

Original Sin.

Christians think it describes the human condition.

BGilLs do not.

0007 Christians believe that humans are disoriented. Jesus provides orientation. Jesus is the way.

For BGilLs, the human condition is perfectible through a never-ending revolution by an administrative state. The human condition may be fulfilled by knowing one’s self. Or, is it – constructing – one’s self?

With Original Sin, we are actors in a theodrama that transcends critical theory. Indeed, critical theory may typify the corruption of Original Sin.

Without Original Sin, we are foolish players strutting on the world’s stage, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. So why not accept the ministrations of a totalitarian government? Why not construct oneself?

10/4/25

Adam and Eve and Original Sin: The Subject Matters (Part 2 of 2)

AEOS 0011 Yes, there is more.

Here is another online course on the same subject matter. All parts appear in Razie Mah’s blogs. Click on the month, then scroll downwards.

0012 These are sample courses. So, one may pick and choose points and reviews as one pleases.

Plus, there are lots of pictures. Pictures can be interesting and informative.

How so?

For the most part, the pictures are diagrams of purely relational structures.

0013 What am I selling?

Three online courses that cover the topic of human evolution. All are offered by Razie Mah. All are available at smashwords and other e-book venues. Merely purchase the e-books, print the pdf or read on a tablet. Each point can be discussed. The texts are designed to read and discuss.

A Course on the Human Niche contains the masterwork, plus four commentaries. This course introduces the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

A Course on An Archaeology of the Fall, contains the masterwork, plus outside reading (Paul’s letter to the Romans and Sura 5). An instructor’s guide is available. This course pertains to the hypothesis of the first singularity.

A Course in How To Define the Word “Religion” contains the masterwork, plus 10 primers. This course concerns our current Lebenswelt, which is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. A “how-to” instruction appears in Razie Mah’s blog in December 2022.

0014 With that said, here is the second online course on this topic.

One: Looking at William Lane Craig’s Book (2021) “In Quest of the Historical Adam”

(September 31-1, 2022, 21 blogs, 120 points)

Two: Looking at John Walton’s Book (2015) “The Lost World of Adam and Eve”

(August 30-1, 2022, 22 blogs, 192 points)

Three: Looking at Andrew Kulokovsky’s Overview (2005) “The Bible and Hermeneutics”

(May 27-16, 2022, 10 blogs, 85 points)

Four: Looking at Carol Hill’s Article (2021) “Original Sin with Respect to Science”

(February 25-7, 2022, 15 blogs, 72 points)

Five: Looking at Roy Clouser’s Article (2021) “… Support of Carol Hill’s Reading…”

(March 8-1, 2022, 6 blogs, 34 points)

Six: Looking at Mark S. Smith’s Book (2019) “The Genesis of Good and Evil”

(January 31-13, 2022, 16 blogs, 100 points)

0015 Total: 90 blogs, 603 points, 10 hours at 1 minute per point.

Maybe, this online course lasts around 2 weeks.

Enjoy this sample and consider purchasing Razie Mah’s online courses.

12/31/24

Looking at Bill Arnold’s Article (2020) “Genesis and the Challenges of the 21st Century” (Part 1 of 5)

0001 This article records a presentation at a symposium on Adam, the Fall, and the goodness of God. The text is published in the journal, Pro Ecclesia (2020), volume 29(4), pages 387-406. I request that the journal to unlock this issue. After all, this lecture is not the only gem, covering a topic that is seldom broached.

0002 The author steps to the podium and posits two axioms. One addresses the evolutionary sciences, in a minimalistic sort of way. The other addresses biblical hermeneutics in the modern age. Ironically, another science hides in the shadow of the second axiom. That science is archaeology.

0003 Here is a picture of the two axioms.

0004 The science axiom poses a double difficulty.

Currently, the biological sciences present all evolution as continuous developments in time, although there are moments of radical… um… “re-organization”, hence the theory of punctuated equilibrium. When the evolutionary sciences cast their models of human evolution into the mirror of theology, the theologian sees a picture that does not quite sync with the wild change of… um… “genre” that occurs the moment after God wraps up the Creation Story, by telling humans that they should give food to the animals (Genesis 1:30).

Speaking of that, here is an application of the two axioms in action.

0005 Mirror of theology?

See Comments on Mariusz Tabaczek’s Arc of Inquiry (2019-2014), available at smashwords and other e-book venues, as well as Razie Mah’s blog for the months of April, May and June, 2024.

On the one hand, the mirror of theology embraces the noumenon.

On the other hand, the mirror of theology reflects models proposed by science. Science is not interested in the noumenon, the thing itself. Scientists are only interested in a noumenon’s phenomena. Phenomena are the observable and measurable facets of a noumenon. Scientists build models based on observations and measurements of phenomena. If the model “works”, then scientismists want to say that the model is more real than the thing itself. At this point, natural philosophers and theologians object and say, “No, the scientific model is not more real than the thing itself.”

0006 After an awkward pause, triumphalist scientists reply, “Well, then, how are you going to know anything about the noumenon without our models?”

“Well,” the natural philosophers say, “What about matter and form? I can know these about the noumenon through experience of it.”

“So how are you going to do that when the noumenon is evolutionary history? How can you grasp that though determining its matter and form?”

To which the theologian sighs and says, “Listen, whatever the noumenon is, it cannot be reduced scientific models of its phenomena. So, I will set up a mirror that will reflect your scientific model, so you can be assured that your models are not ignored when I contemplate the metaphysical structures intrinsic to the thing itself, while keeping my mind open to revelation (including the the Bible). I will call it ‘the mirror of theology’.”

0007 To which the scientist counters, “And, we will correspondingly set up a mirror in our domain, a mirror of science. We will look at the theological statements concerning the character of the noumenon, which really should just be replaced by our mathematical and mechanical models. Then, we will laugh at and ridicule them.”

0008 Now, I once again present the odd coincidence pictured before as an application of the two axioms.

Do I have that correctly?

Does the scientist project his model into the mirror of theology?

Does the theologian project his metaphysical analysis into the mirror of science?

How confusing is that?

0008 It seems to me, a mere semiotician, that these two images actually reflect a single real being. The theologian looks into the mirror of theology and sees what evolutionary scientists project, then looks at revelation and locates an appropriate correspondence. Then, when the theologian’s correspondence is viewed by the scientist in their mirror of science, it says, “That is superstitious nonsense!”

“It”?

I thought male and female he created them.

“It” must be a first approximation.

0009 Of course, to the semiotician, the whole situation is sort of funny, because it implies that there is a body of wisdom that is independent of science, but not subject to science, because it concerns the noumenon, the thing itself.

12/26/24

Looking at Bill Arnold’s Article (2020) “Genesis and the Challenges of the 21st Century” (Part 5 of 5)

0034 Yes, Razie Mah covers what postmodern scientists should project into the mirror of theology.

Our current Lebenswelt (German for “living world”) is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

The discontinuity is called “the first singularity”.

0035 The discontinuity entails a change in the way humans talk.

The hypothesis is technically described in The First Singularity and Its Fairy Tale Trace.

The scientific discovery is dramatically portrayed in An Archaeology of the Fall.

Both texts are available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

0036 The hypothesis, along with the hypotheses proposed in The Human Niche and How To Define the Word “Religion”,pose significant challenges to the way that human evolution is currently conceptualized. See Comments on Michael Tomasello’s Arc of Inquiry (1999-2019), as well as Razie Mah’s blog for January through March 2024.

0037 Arnold drills down into the ideological substance of etiology. With the hypothesis of the first singularity, the theologian’s focus on etiology bifurcates precisely along the fault-line between two genres.

Shall theology project this nested form into the mirror in the domain in science?

0038 The first step in Albright’s development scenario corresponds to the stories of Adam and Eve through the Table of Nations (following the stories of Noah’s flood). Here, Albright’s intuition hits the mark. This step corresponds to a phase of human reason, that may be correctly labeled, “proto-logical”.

Not surprisingly, the “proto-logical” label also applies to all the literature of the ancient Near East that is listed by Arnold.

Indeed, the label, “proto-empirical”, also applies.

Imagine passage from a world that thinks in hand-speech talk to a world that thinks in speech-alone talk. The former allows a diversity of implicit abstractions. The latter does not, because explicit abstraction gums up the works of implicit abstraction. In the proto-empirical phase, explicit abstraction starts to establish a life of its own.

0039 Arnold adds that the next etiological phase corresponds to the stories of Abraham. The founding of the people of Israel touches base with Albright’s “empirical” phase. The Biblical text changes in clarity and focus when passing from the mythohistories of Noah to the tales of Abraham. Terah does not move from his long-established home city lightly. He moves for empirical reasons. Yes, it is history, but it is rendered as myth.

0040 So, the Primeval History, along with other written origin stories of the ancient Near East, may be gathered under the catchment of “mytho-history”. This term has the same semiotic structure as “proto-logical” and “proto-empirical”. Yes, it is logical, but it is before formal logic. Yes, it is empirical, but it is before the empirical takes on a life of its own.

0041 Arnold notes that Albright sees how the term, “adamah”, changes from “humanity” to “a personal name”, in the course Genesis 2.4 through 4.

He sees the change as significant and unsettling.

But, he does not have a vision where the stories of Adam and Eve are located in the tourbillion of increasing unconstrained social complexity manifesting in the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia.

0042 Barth smiles at this unsettlement. For this theologian, as soon as Adam is with us, so is Christ.

In the construction of the temple of the heavens and the earth, God creates humans in His image in the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

In the manufacture of Adam’s body and the inspiration of Adam’s breath, God creates humans in our current Lebenswelt.

0043 Thus, the discontinuity of the first singularity that appears in the mirror of theology, located in the domain of theology, is reflected back in the mirror of science, located in the domain of science, as the discontinuity between Genesis 2:3 and Genesis 2:4.

I wonder.

Can I imagine that there is only one mirror?

0044 A twenty-first century reading of Genesis challenges evolutionary scientists.

Genesis joins all the written origin stories of the ancient Near East, in proclaiming what evolutionary scientists ignore,humans are created by the gods in recent prehistory. Indeed, a causal observation of the archaeological data demands the proposal of a hypothesis like the first singularity, if only the separate two million years of evolution within constrained social complexity from the 7800 years of theodramatic madness within unconstrained social complexity.

But, there is more, see Razie Mah’s blog on October 1, 2022, for a research project for all of Eurasia.

0045 The stories of Adam and Eve precisely capture the theodramatic character and the absolutely crazy turns of events that typify our current Lebenswelt. One does not know whether to laugh or to cry. Father, forgive us, for we know not what we do.

Meanwhile, the Creation Story intimates a deep prehistory, confounding the construction of the temple of the heavens and the earth with a counter-intuitive sequence of events that weirdly coincides with a phenomenological vision of the Earth’s evolutionary “progression”.

0046 A twenty-first century reading of Genesis challenges theologians interested in the noumenon of humans, in our current Lebenswelt.

If the hypothesis of the first singularity becomes more and more plausible, so does a second doctrine of original sin,where the deficits of Augustine’s first attempt are amended, yielding a doctrine that applies to the post-truth condition. See Razie Mah’s blog for January 2, 2024 for a call to action. Also see Razie Mah’s blog for July through October 2024. These blogs will be assembled (for user convenience) as a three-part commentary, Original Sin and the Post-Truth Condition (available at smashwords and other e-book venues).

12/2/24

Looking at Brandon Wanless’s Article (2023) “…on the State of Original Innocence” (Part 12 of 12)

0106 In Theology of the Body, Pope John Paul II proposes that original innocence entails a gift of holiness given to man and to woman, enabling them to participate in the inner life of God, through their radical giving of self to one another, in purity of heart.

He concludes that the ethos of the gift may serve as the basis for a truly adequate anthropology.

0107 To this examiner, Pope John Paul II stands on the soapbox of the theology of Thomas Aquinas. He proclaims biblical teaching.

At the same time, he points toward the prelapsarian Adam… or adamah… and subtly suggests that a truly adequate anthropology may be found in… an application of Aquinas’s metaphysics and biblical teaching to who we evolved to be.

0108 Male and female we evolved to be?

And more…

Male and female in mutual self-giving, we evolved to be.

0109 Here is a picture with another way to appreciate the relation between John Paul II’s specific application and the broad application that The Theology of the Body intimates.

This schema may be applied to all social circles.

0110 Adamah is “humanity”, when the hominin and the social circle may be distinguished but not separated. Adamah do not articulate triadic relations using explicit abstractions. Rather, adamah live them and, over generations, adapt to them. We live by implicit abstraction. Implicit abstractions are built into our souls and bodies. Adamah associates to the “image of God” of Genesis verses 1:26-31.

0111 The foundational social circles are family (5) and friends (5).

The social circle for obligatory collaborative foraging is the team (15). Here is where our lineage learns to be productive and have fun. Proto-linguistic hand talk is an adaptation to teams. Teams engage in sensible construction.

The social circle that provides safety in numbers in travel and at night is the band (50).

The social circle that brings harmony to diverse teams is the community (150). Here is where we learned to be more than productive and experience more than fun. Fully linguistic hand talk is an adaptation to community. Communities engage in social construction. Social construction is the meaning underlying the term, “religion”.

0112 The social circle that gathers bands and communities in seasonal celebrations is the mega-band (500). Here is where singing is first used for social synchronization. The gathering cannot last long, in order to avoid disease. So, rapid social synchronization is required.

Once the voice is under voluntary control due to social and sexual selection, the voice is exapted at the start of our own species, Homo sapiens, over 200,000 years ago. Humans practice hand-speech talk until the first singularity.

The social circle that calls for wisdom and offers deep witness to the signs of The One Who Hand Talks the World Itself is the tribe. The tribe is a linguistic community.

0113 Unbeknownst to Pope John Paul II, a theology of original innocence as a disposition towards interpersonal self-giving may be precisely the metaphysics needed to conceptually elucidate the dynamic harmonies within and among social circles that characterize hominin evolution.

0114 Man is not meant to be alone, as a radical individual, whose sexuality is a tool to satisfy “needs”, according to some theoretical -ismist construction.

Yet, man is alone, caught in a web of explicit abstractions promising to solve his alienation, by incorporating him into an idea, an “-ism”, concocted by some “Western Enlightenment inspired” political philosopher. If he buys into the agenda, then he may be a person, among an ideologically defined people.

Such theory may be technically correct, but it is wholly misleading. Now, -ismists are increasingly discredited.

0115 In our current Lebenswelt, we live in the state of original sin.

We are not alone in contemplating our condition.

Alexander Dugin calls for a fourth political theory.

Pope John Paul II offers a theology that complements Dugin’s vision.

Dugin offers a political theory that complements the pope’s theology.

0116 Just beyond Adam, representing our current Lebenswelt, there is adamah, prelapsarian humanity, representing the Lebenswelt that we evolved to be. Philosophical inquiry into biblical teaching may allow us to see that humans and social circles co-evolve, so man was never meant to be alone.

The people are beginning to realize that the -ismists are wrong, the narod is where we could be, and the ethnos is where we can never return to. We long to return. But, we cannot. So turn around and see what God has to offer.

0117 Perhaps, now, in a confused and exploratory fashion, we can modify our scientific interpretation of human evolutionand stand on Aquinas’s soapbox just like the the pope does, and greet the prelapsarian adamah, as who we evolved to be.

0118 My thanks to the author for publishing an article worthy of examination.

Surely, this examiner goes to places that the author never envisioned.

Such is the way of scholastic inquiry. Commentaries follow commentaries. Then, everything changes.

10/31/24

Looking at N. J. Enfield’s Book (2022) “Language vs. Reality” (Part 1 of 23)

0841 This is an encore performance to the sequence of blogs on the post-truth condition.

As such, this examination wraps up Part Two of Original Sin and the Post-Truth Condition (available at smashwords and other e-book venues).

Take a gander at the full title of Enfield’s text, Language vs. Reality: Why Language Is Good For Lawyers and Bad For Scientists.

Surely, that sounds like a book that belongs to a set of books on the post-truth condition.

So, the numbers continue to build from the last examination.

0842 The book is published by MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The author is a professor of linguistics at the University of Sydney and the Director of the Sydney Centre for Language Research.

0843 The title of the book is a play on John B. Carroll’s (editor) collection of essays by Benjamin Lee Whorf (1897-1941 AD), published in 1956 under the title, Language, Thought and Reality.

To me, this implies that “thought” has transubstantiated into “versus”. The substance of the word has changed, so to speak. The word, “versus”, derives from the same root as the word, “adversary”. So, if “thought” once used to nominally stand between “language” and “reality”, then today, “thought” is confounded with “adversary”, and that might serve as a hint concerning the nature of our adversity.

Perhaps, this is not the only notable feature of the title.

Then again, a book titled, Language, Adversary and Reality, might not fly off the shelves in feel-good book-outlets. It is not as if, next to the Self-Help section, there is a Come To Grips With Your Doom section.

So, expect me to play with the title throughout this examination.

0844 Another notable feature of this book, at least to me, is that the author is not acquainted with Razie Mah’s re-articulation of human evolution, in three masterworks, The Human Niche, An Archaeology of the Fall and How To Define the Word “Religion” (available at smashwords and other e-book venues). The evolution of talk is not the same as the evolution of language. Language evolves in the milieu of hand talk. Plus, the evolution of talk comes with the twist, humorously called, “the first singularity”.

So, Enfield’s work serves as a marker for the twilight of the Age of Ideas and the dawning of the Age of Triadic Relations.

0845 Okay, let me dwell on the idea that the evolution of language is not the same as the evolution of talk.

Comments on Michael Tomasello’s Arc of Inquiry (1999-2019) (by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues, and also, for the most part, appearing in Razie Mah’s blog for January, February and March, 2024) divides the evolution of talk in the following manner.

0846 The first period starts with the divergence of the chimpanzee and human lineage (7 million of years ago) and ends with the bipedalism of the so-called “southern apes” (around 3.5 to 4 million years ago).

In the second period, australopithecines adapt to mixed forest and savannah by adopting the strategy of obligate collaborative foraging. Eventually, Homo erectus figures out the controlled use of fire, leading to the domestication of fire, starting (perhaps) around 800 thousand years ago.

The third period, lasts from the domestication of fire to the earliest appearance of anatomically modern humans. During this period, hand talk becomes fully linguistic, religion evolves as an adaptation to large social circles (of 150 individuals and more) and hominins use the voice for synchronization during seasonal mega-band and occasional tribal gatherings. Then, sexual selection does the rest and the voice comes under voluntary neural control.

0847 The fourth period starts when the voice, now under voluntary control, joins hand-talk, resulting in a dual-mode way of talking, hand-speech talk. Hand talk retains the iconicity and indexality that grounds reference in things that can be pictured or pointed to. But, speech adds a symbolic adornment, which starts as a sing-along and ends up taking a life of its own. Four centuries ago, the North American Plains Indians and the Australian aborigines still practiced hand-speech talk, with full fledged sign and verbal languages. Now, their hand-speech talk is all but dead.

0848 That death, along with the demise of all hand-speech talking languages, comes (and came) due to exposure to speech-alone talk, which has significantly different semiotic qualities than hand-talk and hand-speech talk. Hand-talk is iconic and indexal. The referent precedes the gestural word. Speech-alone talk is purely symbolic. The spoken word labels ‘something’, and sometimes that ‘something’ cannot be imaged or indicated.

Well, it must be real because speech-alone talk provides a label for an explicit abstraction!

0849 Here is a picture of the transition labeled, “the first singularity”.

0850 Consider the words, “language”, “adversary” and “reality”. Each word is a label for ‘something’ that cannot be pictured or pointed to. These words do not exist in hand-talk or hand-speech talk, because the referent cannot be imaged or indicated using a manual-brachial gesture. What does this imply? Does a referent exist because a label has been attached to it? Or, does an explicit abstraction properly label referents that exist irrespective of the spoken word? This type of question is addressed in Razie Mah’s masterwork, How To Define The Word “Religion”.

Fortunately, the author of the book under examination is unaware of the first singularity and the difficulties that a change in the way that humans talk poses. Human evolution comes with a twist.

0851 So why examine this work?

Well, I expect to see the evolution of talk manifesting in this book, even though the author is not aware of Razie Mah’s academic labors.

Surely, Enfield’s work details recent scientific research in linguistics and cognitive psychology, in an attempt to provide the reader with a coherent view of how language is good for lying lawyers and bad for honest scientists.

What will this examination reveal?

08/31/24

Looking at Vivek Ramaswamy’s Book (2021) “Woke, Inc.” (Part 1 of 20)

0255 The full title of the book before me is Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam (Center Street Press: Nashville and New York). The book consists of an introduction, followed by fifteen chapters.

0256 Why am I numbering the start of this examination with the number that follows the end of Professor Steve Fuller’s 2020 book, A Player’s Guide to The Post-Truth Condition?

Well, I have a question.

Is Fuller on target?

0257 One way to address this question is an examination of an author who is a player in the current theo-political dramaof the Fourth Battle of the Enlightenment Gods (1989-present).

Vivek Ramaswamy offers a book that suits the purpose. Take a look at the table of contents. The title of the introductionis “The Woke-Industrial Complex”. The title of the final chapter is “Who are We?”

0258 Are “we” the ones who have substituted the broadcasts of the empirio-normative judgment for our own thoughts, so what we say can be objectified as phenomena for the psychometric sciences?

Or are “we” the ones who read the previous sentence and ask, “What the hell are you talking about?”

The choice is clear.

0259 We are in the fourth world war. I call it The Fourth Battle of the Enlightenment Gods: Empirio-Normative Domination in the Post-Truth Condition.

Here is a list of all four wars.

0260 Of course, those who are certified in modern history will classify this list as “revisionist”.

But, reflect on the titles of the introduction and chapter fifteen of Ramaswamy’s book and ask, “Just who is acting as a revisionist?”

Woke, Inc.?

Or, the confounded subject of domination.

0261 In the introduction, Ramaswamy claims that two characteristics define America as a nation.

The first is the American Dream, where “success” is regarded in terms of “getting ahead”. To many, “getting ahead” is associated with capitalism.

The second is the Latin slogan, e pluribus unum, out of many, one. Pluralism celebrates a variety of views and the challenges of convincing others of the relevance of one’s own view. We all have this in common. Everyone has an opinion. Ramaswamy associates this to democracy.

0262 Here are the associations.

0263 But, how do these slogans associate to the interscope for the post-truth condition?

Yes, I must go there.

The following interscope is typical for the many interscopes that appear in the examination of Fuller’s guide.

0264 For the content-level, the normal context of my intellect_3a brings the dyadic actuality of what I think [cannot be objectified as] what I am willing to say_2a into relation with the possibilities inherent in ‘my will’_1a

What is the nature of this dyadic actuality_2a?

It has to do with science.

What I think is like a noumenon, a thing itself.

What I say is like its phenomena, the observable and measurable facets of a thing.

According to Kant’s slogan, a noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena.

Therefore, what I think [cannot be objectified as] what I say.

0265 Kant’s slogan figures in what is in the Positivist’s judgment.

Here is a diagram.

0266 Clearly, the content-level actuality_2a corresponds to what is of the Positivist’s judgment.

If logical positivists had their way, they would dismiss the noumenon as a stumbling block for scientific inquiry into phenomena. This is precisely why Kant insists on the realness of the noumenon, in addition to its phenomena. Scientific models are not the same as the thing itself, even though triumphalist scientists would have models replace their noumena.

Nevertheless, for most sciences, the noumenon is merely a book-keeping entry corresponding to what is responsible for observable and measurable phenomena.

So, I repeat.

What I think is a book-keeping entry.

What I say corresponds to what the psychometric sciences observe and measure.

08/8/24

Artistic Concordism. Harmony between Genesis and Evolution?

0001 On August 14, 2024, Razie Mah, the blogger and author of The Human Niche, An Archaeology of the Fall and How To Define the Word “Religion, releases an e-book, titled “Exercises in Artistic Concordism“.

Concordism is harmony between religion and science, particulary, the biblical origin stories and evolutionary history. Concordism attempts to build a bridge. But there is always a problem.

0002 According to current interpretations of these matters, either religion or science has to give.

Enter semiotics. Semiotics is the study of sign-relations. Sign-relations are triadic relations. Triadic relations? Thirdness (the triadic realm of normal contexts) brings secondness (the dyadic realm of actuality) into relation with firstness (the monadic realm of possibility).

0003 What if Genesis One is a sign of the evolutionary record?

If one reads the Creation Story through the lens of Charles Peirce’s typology of natural signs, then each day of creation offers icons, indexes and symbols of a corresponding epoch. The days, like pearls, string perfectly onto the evolutionary record. The aesthetic correspondence is beautiful to behold.

0004 What has to give?

The interpretation that the Creation Story is itself the revelation? Perhaps, Genesis One records a revelation. That means there is a visionary, which brings up the question. How do we (as the ones who will hear the words of the vision) evolve to be who we are created to be? We are created to recognize the signs of God. What does this mean?

And, what if the stance that the Creation Story is a vision gives us ways to answer these questions?

0005 What else has to give?

Our theoretical formulation of human evolution? Yes, there is more to our evolution than fossils and genetics. What if, as the Genesis text indicates, our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in? What if there is a cultural twist in recent prehistory?

0006 If one reads the awkward textual transition between the Creation Story and the stories of Adam and Eve as discontinuity, then one may wonder why all the written origins stories of the ancient Near East portray the origin of humans as a recent event. Humans are created, de novo, by differentiated gods.

Why can’t any of the civilizations of the ancient Near East see past a time horizon that an anthropologist may place, say, at the start of the Ubaid archaeological period of southern Mesopotamia?

Why can’t these ancient civilizations see the Lebenswelt that we evolved in?

These queries lead to a much more inflammatory question. Why is our current Lebenswelt not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in?

Imagine the answer to that one!

0007 Today, civilized folk are abuzz about the coming singularity. What if it is not the first?

Uh oh, the first singularity is a scientific hypothesis that harmonizes a cultural twist in human evolution with the stories of Adam and Eve.

0008 Both religious appreciations of the text and scientific blind-spots must transform if there is to be concord.

Plus, that concord will be neither religious nor scientific.

It will be artistic.

An Archaeology of the Fall

A Horror Story by Razie Mah

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