Ken Wilber offers an addendum to his recent article, Response to Critical Realism in Defense of Integral Theory. If you have not already read the full article, you can find it here.

Since writing this, I have seen several articles comparing and contrasting Integral Theory and Critical Realism.  Virtually all of them say the same thing.  They point out several ways that Critical Realism can benefit from Integral Theory, and when it comes to ways that Integral Theory can benefit from Critical Realism, they all say, essentially, “a grounding in ontology.”

Let me make a few points about that.  First, if that is an item you happen to agree with, then by all means do it.  It doesn’t change the fundamental items of the Integral Framework in the least.  And the whole point of the Integral model is that individuals can adapt it as they see best to suit their needs and what they think is right.

But in some ways this is unfair to Integral Theory.  As several responding critics pointed out, Integral Theory has an extensive ontology—from “involutionary givens” to the 20 tenets, whose first tenet is: “Reality is composed neither of things nor of processes, but of holons.”  Holons, of course, are wholes that are parts of other wholes (as a whole atom is part of a whole molecule, a whole molecule is part of a whole cell, a whole cell is part of a whole organism, etc.  They are whole/parts, or holons.)  This is sometimes worded, “Reality is composed of perspectives that are holons” (for reasons explained below).  Since all of the items in all of the quadrants are holons, the Integral map is drenched in ontology (but, as I am maintaining, an ontology inseparable from epistemology and methodology, all interwoven aspects of the Whole—many subjects, many methods, many objects—or Who’s, How’s, and What’s).

But as I said, if one prefers a Critical Realist approach to ontology, be my guest.  I myself don’t do that because it means, first, separating epistemology and ontology, and then “grounding” epistemology in the ontology  (the item Integral Theory can allegedly benefit from Critical Realism)—and yet epistemology and ontology are not separate and separable domains.  They are, from the start, mutually interactive, enactive, complementary aspects of the Whole.  They cannot, as pointed out above, be violently torn from each other, and then attempted to be put back together again by “grounding” one in the other.  Epistemology (and methodology) and ontology are all integrally interwoven and mutually enactive, each contributing an irreducible aspect of the Whole of reality, and none can be privileged (without resorting to 1st-tier thinking).  Epistemology (and methodology) and ontology are each a crucially and mutually interwoven aspect of every holon in existence (all the way up, all the way down), and are so because of a genuine (and not merely claimed) panpsychism, or a Kosmos where consciousness, doing, and being are all enactively engaged dimensions of an inseparable and infinitely interconnected universe—all the way up, all the way down.

This approach neither commits the epistemic fallacy (epistemology is privileged and ontology derived from it) nor the ontic fallacy (ontology is privileged and epistemology derived from it).  Nor does it see ontology separated and consigned to its own realm, and epistemology separated and consigned to its own realm—but rather both arise concurrently (as part of a 4-quadrant tetra-arising, all the way up and down), co‑evolve concurrently, and co-enact concurrently.  The Kosmos is simply too interwoven and too inseparable and too enactive to exist in any other fashion—there are no silo dimensions anywhere in the universe.  Atoms come into being at the same time that they “know” each other; molecules come into being at the same time that they “know” each other; and likewise cells, organisms, and so on.  If their knowing and being don’t properly mesh (which is certainly possible, and actually happens quite often), then the affected holon simply ceases to arise—it ceases to be carried forward by evolution, whether it is a subatomic particle, an animal, or an idea.

It is the refusal to ground ontology in epistemology or epistemology in ontology that sets Integral Theory apart from postmodernism and Critical Realism, respectively.  Instead of, say, epistemology being grounded in ontology, there is instead a “mutual resonance” that does—or does not—occur between these dimensions of being, and their enactive mutuality thus either “meshes” (and the holon is carried forward by evolution) or fails to mesh (and the holon becomes extinct in the very next moment).  This is not two mutually separate domains (epistemology and ontology) smashing into each other and reflecting or not, but two mutually enactive and co-existing dimensions interactively resonating in the living Kosmos or failing to, at which point the very life of the holon failing to resonate also fails to exist, and fades into Kosmic memory as a trace of what once was, but is no more. 

This necessity of mutual enaction is part of the creative process that simultaneously brings forth multiple subjects, multiple actions (methods), and multiple objects—the “multiplicity” in each case occurring precisely because all three of those are mutually interwoven, and as a new dimension (say, a new subject) evolves, so the other dimensions must resonate (and co-evolve) in order to resonate with the new reality, in order to keep the Wholeness part of the holon Whole.  This Wholeness is not the extrinsic sum of separate domains (e.g., epistemology, methodology, ontology), but the dynamic interwoven relationship of intrinsically co-evolving, co-creating, co-enacting internally related holonic dimensions, which must, indeed, resonate with each other or face extinction.  It is the reality of mutual enaction that sets up an equal necessity for mutual resonance among these dimensions in a holon, and ensures that all of them co-evolve together, adjusting and re-adjusting to each other’s reality until a genuine Wholistic resonance occurs among all of them.  It is this mutual resonance among interwoven dimensions, and not the isolated “grounding” of one silo dimension in another silo dimension, that allows knowing to occur at all—and is the fundamental basis of “correct” knowing and authentic being (mutual resonance) versus “inaccurate” knowing and inauthentic being (lack of mutual resonance leading to a fracture of one dimension from the others, and the frantic attempt to reconnect them by artificially “grounding” one in the other).

(This is why “Reality is composed of holons” is often stated “Reality is composed of perspectives that are holons.”  This is simply focusing both on epistemology—perspectives—and ontology—holons—and pointing out their mutually co-existing and co-arising and co-enacting natures.  Perspectives are not grounded in holons, and holons are not grounded in perspectives—they mutually enact and co-create each other, with a change in one resonating with a change in the other, as complementary aspects of the Whole, which keeps it Whole—and insures an integral pluralistic epistemology, an integral pluralistic methodology, and an integral pluralistic ontology, all interwoven, all inseparable—and thus open, not to “reflection” of separate silos, but mutual resonance of complementary aspects of the Whole.)

The genuine (and not merely claimed) panpsychism (or, as I prefer, pan-interiorism) is an important part of this mutually resonating equation of the Whole.  It is very similar to the stance of Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced “purse”)—America’s one unanimously recognized philosophical genius.  That epistemology and ontology are radically inseparable means that every sign is not just representing an object or referent, but is simultaneously and in-part interpreting that referent (the “knowing” and “being” co‑arising).  As Peirce says of an act of semiotic knowing, it consists of “an action, or influence, which is, or involves, an operation of three subjects, such as a sign, its object, and its interpretant [note the “interpretant’], this tri‑relative influence not being in any way resolvable into an action between pairs [of those three interwoven dimensions].”  This means the epistemic sign and ontic object are categorically inseparable from each other and from some act of interpretation, and not that one is “grounded” or “reflects” the other.  Peirce comments on how odd this seems to conventional, siloed, fragmented theories of epistemology and ontology: “It seems a strange thing, when one comes to ponder over it, that a sign should leave its interpreter to supply a part of its meaning; but the explanation of the phenomenon lies in the fact that the entire universe—not merely the universe of existents, but that wider universe, embracing the universe of existents as part, the universe which we are all accustomed to refer to as ‘the truth’—that all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs.”  Epistemic signs, and their ontic objects, go inseparably together—all the way up, all the way down—and they operate, Peirce would say, not with one of them separately “reflecting” or “being grounded” in the other, but with a mutual “perfusion” of both throughout the entire universe.

(Peirce is particularly famous for inventing the school of pragmatism.  When William James began calling himself a pragmatist and began supporting pragmatism, Peirce was not altogether pleased with James’s exact presentation, and so he changed the name of his system to “pragmaticism,”—“a term,” he wrote, “so ugly as to discourage theft.”)

But, I repeat, you can separate out ontology and attempt to ground epistemology in it if you so desire, and still use the Integral Framework—not a single aspect of the Framework is fundamentally changed by that move (although its meta-understanding is).  And the writers who say that Integral Theory lacks this type of “ontological grounding” are absolutely right.

+READ FULL ARTICLE