This is the student site for The Magellan Courses – a curriculum of studies across domains that engage an emergent type of post-rational reasoning. What makes this type of reasoning post-rational, is that, unlike all levels of rational thinking, it does not originate from dualistic categories, but rather from onto-logical ones. The term “onto-logical” references thinking that arises whole, from the creative source of being(in-becoming), and retains the structure of dynamic wholeness, rather than being split up by the rational mind into opposite, albeit complementary, pairs. Therefore, instead of reasoning in terms of static conceptual categories, onto-logics engages dynamic properties and their relations, building systems from originary generative processes. These generative processes can be linked to the kinds of structures that arise in the conceptually dualistic, rational mind, by referencing the nature of order internal to the creative whole. The nature of order in a generative process, is never dualistic, because it itself is a living, dynamic whole system.
Magellan set out with his fleet of four, the Trinidad, Victoria, Concepcion and Santiago, to sail around the world. Although only a few of the original 247 men survived the circumnavigation, it was the first time in recorded history that humans experienced the world as a whole planet. Until the space age, all exploration of this planet was painstakingly done by moving through the terrain. We had yet to gain a vantage point from space from where we could simply observe its wholeness.Every individual perspective, from every individual hill, hillock and seaway, contributed a piece of the whole picture, and we used the stars to triangulate their relations.
This is a metaphor for the Magellan Courses. Our fleet is comprised of broad domains of special interest. And because we cannot yet completely see the kinds of new consciousness we are working from, we will need to piece together the innumerable points of reference by identifying the stars we will navigate by. For those who survive the trip, success will feel like having closed an epistemic circle, where once was a huge gap of expectancy for what is “not yet here” will be found to have been always already arising. This is the key moment of the onto-logical discovery –
We shall not cease from exploration. And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.
~ T.S. Eliot Little Gidding
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Just like a rock
Behold! A rock!
Now I understand this much more clearly and feel it will crystallize further!
However, a few questions are inherent:
If Magellan had been offered a satellite-space-shuttle, would he have choosen that for his vessel?
If a student or teacher on the Magellan were to invent such a vessel or otherwise gain a vantage point from space from where we could simply observe” the wholeness of what is emerging, when should he reveal his secret?
Until revealed, exploration of this materiel may be only “painstakingly done by moving through the terrain” But which is more fun? An adventure in the terrain or knowing seeing the whole whilst resting in space? OR BOTH!?
My suggestion to that teacher, student or group of fellow travellers is:
Don’t spoil the fun! Let flesh-and-blood be seasoned by wind, waves and sun. and do explore on the previous forms of vessel, so that you can take anyone, anywhere on this ride in the future. Help us to navigate with a more accurate seeing of the next structure preserving leg of the voyage. And tease us along with a twinkle in your eye. Perhaps you can keep our captain safe from the Heathens and calm a potentially mutinous crew when the going gets tough. That way and by this miracle of coming from the future may you rewrite the story and we’ll all (everyone, including the horses) make it home in time for the wedding…
In JC’s words?
“The one who brings a hearty appetite to this (…) will be fit and ready for the Final Day.”
So me-heartys, I ask you in JC’s name (please don’t section me this time!):
Jesus was curt: “Are you ready to rough it?…”
Here’s the riddle that came to me while reflecting on the question of travelling by sail boat, even though we do not need to:
i believe the deep motivation for this crew’s courageous commitment to embark on this adventure on the ships of the magellan fleet – instead of making use of satellite images of earth from space now available to us at home – is contained in this riddle:
the Overall valUe gained fRom an expedition by BOat, goes Deeper an HIgher than that absorbed by watching SAtellite TeleVision At Home. so we take this risky Voyage arOund the World, on purpose, to honour what is revealed when you explore the words of these pioneering word-worlds yourself, and connect the capitalS.
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Wow, I read that TS. Eliot years ago via Joe Campbell & understood it to mean we’re in this tea party, where manners are a necessity, not a goal. I’m enthused to be re-oriented or re-occidented as the case may warrant.