Alternative Ontology Research Articles

Phenomenology of Mystical Psychedelic Experiences: The Case of Existential Anxiety

AbstractThe essay offers an interpretation of psychedelic peak experiences. It criticizes the quasi-scientific naturalistic attempts to explain such experiences and offers an alternative ontology underlying a more complex sense of naturalism, thus defending an entheogenic view irreducible to mere psychological effects. First, the mainstream ontology in the paradigm of natural sciences is exposed as being a version of the ontology of presence. This fact is shown as the reason for the phenomenological gap and the impotence of the natural sciences to address human experience. Next, existential anxiety is interpreted in terms of Heidegger’s ontology and is suggested as the core dimension of possible spiritual transformation. Finally, the phenomenology of mystical psychedelic experiences (MPE) is interpreted in terms of overcoming existential anxiety– a well-documented effect of MPE – and explicated in ontological terms. The psychedelic experience is shown to be mystical in a sense of transcending the everyday mode of existential denial of the enigmatic nature of the universe by facing the nothingness in a way that transforms one’s stand within it into a stand of original belongingness to the field of emptiness (Nishitani). Different aspects of psychedelic experience are explained and co-related in terms of such a transformation.

How indigenous spiritual beliefs shape health-related consumption rituals: shipibo health rituals to tackle covid-19

PurposeIn marketing and consumer research, the study of Indigenous ideas and rituals remains limited. The authors present an Indigenous-informed study of consumption rituals co-produced with members of the Shipibo–Konibo Indigenous group of the Peruvian Amazon. Specifically, the authors worked with the Comando Matico, a group of Shipibos from Pucallpa, Peru. This study aims to investigate how Indigenous spiritual beliefs shape health-related consumption rituals by focusing on the experience of the Shipibos and their response to COVID-19.Design/methodology/approachDrawing upon the principles of Indigenous research, the authors co-produced this study with the Comando Matico. The authors collaboratively discussed the research project’s design, analysed and interpreted data and co-authored this study with members of the Comando Matico. This study uses discourse analyses. The corpus of discourse is speech and text produced by the Comando Matico in webinars and online interviews during the COVID-19 pandemic. The full and active participation of the Comando Matico informed the discourse analysis by ensuring Indigenous knowledge, and worldviews were infused throughout the process.FindingsThe authors foreground how Indigenous spiritual beliefs act as a force that imbues the knowledge and practice of health, wellbeing and illness, and this process shapes the performance of rituals. In Indigenous contexts, multiple spirits coexist with consumers, who adhere to specific rituals to respond to and relate to these spirits. Indigenous consumption rituals involve the participation of non-human beings (called rao, ibo, yoshin and chaikoni by the Shipibos) and this aspect challenges the traditional notion of rituals and ritual elements in marketing.Originality/valueThe authors demonstrate how Indigenous spiritual beliefs shape consumption rituals in the context of health and draw attention to how the acknowledgement of alternative ontologies and epistemologies can help address dominant hierarchies of knowledge in marketing theory.

Spirituality and Nature: Alternative Ontologies to Innovate for the Future.

Spirituality and Nature: Alternative Ontologies to Innovate for the Future.

Decolonisation as Dis-Enclosure: overcoming the dangers of positionality and identity in comparative education

ABSTRACT This conceptual paper aims to discuss how to address the dangers emerging from scholars’ proclamations of positionality and identity in debates on decolonisation in comparative education. The approach proposed engages with two ideas that were central to the work of French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy and were further developed by Cameroonian philosopher Achille Mbembe: dis-enclosure and being-in-common. The author argues that these two ideas offer an alternative ontology of decolonisation that challenges the binary logic of identitarian thinking (e.g. western/non-western; white/non-white) in which proclamations of positionality and identity may often be rooted. This argument highlights the theoretical and political advantages of adopting a non-identitarian perspective for decolonisation debates in comparative education. The paper concludes with considering the implications of this alternative ontology of decolonisation in comparative education, with a specific focus on how scholars can foreground a shared responsibility for ‘reparative futures’ in research, writing, and teaching.

Complementary ways of seeing “the Nature”: Integrating varieties of knowledge practices in the management of local environmental conflicts in Colombia

The complex pathways of armed conflict and its consequences for ecosystem transformations and environmental change have been well established in the literature. However, despite recent progress in this subject area, there is still a lack of integrative transdisciplinary research in this context, limiting our potential to fully understand the scalar interwoven processes of armed conflict, societal transformation, and ecological consequences. We address this desideratum by suggesting an alternative way of understanding the dynamics of environmental peacebuilding (EP) that integrates local narratives about “nature” and “conflict” with “real-world” data. By this, we aim to first foster a transdisciplinary heuristic linking environmental and earth system science with political ecology and social science. Second, we base our heuristic on a decolonial understanding of knowledge production, thus integrating complementary ways of seeing from above and from below into an interactive and relational practice of knowing. Our paper is based on research and intervention projects, combining both statistical and quantitative human geographical data with ethnographic field research to understand deforestation. With this paper, we hope to encourage academic discussions on alternative ontologies and epistemic practices and inform contextualized EP efforts.

Reimagining Extinction in Australia and Japan: ‘Voices’ of the Tasmanian Tiger and Hokkaido Wolf

ABSTRACT This is a comparative, cross-cultural, and multi-disciplinary study of two extinct animals, the Tasmanian tiger in Australia and the Hokkaido wolf in Japan, and their ongoing cultural ‘presence’. The thylacine was last documented in captivity in 1936, and the Hokkaido wolf became extinct around 1900. Both faced rapid extinction due to anthropogenic factors associated with colonisation and modernisation, including eradication policies. Nonetheless, both animals have ongoing cultural and conservation significance. In Australia, the thylacine has become a symbol of redemption and conservation advocated for by devoted citizens who do not believe the animal is extinct. In Japan, the story of the Hokkaido wolf has been kept alive by Tezuka Osamu, a legendary manga/anime artist. Tezuka’s life project was to change anthropocentric human-nature relationships through his work. These two animals have significant ongoing implications for conservation and sustainability. The Tasmanian tiger offers a new approach to conservation through the pursuit of ‘Lazarus species’. The Hokkaido wolf provides an alternative ontology useful for rethinking human-nature relationships. Both point to the significant roles that different worldviews and emotional commitments can play for sustainable futures. They present new possibilities for reimagining extinction in the Anthropocene, showing that even extinct animals can give us hope.

Beyond Crisis and Emergency: Climate Change as a Political Epic

AbstractThe available choices of political responses to disruption in the global climatic system depend in part on how the problem is conceptualized. Researchers and policymakers often invoke a “climate crisis” or “climate emergency,” but such language fits poorly with current knowledge of the problem's physical causes and social impacts. This article argues that climate change is instead more like a political epic. It involves neither sudden onset, as in the concept of emergency, nor decisive resolution, as in the concept of crisis, but rather a protracted ordeal of (temporally) obscure origins and uncertain outcomes. This alternative ontology of climate change highlights its novel temporal properties, including unusually slow-moving or time-lagged causal dynamics, with unsettling implications for academic research on the climatic-institutional nexus. Normatively, it undermines arguments for democracies’ environmental superiority over autocracies that rely on the former's general superiority at resolving crises and responding to emergencies. At the same time, some new arguments for democratic distributions of power become possible within the epic frame. More broadly, embracing the assumption of epic climate change may redirect attention from Promethean, managerial, or technocratic solutions to questions about which values or identities deserve preservation amid presumptively interminable and imperfectly remediable sources of disorder.

Tx’otx’ and la defensa del territorio: articulating Mam territory as an Indigenous cross-border nation

ABSTRACT This article examines the way the Maya-Mam, an Indigenous people divided by the Guatemala–Mexico border, define territory in relation to and across state borders. As state borders geographically, socially, culturally, and politically divide the pueblo Mam, state maps bolster these divisions and state subjugation by promoting a nation-state framework that circumscribes the Mam within its borders. However, the Mam are problematizing state depictions of spatiality: they denaturalize state borders by articulating alternative ontologies of territory. This study shows that in their everyday lives, Mam councils, activists, and individuals aim to promote broader cross-border Mam unification to better defend territory from potential harm. They use a dual-prong approach for articulating territory: through the development of narratives that draw upon a more holistic understanding of territory’s ‘nature’ and by making counter-maps that incorporate Mam understanding of territory. I argue that these Indigenous efforts weave together a resistance to and refusal of state frames.

Do We Collaborate With What We Design?

The use of terms like "collaboration" and "co-workers" to describe interactions between human beings and certain artificial intelligence (AI) systems has gained significant traction in recent years. Yet, it remains an open question whether such anthropomorphic metaphors provide either a fertile or even a purely innocuous lens through which to conceptualize designed commercial products. Rather, a respect for human dignity and the principle of transparency may require us to draw a sharp distinction between real and faux peers. At the heart of the concept of collaboration lies the assumption that the collaborating parties are (or behave as if they are) of similar status: two agents capable of comparable forms of intentional action, moral agency, or moral responsibility. In application to current AI systems, this not only seems to fail ontologically but also from a socio-political perspective. AI in the workplace is primarily an extension of capital, not of labor, and the AI "co-workers" of most individuals will likely be owned and operated by their employer. In this paper, we critically assess both the accuracy and desirability of using the term "collaboration" to describe interactions between humans and AI systems. We begin by proposing an alternative ontology of human-machine interaction, one which features not two equivalently autonomous agents, but rather one machine that exists in a relationship of heteronomy to one or more human agents. In this sense, while the machine may have a significant degree of independence concerning the means by which it achieves its ends, the ends themselves are always chosen by at least one human agent, whose interests may differ from those of the individuals interacting with the machine. We finally consider the motivations and risks inherent to the continued use of the term "collaboration," exploring its strained relation to the concept of transparency, and consequences for the future of work.

From objects of study to worldmaking beings: The history of botany at the corner of the plant turn

AbstractThe “plant turn” of recent years has surfaced as an interdisciplinary position that sees plants as more than inert, passive objects subject to the whims of humans and of more charismatic animal life. Recent research in STEM, the social sciences, and the humanities, alongside scholarly publishing pursuits, have opened a field in which a small yet expanding community of scholars are proposing the worldmaking and agential capacities of plants. While the field of environmental history has already spent decades centering vegetal life and its profound impact on human societies, this essay considers what the plant turn might look like for the history of science and more specifically, the history of botany. What might it mean for plants to transform from objects of study to worldmaking beings in histories of the science? Drawing on two brief historical case studies from the Philippines, the essay invites consideration of plant worldmaking, understood in tandem with alternative ontologies, and of theorizing with plants. Though it may be much too soon to draw conclusions about what the plant turn may portend for the history of science (and the writing that may come from it), historians may have something to offer the plant turn—in discipline and method—in order to make this promising bed of scholarship rigorous and accessible.

Charged Space: The Anatomy of the In‐between

AbstractCo‐founder of design practice OFICINAA, Silvia Benedito highlights alternative ontologies of ‘void’ and ‘penumbra’ – as spaces of expectation and opportunity within which to create areas and objects that exploit these notions in beneficial ways. The ensuing atmospheres cosset natural resource conservation and human delight, related spaces of umbra/penumbra that formed the basis of her studio's Beastie project in New York.

On the Existence of a Preserved Ontology Posited by a High-Dimensional Bohmian Interpretation

AbstractIt has been argued that in the context of Bohm’s approach to quantum mechanics, the postulation of a three-dimensional ontology (as opposed to a high-dimensional one) is presumed to be the only interpretation that may reliably support object-oriented realism by virtue of the fact that this ontology is approximately preserved through scientific change, at least in the classical–quantum transition. Based on an interpretative analysis of the Bohmian formulation, I shall critically evaluate the tenability of this argument. In so doing, I shall argue that this formulation admits the postulation of an alternative ontology that is properly defined in a high-dimensional space, and is approximately preserved among this transition. As a result, both the three-dimensional and the high-dimensional worldviews shall form the basis of an equally reliable endorsement of object-oriented realism in the context of the Bohmian framework. I shall conclude that this argument becomes a problem of metaphysical underdetermination between a three and a high-dimensional Bohmian interpretation.

Remember the Future

The starting point of this study is the prehistoric “teganoschemo” archaeological find of the Syros-Keros civilization in the Aegean Sea. These artifacts have been causing debates among archaeologists as their raison d'être is still contested. The aim of this study is to bring a prehistoric ontological model of design and craft to contemporary design practices. In order to explore such alternative ontologies, we turn to the past and address themes of death and life embodied in these prehistoric artifacts. As we leave Modernity behind and transition towards Sustainment, a new ontology for Design is necessary. By understanding the ontological framework of prehistoric designers, we aim to create propositional artifacts that exemplify what design can be. The propositional artifacts created act as different phases in a research-through design process that aims to investigate how design operates within an alternative system of values.

Call for reflection on the feminist Left: why care, solidarity and abolitionism cannot sufficiently underwrite a radical programme of social change – Fraserian critical theory and an extended review of Cannibal Capitalism

This article first introduces and reviews Nancy Fraser's latest book Cannibal Capitalism. Next, it discusses the book's its programme for critical theory in the framework of Fraser's previous scholarship. It focuses on two ingredients of ‘Fraserian' critical theory: the role of difference in social justice-driven research and the separation of ontological and normative parts of such research. It then applies these specifically to feminist radical theories and explains why current, ostensibly non-economic, care-, solidarity- and abolitionist resistance programmes cannot underwrite sufficiently radical political programmes for social change. While these programmes' alternative ontologies are resourceful for informing and fomenting resistance, their potential to radically change social structures hinges upon their ability to relate their programme to other socially dominated and economically oppressed groups on the Left. Because capitalism codes both social domination and economic oppression, radical programmes would integrate their ostensibly non-economic ontological resources with a critique of capitalism to illuminate the common struggles of socially dominated and economically oppressed. ‘System crises critique' articulated by Fraser in Cannibal Capitalism is an example of one such ‘radical’ programme, which mobilises the working class as well as other marginalised groups, which are simultaneously economically oppressed and socially dominated.

Clinician and patient perspectives on the ontology of mental disorder: a qualitative study.

Psychiatry may face an "identity crisis" regarding its very foundations. The lack of consensus regarding the theoretical grounds of psychiatry as a discipline has its epicenter in the discussion about the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM). A growing number of academics considers the manual broken and a growing number of patients voice concern. Despite the huge body of critique, 90% of Randomized Trials are based on DSM definitions of mental disorder. Therefore, the question regarding the ontology of mental disorder remains: what is a mental disorder, exactly? We aim to identify ontologies that live among patients and clinicians, evaluate the degree of consistency and coherence between clinician and patient views and contribute to the establishment of a novel ontological paradigm of mental disorder that is aligned with patients' and clinicians' perspectives. Eighty participants (clinicians/patients/clinicians with lived experience) were interviewed using a semi-structured interview, exploring their ideas on the ontology of mental disorder. This question was approached from different angles which led to comprising the interview schedule into different topics: "concept of disorder," "representation by DSM," "what is treated," "what is recovered," and "the right outcome measure." Interviews were transcribed and analyzed using inductive Thematic Analysis. From all subthemes and main themes, a typology was constructed in which six, not necessarily mutually exclusive, ontological domains were identified: mental disorder as (1) disease, (2) functional impairment, (3) loss of adaptation, (4) existential problem, (5) highly subjective phenomenon, and (6) deviation from social norms. Common ground for the sample groups was that mental disorder is about functional impairment. Although about a fourth of sample clinicians holds an ontological concept of disease, only a small percentage of patients and none of the clinicians with lived experience adhered to an ontological concept of disease. The sample clinicians most often understand mental disorder to be a highly subjective phenomenon, and individuals with lived experience (patients and clinicians) most often understand mental (dis)order to be adaptational in nature: an (im)balance of burden in relation to strengths, skills, and recourses. The ontological palette is more diverse than what is taught about mental disorder in dominant scientific and educational discourse. There is a need to diversify the current, dominant ontology and make room for other ontologies. Investment is required in the development, elaboration and coming of age of these alternative ontologies, allowing them to reach their full potential and act as drivers of a landscape of promising novel scientific and clinical approaches.

The stakes of abyssal geography. Response to commentaries on David Chandler and Jonathan Pugh's ‘Abyssal geography’.

The stakes of abyssal geography. Response to commentaries on David Chandler and Jonathan Pugh's ‘Abyssal geography’.

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

Hawaiki According to Tupaia: Glimpses of Knowing Home in Precolonial Remote Oceania

Abstract This essay looks into the concept of an ancestral homeland in Remote Oceania, commonly referred to as Hawaiki (‘Avaiki; Havai‘i; Hawai‘i). Hawaiki intriguingly challenges Eurocentric notions of ‘home.’ Following the rapid settlement of the so-called Polynesian triangle from Samoa/Tonga at around 1000 AD, Hawaiki has emerged as a concept that is both mythological and real; genealogical and geographic; singular and yet portable, existing in plural regional manifestations. I argue that predominantly Pakeha/Popa‘ā research trying to identify Hawaiki as a singular and geographically fixed homeland is misleading. I tap into the archive surrounding the Ra‘iātean tahu‘a and master navigator Tupaia who joined Captain Cook’s crew during his first voyage to the Pacific to offer glimpses of an alternative ontology of home and epistemology of Oceanic ‘homing.’

THE MACHINE IN THE GHOST: TRANSHUMANISM AND THE ONTOLOGY OF INFORMATION

AbstractAn ontology of information belies our common intuitions about reality today and animates and governs both explicit scholarly study in philosophy and the sciences as well as the ideologies that are growing out of them. Transhumanism is one such technoscientific ideology that holds to a very specific ontology of information which need not be the only one on offer. This article argues that the transhumanist ontology of information exhibits gnostic and docetic religious overtones in it and that it devalues physical existence. At the same time, despite claiming a rejection of supernature, hypothetical transhumanist practices (such as mind‐uploading) posit the infosphere as a kind of supernatural realm that is often set in opposition to the natural world. This article presents a critique of transhumanist conceptions of information and offers an alternative ontology of information that more adequately accounts for the distinction between the natural and supernatural as well as the integrity of the physical world.

Disasters in the Anthropocene: a storm in a teacup?

Dramatic alterations to the natural environment due to human activity have produced a permanent rupture in the Earth system; the relative stable epoch of the Holocene has given way to a volatile Anthropocene. Acceptance of these claims means that we now live in this altered physical reality, inviting us to rethink how we conceptualise disasters. Yet, disaster scholars have been hesitant to apply the Anthropocene label and to acknowledge the profound changes that it can bring to the study of disasters. This paper queries whether this label is a necessary adage or unnecessary baggage for disaster studies by examining the possibilities and the challenges associated with engaging with the Anthropocene. An analysis of the concepts, causes, and consequences of disasters reveals how the Anthropocene provides, as the very least, a theoretical heuristic for challenging linear temporal assumptions, the epistemological status of uncertainty, and the location of agency in disaster studies.