![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Abram and Buber
Dec. 13th, 2004 02:51 pmAt 12:30 a.m., I learned that someone had recalled one of my library books -- which I hadn't even looked inside yet -- and I'd have to return it today. Rats! It's only fair, though, since I'd recalled it from someone in order to get it. (Maybe this person and I are now alternating three-week sessions with it.) So I took it to the library and then sat there reading the first 19 pages before giving it back. When I ended, the author was sitting cross-legged in a moss-lined cave, about 5' deep and 4' high, waiting out a rainstorm and watching spiders build webs across the cave entrance.
The book is The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World by David Abram. From what I can tell, he's distinguishing between two ways of interacting with the world, which Martin Buber called "I-Thou" and "I-It," linking ecologically harmful ways of interacting with the world to the dominance in our culture of "I-It," and then linking the "I-It" relationship to a given culture's use of written language.
Buber's I and Thou was probably the first truly profound book I'd ever read. Basically, sometimes our mind is oriented towards relationship and empathy, and sometimes it is more oriented towards processing, managing, using. For the former, we have what are sometimes called "authentic experiences" -- it's where we get our sense of being truly connected with other people and beings. For the latter, people and everything else are reduced to items. We can't sustain "I-Thou," and "I-It" is necessary to function in the world (let alone manage a business, etc.). At one point, if I remember correctly, Buber essentially defined "God" as an abstract way of referring to "Thou"-ness. Worth rereading some time, even though Buber seemed to grossly misunderstand and misrepresent Buddhism when he eventually talks about it. Also, Buber didn't explore the ecological implications of his idea, except in the famous "I consider a tree" passage. (Someone has put exerpts from I and Thou on the Web here.)
Anyway, so Abram's hypothesis is interesting, but I'm not sold yet. Mostly because I only got to page 19, of course, but also because he apparently isn't even aware of Buber; he doesn't show up in the index, and Abram gets his ideas from later philosophers (or possibly thinks they've originated with himself). Also he misspelled "betel" nut as "beetle."
The book is The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World by David Abram. From what I can tell, he's distinguishing between two ways of interacting with the world, which Martin Buber called "I-Thou" and "I-It," linking ecologically harmful ways of interacting with the world to the dominance in our culture of "I-It," and then linking the "I-It" relationship to a given culture's use of written language.
Buber's I and Thou was probably the first truly profound book I'd ever read. Basically, sometimes our mind is oriented towards relationship and empathy, and sometimes it is more oriented towards processing, managing, using. For the former, we have what are sometimes called "authentic experiences" -- it's where we get our sense of being truly connected with other people and beings. For the latter, people and everything else are reduced to items. We can't sustain "I-Thou," and "I-It" is necessary to function in the world (let alone manage a business, etc.). At one point, if I remember correctly, Buber essentially defined "God" as an abstract way of referring to "Thou"-ness. Worth rereading some time, even though Buber seemed to grossly misunderstand and misrepresent Buddhism when he eventually talks about it. Also, Buber didn't explore the ecological implications of his idea, except in the famous "I consider a tree" passage. (Someone has put exerpts from I and Thou on the Web here.)
Anyway, so Abram's hypothesis is interesting, but I'm not sold yet. Mostly because I only got to page 19, of course, but also because he apparently isn't even aware of Buber; he doesn't show up in the index, and Abram gets his ideas from later philosophers (or possibly thinks they've originated with himself). Also he misspelled "betel" nut as "beetle."