PHILOS 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: David Abram, Kecak, Sanghyang
Epistemology: The Phenomenology of David Abram
David Abram: “The Ecology of Magic” is from The Spell of the Sensuous
Source: http://www.primitivism.com/ecology-magic.htm and pp. 32-39
Review: What is the best way to know the truth about reality?
➢ Descartes & Hume: Scientific Method
➢ Marx & Engels: Dialectical Method
➢ Nietzsche: Perspectivism
➢ Abram: Phenomenology
Meet Philosopher David Abram: Short Course Description (start at 30 sec)
From Introduction ● “Phenomenological Critique” seeks to understand the
world as it is experienced in its first-person felt immediacy, before attempts to
reflect on it or theorize it. Since we can never capture the world as it is “in itself,”
we can at least apprehend what it is “for us.” This approach reveals how various
conceptual constructions obscure or distort our attempts to grasp particular
realities on the basis of our “lived experience” alone.
> Does this philosophy correspond with my direct, sensorial experience?
> If I “bracket” my socially constructed assumptions, what might I
discover?
EXAMPLE: Baraka’s Phenomenological Critique of Civilized Reality:
What is the film’s method of getting at the truth about reality?
➢ “Bracket” your understanding, e.g. assumption of Enlightenment
Progress
➢ Allow the film to affect you. Be open to the epiphany if offers via the
“spell” of the sensuous?
➢ What is the conclusion/truth revealed through the film?
Opening sequence:
How is it like Abram’s example with the fireflies or spiders in cave?
How is it different from Roquentin’s view of the tree root in Sartre’s Nausea, or
Nietzsche’s Parable of the Madman?
Before Civilization
After Civilization
Pace & Rhythm of life is slower;
symbolized by tribal drum beat
Pace & Rhythm of life is faster;
symbolized by mechanical beat.
Humans lived closer to and in sync with
nature; 'Kecak' Balinese Monkey Chant
Humans are alienated from nature;
living in cells, processing animals thru
factory process. Chicks
Efforts to experience life fully/directly are at
the center of life; Kecak has roots in
sanghyang, a trance-inducing exorcism
dance.
The experience of life is mediated by
various forms of containment and
mechanical processes: humans are
moved along like chicks.
Life is communal; communion is way to
Individuals are alienated from nature
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truth.
and each other.
So, what is the conclusion/truth revealed through the film?
“The Ecology of Magic” (excerpt from chapter one of The Spell of the Sensuous)
➢ What does Abram mean by the “the spell of the sensuous”?
➢ A “spell”: the influence of “magic” on one’s awareness; fascination
➢ He opens his book by sharing an experience in the rice paddies of Bali: “I felt
myself at times falling through space, at other moments floating and drifting. I
simply could not dispel the profound vertigo and giddiness; the paths of the
fireflies, and their reflections in the water's surface, held me in a sustained
trance. Even after I crawled back to my hut and shut the door on this whirling
world, the little room in which I lay seemed itself to be floating free of the Earth.”
➢ What is the shaman’s ‘method’? “the ability to readily slip out of the perceptual
boundaries that demarcate his or her particular culture-boundaries reinforced by
social customs, taboos, and, most important, the common speech or language-in
order to make contact with, and learn from, the other powers in the land.”
➢ Contrast with the philosopher?
Shaman
Philosopher (Descartes)
Acts as an intermediary between the
human collective and the larger
ecological field. (ecocentric)
Works solely in the human world, for
human ends. (anthropocentric)
Uses lived experience (feeling,
sensory) as a guide to reality;
perception.
Uses logic and research as a guide
to reality; cognition.
Animistic view of nature as “subject”
Dualist view of nature as “object”
Method: “magic”; communion;
attention to relations
Method: science; analysis of objects
Truth is inter-subjective
Truth is objective
Phenomenology
What is the nature of EXPERIENCE according to Abram?
➢ Necessarily subjective (not impartial, based on perception)
➢ Necessarily relative to our position or place, desires, tastes, concerns
➢ Indeterminate (not known exactly, vague, having no numerical meaning)
➢ We experience reality first in a preconceptual, ambiguous, untheorized,
spontaneous way
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Document Summary
David abram: the ecology of magic is from the spell of the sensuous. Meet philosopher david abram: short course description (start at 30 sec) From introduction phenomenological critique seeks to understand the world as it is experienced in its first-person felt immediacy, before attempts to reflect on it or theorize it. Bracket your understanding, e. g. assumption of enlightenment. Be open to the epiphany if offers via the. How is it different from roquentin"s view of the tree root in sartre"s nausea, or. Pace & rhythm of life is slower; symbolized by tribal drum beat. Humans lived closer to and in sync with nature; "kecak" balinese monkey chant. Pace & rhythm of life is faster; symbolized by mechanical beat. Humans are alienated from nature; living in cells, processing animals thru factory process. The experience of life is mediated by various forms of containment and mechanical processes: humans are moved along like chicks.
