This workshop combines information intake, reflection, and rehearsal of concepts and methods presented by the instructors. Its focus is experiential learning. Dialectical thinking is introduced as a matter of changing one’s thinking as it manifests through speaking (whether as “interviewer” or “interviewee”) as well as writing.
From this characterization the following topics derive:
1. Dialectical thinking as a way of positioning oneself toward the world at large
2. Dialectical thinking as a method of opening one’s own and others’ mind(s)
3. Dialectical thinking as a mental realization of the four quadrants of dialectic based on “thought forms” (Hegel’s “effort of the concept”)
4. Dialectical thinking as a method of text analysis and text evaluation
5. Dialectical thinking as an adult developmental assessment tool
6. Dialectical thinking as a set of phases of cognitive development between the eras of Understanding and Practical Wisdom
7. Dialectical thinking as an approach to teaching any subject
8. Dialectical thinking as an approach to mentoring, coaching, and consulting
These topics are worked through by participants, in experiential exercises comprising:
· Lecture
· Work in small groups of 3-4 participants
· Plenum reflections and discussions (all groups)
· Demonstration of cognitive interviewing by instructors and participants
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Sketch of a one-day workshop
Workshop procedure consists of alternating the introduction of theoretical background materials through lecture and demonstration with having participants do exercises in small groups. When group work completes, all participants return to the full group (plenum) to highlight, discuss, critique, and extrapolate from, results.
Part I : The Three Managers (A, B, C), -- examples of cognitive world construction, used repeatedly in order to deepen dialectical thinking:
Three Managers speak to the present situation of their organization:
· First round: initial analysis, followed by the introduction of dialectical quadrants
· Second round: what quadrants are referred to?, followed by the introduction of thought forms
· Third round: what thought forms are referred to?
· Fourth round: what thought forms are missing, and could be used for better results?
Part II: Do it yourself in writing: groups agree on a “story” in the sense of Manager A or a personal story of their own, and then elaborate and expand it in writing in the sense of the cognitively more advanced thought forms as do Managers B and C.
Group representatives discuss process experience and results
Part III: Do it yourself in speaking: agree on a particular topic of discourse, and then develop questions as mind openers based on the dialectic thought forms, and elaborate the topic in an interview setting.
Group representatives review process experience and results in plenum.
Part IV: Interviewing based on the Dialectical Thought Form Framework (DTF)
1. Instructors explain and model cognitive interviewing
2. Participants practice their dialectical thinking in listening to others and probing others’ thinking (“semi-structured interviewing”;”Task House”). In your group of 4, interview a group member on his/her professional work, with 2 witnesses
Interviewee, interviewer, and witnesses share their experience and draw conclusions for improving interviewing.
Group representatives review process experience and results in plenum.
Part V:
1. Introduction to Concept Behavior Graphs (CBGs)
2. Comparison of two CBGs; drawing conclusions from their differences in terms of cognitive fluidity and/or complexity, and cogency of writing and communication
Part VI: Practicing dialectical thinking in analyzing different texts (interview fragments, excerpts of policy documents or theoretical texts), in order to create a “Concept Behavior Graph” (CBG) summarizing “moves in thought” in the text. Group members attempt feedback to interviewees or authors.
Group representatives review process experience and results in plenum.
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Biographies
Otto Laske Dr phil, PsyD is the Founder of the Interdevelopmental Institute (IDM) and its present Director of Education and Director of IDM Press. He is a student of T.W. Adorno, Frankfurt School, and of R. Kegan, Harvard School of Education. Otto is also a poet, lifelong composer of music, and visual artist (animation, digital painting/photography). See www.interdevelopmentals.org and www.ottolaske.com .
Bruno Frischherz, Dr phil, is professor of communication and business ethics at the Business School of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (Switzerland). His special interests are discourse analysis, online communication, knowledge management, corporate social responsibility, and ethics of technology.
Teaching Media: Powerpoint slides, handouts, pre-workshop readings. Computer, LDC and screen, blackboard or equivalent
Target Audience: members of Integral, whether philosophers, scientists, consultants, mentors, coaches, writers.
Abstract
The four quadrants or moments of dialectic that form an integral part of Laske’s Constructive Developmental Framework represent the epistemological aspect of Bhaskar’s ontological quadrants (1M, 2E, 3L, 4D). Laske’s “Quadrants of Dialectic” provide a basis for understanding and reflecting upon the ontological quadrants in the way of deep, transformational thinking based on thought forms. In regard to Wilber’s work they make possible integral dialectical thinking in a way not practiced, only espoused, today.
This workshop focuses on the epistemological, rather than the ontological, aspect of the four quadrants. We aim critically at the preponderance of formal logical thinking in 99% of communications and writings in the Western hemisphere, not only in the sciences but also in philosophy, including integral philosophy. In light of a broader “geography of thought” (Nisbett), we propose that Western thinking, even when “holistic” and “systemic” or “integral”, retains deep shadows of adhering to formal-logical constraints that hinder deep thinking. By deep thinking we refer to the 2500 years old Western tradition of “dialectical” thinking deriving from the late Plato (dialektike), and renewed by Hegel, the Frankfurt School (Adorno and Horkheimer) and, most recently, Bhaskar (1993).
Reading about and experiencing dialectical thinking are different things because experience presupposes the yearning and curiosity to access one’s own idiosyncratic thinking process which is, at bottom, dialectical. One may have read about dialectic for years and not be able to embody it expertly. For this reason, this workshop’s first mandate is to prepare participants for opening themselves to becoming observers of their own untrammeled thinking process (rather than permitting it to be submitted to the “logic censor” of society). The workshop also wants to sharpen participants’ sensitivity to the fact that every word they speak and write is based on mental processes by which they construct their “world” in an idiosyncratic way, quite different from “the world as it is” outside of them, and determined in its content by the structure of the concepts used.
Integral thinkers in particular – whether philosophers, scientists, teachers or consultants – benefit from this workshop by acquiring the ability to realize the dialectical root of Wilber’s four quadrants, all of which embody what Laske calls “the quadrants of dialectic”.
Dialectical thought forms provide a basis for using each of Wilber’s quadrants in greater depth, and also deepen one’s understanding of the intrinsic connection between the four quadrants which otherwise remains espoused.