Esther Lightcap Meek 2015 DT S Arts Conference LOVING TO KNOW/CREATE: EPISTEMOLOGICAL THERAPY FOR ARTISTS AND OTHER KNOWERS

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1 Esther Lightcap Meek 2015 DT S Arts Conference LOVING TO KNOW/CREATE: EPISTEMOLOGICAL THERAPY FOR ARTISTS AND OTHER KNOWERS

2 My story

3 Knowing (Ad)Ventures Pilgrimage Gift

4 and why/how that matters to art and the creative act

5 This week: Today: The Need for Epistemological Therapy Tomorrow: How Knowing (and the Creative Act) Works Thursday: Friday: Loving to Know: Covenant Epistemology for Artists and other Knowers Inviting the Real, and the Real We Invite

6 Today: The Need for Epistemological Therapy

7 Epistemology shapes our lives. the patterns of epistemology can help us decipher the patterns of our lives. Its images of the knower, the known, and their relationship are formative in the way an educated person not only thinks but acts. The shape of our knowledge becomes the shape of our living; the relation of the knower to the known becomes the relation of the living self to the larger world. Parker Palmer

8 You may not have thought about it, but you may have felt it. Intellectually Spiritually Psychologically Artistically Physically

9 The Knowledge-as-Information Mindset INFORMATION. Facts. Linear. Impersonal. Bits are better: Knowledge is power. Reduce. Analyze. Split. for Power and Control. Just read it off the world.

10 Esther s Daisy of Dichotomies Knowledge Facts Reason Science Theory Objective Public Mind Male

11 Knowledge Facts Reason Science Theory Objective Public Mind Male Belief Opinions, interpretations, values, morals Faith, emotions Art, imagination, religion, authority, tradition Application Subjective Private Body Female

12 DEFECTIVE!!!!!! The Knowledge-as- Information Mindset The Defective Epistemic Default (DED)

13 Modernity: the ambition of power over nature Human knowledge becomes mature and manly, able to beget children, only when it is directed to its true end, namely, power over nature in order to minister to the needs of life. --Francis Bacon ( )

14 Modernity: the ambition of power over nature Instead of speculative philosophy we can find a practical one, by which, knowing [natural things] we can employ these entities for all the purposes for which they are suited, and so make ourselves masters and possessors of nature. The entire class of causes which derive from a thing s end, I judge to be utterly useless in Physics. --Rene Descartes ( )

15 Modernist Epistemology A substantive decision is required of us, for modernity has eroded even our readiness to hold to the miraculous scandal [of the Resurrection]. But the matters of life and faith cannot be expressed in the tongues of modernity, for its technical epistemology, incapable of doxology, has consigned us to death and despair. Walter Brueggemann

16 Toxic modernism Pragmatism Utilitarianism Commercialism The transactional Commodification Scarcity Reductivism Fragmentation The soil in which I was planted was not soil I could thrive in.

17 I am a misfit.

18 DED-ly Fallout Depersonalization Disengagement Irresponsibility Indifference Boredom Cluelessness Hopelessness Skepticism Cynicism Atheism Secularism Compartmentalization Fragmentation Disembodiment Wonder Dynamism Adventure Confidence Risk Hope Wisdom Jesus the Truth

19 Protestant Christian epistemic default? Comprehensive Christian Information Sermons, Bible studies, conferences, heaven Christian Daisy: Absolute Truth Relativism Reason Faith Theory Application Theology Relat p w/ Jesus I love Jesus!

20 So chuck Modernism!...for what?

21 Knowing (Ad)Ventures tomorrow Compromise? NO! A THIRD way. Healing our epistemic default. Loving to Know Wonder Adventure Hope Promise Risk Responsibility Integration Insight Transformation Confidence Joy Reality Wisdom Jesus the Truth

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23 Conversations Examples of the DED Impact of the DED