Chaosmos: Edgar Morin's basic analogue for viewing lifel
Abstract
Chaosmos: Edgar Morin's basic analogue for viewing lifel SAGE Publications, Inc.1997DOI: 10.1177/095715589700802408 J.L. Roland Bélanger Edgar Morin wrote in the first volume of La M6thode: La Nature de la nature that he is not giving us a method, but is, rather, in search of a method (NN: 21). He even speaks of 'non-method' and 'anti- method' (NN: 15ff). This paradoxical position notwithstanding, it appears clear that he, like all of us, has, needs - consciously or unconsciously - a reference point from which to make judgements, explain our world, act to valorize our life. This reference point has variously been termed a model, an analogue. The use of models in thinking and learning has now become pervasive. The geographer Peter Haggett wrote: 'In model-building we create an idealized representation of reality in order to demonstrate its most important properties' (cf. DeBlij: 55). John Holland says the same: 'The basic maneuver for constructing models ... [is to] eliminate details so that selected patterns are emphasized' (Holland: 31). Models are more and more used because reality is more and more complex, thereby forcing scholars to filter out the main processes and their responses. Models thus convey, if not the whole