Then there is systems theory. Much of systems theory seems exactly the same as field theory, and little wonder. Working systemically can just be another term for working field theoretically.

But then some say, systems are contained within the field. So working systemically is different than working with the field.

What do you think - is this true, and if so, exaclty what are the differences?

Ruth: The terms "field" and "system" are used variously, hence the confusion. I like to reserve "system" for something that is closed and has basic elements that interact, while I use "field" as a holistic, process-oriented concept. Chaos theory as well as quantum theory are field theories as defined above. When something is far from equilibrium, it loses its "system" elements and reorganizes itself in surprising ways.

Phil: I would agree about the relatively smaller (so to speak) view of systems and the relatively larger view of field, but something in this has caught my attention.

What is equilibrium? How can we speak of a field having such a thing? It seems to me that the field just is, with its demands and effects in process. I suppose we could say that if we introduce anything new into the field that that requires a change in every member of the field, and thus a restabalization to accomodate the new field entity, but it seemed odd to me to think of the idea of equilibrium in the field. Equilibrium seems more a truly systems concept, where a segment of the field becomes bounded and studied unto itself, and thus becomes a fiction because it's an artificial dynamic.

This whole conceptualization of field begs the question of what we even mean when we say "field." If we speak of the unified field, as Parlett does, we are talking about the environment, the context of which a subject is a member. However, when we start talking about the phenomenology of that subject, then we are talking about what Lewin called the "lifespace," everything that has effect. The closest he got to talking about the environment (what PHG call the "objective world") was when he wrote about the boundary. I have sorted this for myself by talking of the boundary as the substantive layer of the field and the person's own phenomenological field as the experiential layer of the field, and then I maintain the integrity of the unified field, of which there seems to be only one, for me.

Sylvia: The following quotation from Lewin, found on page 277 in PHG, might help the recent discussion:

"It is particularly necessary that one who proposes to study whole- phenomena should guard against the tendency to make the wholes as all- embracing as possible. The real task is to investigate the structual properties of a given whole, ascertain the relations of subsidiary wholes, and determine the boundaries of the system with which one is dealing. It is no more true in psychology han in physics that 'everything depends on everything else.' "

I have found that the most productive way to think of a field is to conceive of it as a "sphere of influence." Just as the physicist, the biologist, and the economist limit the domain of any given study or experiment they undertake, so we as therapists have to look at the relevant spheres of influence which impact the ongoing processes and the elements that exist within the field. So, for example, to understand certain behaviors/cognitions/feelings, etc in a given client, it is often necessary to see that client within the context of, say, his nuclear family, or current family, or the situation at work, a regional economic situation, the field which includes the client and the therapist, and/or some combination of these influences. The rationale for family therapy is that difficulties which one or more members of a family are experiencing can be understood and treated most readily by dealing with the larger field of which each is an element.

Neither "the whole of reality," nor the whole physical world, nor any other such all-encompassing field is manageable enough to be helpful. Moreover, the world as we experience it is actually "chunky" or "lumpy" - the large field exists in, and encompasses, numerous smaller fields. "Field" is thus a relative term, depending upon what your interest is and where you want/need to focus.

Generally speaking, fields comprise within themselves more tightly organized elements such as molecules, atoms, various sub-atomic particles within a field of forces of some kind, individual persons, couples, families, racial groups, school districts, schools, school classes, athletic conferences and member teams, towns, counties, states, regions, nations, etc ad infinitum; all these exist within various relevant spheres of influence. These vary greatly as to the tightness/looseness of organization, stability. affectability/effectiveness. We can either look at the various relationships among these elements and thus take a systems view, or we can view each element as a systematic whole which permits the elements or parts to function in certain ways which are characteristic of the whole but not of the parts.

A system can be primarily one in which the elements have relatively external relationships, or primarily one in which there is on-going and incessant reciprocity, so that over time the relationships are synergistic.

Now the question arises as to whether we should conceive of a human being in field theoretical or systems terms. I think it's a false choice since it depends upon what your interest is. If we are interested in focusing on how the person's powers-to-function in a number of specific ways in order to carry on the processes of contact are functioning, it makes sense to focus on the several elements in the systemic life of the person, such as habits, decision-making processes, cognitive assumptions and beliefs, etc., bearing in mind that these can never exist apart from the whole organism and that there is constant reciprocal influence of all the elements on the whole. This approach is good for a kind of diagnostic assessment, in the sense that we can see where in particularly the blockages are and intervene with precision in specific and most effective ways. On the other hand, if we want to think about the actual living of the person through time, it can be helpful to think of the person as a complex field which constantly reorganizes itself as it has new experiences. Here the emphasis is on the fundamental dynamism of the organism, with the implication that all that has ever happened in the organism's life is present in how the organism is organized in the moment. The task of therapy is thus to find ways to make contact with the actual living of the person, and to do so in ways which help her to reorganize herself in healthier ways. In this way the effects of the past can actually be changed.

In chaos theory, such as that of Prigogine, a system such as a thermodynamic system or an organism's metabolic system functions at or near equilibrium most of the time. However, under certain conditions minor variations can come to be amplified or something radical can happen to push the system far from equilibrium. Here is where the normal patterns break down, i.e. chaos begins to characterize the system. However, what usually happens is that the system reorganizes itself into a new organization. The value for this in both individual and family therapy is that if the therapy can help thru certain interventions to change the habitual patterns of behavior/interaction/response, the individual or family has an opportunity to reorganize itself in more functional, healthy ways. The field in the case of therapy is the therapeutic situation itself and the processes that occur within it over time.

Bruno: I am glad that I have been stimulated by your e-mail into thinking and then writing a response to you and on the topic. All that you say about field and holism is understandable and I agree with much of it. I notice that in your examples of field components you limit yourself to "externals" and do not include ideas, values, beliefs and such.

As I understand it, though, the systemic view is not the same as the relational one: the systemic looks at position and influence among a number of systems, the relational at relationships between two. To conceive of “spheres of influence” is a systemic view. To consider the therapist and the client systemically would be to position them both in a context and describe the observed influences. The relationship approach would be to be communicative with each other and to observe or take note of how their dyadic process is evolving.

You ask whether one should look at a human being in other than field theoretical terms. Holistically speaking, the alternative would be in Cartesian terms, that is, dualistically and would exclude a systemic approach. I understand our predicament, however, which is that to look at anything discretely is to particularize and therefore to dichotomize, to seve the connection (in our Middle Zone only) of the part with the whole of which it is/we are an indivisible part. We can, probably, only experience the whole mindlessly and Zen-like or Taoist-like, from the other side of Enlightenment. Then, being One, we can do like the monk who laid down for the tiger to eat him so that she could feed her starving cubs – he knew the inseparability of them all.

Sylvia: I do not distinguish between a systems and a relational view when I speak of a field as a sphere of influence. I did say that a system can involve either external or interpentrating relationships among the elements in/comprising the field. Most of the fields we live in are very complex and, as I said, we have to focus upon what overlapping/interpentrating spheres we are interested in taking into account. The field which comes into being as the client and therapist meet is influenced by much of what each brings with him/her, including beliefs about many things, habits of interaction, the theoretical orientation of the therapist, the expectations and hopes of the client, perhaps race, cultural differences, age, etc. Also, let us say that one person becomes sexually attracted to the other, then the code of ethics of each becomes a relevant factor, as do certain laws. Obviously, the physical proximity of client and therapist, along with a variety of possible influences in the setting, such as the visual qualities of the decor, comfort factors, the conditions of health of each, time of day, and so on and so forth may or may not be relevant factors on any given occasion of meeting. The important question is, what is relevant to the present situation? Of course, gravity is omnipresent on planet earth, but most of the time it isn't a relevant factor which needs to be focused on. The reciprocal relations between therapist and client are always relevant factors, even though we sometimes focus upon the relating and at other times we focus on how the client related to others who are only psychologically, not physically, present. I think "field" is always relative to what is germaine to what one is dealing with; thus it should always be taken as a relative term which becomes defined within a specific context. As I said before, we can't work with "the whole of reality" or "the physical universe" or even "planet earth." Those don't help us understand concrete and specific situations, which is what we are always dealing with in therapy.

As for grasping the whole, I think it is important to BEGIN with holism. Then in doing any analysis we need to keep reminding ourselves that what we are choosing to focus on does not exist apart from the whole, that what we are doing involves "distinctions of reason" and not "real distinctions." Thinking of things apart from their context is a habit of thought which has certainly characterized most thinkers following Descartes. On the other hand, Plato and other Greeks started it. Aristotle's great contribution is to have begun with, and to have constantly recurred to, the whole. For example, we may study a part of an organism's body, say the heart, but we need to keep in mind that the heart cannot exist as a heart apart from its relation to the whole. Remove the heart and study it in a lab and it's no longer a heart in the primary sense (it's really a former heart), since it can no longer carry on the functions which are characteristic of a real heart. Or, a physician may specialize in cardiology but if he loses sight of the heart's relation to the whole organism his skill will be compromised. Similarly, when physicians prescribe a medication without taking into account other medications the patient is taking and certain other physical conditions the patient has, they practice "bad medicine."

Pushing the discussion one more step, one of the human capacities we need to cultivate is our spirituality, since that is the capacity which allows us to appreciate the wholes of life, and to interact with those things which we cannot fully know, control, or predict. But that's a broader discussion.

Phil: Bruno wrote, "I am glad that I have been stimulated by your e-mail into thinking and then writing a response to you and on the topic. All that you say about field and holism is understandable and I agree with much of it. I notice that in your examples of field components you limit yourself to 'externals' and do not include ideas, values, beliefs and such."

This is one of the reasons I find it confusing and not really helpful in training others to use the word "field" to speak of an external set of conditions, environment, etc, on the one hand AND an internal sense of one's experience (thus, to speak of one being "of the field" or to speak of one's field). To me, it is much more helpful to think of the external as just that, the external, objective world. That which is. Then there is the organism which is of the environment, in the environment, part of the environment, etc. And of course there is the boundary where the organism experiences self in the environment. I think the matter is complicated further by research that clearly indicates we organisms process our experience at many levels, and that a lot of it is carried out unconsciously, out of awareness. So, that is one reason that I conceive of the boundary as part of the field, but a part which incorporates unconcsious process as the organism's record of encounter in the objective world. That which rises to the level of awareness becomes one's construction of meaning, and thus, what many call one's experiential field.

Sylvia wrote,

...I think "field" is always relative to what is germaine to what one is dealing with; thus it should always be taken as a relative term which becomes defined within a specific context. As I said before, we can't work with "the whole of reality" or "the physical universe" or even "planet earth." Those don't help us understand concrete and specific situations, which is what we are always dealing with in therapy.

She brings up the practical limits we have in dealing with field in therapy. I agree that we cannot deal with the whole of reality, and that we cannot really understand how a butterfly flapping in Japan effects the breeze in Austria, etc, etc. There was a time when we couldn't really understand how and when a hurricane might sweep in over us and destroy the village, either, but currently we can say a lot more about that, and we have ways of tracking them as they form a long, long way away from the village. Whereas before one might say the villagers' field was about as far as any one villager could walk in a day, today we would say that the villagers' field is several hundred miles extended out into the Atlantic Ocean. I heard recently of a new super computer so fast and so large that they predict it will be able to analyze all the variables regarding the direction of any given hurricane so that prediction of exact landfall will become routine. When we get to a level of system such as that, what we are dealing with is understanding a very complex adaptive system (which is really systems within systems), and at that level we really are talking about what many used to just call "field." So, all this becomes relative, and to me it is much simpler to just accept Lewin's simple definition: everything that has effect. If, then, in therapy, you realize that something is having effect, you simultaneously realize it to be of the field. The question then becomes "how" is it present, and what is its effect - for the client and for the therapist? Is it something in the front of someone's head, obstructing the view, or at the bottom of someone's head, being processed emotionally and really somewhat removed from the conscious "thought" centers? Or, is it something central and of which the subject is fully aware? How does the person experience being of the field?

People have surmised co-created fields, environmental fields, individual fields, community consciousness, ontological and experiential fields, etc, etc. To me, this gets so muddled that I long for a simple way to talk about these things, one that has heuristic value and that can be utilized in training. I don't think such a thing is impossible or unreasonable. Were there to coalesce a common agreement about the nature of field, boundary, organism, and objective world, etc. it would prove very helpful.

Gerhard: Phil wrote,

This is one of the reasons I find it confusing and not really helpful in training others to use the word "field" to speak of an external set of conditions, environment, etc, on the one hand AND an internal sense of one's experience (thus, to speak of one being of the field or to speak of one's field).

This might be confusing (and I think it is indeed), but I find it interesting to ask: On which basis do people come to such a conception of "internal" and "external?" I think this has to do with the fact that everybody knows (1) that ALL of our perception and experience (also of everything OUTSIDE our physical body) is - in a physical sense - in last instance based on a process in our brain, INSIDE our physical body (2) but at the same time this is only what (nearly) everybody KNOWS, it is not what he/she EXPERIENCES. In his/her experience the things he/she perceives are perceived as OUTSIDE his/her body. I think this seemingly paradoxical situation is the basis for several conceptions for internal and external, for Bruno's position as well as for the position you are advocating. In fact it is the 'old pseudo-problem' Wolfgang Kohler is discussing (and solving in my opinion) in his article "An old pseudoproblem" (we have web-published this article in the GESTALT ARCHIVE).

The solution Kohler proposes is as follows: One has to distinguish strictly between the experienced, phenomenal world at the one hand, and the physical, transphenomenal world on the other hand. (1) My experienced, phenomenal world comprises not only my perceived environmen (including my perceived body) but also my perceived bodily I (or, as LEWIN says: my life space comprises person and environment, meaning exclusively the phenomenal person and its phenomenal environment, not the physical organism and its physical environment). And this phenomenal world is not "neutral," but full of affordances, attractions, repulsions - it is a phenomenal FIELD in the strict sense of the EINSTEIN definition of a field. The physical bases of this phenomenal world are brain processes, but these cannot be perceived; they belong to the (2) transphenomenal world, which comprises my physical body and its physical environment (including the physical bodies of other persons). There is NO field relation of any known quality (electric, magnetic, gravitational) between my physical body and my physical environment (though there is a physical field in the physical brain). The attraction, repulsion etc. which links me to the persons or distances me from them are not the outcome of any field between our physical bodies, but in first instance of the field relations in my (and their respective) phenomenal worlds between the experienced I and the experienced others.

[Viewed from this perspective, 'organism', 'environment' and so on are very ambiguous terms: one would have to clarify in each case, whether one is speaking of the physical body or the experienced body, of the physical environment or the experienced environment. Also the term 'boundary' needs to be specified: is one talking about the boundary between the physical body and its physical environment - which would be the physical skin - or is one talking about the boundary between my perceived person and my perceived environment.]

So it might be (I am not really sure for language reasons) that I advocate a point of view which is contrary to yours: What underlies our trans-atlantic friendly relationship, for example, is a field relation within our respective phenomenal (or experiental) fields, resulting in experienced actions which have consequences in the transphenomenal world and via these consequences can enter the phenomenal world of the respective other.

Ruth: Thank you for explicating the Gestalt Psychology underlying Goodman's view that mind, body and external world are one in contact, that in sensing, the organ and the object are the same. I have thought about this quite a bit from a physiological perspective as well as in other ways. I was glad to meet you in Palermo.

Bruno: Dear Gerhard, I read your comments on Phil's e-mail and (obliquely) on mine. (1) It seems to me that Kohler is saying that the physical world cannot be known and only inferred by our phenomenology. (2) I think we're moving back to Descarte's position of mind and body being two different "things."

Sylvia: I'm just now finding time to comment on your discussion of "boundary" earlier this month. I want to add more of a phenomenological perspective to what's been said.

Speaking from that perspective, in a recent post I mentioned that awareness is intentional, i.e. is always awareness of something, is always of an object of awareness. In that context I didn't point out that "who" is aware is not an object but a subject, and never appears to itself as an object. That doesn't mean, of course, that we can't be aware of states and processes of thought, feeling, action, etc. But those are only "the tracks" of the self who is aware, feeling, thinking, acting, etc. - never the subject or self itself. In other words, each of us as subject can never quite catch ourselves in the act of being ourselves, since we are always a transcendent step "behind" all of our acts of awareness. That is what it means to be a subject rather than an object.

So what does this have to do with "boundary," and in particular "boundary as a relative term?" The working definition for "contact" in Gestalt is "meeting the other," and the boundary is "where" this meeting occurs and the means, the "how," by which contact between the aware subject and the other occurs. It doesn't exist in the way that the skin or a membrane actually exists. "Boundary" is a strictly relational term, meaning only "where contact between subject and its object meet." Thus, when the subject is aware of, or interacting with, some things in the external, public world, the meeting occurs between the organism (the person) and elements in the environment. But when, for example, I am absorbed in thought or am dealing with any of the varieties of pain within, then the boundary is internal. In this case, I as the subject am aware of the internal phenomena, and they are the objects of my awareness, or when, for example, I retroflect, my action involves me, as subject, acting on myself as object in certain ways and for certain purposes.

Many theoretical terms are relative in that way, and how they are to be understood is determined by the domain or context in which they are applied. Matter-form, cause-effect, figure-ground, part-whole are all relative terms. For example the materials making up a house are matter to the arrangement which is the form of the house, but the house itself is part of the matter of the larger and more encompassing form of the block, the neighborhood, city, etc.; when we focus on a figure the ground lacks clarity, but if we change our focus the ground can become the figure and the former figure becomes ground. An effect can become a subsequent cause. And so on. These are all helpful analytical tools, and it is because they are not riveted to a given context and completely definite in their meaning and application that are so useful. They all help us think and understand relationally.

Phil: The only thing I would add to what Sylvia has written about the boundary being relative is that it belongs to the lifespace of the subject. It is not something that exists between one subject and another. The use of metaphor sometimes obscurs, even in the effort to clarify, but often it is so useful as to ventrue the risk. Thus, Goldstein used a biological/structural metephor of a single-celled organism and extrapolated from there. Perls picked it up and extended on it. Lewin, however, used a functional metaphor when he spoke of the boundary. In either case, the membrane, the boundary, the place where subject ends and environment begins, is the boundary. It may be relative to external or internalized others, but it still belongs to the subject and is part of the self.

Indeed, many maintain that we only experience self AT the boundary. But you see what happens when we slip into that kind of language? It suddenly appears that subject and object are meeting at some third place, as if one were a bartender and the other a customer, and the bar, the boundary, both separates and unites them. Rather, it is the touching of themselves, the communion of their relative boundaries, that creates contact, especially that kind of contact called an I-Thou moment.

Sylvia: I agree with the points Phil made. Boundary ought to be thought of in the context of the person's/organism's "life space," where and how it does business with others. One small quibble, I think it's more accurate to say that the boundary is where we meet the "other," but not necessarily the environment. Of course, we could define the object of awareness as the "environment," but it's better to leave that as simply the "object" of awareness. "Environment" has more of the sense of something external to the organism/person. The skin separates the organism from the environment and is part of its connection to the environment, but the boundary is not the same as the skin, even tho' Goodman speaks of that way once in PHG. However, in that same passage he talks about how the boundary can be moved inside in the case of pain. So the main point is that the boundary is where contact is made with otherness, between me as subject and the other as object - even when that other is my own phenomenology.

Thanks for pointing out the use by Lewin of a functional definition of "boundary." He also uses the functional metaphor of "walling off" to refer to those experiences which have not been fully assimilated. What we call "unfinished business" Lewin would say we have "walled off," the result being that these walled of "chunks," not only absorb some of the person's energies, but they also interrupt the ready flow of internal processes. It's important, as you point out, to think of these as metaphors, and are not to be taken as "free-standing realities"; they are maps, not the territory.

Phil: Sylvia wrote, "I think it's more accurate to say that the boundary is where we meet the 'other,' but not necessarily the environment. Of course, we could define the object of awareness as the 'environment but it's better to leave that as simply the 'object' of awareness."

I have been thinking of contact as a larger category than Buber's dialogic sub-categories of I-Thou and I-It. In fact, as our theory has developed, it seems to me that the emphasis on contact in the Polsters' work opened up more interest around interpersonal contact and stimulated more discussion of Buber, as seen in Hycner and Jacobs.

Thus, contact occurs between organism and that which is not organism. It seems from what you've written above that you conceive of "other" as a personal category (perhaps I-Thou), but I would not see that as necessary. Thus, whatever a person contacts at the boundary is "other." In this way, a person with seasonal-affective disorder might contact an overcast day and organize the contact as a "gloomy," overcast day.

Sylvia also wrote, "'Environment' has more of the sense of something external to the organism/person. The skin separates the organism from the environment and is part of its connection to the environment, but the boundary is not the same as the skin, even tho' Goodman speaks of that way once in PHG. However, in that same passage he talks about how the boundary can be moved inside in the case of pain. So the main point is that the boundary is where contact is made with otherness, between me as subject and the other as object - even when that other is my own phenomenology."

I see. I agree and see the difference. The only way an overcast day becomes a gloomy, overcast day is that it enters the person at the boundary. Thus, our boundaries are permeable (to follow a metaphor).

This is also, it seems, where we have quibbled before over the terminology useful for discussing field. Whereas I see one, unified field, others are willing to talk of multiple fields, fields within fields, and both an ontological field (in the sense of external environment, the objective world, etc) and a phenomenological field, or the person's individual experience of the ontological field - the relationship between these two conceptions of field being that contact is what organizes the phenomenological field. Thus, contact with the objective world helps form the boundary, which is the self, the experience of self. I prefer to keep to the notion of a unified field, and thus of only one such field - all things having effect. That was Lewin's definition of the lifespace. Since all things having effect includes both the evironmental, or external influences and the internalized influences, I had to come up with some way to distinguish what I was talking about at any given reference to field (ie, what kind of field?). So I cocneived of layers (I actually think that Malcolm Parlett preceded me in this, when he discussed the field as "lamenated" or "layered"). To me, there is the substantive layer of the field, which corresponds to your ontological field, and there is the experiential layer of the field, which corresponds to your phenomenological field.

Sylvia: First, I have said again and again that contact is "meeting with the other," and I don't see how you conclude that I think of this as a purely personal event: anything at all which claims our attention and/or mobilizes our energies is something we are in contact with. If I am a geologist I am often in contact with rocks, soils, etc, and also with the theoretical ideas and the data which relate to them. If I work with a colleague, we have contact; if we carry on research together we jointly have contact with the objects of our study and with each other. If I have a toothache I am in contact with the pain and my mouth and head, and I have to entertain ideas about getting to the dentist, taking the antibiotics, etc etc. So I have never thought of contact as only interpersonal.

I don't like the spatial metaphor as a way of understanding "field." I like Jay Levin's way of putting it: a field is a sphere of influence. Of course, the world I live in with others is the embracing field and has all sorts of effects on me, aware and unaware. If I study medicine I may be interested in certain ways in which this takes place; so I focus upon a certain domain of influence, a field, within that larger field. But how I address that domain is influenced by the influence of the ideas I hold about it, about the nature of scientific enquiry, political pressures within my institution, and so and so on. Some of those ideas I bring to the situation will probably be altered by my study. How these are organized by me within myself vastly influences how I deal with my research and how the outcomes turn out to be. So I and the domain of my investigations constitute a field in which contact is going on as I reciprocally interact with the elements in the environment. But that field is not isolated from the general environment or from the influences (the many other spheres of influence or fields) I bring with me. The results of my study may well influence governmental policy, which, in turn is likely to alter the domain I have studied. So within the domain of my contact with the elements within the range or domain of my study - of, let's say, the effects of lead in the atmosphere on children's growth patterns and intellectual development - I am operating within a vast nexus of spheres of influence. And the result has spreading effects throughout a number of intersecting fields. Overlapping fields doesn't capture the interpentrating character of the mutually influencing fields. By opting for the "layered" metaphor you immediately have the problem of how these interact; whereas, if you begin with interpenetrating spheres of influence - which seems to mirror the world of our experience more accurately - you don't have the problem. Kind of like defining mind and body as totally different orders of being and then struggling to see how they could possible influence each other. Don't begin there, but with the holistic notion that an organism is a unified whole in which everything interacts with everything else, then you don't ever have to deal with the mind-body problem.

Amit: Sylvia, you point out that "Matter-form, cause-effect, figure-ground, part-whole are all relative terms." I think this is important. I think also that it is important to understand that they are also dialectical terms. You can not have matter without form, cause without effect or figure without ground. Gestalt psychology tells us that subject and object are in a dialectical relationship, mutually effecting each other so that it is impossible to tell what is cause and what is effect. This is part of what we speak about as "the field." The major difficulty here is, I think, that we tend to see these dialectical concepts as separate parts and not as a whole. I think you have a point, Sylvia, when you chose to speak about "interpenetrating spheres of influence."

I sense some leftovers from the conflict between atomis vs holism. As if "I" was one unit and "Thou" was another unit and that they could have contact at a certain "boundary" (oops, there was the famous "third place"). I would like much more to think that consciousness is an effect of the field. The old gestalt prayer seems outdated in this context ("I am me and you are you...")

You are right I think, Phil, when you state that ."..many maintain that we only experience self AT the boundary..." I do not think that this gets us into trouble, but we sure will if we fail to see the dialectical nature of the subject-object relationship. The boundary is not, and cannot be fixed anywhere and thus can not be a "place." There is no "I" without a "Thou." It is like trying to buy something with one side of a coin. And where do the two sides of the coin meet? In the middle? More to the tails side? Sylvia, you state "I am operating within a vast nexus of spheres of influence. And the result has spreading effects throughout a number of intersecting fields." I think this is a useful idea. It suggests interdependence.

The trouble is that we do not have a concept that allows us to capture the dual nature of what we up till now have called either subject or object. If we have the idea of 'interpenetrating spheres of influence' and, I think, even nested spheres of influence, we could make use of a concept that in itself incorporated the subjects' dual nature - as a part in a relationship (I-Thou) and as a separate whole. This would help us understand that there is no certain point where contact occurs, where "Thou" ends and "I" begin. "Interesting," for example, is an interesting word. It has its roots in two words; 'inter' meaning 'in between' and 'esse' meaning 'to be'

It is simply a choice of perspective. As in the example with the coin above, you need to choose - consciously or subconsciously - which side of the coin to show when you pay your bill, heads or tails, but they will both be there. We are always a part of something, in contact with something, and we are still always a whole. Contact constantly fluctuates like flames from a fire, transforming oxygen from the environment, adding to it new substances. I suggest we use the term "holon" to refer that which, being a whole in one context, is simultaneously a part in another.

Phil: Sylvia wrote, "I don't like the spatial metaphor as a way of understanding "field." I like Jay Levin's way of putting it: a field is a sphere of influence."

Okay. Sounds good to me too. This is essentially Lewin's position when he chose "everything having effect." (But, to be picky, what is a sphere, if not a spacial figure? Sphere - layer, these are both metaphors to describe some aspect of the field.) Still, where do you draw the lines in defining these spheres? How do you put a limit on the field? As soon as you do (so as to distinguish one sphere of influence as opposed to another), I would contend that you have bound off a portion of the field and made it into a system. To me, that is the definition of system and the distinction between system and field. A system is a bounded portion of the field. If you cannot place such a containment, then it makes no sense to speak of a sphere of influence that is not at the same time part of another sphere in such an essential way that the two are actually one larger sphere, and so on and so on. That is what I understand when Parlett uses such terms as the "unified" field. Yet, as soon as you containt a portion of the field, you have limited yourself to describing how that portion interacts within the confines of its limits, and that is a system.

Furthermore, I never conceived of the substantive layer and the experiential layer as merely overlapping. To me, where the experiential layer interpenetrates the substantive layer, one has grounded awareness. (I have drawn a diagram in my article in Gestalt Review showing how these things operate.) To the degree, then, that they do interpenetrate, it is not just "experience-near" but also "nearly-true experience" that is occuring. It is aware contact, and while it is interpreted, it is near things as they are. That is the nature of adaptation. If adaptation were merely constructed, relative phenomenology, it could be anything we wanted and we could all live forever. However, that is not the real world. Some people get run over while crossing the street because their sense of distance is off and the truck is actually closer than they constructed it to be. That experience, up until the time of impact, is not-nearly-true experience. In that case, the person's experiential layer did not synq very closely to the substantive layer; that is, until the moment of reckoning!

It seems en vogue and very "proper" for Gestaltists these days to say that because of the field, because of chaos, because of quantum mechanics, and because of postmodernism, there is no individual reality. There is no individual. To me, Newtonian physics wasn't proven totally wrong, just not enough.

In our theory we have gotten away from something that I think is important, and which hangs around in very important ways. That is the effect of the object, which in gestalt psychology was conceived of as having properties in itself which could make for a good or a bad "gestalt." Of course, people realized the organization was occuring in the mind of the beholder, but that doesn't change the fact that it is a reciprocal loop between organizing observer and actual object, with unique properties that set one object off from another. We do in fact need both observing subject and observed object to complete the loop, but each has its own, essential properties.

Sylvia: I think it's very important to note that Lewin did not hold the position that "everything is related to everything else," at least not from a practical point of view. The quotation of Lewin in PHG is very important to keep in mind. It is one which has primarily influenced how I understand fields, although I am also influenced by my understanding of scientific investigations. I'll quote it (PHG 4.3, 1951ed.)

It is particularly necessary that one who proposes to study whole-phenomena should guard against the tendency to make the wholes as all-embracing as possible. The real task is to investigate the structural properties of a given whole, ascertain the relations of subsidiary wholes, and determine the boundaries of the system with which one is dealing. It is no more true in psychology than in physics that "everything depends on everything else." (p.277)

It is the task of science to determine what kinds of things are related to other things and how they are related. In other words, scientific research involves trying to discover what are the conditions for certain phenomena and to develop models which help us understand the principles of their interactions. For example, years ago at a university in St. Louis it was discovered that it was decisively significant that strep throats preceded cases of rheumatic fever. Before this discovery it was thought to be coincidental, not causal. But the scientific investigations found that the body produces antibodies to fight the strep infection which in turn attack heart valves; it was also discovered that antibodies can also attack the kidneys, causing nephritis. The point is that science is largely concerned with discovering the range of interactions and influence among often disparate elements. Holistic medicine, as well as holistic psychotherapy, has the same concern. Indeed, most learning at every level has to do with discovering what goes with what, what influences what, and how that happens. This does not necessarily have anything to do with spatial relationships. Rather it is better understood in terms of action, reciprocal or mutual influence. In other words, as I said to Amit in another post, it is best to think of fields in dynamic terms, as having more in common with verbs than with nouns, algebra or calculus rather than geometry. The spatial metaphors such as "layers" necessarily set up the problem of how interactions can possibly take place, thus the mind-body problem - whether you intend that or not. It's built into the metaphor.

Which leads me to say that two of the abiding limitations of Western philosophical and scientific thought are the tendency to think in terms of space more than time, and of the underlying stuff such as matter instead of complex interactional events. It's an old bias which I believe is passing away because we've come up against the intrinsic limitations of that paradigm.

I don't like the term "substantive layer," since it resonates too much with the prejudice that the material world is the "really real" world and the world of experience isn't. All of these are real, but they are not all equally share-able. Many of the ideas everyone has do not match up with anything in the shared world (nobody is error-free), but many other of our ideas have at least an analogical relationship with the shared world. I agree that if everything were "just in my mind" then all of my endeavors would meet with success, I would never be frustrated, nothing would resist me. But our lives are not that way - we meet with resistance on every hand. So we hypothesize that there is a world which we share with others, and that it is not a creature of my own mind and will. But, of course, we can never lay aside our peculiarly human ways of knowing to see it with nonhuman "eyes," and thus to see it as it actually is. Our human - common and ideosyncratic - ways of contact are an intrinsic limitation which we won't transcend in this life.

I don't think "system" carries with it the necessary sense of being bounded. Indeed, there are very few closed systems. Rather, in trying to understand a certain set of phenomena, even if, for example we are doing consulting for a corporation which is dysfunctional in some ways, we have to try to discover what the influential factors are, and some of them are not found within the "system" of the corporation. Market factors, for example, have an impact on how a corporation functions, but so do the family situations of some of the executives, the philosophical views on leadership styles of those in managerial positions, etc. etc. In other words, part of the task in both understanding or intervening in order to bring about change is to trace out the dynamic "lines" of influence which contribute to the way the phenomena happen. Some influences will be obvious and strong, some will be less obvious and strong, some will appear to be strong but are really not crucial. So it's important to find out what influences what, but also to determine how and to what extent and with what power some element/s influence/s other elements. We rarely have an exhaustive knowledge of any domain or field of influence, or of the interactions in which numerous domains or fields intersect. Again, think dynamically rather than spatially, in terms of actions and interaction instead of overlap or contiguity.

In my mind field and system, conceived dynamically, are equivalent terms. I think it's important to keep in mind that a complex field/system contains a number of less comprehensive fields/systems. I think when we come to discuss organisms it is fruitful to think of them as systems, since "system" does have the connotation of a greater degree of integration and a tighter organization than a field does. On the other hand, there is nothing wrong with thinking of an organism as a highly complex field existing within multiple intersecting fields which affect it. I think each term can be used more fruitfully in some contexts than in others, but it depends on what you want to emphasize than in any mutually exclusive differences.

The world is actually an extremely complex and ragged affair. Five people can be witnesses to an instance of child abuse in a restaurant (an example from my book), and each one perceives it differently, and each has different action/inaction responses. A social worker may feel alarmed and call the police, a couple discussing divorce will mostly ignore it in the intensity of their own interaction, a waitress who was abused as a child may run away, a family in which the parents routinely beat their kids may look on approvingly, the manager of the restaurant may try to get the family in which the abuse is occurring to leave the restaurant because he is afraid of bad publicity or that some customers will leave without paying.

The perceptions and reactions of all of the individuals in the restaurant are a function of both the event and the complex influences each comes to the situation with. Indeed, there are many more spheres or domains of influence, i.e. fields, than there are people, since we all carry within the unique organization of our own experience vastly multiple influences. All of this is confusing, of course, but then one of the complex tasks of life is to understand what influences what and how, so that the world stops being a maelstrom of unintelligible phenomena and begins to be perceived as having some structure. The same is true in the work of the therapist: we have to trace out what in the client's ground - how he/she has organized the influences in his/her life - conditions his/her current responses to the situations he/she lives in. As we explore the person's situations which are of concern and their relations to the person's ground we intervene in ways which help the person reorganize that ground, and thus alter his/her present responses/behavior. We don't just work with the presenting figure, but also with what is the ground out of which these figures emerge. Ultimately, the figures will be changed if we succeed in helping the person change/restructure the ground.

Phil: You claim that field and system are dynamic equivalents, and I disagree. I think systems operate within a person's unified field. I think that the field is everything having effect, which cannot be known in its entirety, and thus is practically, even though not theoretically, unbounded. A system is artificially bounded, in the sense that someone sets the limits on the field for practical purposes. The field is discovered, but a system is created and imposed upon the field. If the field is a priori, then our phenomenological method, including the way in which two phenomenologies meet in dialogue, is compatible, nesting in the midst of a field that is somewhat known and appreciated, but always available to be further discovered and only limited by the abilities of client and therapist to meet one another, to learn from one another. However, if a system is a priori, then one places an artificial structure of some kind as a lense through which to view the experience of people in the system, and one often intervenes in a goal-oriented fashion, changing parts of the system in order to cause an effect in the system overall. (Incidentally, that does not fit well with the paradoxical theory of change.)

If there is any question about whether or not a system is limited, consider the way some people define evolving, complex adaptive systems (perhaps the closest thing to your description of interpenetrating spheres/systems/fields). According to Dr. Luc Steels at the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the University of Brussels, such systems are characterized by the following features:

• "Self-maintenance: Self-maintenance means that the system is actively establishing itself. To avoid annihilation due to increased entropy, the system needs to constantly rebuild itself by drawing materials from the environment and establish a boundary between itself and the rest of the environment.
• Adaptivity: The system is not only capable to maintain its own internal equilibrium for a constant environment, but also adapts when there are (small scale) changes to the environment in order to enhance its chances of further existence.
• Information preservation: The information defining the system is capable to be perserved so that the system does not depend on the continued existence of its components to survive. It is the role of the components that keeps the whole system together and if the various roles and their interrelations are preserved the whole system is preserved.
• Spontaneous increase in complexity: The most remarkable aspect is that the system is able to increase its own internal complexity. This could mean that there are increasingly more parts, more complex relations between parts, more complex behaviors of the parts, etc. Moreover often instances of the same system come together to form a larger whole that operates as a single system at a higher level." -