A brief review of two articles by the Beninoise historian and philosopher of science Aimé Dafon Segla:
“The Cosmological Vision of the Yoruba-Id`a`acha(West Africa):A Light on Yoruba History” ( African Cultural Astronomy: Current Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy Research in Africa, Holbrook, Jarita; Medupe, R. Thebe; Urama, Johnson O. (Eds.) 2008) and “ The Scientific Mind and Cultural Articulation in an Oral Society: Language as Mirror” (Social Science Information,2003,42(3)339-374).
For me, reading him is a unique experience. He operates at the intersection of mathematics, astronomy, semiotics, linguistics, epistemology, and Yoruba history and culture.
The exuberance of his ideas clearly suggests a work in progress as he grapples with questions and ideas emerging from his preoccupation with the interpretation of the scientific universe of the Yoruba people, in relation to observations from other parts of the world. His grasp of recondite aspects of the Yoruba-Orisa tradition system of knowledge known as Ifa, as he enables such arcane conceptions achieve transformation into clear and simply accessible formulations, is most impressive. In my view, Ifa scholarship could benefit significantly from his elucidation of the logical relationships in Ifa between spatial relations, the dimensions of the human body, number theory and cosmic structure. I have been searching for guidance on the logic of relations through which the organising principles of the Ifa system are developed and his work goes a long way in uncovering that. He makes clearer, in a way that complements while going into a much more foundational archaeology of concepts, the mathematical dynamism of Ifa as elucidated by Olu Longe-“Ifa Divination and Computer Science” (University of Ibadan ) and Ron Eglash African Fractals (http://www.rpi.edu/~eglash/eglash.htm).
Segla’s work demonstrates, par excellence, the genius of the Ifa system in terms of techniques of epistemological compression and expansion in which a minimal structure of symbolic forms-a relationship between one and two- encapsulates an entire cosmogony, itself represented in terms of an unfolding series of numbers-from two to sixteen and from sixteen to two hundred and fifty-six, with an infinite range of literary texts associated with each number that emerges through this numerical unfolding. This relationship between numerical and literary organisation is itself replicated in tactile visual symbols, such as the divining chain, the opele in Yoruba, and the divinatory palm nuts, ikin in Yoruba, divinatory instruments which are organised in terms of the same numerical structure, their associations also demonstrating the process of the creation of infinite possibility of
meaning from the most limited means.
Segla enables one to look at Ifa with new eyes, even if one is familiar with the Ifa literature coming out of Nigeria, understood as the origin of the system, a claim that Segla seems to both corroborate and challenge. As Abiola Irele observes in “The African Scholar” (Transition), the scientific achievements of Classical African cultures are understudied, the focus of scholarship being on the humanities and the social sciences, and as Paulin Hountondji argues, even when such studies take place, they operate in terms of a description of ideas that have been superseded, and are best understood as historical markers and anthropological guides, if I am not misinterpreting his subtle arguments in “The Reasons for Scientific Dependence in Africa Today” ( Research in African Literatures, 1990). Segla, in my view, might not be completely free of this charge of seeing Classical African thought as evidence of superseded achievements, since he argues that Classical Yoruba scientific thought is best understood as intuitive rather than theorised but bases his arguments on interviews with people who are not traditional knowledge specialists, but with lay people. That strategy enables him to develop his argument about the innate character of mathematical intuitions and their presence among Yoruba people without Western education, a stage of cognitive possibility he correlates with the intuitive stage of Western scientific rationality centuries ago. I think, though, that in doing that he could be seen as falling into the trap of primitivising the African, particularly since if one wants to learn about the quality of theoretical thinking in any discipline, one does not approach the lay person in whatever society one is studying, but learns from the specialist.
Having noted that, however, it remains true that Segla is able, using the same premises on the intuitive character of mathematical knowledge and its grounding in metaphors derived from spatial orientation through the body,to develop a strong argument for the teaching of mathematics in Yoruba. Using vigorously and precisely developed examples, he argues that Yoruba mathematical conceptions can be developed in relation to more reflexive theoretical formulations.
His invocation of Yoruba and Western history and linguistics, his deployment of insights from the philosophy of mind, and from sociological and architectural conceptions from Classical Yoruba culture, within the context of a solid grounding in the disciplines of the Western academy, is amazing.
The essay on the scientific mind in oral society is from the Sage free journals access offer that ends on April 30.The essay on the cosmological vision of the Yoruba Idaacha is from the amazing volume on African astronomy edited by Jarita Holbrook published by Springer, African Cultural Astronomy, which I am poaching by posting here, since I gained access to it through an institutional password. The work is so powerful, and in my view, so little known, that I was able to persuade myself that I was doing more good than harm by making it thus available.
I pray Segla makes more of his work available in English since most of it seems to be in French and the translation of the work on cosmology seems to suffer slightly from translation. The second comes across more clearly.
IMAGE
Nyansapo,the Wisdom Knot
Symbol of wisdom, ingenuity, intelligence and patience in the Akan/Gyaman Adinkra corpus of visual symbols.. An especially revered symbol of the Akan, this symbol conveys the idea that "a wise person has the capacity to choose the best means to attain a goal. Being wise implies broad knowledge, learning and experience, and the ability to apply such faculties to practical ends."
Quoted from http://www.welltempered.net/adinkra/htmls/adinkra/nyan.htm
Nyansapo can be seen in terms of the image of opening and closing, tying and untying, freedom and enclosure, lines and circular forms, associated with tying and untying a knot.Its design is a delicate intertwining of lines suggesting both the sense of enclosure and of spatial release emerging from a highly imaginative transposition of the visual impressions conveyed by the twining and untwining of a knot.
"Puzzles and difficulties are for Aristotle the starting point of philosophy.[He] uses the metaphor of a knot. '...the difficulty of our thinking points to a 'knot' in the object; for in so far as our thought is in difficulties ,it is in like the case with those who are bound; for in either case it is impossible to go forward'.
[On gaining adequate understanding we experience a ] the subsequent free play of thought' "
Adapted from Aristotle,Metaphysics,III,I25-34 and Jonathan Lear,Aristotle:the Desire to Understand,1999.Chap.1.p.4.
Count the links of the chain; worship the triple Fire: knowledge, meditation, practice; the triple process: evidence, inference, experience; the triple duty: study, concentration, renunciation; understand that everything comes from Spirit, that Spirit alone is sought and found; attain everlasting peace; mount beyond birth and death.
When man understands himself, understands universal Self, the union of the two kindles the triple Fire, offers the sacrifice; then shall he, though still on earth, break the bonds of death, beyond sorrow, mount into heaven.
Death speaking to Nachiketas in The Ten Principal Upanishads.trans.W.B.Yeats and Shree Purohit Swami.1970.p.27.
“The Cosmological Vision of the Yoruba-Id`a`acha(West Africa):A Light on Yoruba History” ( African Cultural Astronomy: Current Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy Research in Africa, Holbrook, Jarita; Medupe, R. Thebe; Urama, Johnson O. (Eds.) 2008) and “ The Scientific Mind and Cultural Articulation in an Oral Society: Language as Mirror” (Social Science Information,2003,42(3)339-374).
For me, reading him is a unique experience. He operates at the intersection of mathematics, astronomy, semiotics, linguistics, epistemology, and Yoruba history and culture.
The exuberance of his ideas clearly suggests a work in progress as he grapples with questions and ideas emerging from his preoccupation with the interpretation of the scientific universe of the Yoruba people, in relation to observations from other parts of the world. His grasp of recondite aspects of the Yoruba-Orisa tradition system of knowledge known as Ifa, as he enables such arcane conceptions achieve transformation into clear and simply accessible formulations, is most impressive. In my view, Ifa scholarship could benefit significantly from his elucidation of the logical relationships in Ifa between spatial relations, the dimensions of the human body, number theory and cosmic structure. I have been searching for guidance on the logic of relations through which the organising principles of the Ifa system are developed and his work goes a long way in uncovering that. He makes clearer, in a way that complements while going into a much more foundational archaeology of concepts, the mathematical dynamism of Ifa as elucidated by Olu Longe-“Ifa Divination and Computer Science” (University of Ibadan ) and Ron Eglash African Fractals (http://www.rpi.edu/~eglash/eglash.htm).
Segla’s work demonstrates, par excellence, the genius of the Ifa system in terms of techniques of epistemological compression and expansion in which a minimal structure of symbolic forms-a relationship between one and two- encapsulates an entire cosmogony, itself represented in terms of an unfolding series of numbers-from two to sixteen and from sixteen to two hundred and fifty-six, with an infinite range of literary texts associated with each number that emerges through this numerical unfolding. This relationship between numerical and literary organisation is itself replicated in tactile visual symbols, such as the divining chain, the opele in Yoruba, and the divinatory palm nuts, ikin in Yoruba, divinatory instruments which are organised in terms of the same numerical structure, their associations also demonstrating the process of the creation of infinite possibility of
meaning from the most limited means.
Segla enables one to look at Ifa with new eyes, even if one is familiar with the Ifa literature coming out of Nigeria, understood as the origin of the system, a claim that Segla seems to both corroborate and challenge. As Abiola Irele observes in “The African Scholar” (Transition), the scientific achievements of Classical African cultures are understudied, the focus of scholarship being on the humanities and the social sciences, and as Paulin Hountondji argues, even when such studies take place, they operate in terms of a description of ideas that have been superseded, and are best understood as historical markers and anthropological guides, if I am not misinterpreting his subtle arguments in “The Reasons for Scientific Dependence in Africa Today” ( Research in African Literatures, 1990). Segla, in my view, might not be completely free of this charge of seeing Classical African thought as evidence of superseded achievements, since he argues that Classical Yoruba scientific thought is best understood as intuitive rather than theorised but bases his arguments on interviews with people who are not traditional knowledge specialists, but with lay people. That strategy enables him to develop his argument about the innate character of mathematical intuitions and their presence among Yoruba people without Western education, a stage of cognitive possibility he correlates with the intuitive stage of Western scientific rationality centuries ago. I think, though, that in doing that he could be seen as falling into the trap of primitivising the African, particularly since if one wants to learn about the quality of theoretical thinking in any discipline, one does not approach the lay person in whatever society one is studying, but learns from the specialist.
Having noted that, however, it remains true that Segla is able, using the same premises on the intuitive character of mathematical knowledge and its grounding in metaphors derived from spatial orientation through the body,to develop a strong argument for the teaching of mathematics in Yoruba. Using vigorously and precisely developed examples, he argues that Yoruba mathematical conceptions can be developed in relation to more reflexive theoretical formulations.
His invocation of Yoruba and Western history and linguistics, his deployment of insights from the philosophy of mind, and from sociological and architectural conceptions from Classical Yoruba culture, within the context of a solid grounding in the disciplines of the Western academy, is amazing.
The essay on the scientific mind in oral society is from the Sage free journals access offer that ends on April 30.The essay on the cosmological vision of the Yoruba Idaacha is from the amazing volume on African astronomy edited by Jarita Holbrook published by Springer, African Cultural Astronomy, which I am poaching by posting here, since I gained access to it through an institutional password. The work is so powerful, and in my view, so little known, that I was able to persuade myself that I was doing more good than harm by making it thus available.
I pray Segla makes more of his work available in English since most of it seems to be in French and the translation of the work on cosmology seems to suffer slightly from translation. The second comes across more clearly.
IMAGE
Nyansapo,the Wisdom Knot
Symbol of wisdom, ingenuity, intelligence and patience in the Akan/Gyaman Adinkra corpus of visual symbols.. An especially revered symbol of the Akan, this symbol conveys the idea that "a wise person has the capacity to choose the best means to attain a goal. Being wise implies broad knowledge, learning and experience, and the ability to apply such faculties to practical ends."
Quoted from http://www.welltempered.net/adinkra/htmls/adinkra/nyan.htm
Nyansapo can be seen in terms of the image of opening and closing, tying and untying, freedom and enclosure, lines and circular forms, associated with tying and untying a knot.Its design is a delicate intertwining of lines suggesting both the sense of enclosure and of spatial release emerging from a highly imaginative transposition of the visual impressions conveyed by the twining and untwining of a knot.
"Puzzles and difficulties are for Aristotle the starting point of philosophy.[He] uses the metaphor of a knot. '...the difficulty of our thinking points to a 'knot' in the object; for in so far as our thought is in difficulties ,it is in like the case with those who are bound; for in either case it is impossible to go forward'.
[On gaining adequate understanding we experience a ] the subsequent free play of thought' "
Adapted from Aristotle,Metaphysics,III,I25-34 and Jonathan Lear,Aristotle:the Desire to Understand,1999.Chap.1.p.4.
Count the links of the chain; worship the triple Fire: knowledge, meditation, practice; the triple process: evidence, inference, experience; the triple duty: study, concentration, renunciation; understand that everything comes from Spirit, that Spirit alone is sought and found; attain everlasting peace; mount beyond birth and death.
When man understands himself, understands universal Self, the union of the two kindles the triple Fire, offers the sacrifice; then shall he, though still on earth, break the bonds of death, beyond sorrow, mount into heaven.
Death speaking to Nachiketas in The Ten Principal Upanishads.trans.W.B.Yeats and Shree Purohit Swami.1970.p.27.
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