By Bahram Roshan Zamir

It took archeologists more than 150 years to finally discover a very old civilization in Iran.

As we know, Copper was first used about 5500 B.C. by some old civilizations that were formed in river valleys. Among these we can refer to Elam or Susiana civilization, which were formed beside the Karun River, situated in Kuzestan Province, southwest of Iran; Jiroft civilization in southern province of Kerman and the civilization of the Burned City (known) as Shahre Sukhte, in Persian in the southeastern province of Sistan and Baluchistan. The history of all these civilizations goes back to 5000 years ago. However, the Elamite civilization is the only one which managed to survive for millenniums.

In the second millennium BC, the Elamite Kingdom was a powerful rival for Mesopotamian governments.

The Elamites destroyed the city of Ur about 2000 BC. Subsequently, they exerted great influence on the rulers of Babylonia. After the capturing Babylonia in 1595 BC, by the Kassites (A prior Aryan ethnic group) however, the country suffered a political decline for about 350 years.

Elam experienced a political revival under King Shutruk-Nahhunte I (reigned about 1160 BC), who conquered Babylonia, deposed the Kassite dynasty, and placed his son on the throne. King Shilhak-Inshushinak (r. about 1140 BC), a great administrator and patron of arts and sciences, created a powerful Kingdom. Under his rule and the other king, Untash-Napirisha the borders were greatly extended, the literary use of the Elamite language was revived, and an architectural and sculptural renaissance took place. Dor-Untash, the city of the king and the huge temple of Inshushinak, the great God of Elam, as the tallest Mesopotamian style temples (Zigurat) in the ancient world, was built by those kings in Khuzestan (Called Zigurat-Choghazanbil). And it does exist until today as the oldest World Heritage Site in Iran.

In last years of the 12th century BC, Nebuchadnezzar I, Babylonian Great King conquered Elam. Since then, Elam disappeared for more than 3 centuries. However, the Kingdom rose again. It was after then when the Assyrian Empire – the first empire of the history- invades Susa and destroyed the whole city and its sacred temples forever.

In the second millennium BC, the Aryans entered Iran territory, bringing with themselves the treasure of Indo-Iranian languages.

The name Iran derives from the word “Airyana”. This word is used in the Avesta- the holy book of Zoroastrians- dating 3000 years ago (maybe more) and changed to “Aryan-Shatr” and “Iran-Shatr” in the first centuries A.D. and finely ended in “Iran” in Firdowsi’s shahname.

In the first millennium BC, some tribes of the Iranians moved gradually into the mountains area of Zagros, neighboring the Elamites in south, Assyrian empire in west and some other prior Aryans and non-Aryans in north.

The Scholars divides them to three parts. The Medes settled in north western, west and center of Iran, the Persians in south western and the Parthians in north eastern of Iran.

The reason is that these three major groups constructed 3 -Fourth, fifth and Sixth- “great eastern monarchies” (As English historian, Henry Rawlinson named) From 8^th Century BC, to 3^th Century A.D and after that the national-religious Empire of Iran was built by Ardeshir Babakan, called the Sassanid Empire, longing for 430 years. It ended in 650 A.D. the year that Yazdgerd III- the last Zoroastrian king of Iran- was murdered. And Muslim Arabs’ conquer was completed in Iran.

To be continued…

3 -Fourth, fifth and Sixth- “great eastern monarchies” (As English historian, Henry Rawlinson named) From 8^th Century BC, to 3^th Century A.D and after that the national-religious Empire of Iran was built by Ardeshir Babakan, called the Sassanid Empire, longing for 430 years. It ended in 650 A.D. the year that Yazdgerd III- the last Zoroastrian king of Iran- was murdered. And Muslim Arabs’ conquer was completed in Iran.

To be continued…

by Sherwin Vakili

1. At first, this text was supposed to be a critical inqiuery on Foucault’s lecture “L’ordre du discourse” (Foucault,1971), and its core question, which is about  the mechanisms and processes that suppress the discourse and differentiates  the serious, authentic and creditable statements from ordinary, low level speech.

Meditating on this question, and evaluating Foucault’s brilliant answers critically,  a new answer poped out which is more related to complex systems theory and systemic  approach toward sociology, rather than Foucaudian archeology/ geneology. And by this reformulation of the question, this paper emerged as an answer. Before starting our discussion, some considerations must be made to illuminate   the writer’s philosophical presumptions and the theoretical paradigm used to deal with the problem.

As mentioned, the main question of our debate is the influences of power on discourse.

Looking through the mechanisms responsible for top/pop discourse discrimination  is a fruitful method for understanding the patterns of power dynamics. The rules  that govern the boundary formation between the vulgar dialogues of the pop and  intellectual monologue of the cultural reference group, are from a special point  of view, a good laboratory to analyze the power/truth interconnections.

The presupposition that there is an important and determinative interrelation between   these two entities, has a long history. From Protagoras to Neitzsche and Foucault,  some semi-anarchic thinkers believed that transcendental pure essence of the  crystallized truth and rationality is a myth and human interests, along with  power relations are determinative forces shaping the truth. Here, we accept this irritative assumption, and therefore believe that asking about power’s limitative functions on truth formalizing systems (language/discourse)is meaningful.

So, by a Foucaudian vocabulary, the core question of “what determines the value  of a discourse?” can be interpreted to “what are the disciplinary mechanisms  acting on the discourse?” (Foucault, 1979). For dealing with such a taboo inquisition, first of all we should clarify our own theoretical background. This text is written in a systemic paradigm. The systems  theories in sociology, whose best known defender was Niklas Luhmann, is a multidisciplinary holistic approach towards the dynamics,structures and functions of the society, when it be analyzed as an evolutionary autopoietic system. Nowadays, the Luhmannian  formulation of this theory is the most influential. Although, we are all in  debt of Luhmann’s deep and thoughtful interpretations of the social phenomena,  our own systemic model bifurcates from his in some points, especially in the  course of definition ofsubjectivity and its place and importance in our systemic  model.

Our aim here is neither dealing with Luhmann’s ideas, nor commenting on Foucault’s approach. Instead, we try to look into the problem of “meaning exclusion” via power procedures, through our own systemic model of culturalevolution. The theoretical base of this text is a special version of systemic sociology, which is called “theory of the Manesh-ha”, proposed lately as a M.Sc thesis (Vakili,  2002 [B]). This theory, is under the influence of Luhmann’s systemic sociology  (Luhmann,1995), and backed up by a multidisciplinary approach, especially the  sociobiological view of E.O.Wilson (Wilson,1995) and fantastic insights of Richard  Dawkin’s memetics (Dawkins,1989).

Here is no time and space for restating the methodological odds and ends of this   model and showing its applications in the field of cultural studies. Therefore,  it will suffice to mention the main points of this theory:

A) In this theory, we define Manesh as the quantum of cultural dynamics. A Manesh is a autonomous, replicative system that exists as a subsystem of a symbolic/semantic  apparatus -such as natural language. The natural neural networks -specially human brains- act as their natural dwellings. So, each Manesh’s informational  structure is essentially coded as a pattern of neural activation. These systems  change the behavioral patterns of their hosts, and replicate through communicative  channels. Their semantic or syntactic content change randomly through time,  via internal or external variables. These structural oscilations are functionally  equal to genetic mutations in biological replicators.

B) Culture, in the theory of the Manesh-ha is defines as a field of interconnecting assemblages of Maneshes, that can interact with each other because of their  communicative code-meaning resemblance. So, culture can be formulated as an  meta-evolutionary field, containing a complicated array ofevolutionary replicating  systems. So, we may think of two different hierarchical layers of evolutionary  processes in a social system: processes related to bodies -biological evolution-  and those linked with maneshes –cultural evolution.

C) Natural selection in Maneshes acts via the hedonistic factor of pleasure and reward (Vakili, 2002 [A]). It means that replicatory success of a Manesh -which  represents its duration and evolutionary fitness- is determined basically by  its statistical ability to create pleasure in its host-brain.

D) Pleasure is itself an ancient system for encoding biological fitness, so the      evolutionary success of the physiological bodies and semantic contents of their  brians (Maneshes) link via this unified field of natural selection. This brief review of the main assumptions of the Theory of the Manesh-ha, may illuminate our means and goals. In the systemic paradigm, we tolerate the paradoxes  and dialectic concept counterbalances. This seems compatible with Foucault’s  ideal formulations (Foucault, 1978), but in the other hand, we do not share  his furious opposition to meta-narratives (Foucault, 1991). In systemic approach,  we accept the incomplete and non-deterministic nature of the scientific theorization,  but we keep trying to reach the most integrated and compatible rational model,

which then will become the dominant narrative according to evolutionary laws.

So, we are not supposed to content ourselves with a mere descriptive answer  to the problem of meaning exclusion –as Foucault does- and try to extract a  liberative methodology, which is somehow systematically present in the “L’ordre  du discourse” (Foucault,1971).

2. Let’s start our survey by a less an ambitious question: “How can we define  the meaningful discourse in the theory of the Manesh-ha?”

For answering this question, we need the concept of phase space.  Phase space is a theoretical N dimensional space, whose each axis represents one   special variable influential in the dynamics of our subject of observation. Each  subject matter in the CST can be analyzed as a system, with its specificdynamic  parameters and determinative variables. So, we can define a phase-space for  any system. For example, the phase space for a simple projectile with four variables  (initial velocity, mass, gravitational force, and air resistance),is four dimensional.  Each moment of the projectile in this hypothetical space can be shown by a single  point, and if we add time as the fifth axis, we can show its whole path by a  single line in this space. This line, representing the passage of the system  through all possible choices, is called a trajectory. The system is called simple  or linear if the pattern and form of its trajectory could be formulized by differential  equations. Otherwise, it is complex, and if there be some undetermined parts  in it, we call it chaotic. Chaotic systems are complex entities whose trajectory  is irregular and unpredictable, but usually locally patterned. The pattern of  these combinations of lawful fragments and its chaotic joints to other such  pieces is determined by synergetic regularities, emerging from complex structure  of the system and making its autopoietic behavior possible.

In complex systems, we always observe a high level of indeterminacy, which is an effect of system’s high degree of freedom. Degree of freedom can be modeled  on the phase space as trajectory points in which the system possess more than  one behavioral choice. Theses points are called symmetry(or Curie) points.

System at these points select one of the choices possible, and because of the  symmetry -or equipotentiality/ equiprobablity- of the choices, no external observer  can foresee its behavior after the Curie point. As an imaginative representation, we may say that trajectory at the symmetry point breaks to two or more probable continuities. This phenomena is called

bifurcation, and is a sign of the systems indetermincy. System at the symmetry  point choose its own behavior. In this special domains of phase-space the internal  variables abruptly dominate the external factors, that’s why the exact form  of the trajectory at these areas become vague and unpredictable. Systems when  reached the symmetry points, have to pass it anyway, because one of their phase  space ingredients is temporal dimension. So whether decidedly and thoughtfully  or arbitrarily and randomly, the system chooses at the symmetry points, and  through this act “breaks the symmetry” .Breaking the symmetry is another definition  for information creating. So, complex systems by traversing their ramified trajectories,  continually break the symmetry and by reducing their past tense behavioral ambiguity,  create the information that is used for increasing their internal complexity.

It is the simplest interpretation of Luhmann’s “increasing the internal complexity  by the cost of decreasing the external ambiguity”.  Psychological states -such as hesitation- and sociological mass movements such      as mobs are good examples for indeterminacy and symmetry breaking of complex  systems. The information created through this process is understood as the memories  of the person or society of its deeds. Psychological systems are conditioned  by the -hedonistically defined- victories or failures in reaching their goals,  which are always pleasure related in our model (Vakili, 2002 [A]). In each system, we may define one or more equilibrium states that can be represented by some points on the phase space. These points are energetically, thermodynamically,  or functionally optimal and economical. So the trajectory near these points  bends toward the nearest one, and remains there until an external force rides  them out of this “potential well”. These points are called attractors.

3. Now, after this brief review of Manesh-ha’s theory concepts, we may turn to our central problem. What is the meaningful discourse and how is it determined   and differentiated?

Let’s start with a simple model.

Assume that in a illeterate society such as S, the only communicative channel available is oral language of L. If L is composed of words with maximum length   of phonems, propositions with the maximum length of B words, and units of communicative    action with the maximum C propositions interchanged, Then Communicative sphere    of the S can be modeled as a phase space such as S, in which:

I) Possess C dimensions,

II) Whose dimensions are not simple lines representing unique parameters, but a chunked independent phase space with B dimensions,

III) Again, whose dimensions are not simple lines, but a chunked independent phase space with A dimensions,

We call this complicated phase space, with its interwoven multi-layer subspaces,  a “hierarchical phase space”. This kind of phase space, although hard to bear in mind, is theoretically definable.   We may model this space with computer techniques and solve some of our analyticalquestions by its aid. In this paper, for the sake of simplicity, we just represent  the two or three dimensional shadows of this ultra-phase-space. More precise analysis of such a phase space can be done with the matrix formulations.

Now, think of a bipole simple dialogue in the S. Each of the speakers, due to their socially based, internalized rules of dialogue -like what ethnomethodologists  like to mention- produce strings of lingual signs. Each string combined of meaning-carrier  words which shape the propositions. We can show each string by a point in our  simplified ultra-phase space. By this method, we may represent all possible  communicative actions in our model by interconnected lines.

Linguists have shown us that all the phonological combinations available in our phase space is not instrumental. The realms of language L is a subspace of S,  where the linguistic rules of the phonem/word/proposition combinatorials govern.

We have a succession of one hundred G’s in S, but this is not ausable word

of the L. Pronunciability, simplicity, discriminatibility and referentiality

are the key concepts that differentiates the meaningful subspace of L, from

the non-lingual background parts of S.

We may extract the meaningful subspace of s as an incarnation of the L in the S, by taking the criteria of referentiality. Each point of S that refers to something,  and so means something, belongs to s. We may understand s as the phase space  of the meaning in the society S. In a dialogue, all of the pseudo-lingual strings  outside s assess as meaningless and therefore non-communicative. These non-interpretable  strings are called “noise” in the information theory.

The meaning phase space of s is defined in a society, rather than on an individuals. Each individual -depended on his or her unique life experiences-has access  to a special domain of s. Most parts of the S is infamiliar to anormal speaker  of a language. Scientific concepts, juridical idioms, a great deal of ethnic  or class slangs, and many regional famous sayings are completely  unpalpable  for a simple user of the language.

For example, if Persian language possesses sixty thousand words, anormal literate  native speaker of this language uses around six thousand of them in his ordinary  life. It means that only ten percent of the s in this individual is used. In  other words, s possesses sixty thousand points representing the words that each  individual just access to a subspace of it, which amount ten percent of its  volume.

Production of the meaningful speech is governed by exactly the same laws. Rules of the conjugation determine the pattern of word formation and the laws of syntax  reign the kingdom of propositions, the same can be told about the discourses  and rhetorical traditions. So, we have some generative rules that determine  the structure of s in each hierarchical level.

Our abstract model can be better understood with an example. In Persian, we have an alphabetical system containing 32 letters. If maximum length of a word in Persian  be 20 letters, maximum length of each proposition be 30words, and maximum length  of each unit of discourse be 500 propositions, then the phase space for Persian  discourse will possess 500 dimensions, eachof its dimensions composed of a  30 dimensional space, whose each dimension is in turn a 20 dimensional space  itself. It is the meaning of our ultra-phase-space. As mentioned, just a subspace  of this complex imaginary apparatus is instrumentally available as a discursive  playground.

The boundaries between the meaningful s and the remainder of meaningless S is  not rigid and static. The emergence of s out of S and its changes is a synergetic  phenomena. The language as a whole, and its discursive parts are dynamic evolutionary  systems, which are invented, used and revised by the individuals to be adaptive  to their cognitive and communicative needs.

4. By this systemic description of the meaningful discourse, it comes to light that in each society (S), in each social condition, only an extravagant limited part  of the whole symbolic phase space is available due to each individual as meaningful,  appropriate and useful communicative choices. The individual’s field of selection  by this means is reduced to a controled, predetermined and purified assembly  of traditionally benign choices. Other possibilities are ruled out as impolite,  irrelevant, irrational, and insane, as Foucault categorizes them. This pattern  of choice reduction leads to a shrunken semantic phase space, whose actual choices  are limited to a few traditionally predetermined cases. This mutilated field  of availabality in the semantic sphere can be called the “permissible field”,

which is different from the prohibited part which was ruled out.

This reduced form of semantic phase space, although shrunken and folded, is still complicated enough to bear misunderstandings, errors, and parole mistakes, as  well as trickeries and lies. We actually oversimplified the essence of natural  language in our model by neglecting the paralocutionary symbols, voice stresses  and elements of body language. As a matter of fact, our three layered model  of lingual phase space is linked with so many other paralingual and meta-lingual  symbolic systems that our theoretical endeavor means nothing more than a local  oversimplified structure useful just as an methodological guide.

Our core question, if be reminded, was about mechanisms and causes that differentiate the permissible from prohibited subsystems of semantic phase-space. This is  systemic interpretation of the same challenge introduced by Foucault in his  “L’ordre du discourse” .We may define the cultural elements (maneshes) as evolutionary, autopoietic informational systems included in this semantic sphere. So, the rules that govern the order  of the discourse, discriminates the allowed, benign and -economically or politically-  useful Maneshes, from deviant, ill-minded, and wasteful elements. The pattern  of this differentiation is dominated by the power relations in the society,  which regulate and control the distribution of these meaningful elements, and  by this means determines their fitness, and shapes the portrait of the cultural  identity. Our central challenge, so, is to understand the processes that determine  this pattern of inclusion or exclusion, absorbtion or excretion, and selecting  or discarding.

5. Reason is the weaponry of an animal without the teeth and claws, as Neitzsche teaches us. By accepting such an axiom -which is taboo neither in systems theory  nor Foucault’s paradigm- we should ask about the evolutionary causes and effects  that shaped the structure of the reason, or any other configuration of laws  responsible for demarkating the border of permissible discourse. There must  be a functional explanation that justifies the unique and special structure  of this boundary, or a description that formulates our knowledge limitations  about this phenomena. If there is something stablet hroughout the history of  this semantic exclusion -even for a few centuries as Foucault’s episteme,- there

must be an explanation about its evolutionary gains as well. We shall search  for the costs and benefits of any special pattern of permissible discourse delimitation. In the Theory of Manesh-ha, a social system is described as a four layer hierarchic  complex entity which contains, according to a revised version of Parsons’ original  cybernetic view (Parsons, 1951), a biological, psychological, social and cultural  levels (Vakili,2002 [B]).

In each of these layers there is a complicated network of interwoven phenomena   that as a whole make up the bodies, personalities, societal organizations, and  cultural identities respectively. We may use the abbreviation of BPSC as a shortening  form of these levels’ names. The differences of these levels is summed up in  the table-1.

Social system, alike any other evolutionary system, is dwelling on a fragile border between order and chaos. Entropic principle, along with random malfunctions  which are determined statistically by internal or external factors, always threaten  the system, against which there is no armor in the system but its autopoietic  potential. Any process -in each of these functional levels-that help this self-organizing,  anti-chaotic battle is welcomed by the blind laws of natural selection. Social  systems pass through the discrete points of a fractal shaped, complicated attractor.  The points that posit near equilibrium points, but not overlapping them. (By  the way, isn’t it true that the thermodynamic equilibrium is biologically a  synonym of death?) So, we may say that social systems roam along a near equilibrium  attractor, jumping from a local, temporal point on the attractor line to the  other. This is the process that is called autopoietic behavior, and here is  the key to understand the evolutionary increase of the system’s complexity.

We already know some of the rules that make up the backbone of such a strange structure. We know that there is a brutal natural selection process active in  the whole system. There is at least one set of selective criteria that links  to the biological level, and acts on genomic combination, due to the species  natural history. In the theory of the manesh-ha, another set of selection rules  is assumed at the cultural level. In this level the selection action the semantic  entities through changing the distribution of the maneshes in the population.

So, we may think of two interdependent sets of selective criteria; the biological  inclusive fitness, and the cultural semantic fitness, which is the bedrock of  permissible discourse definition. In the field of discourse analysis, what is crucial is society’s stability in the psychological and sociological levels. It means that semantic combinations, meanings,   symbols and discursive entities that guard the mental and economico-political  states are favourable in the process of natural selection.These are the discursive  elements that can be intentionally evaluated by twointerconnected criteria.

In psychological level, our standard for absorbing or discarding of the meaning  is good old pleasure, and in the sociological level It is measured by the power  equations. These factors need a formalistic apparatus to be measured, compared  and evaluated, and that’s why so many parallel systems of pleasure/power codifications  have been emerged throughout history. Monetary systems, codes of nobility,  symbols of luxury, and titles and aristocratic medallions of honor are all sublanguages  invented to code these essential variables. These are the socially based equivalents  of the biological neuropeptidergic system that codes the pleasure in the brains.

By this symbolic structure of the value-meanings, popular understanding of the good vs. evil, pleasant vs. painful, useful vs. useless, and benign vs. malignant  become possible. By the aid of this artificial table of the codes, and this  shrunken semantic phase space, people gain the possibility to reducetheir own  numerous behavioral choices to a limited set of estimable normative action programmes.  These actions should not threaten the social/psychological stability. Therefore  nothing risky, new and creative is permissible. You should not ask about  the validity of the dogma, doubting about the commonsensical facts, and acting  creatively farther than a normative threshold.

This means a practical behavioral algorithm for each individual. Anyone and is criminate the important, rational, useful, sane, and allowed choices by this way, and  then there remains just the decomplicated act of choosing which is usually programmed  itself by the traditions, mass media and propaganda. The cultural elements,  or maneshes, that control these pleasure/power codification and govern the holistic  dynamics of other maneshes are among the discursive elements themselves. They  are semantic systems that claim the truth about other semantic systems. They  are ingredients of the cultural levelthat act as an internal attractor and  determine the distribution of other meneshes. They are the landmarks that demark  the permissible discourse boundaries.

These regulative maneshes, are selected so that their influence on the social dynamism -in all BPSC four levels- maintain the stability of the system. So,  the meanings that are dangerous for bodies (such as suicide and homicide instructions),  personalities (anxieties and some philosophical doubts), societal (all interactions  that are not winner-winner), and cultural (low fitness maneshes), must be diminished  and filtrated.

6. There are four main manesh-fitness-determining criteria that can be extracted  from four layers of BPSC. A) In biological level, the evolutionary discriminator of the permissible/non-permissible discourse-knowledge is the ancient rule of reductiuon. The substantial passion  for reducing all the cognitive elements in hand to one or a few well-known entities,  is the best manifestation of this pattern. Nervous systems, along with biological  sensitivities, have an innate limitation in surveying the multidimensional and  overcrowded external word. Solving of this so-many-stimuli-and-so-few-receptors  problem is simply possible by categorizing the stimuli and reducing each of  them to an outstanding code.

Generalization of this simple technique  have been  led to a huge body of theorization about our experiences. From Ionian philosophers and   their arxh to our up to dated quantum mechanics, all are based on the strict  methods of reductionist approach.

B) In psychological level, what is important is the integration and unity of the heterogeneous set of the cognitive and emotional phenomena which are configurated  in a first person singular identity of the self. So, the myth of a unifying,  integrated entity which can be called “I” emerges through this psychological  need. All cognitive or emotional inputs that constitute incongruent or paradoxical  patterns inside the psychological level can be assessed as a threat for the  stability of the personality, and therefore must be abandoned and excluded.

As we know from psychophysiological discoveries (Braude,1991), this sort of absolutely congruent and all integrated psychic system is a cognitive illusion rather than  an objective fact. So, the most important factors that should be diminished  in our black list of threatening paradoxes, are the epistemological doubts and  dilemma that point us the illusive nature of this integration. That is why normative  cognition is based on a unified, self-congruent field of knowledge, and our  aims and dreams are seemingly ordered in such a self-consistent formal system  as well.

The passion for integration is not limited to this level. It reflects in the  social level as economical, political or organizational desire toward solidification.  In cultural level we may touch its echo as the self organizing behavior of the maneshes   that leads to the interconnections and unification of the semantic elements  to form huge systems of thoughts, fields of theorizing, or epistemic paradigms  as Foucault mentions.

C) In the social level, the main phenomena observable is the symbolic interaction,    or by Luhmann’s terminology, communicative action(Luhmann,1995). Success of  the system’s functions in this level is depending on vividness and accuracy.  What is important in a communicative action is meaning interchange, and this  becomes possible via a transparent, unambiguous discourse. So the discursive  elements must be filtrated, purified and simplified so that the meaning send  by the interrogator be understood similarly by the audience, and this calls  for precision.

D) In the cultural level, we confront a new self sustaining evolutionary system.      The maneshes, whose vague synonym may be assumed as cultural elements, are replicatory systems with mutable information contents that effect on their carriers/hosts  behavioral pattern and by this means determine their pleasure/fitness. These  semantic units -the same as all other evolutionary systems- compete with each  other for resources and niches. Their niches are human brains and their resources  are communicative channels. What is important for a manesh is winning the match  of natural selection and find a suitable opportunity for replication. The effective instrument for achieving this goal, is itself of a semantic essence.

Human hosts absorb and propagate the maneshes that increase their pleasure/lifespan.  Because of ultra-complicated nature of the cultural level, there is no direct  linkage between a unique manesh and the evolutionary/hedonistic gains of it.  Maneshes like communications, personalities and bodies, act throughout a complex  network of interactions and mutual causalities. This means that an individual  have no objective clue for estimating the value of a special manesh. The only  useful information actually originates from the semantic structure of the manesh  itself, and manesh’s claims about its usefulness, that is usually echoed by  the eager fans. So, the claim for deepness, seriousness, importance and truth  is the crucial factor in the cultural level.

7. So far we have analyzed the fitness variables and stability factors effective in a socio-cultural system and showed that there is four semantic attractors,  which govern the systems dynamic in each of BPSC hierarchical layers. These  factors were respectively simplicity (by reduction), integration (by congruence establishment), accuracy (by conventional precision) and importance (by claiming  vitality).

These four semantic attractors lead to four evolutionary strategies in the semantic  behavior of social systems. These are the factors that differentiate the permissible  discourse from the non-important, ambiguous, paradoxical and enigmatic. This  four-layered system of meaning demarcation creates four ways of exclusion and  mutilation of the meaning, each based on an illusionary axiom. For the sake  of simplicity, we mention them here by metaphoric names.  A) Illusion of simplicity and its reductionist methodology leads to “Senemar      complex”. The name of this case is borrowed from an old Arabian story which  is about a royal architect -Senemar- who had built a palace for the king of  Yemen, that could be ruined by displacing a singular brick in its wall. The  passion of reducing all the weights of the theoretical structures to a unique  center of semantic gravitation is a prominent diagnostic of this illusion.

B) Illusion of integration bears the Marduk complex. Is is the name of the great Babylonian god, who became the Lord of the gods because of conquering the Tiamat,  the god of chaos. Marduk complex is equal to dogmatic belief in order, lawfulness,  and regularity of the world, which is usually thought understandable and formalizable.

C) Illusion of accuracy makes up the Aristotle complex. Content of this complex  is based on identity principle that claims static nature of the universe. there  is no change or metamorphosis, outside the secure realm of the Marduk’s laws.  As Foucault mentions by his own terminology, this complex as been dominant  from seventeenth century on (Foucault, 1970) by increasing the symbolic elements  of scientific language and decreasing its semantic field, which makes the predetermined  and controled conventional interconnections possible.

D) Illusion of importance may be called Plato complex, because of his insist      on deepening and idealizing of the meaningful codes, as well as his claim of  political power due to this potentiality (Popper,1981). This complex is specially effective because by its claim of importance and seriousness,   it links discourse with power and sums up all four illusions in a regular and  consistent pattern of belief. Anywhere we encounter their regularities, counter

examples and paradoxes, they may be eliminated by referring to our own superficial  and insufficient intellectual efforts, not the invalidity of our axioms. By this  means, the cognitive system based on these four complexes become stable and  criticism-proof.

8. Permissible discourse is produced by a disciplinary system which is constructed

by these four complexes. Its self-recursive nature, which is a present from  uncle Plato, is its stronghold. The consequences of this demarcating system  are qccurately mentioned in the Foucault’s “The Order of Discourse”, and can  be geneologically analyzed by the aid of his famous model of episteme transformations.  The sincerity toward truth, the domination of the author, mathematism and empiricism  are all manifestations of these four complexes. the idolatry of the truth can  be derived from Platonic complex. The demand for referring the discourse to a  known and familiar author is a consequence of the Aristotle complex. empiricism  and mathematism are respectively up to Marduk and Senemar complex. So we can  see that Foucault’s pathology of discourse formation is deductable from our own systemic

model, added to a new and more analytic theoretical apparatus.(You see, even  in a critical text like this the claim of credit refers to the illusions listed  above, that is why building a new analytical construction is so good and brilliant).

Our systemic model differs the Foucaudian paradigm in these points:

A) First of all, in systemic models we do not deny the principle of continuity.  We think about some of the patterns and structures as long lived, almost permanent  specificities of the social system. Of course this continuity in terest does  not lead to structuralist’s dogma about its generality and unchangability. Foucault’s  warnings about the simplicity and insufficiency of the metaphysical continuity  presumption, although interesting and useful, is not believed as a discreteness-centered  counter-metaphysics. In other words, from systemic point of view, continuation  is a theoretical assumption rather than an onthologic one, which is useful for  analyzing systems of thought –Foucault himself included- properly.

B) We do not share Foucauldian deep aversion of metanarratives (Dreyfus& Rabinow, 1989). In systems theory, we are aiming to build up a consistent, pervasive  theoretical model to justify the patterns and discriminate the regularities.  This goal is the same as other paradigmatic models that try to rationalize the  facts and formulize the world. It seems that complete epoch of these four illusions  be both impossible and fruitless. All major theoretical challenges to understand  the being, or criticizing such an understanding, possess a subsidary scaphold  of these merged complexes. All we can do is to remind the illusiveness of these  axioms and open up the theoretical semantic phase space by changing these presumptions  locally. This is what Foucault calls “reversion” which can also be called criticism.

C) Our model is essentially hedonistic. It is neither Foucault’s, nor Luhmann’s, intention to search and find such an ultimate attractor for a great deal of  the behaviors. But in the theory of the manesh-ha we believe that there is an  experimentally discriminable attractor, -not unique or teleological, but central  and influential- that is the reward system and its complements.

D) Foucault, because of his anti-dominational approach towards the discourses  and meta-theories, can not propose liberative strategic programs. This defect  is a consequence of his radical refusal of the metanarratives. Ourmodel, in  contrast, validates the consistency and pervasiveness as a powerful competetive  tool in the cultural level. So, any influential liberative criticism must itself  be interpreted to these normative Lingua Franca of the Maneshes world. We are  not doomed to repeat the errors lurked beneath the normative discourse, but we  have to penetrate into its crust if we are aiming a meaningful change occured  by our criticisms. In other words, we need to creat a new disciplinary regulation  in our discourse, if we want it be resistant against other normative competetors.

9. Our model have some common points with Foucaudian paradigm, on the other and:

A) Both approach accentuate the freedom of criticizing and negate the common sensicality of the deepest theoretical dogma and presumptions, even just for the sake of  curiosity. Moreover, both believe their own assumptions as local, uncertain  and somehow arbitrary.

B) Both approaches applaud the multidisciplinary approaches toward the sociological problems. We may even say that they both use a systemic, experimentally enriched  method of reformulating our familiar world representations. Both of the methods  stress on the multidimensional nature of the social subjects of inquiry.

C) Both strategies concentrate on the biological facts and hard evidences about  the social formations. Foucault’s politics of the body, and our centrality of  pleasure/fitness are among our rich conceptual borrowings from biology. Geneaologically,  we may say that this interest to biological documentation have been started  by the Nietschze himself.

D) The core intention of Theory of Manesh-ha and Foucaudian paradigms liberative. There is a common passion for resisting domination -in Foucault-and enlarging  the semantic phase space -in Maneshes theory- which from a Kantian point of  view, originate from a meta-epistemic ethical motivation for freedom.

10. The aim of the intellectuals challenges is asking bravely, rather than answering conservatively. The goal of this text has been clarifying a vital and important  question. If there be any expansion in the semantic phase space of the reader,  this goal is attained.

References

Braude, S. E. First person plural, Routledge, London, 1991.

Dawkins,R. The Selfish Gene, Oxford University Press ,1989.

Dreyfus,H.L. & Rabinow,P. Michel Foucault; Beyond Structuralism  and Hermeneutics, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1983.

Foucault ,M. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of Prison, Tr. byA.Sheridan, Vintage, NY. 1979.

Foucault,M. Colloqui con Foucault (interview with D.Trombadori) in:Remarks on

Marx, Tr. by: James,R. & Cascaito,J. Semiotext pub. 1991.

Foucault,M. L’rdre du discourse, Gallimard, Paris, 1971.

Foucault,M. Neitsche, la geneologie, l’histoire, hommage a jean hypolite,Press   universitaire de France, Paris, 1971.

Foucault,M. The Order of Things, Routledge, NY, 1970.

Luhmann,N. Social Systems. MIT Press, 1995.

Parsons,T. Social System, Harvard University Press,1951.

Popper, K.R. Open Society and its Enemies, Oxford University Press,1981.

Vakili,Sh. Reward, Symmetry and Free Will, Kanoon-e-Khorshid, Tehran,2002 [A].

Vakili,Sh. The Theory of the Manesh-ha: Using Complex Systems Theoryfor Modeling      Cultural Changes, M.Sc. degree thesis, Faculty of socialsciences, Tehran university,  2002 [B].

Wilson,E,O. Sociobiology, Belknap Press, NY, 1995.

by Masoud Loghman, translated by Maryam Jafroodi

Iranshahr- Sherwin Vakili is one of the distinguished young professors at the University of Tehran.

As an investigator, who has dedicated his life to his researches and analysis, his main concern has always been redefining the concept of Iranian Identity and Persian Self.

The following text is the first part of an interview with him, in which he expresses his points of view about will writing in ancient Iran.

It seems that even in the ancient times, there were some men wise enough to understand the concept of death and to accept it as their certain fate.

Yes. That’s true. In fact, that’s why the invention of writing systems and the emergence of civilization coincide with the appearance of some texts that reflect a certain kind of, what I call it, “death management”. Today, we mostly classify these texts as deeds of endowment or wills; however, this is exactly what should not be done, when it comes to the ancient sciences.

“Death management”; what a nice combination! Now, will you please tell us what similarities do you see between these texts that, according to you, have managed the death of their authors?

First of all, they are all personal texts. They all are pronounced by a specific person and they all reflect his or her personal hopes and desires. In other words, the personal and intimate wishes of the author of a so called will, as well as his or her final solicitudes and hopes, make these texts completely unique and especial.

Secondly, all these text are somehow connected to the concept of death. A will does not limit itself to simply orders and requests; it includes some kind of commands and petitions that are directly connected to the concept of death. A will manifests the hopes and the desires of a person who is facing death. That’s why all these texts resemble the elegance and formidableness of death, as well as its mysterious and tickling essence.

So, why do we normally classify these texts as religious ones?

Look, in a normal life, desires are the prisoners of time. Time is the thing that builds the life of people. To be more specific, life is the only context in which desires can come true. If someone asks for something which is placed outside of his or her dominated territory of life, this wish would be considered something unordinary and strange. This internal paradox can be the reason why many cultures classify wills as religious texts.

Let’s get back to the main subject of our discussion. As you know, Iran has a documented record of 5000 years. By the other hand, enjoying from 26 centuries of political unity, along with cultural and identical harmony, in comparision with its strong rivals, China and India, this nation is considered the oldest civilization of the world which has managed to survive constantly during all these time. Considering this, I imagine that within such context, we should expect ancient methods of will writing.

Yes, actually, that’s exactly the case here. In Iran, even before the emergence of Cyrus the Grate and the unification of the country, we do see some very interesting samples of wills.

The most ancient wills written in Iran probably belong to the oriental and occidental margins of its territory. Some ancient works from Sumer and Elam prove the existence of this tradition. Those scattered pieces that concern ordinary people are just simple inscriptions, which mostly reflect the pattern of wealth distribution among the heirs. These texts remain scattered until the middle ages of the second millennium. They also have a simple and shallow content. It seems that the person who is facing death limits all his desires and wishes to the simple task of determining the destiny of his or her wealth and thus, satisfying the basic needs of his or her heirs.

Even though, from the second half of the second millennium, which coincide with the rise of Hittites in Anatolia, Haniglabats in Mesopotamia and Kassites in Babylonia, a completely distinct method of will writing came to existence. The first Aryan governments in the region were formed in the same era. Also, this was the era in which the cultural, religious and lingual elements of what we today call it the Indo Iranian identity were established. The longest and the most interesting will which was written during this period is the one written by the powerful king of the Hittites, Hattusilis the first (1650- 1620 B.C.), the king who left his son a very united and powerful nation.

Can you tell us what is written in this will?

Of course! This is a political will written just like others. It addresses Hattusilis’s son as well as the nation. In this text the king humbly reads:

“Behold, Mursilis is now my son. In the place of the lion the god will set up a lion… after three years, he shall go to war… if you take him with him on a campaign while he is still a child, bring him back safe… Until now no one in (my family) has obeyed me. Mursilis, you must obey me. Keep my words. If you keep your father’s word you’ll be fed. When maturity finds you eat two or three times a day, and enjoy yourself. When old age is within you, then drink to satiety. Then you can set aside your father’s words. My grandfather appointed his son as the governor of Sanahuita. But the servants and the aristocrats ignored the king’s word and replace him with Papa Dilmah. How long has it passed since then? What happened to the house’s of those aristocrats? Where did they go? Were they destroyed?

Why is these will so important?

In fact this will has various important aspects. What should be considered while studying this will are the subjects pointed by a king, who is facing death. The destiny of the crown is clearly his main concern. Hattusilis has addressed his family status and has intended to explain himself by mentioning names and bringing up examples. His will follows all the patterns of an ordinary will in the second millennium B.C.

How about Iranian kings? Did they also take the same road?

Yes. In the very same era, the kings of Babylonia, Elam, Assur y Egypt shared political and moral views in their wills. In the same time, they also addressed their heirs, the people and the aristocrats. Being so, their text became a mixed one which can be categorized as a Book of Government, a book of advices or a will.

Is there any information about the will of ordinary people in this period?

Although we have much little information regarding your question, it seems that they also used to address their heirs according to the same pattern.

To be continued…

Original text: http://iranshahr.org/?p=9984

Iranshahr- “A Godfather for History” or call for rewriting Achaemenid history presents a critical assessment of inaccuracies of Achaemenid history as found in Herodotus and Greek sources and reveals their partial views when writing Achaemenid history down.

The book consists of a foreword and eight sections including different dealings which reflect the writer’s concerns: ‘Historiography in ancient Greece’, ‘Who is Herodotus?’, ‘Herodotus measured by his siblings’, ‘Wonders and characteristics of Herodotus history’, ‘Herodotus’ view of Iranians’, ‘Archaeology’s response to Herodotus (the instance of Cambyses and Cow of Apys)’, and ‘Legend of Median Wars (Marathon and Salamis in western historiography and today versions of history made by Byzantine writers)’.

Farshid Ebrahimi, author of ‘Macedonian Alexander according to Pahlavi Texts” told IBNA: “At the threshold of 21st century of birth of Christ which pan-Hellenists still seek roots of culture and western civilization in it, tracing these roots back is a must in modern Iran studies.”

He added, “Because Hellenic Greece stands as a symbol of western identity against the panorama of ancient Iran’s cultural world (as well as Middle East) so that it can be the sole source of historiography for the political goals of the west in long time and the best means of backgrounding cultural and sociopolitical dominance over East.”

“This treatise is a call for revisioning and rewriting Achaemenid history in order to purify it from polluting predilections and enmity, rancor and inadequacy; it is a reminder of the necessity for modification of history which is now done after centuries by its true heirs.”

Abrishamifard Publication has previously published ‘Macedonian Alexander according to Pahlavi Texts” from the same writer; now “A Godfather for History” is released to the market by this publisher in 160 pages and price of 2500 Tomans.

Source: IBNA.ir