Conceiving the Taxonomy

Basics

The Taxonomy deals with "whole person" functioning.

Use of the Taxonomy is primarily an affective process i.e. based in and energized by feelings.

The Taxonomy is based in innate brain-circuits as yet unknown.
ClosedHypothesis

Because affective processes are continuous with vertebrates down to the most primitive, and probably invertebrates too, the neural systems are surely not cortical. In any case, the Taxonomy itself is not a cognitive product, but innately given categories that need to be filled and rules that need to be followed.

Following the work of Jaak Panksepp, the brain origin is currently assumed to lie in mid-line midbrain structures like the PAG and VTA, which are tightly connected to the autonomic nervous system as well as the hypothalamus and the cortex. The cerebral cortex provides the actual content for taxonomic categories, and can suppress feeling states.

Taxonomic use is innate and instinctive. Whenever and however a person functions, the Taxonomy is in operation. In functioning as a person, the cortex comes into play. In doing anything as a person, we also use our body i.e. a person has a mind and a body. We use our will in relation to our mind (i.e. functioning) and body, but not in regard to our brain.

Domains

The Taxonomy consists of a Root Domain that contains Primary Domains. These Domains:

  • exist to meet needs
  • are driven by innate psychosocial pressures
  • contain the means to meet the needs and relieve the pressure.

The Root Domain deals with the Will and generates endeavours by being creative. It is structured as a Hierarchy containing 7 Levels of Will. Its full elaboration provides for personal functioning. Many of its distinctive features are overtly dependent on use of Will.

Here is where we find the drive to cope, the pressure to thrive, and the potential for creativity. The Root Domain is also home to humanity's religious commandments, and higher guides that deal with happiness, community life, and goodness

The natural language name for the Root Domain (adopted early 2015) is Will.
ClosedOther Possibilities:

Each of the Root Levels contains a Primary Domain that is similarly structured as a Hierarchy. There are, therefore, 7 Primary Domains, each named after their content, The example below shows the arrangement for the Inquiry Domain-RL2.

Although functioning within each primary domain is also will-based, many features appear to occur spontaneously or naturally. Reflective practitioners are natural inquirers who attempt to appreciate domain constituents and their significance as part of self-development and as a guide for others who seek to function better. The present taxonomic research program has been conducted in that spirit.

Everything that can exist within a Root Level has a taxonomic location somewhere in the corresponding Primary Domain. The diagram below shows all 7 Primary Domains. The 6th Level is highlighted in each Hierarchy because this is where Domain control structures are found.

Evolutionary Drivers

To this point, the following general parameters of personal functioning have been formulated and validated:

  1. Principal Psychosocial Pressure. This property of the Root Hierarchy Level derives from the neuro-biological origins of endeavours. It is the explanation for the observed 'projection' or 'correspondence' of the RH-Levels with other 7-Level taxonomic forms.
  2. Primal Need. This is the goal and value of each Root Level, and hence the rationale of structures within the Primary Domains. Meeting the Primal Need relieves the Psychosocial Pressure.
  3. Primal Means. This controls how the Primal Need is met, and is located in the Domain controls. The Spiral ensures minimal satisfaction of the Primal Need and, with enough effort, enables its sophisticated handling.

The Root Domain has similar drivers: the Root Psychosocial Pressure, the Root Primal Need, and the Root Primal Means.

Domain Fundamentals & Controls

Each Domain has «fundamentals»: a triplet of structures which are the basic means for meeting the Domain's Primal Need. This triplet emerges from its originating hierarchy of 7 elements. There is a Primal Vehicle that generates a Primal Effect and operates within a Primal Field. The example below shows the fundamentals for PH5-Communication.

These Domain fundamentals have a complicated system of embedded controls based in a Typology nested within the 6th Level. There are Principal and Subsidiary controls.

The Principal Typology Complexes control effective pursuit of particular specialized aspects of endeavour characteristic of the various Primary Domains. The Root Typology Complex has not yet been examined fully, but it appears to control coping to ensure the endeavours of personal life are sufficient for survival.

The Taxonomy as a whole is also subject to over-arching ethical controls which are found only in the Will Domain (RH)—where they specify our relation to humanity, and the Purpose Domain (RL6)—where they specify our relation to society.

The Typology Complexes

The Root or Principal Typology Complexes exist nested within Level-6 to provide control of the Root or Primary Domain Fundamentals. The image below uses PH'1 within Action-RL1 as an example.

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The 7 Types (-H'•) are optimizers: alternative and incompatible methods to ensure the best use of the Domain Fundamentals. The 28 Subsidiary Types (of which a formalized single set of 7 is shown in the example) provide further more specialised control for 7 discrete Arenas (-Q•) that meet each of the Primal Needs from one Domain's perspective.

The Spiral (-H'•C) provides the Primal Means that controls meeting the Primal Need. In Action-RL1, under an innate psychosocial pressure for performance, a minimum form of the Primal Means occurs spontaneously. With enough effort over time, maturation may occur until a maximally sophisticated handling is developed.

The Spiral-derived Tree(-H'•CK) represents what is required for meeting the Primal Need regardless of the stage of development on the Spiral trajectory.

The Spiral-derived Structural Hierarchy (-H'•CsH) contains the components emerging from that Spiral-derived Tree that ensure effective handling of the relevant innate psychosocial pressure.

The Spiral-derived Structural HierarchyTree (-H'•CsHK) provides for an ultimate Primal Controller that focuses on how well the Primal Need has been met i.e. the Primal Controller is thought to target the Primal Means.

The 7 Types (RH') are the Primal Quests, alternative and incompatible methods for conducting one's life via endeavours. There is no known division into Subsidiary Types.

The Root Spiral (RH'C) provides for coping, which is the Primal Means to meet the Primal Need to thrive.

The Root Spiral-derived Tree(RH'CK) takes the essences from each coping mode to indicate what determines thriving (Primal Need) regardless of the sophistication of coping in terms of the Spiral trajectory.

The Root Spiral-derived Structural Hierarchy (RH'CsH) contains the components emerging from that Spiral-derived Tree that ensure effective handling of the relevant innate psychosocial pressure, believed to be surviving.

The Spiral-derived Structural HierarchyTree (RH'CsHK) provides for an ultimate Primal Controller, currently thought to be resilience, that targets how well a person is coping.

Originally posted: 15-Feb-2015. Last amended 17-Apr-2024.