I know you are but what am I?

This childhood expression came back to me today. It was used when someone called you an insulting name, like fat or ugly. We'd respond this way to reflect that name back on them, letting them know that maybe you are that way but I am not. But what am I then?

Which leads me to what's in a name? The motivation for this inquiry was a discussion of Evan Thompson's dialogue with Sam Harris about his new book Why I'm Not a Buddhist. There are so many isms that name how one identifies who and what they are: Buddhist, capitalist, socialist and so on. Same with the process of naming a child. A name describes something about us, a shorthand way of calling each other. 

Generally though such names are very broad categorial descriptors. Since we are not one thing we have several named identities, like brother, boss, academic, philosopher, mechanic and so on. And yet we choose particular names with which we identify deeply, particularly when it comes to religion or philosophy. Hence broad categories like Buddhist, even though within that tradition there are so many sub-cultures and names to distinguish one from the other.

My birth name, Edward Berge, translates as prosperous guardian of the mountains. That sounds romantic, one who prospers by guarding the heights of human endeavor. Perhaps that's one reason I became a scholarly academic, to carry on the traditions of that august repository. But it's not a name unique to me: There are dozens if not hundreds of others with that same name. And yet we are not at all the same, each with our own unique qualities and characters. In that sense our names are what limits us, what makes us a Borg, a cog in a cultural machine that deprives us of our individuality, of not only who we are but what we can become.

So I have always explored different ways of naming, creating hybrid terms that challenge those limiting, conventional descriptions of our identities. For example, in online communities we often choose screen names. The one I long ago chose is theurj, which has several layers of meaning. The most obvious one is the primal urge associated with sex. You know, I got the urge to merge. It is a a shortened version of a name I took when I was initiated into a hermetic and qabalistic Order to describe my goal or mission. It comes from the word theurgy, which translates literally as god worker, and is in the tradition of ceremonial magick. Much like other initiatory traditions, one must choose a new name to direct one's focus and attention.

I've also played with my given name, changing it to Edwyrd Burj. From early on some have taunted me by calling me Edweird, as I was weird in the sense that I didn't always follow the norm, that I did things differently, that I was unusual. As a kid that was hurtful as I wanted to be part of the crowd. I didn't want to be different to the point of being rejected. As I aged though I wore it like a badge of honor: I wasn't a normal automaton, a Borg in the cultural machine, just another brick in the wall. 

Weird comes from wyrd in old English referring to the Fates as popularized by the witches in Macbeth. So yeah, I took on that name as representing one who guides not only my own but the fates of humanity. And my Facebook profile lists my pseudonym as Edwyrd theurj Burj. A Google search reveals I'm the only one with that combination of names so it, and I, are truly unique. As are we all. It behooves us to think about consciously choosing a new name for that purpose.

Getting back to identifying with isms as a process of naming, it is common in the developmental communities to differentiate ourselves from broad cultural categories that define worldviews. For example: pre-modern, modern, post-modern, meta-modern. As is obvious, all of these names are obsessed with modernism and define themselves in relation to it. None of them have escaped or transcended modernism, apparently the goal; all of them are wedded to and defined by it. If we really want to be a development from it then we need a name appropriate to that task. 

As a sampling of what we can call ourselves to indicate the change in worldview that is emerging, I've written and talked about hier(an)archical synplexity, a takeoff on hierarchical complexity. That latter is all the rage in developmental communities, a mathematical model that serves the purpose of organizing everything under its auspices. My takeoff though is a mouthful, too many words, too technical, to serve the purpose of defining a cultural movement. Hence I've shortened it to synicism, itself a hybrid takeoff from the philosophical tradition of cynicism.* Ironically, going back to Thompson's penchant for cosmopolitanism,** cynicism is considered to be an influence on that ism. And yet I choose a hybrid of cynicism into synicism to indicate the developments of hier(an)archical synplexity as noted above.

I know you are but what am I? I'm a synic. And obviously a syncretist. And maybe even a syncretin. Welcome to Syn City.

* Also of note are similarities and cross-influences of Buddhism with Greek traditions like cynicism.

** Michael Brooks also uses that term in his formation of a cosmopolitan socialism.