Chapter 2. Triadic relations
It's hard to explain to non-surfers how it feels to carve across a wave, to push the limits of your surfing ability and to surf even better than you thought you could. There's a thrill in surfing that only the experience itself can communicate to you. One surfs with the wave, drawing on experience to manoeuvre the surfboard in synchrony with the wave, all the while anticipating how it will change shape. As a nexus of past, present and future experience, surfing corresponds to Kant's model of the intellect, which portrays information as the product of three types of synthesis: the apprehension of raw perceptual input (present), the recognition of concepts (past) and the reproduction of each in imagination (future). Imagination is the least stable of the three, as it allows the mind to alternate between understanding and sensibility.
This triadic pattern reappears in Freud's model of the psyche, comprising three functionally interrelated parts, one of which negotiates between the other two. According to Freud:
"The ego is that part of the id which has been modified by the direct influence of the external world ... Moreover, the ego seeks to bring the influence of the external world to bear upon the id and its tendencies, and endeavours to substitute the reality principle for the pleasure principle, which reigns unrestrictedly in the id.... The ego represents what may be called reason and common sense, in contrast to the id, which contains the passions ... in its relation to the id it is like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to do so with his own strength, while the ego uses borrowed forces." (Freud, 1962, pp.363-4)
This analogy is similar in structure to surfing, where the rider has to control a superior force, in the form of a wave; the imagination riding the mind like a surfer riding a wave. But, unlike Freud and Kant, the surfing model of the psyche is based on the notion of embodied cognition (EC), which characterises the mind as physically grounded in its situated presence. My contribution to EC concerns the nature of situated presence, which I describe as oscillatory. In my view, situated presence emerges from the confluence of spatial and temporal relations, portrayed metaphorically as a breaking wave. The interaction between the surfboard and the wave represents the roles played by spatial and temporal relations in how we perceive reality.
To analyse how a surfboard responds to a surfer's movements, the designer reduces the surfer's influence to a set of rotational axes. Focusing on the surfboard, he ignores the shape and motion of the wave, which is subsequently reduced to a flat plane. At this level of abstraction, the surfer's influence can be represented diagrammatically, enabling the designer to more easily visualise the different phases of a manoeuvre, as well as the transitions between them. By visualising each phase in terms of its rotational axis, or sequence of axes, the designer can identify which portions of the surfboard come into play for a given manoeuvre.
We can visualise rotational axes in terms of lines of latitude and longitude circling the globe:
- The first rotational axis traces a circle on the horizontal plane, which can be thought of as the Equator. So long as the surfboard rotates on this plane, its interaction with the wave has no effect. So, this is a monadic relation, defined solely by the wave in its relation to itself.
- The second rotational axis traces a circle on any vertical plane; which can be visualised as the lines of longitude circling the globe from north to south. Rotating on any of these axes causes the surfboard to penetrate the wave, which represents a dyadic relation between the surfboard and the wave.
- The third rotational axis traces a circle on a plane set at right angles to each of the other two. This second vertical plane of rotation simultaneously introduces the variable of direction, in the sense of the surfboard traversing the surface of the wave. When all three rotational axes combine, monadic and dyadic relations become absorbed into triadic relations.
Numerous mental phenomena are modelled on triadic relations. Fundamentally, this structure reflects the spatio-temporal structure of experience, represented in table 1, in the form of five isomorphic schemas, each comprised of three a priori components, corresponding to temporality, space and emergence.
| Philosophers |
Modes |
temporality |
space |
emergence |
| Kant |
Intellect |
sensibility |
understanding |
imagination |
| Freud |
Emotion |
id |
super ego |
ego |
| Peirce |
Semiosis |
object |
sign |
interpretant |
| Saussure |
Signification |
signified |
signifier |
meaning |
| Halliday |
Metafunctions |
textual |
interpersonal |
experiential |
| Metaphor |
Surfing |
wave |
surfboard |
manoeuvres |
Table 1. Isomorphic models depicting the organisational principles that make experiences coherent.
The character of triadic relations can be visualised in the geometry of surfing, where the proportion of spatial and temporal relations is influenced by both the shape of the surfboard and the shape of the seabed. Since wave shape is influenced by both the depth and shape of the reef, these two features represent either end of a spatio-temporal continuum; the reef inducing spatial relations and the wave temporal relations. Consequently, fluctuation in the tide represents the relative proportions of each, with low tide triggering more spatial than temporal relations and high tide triggering more temporal than spatial relations. At high tide, waves break less intensely, reflecting the reduced influence of the reef on wave shape. Somewhere between these two extremes, depending on the size of the swell, temporal and spatial relations blend in such a way as to produce an optimal shape for surfing.
The response of the surfboard is influenced by both the shape of the surfboard and the shape of the wave, with the proportion of each influence depending on how actively, versus passively, the surfer engages the wave. Actively engaging the wave can be likened to spatial relations, because the surfboard - its shape and motion - is the primary factor influencing where it is going. This is the penetration phase of a manoeuvre, when the surfboard rotates into the water. Passively engaging the wave can be likened to invoking temporal relations, because the surfboard follows a track determined more by the shape and motion of the wave than by the shape and motion of the surfboard. This is the release phase of a manoeuvre, when the surfboard rotates out of the water. Since the response of the surfboard is derived simultaneously from the shape of the wave and the shape of the surfboard, their interaction represents a spatio-temporal continuum; the surfboard inducing spatial relations and the wave temporal relations.
In terms of Kant's model of the intellect (Brook, 2009), imagination is the product of understanding, represented by the surfboard design, and sensibility, represented by the shape of the breaking wave. Characterising sensibility, the curvature in the surface of the wave is analogous to the access afforded by memory to past experiences. The hollower the wave, the deeper the access, the more experience to draw on. Characterising understanding, the penetration and release phases of a manoeuvre are analogous to concentration and contemplation, in the sense that concentration is active, while contemplation is passive.
C H A P T E R S
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Surfism : Triadic relations : Articulation : Spatial perception : Dimensionality : Periodicity : Semiosis : Conclusion
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