(Preface to The Brotherhood of Doctrines by Korzybski.)

EPOCH-MAKING utterances in science are not always accompanied by a blare of trumpets. It happens once in a while that an entirely new idea is given to the public through obscure channels in a form so modest as almost to escape attention. Riemann’s revolutionizing paper “On the Hypotheses Which Lie at the Base of Geometry,” published in 1854, is a case in point; so also Minkowski’s “Space and Time,” published in 1908, which established a new starting point in scientific thinking. Count Korzybski’s paper, given herewith, may fairly be considered a similar instance because, though it has not yet reached the general public, it has been recognized by scientific thinkers as an outstanding achievement. Some say it will be used to date a new manner of thinking in the subject with which it deals.

A Brief Biography of Alfred Korzybski thanks to Philosphere. com

From Manhood of Humanity (1921) by Korzybski:

It is the aim of this little book to point the way to a new science and art—the science and art of Human Engineering. By Human Engineering I mean the science and art of directing the energies and capacities of human beings to the advancement of human weal. Comment: Korzybski had eventually abandoned the term 'human engineering'—it was much abused — per his statements made a few years later. (WPT, rev. 18 April 2003) It is evident that, if such a science is to be established it must be founded on ascertained facts—it must accord with what is characteristic of Man—it must be based upon a just conception of what Man is—upon a right understanding of Man's place in the scheme of Nature.

What is Man? I hope to show clearly and convincingly that the answer is to be found in the patent fact that human beings possess in varying degrees a certain natural faculty or power or capacity which serves at once to give them their appropriate dignity as human beings and to discriminate them, not only from the minerals and the plants but also from the world of animals, this peculiar or characteristic human faculty or power or capacity I shall call the time-binding faculty or time-binding power or time-binding capacity.

"The matter of definitions.. is very important. I am not now speaking of nominal definitions, which for convenience merely give names to known objects. I am speaking of such definitions of phenomena as result from correct analysis of the phenomena. Nominal definitions are mere conveniences and are neither true nor false; but analytic definitions are definitive propositions: and are true or else false. .." pp. 58-59

".. If we analyse the classes of life, we readily find that there are three cardinal classes which are radically distinct in function. A short analysis will disclose to us that, though minerals have various activities, they are not "living." The plants have a very definite and well known function--the transformation of solar energy into organic chemical energy. They are a class of life which appropriates one kind of energy, converts it into another kind and stores it up ; in that sense they are a kind of storage battery for the solar energy ; and so I define THE PLANTS AS THE CHEMISTRY-BINDING class of life.

Comment: E R. B. Wolf spoke about plants as 'energy-binding' class of life ; the small difference of expression applies rather to an aspect of the plant-life than to any 'essences' and it seems worthy of noticing in the context of K's 'chemistry-binding' plants. I notice that J. S. Bois was strictly following Korzybski's definitions. (WPT, rev. 18 April 2003)

The animals use the highly dynamic products of the chemistry-binding class--the plants--as food, and those products--the results of plant-transformation--undergo in animals a further transformation into yet higher forms ; and the animals are correspondingly a more dynamic class of life ; their energy is kinetic; they have a remarkable freedom and power which the plants do not possess--I mean the freedom and faculty to move about in space; and so I define ANIMALS AS THE SPACE-BINDING CLASS OF LIFE.

And now what shall we say of human beings ? What is to be our definition of Man ? Like the animals, human beings do indeed possess the space-binding capacity but, over and above that, human beings possess a most remarkable capacity which is entirely peculiar to them--I mean the capacity to summarise, digest and appropriate the labors and experiences of the past ; I mean the capacity to use the fruits of past labors and experiences as intellectual or spiritual capital for developments in the present ; I mean the capacity to employ as instruments of increasing power the accumulated achievements of the all-precious lives of the past generations spent in trial and error, trial and success ; I mean the capacity of human beings to conduct their lives in the ever increasing light of inherited wisdom ; I mean the capacity in virtue of which man is at once the heritor of the by-gone ages and the trustee of posterity. And because humanity is just this magnificent natural agency by which the past lives in the present and the present for the future, I define HUMANITY, in the universal tongue of mathematics and mechanics, to be the TIME-BINDING CLASS OF LIFE.

These definitions of the cardinal classes of life are, it will be noted, obtained from direct observation ; they are so simple and so important that I cannot over-emphasize the necessity of grasping them and most especially the definition of Man

Comment: EIt seems that the definition of man as 'time-binder' does give a sense of how man differs from the brute animals. It being a very general term, I would venture to propose that it be not used in vain. (WPT, rev. 18 April 2003

From Time-Binding (2nd paper 1925) by Alfred Korzybski

If we have not the sense for this inherent stratification of all human knowledge we are entirely unaware of the mixing of our levels, the confusion of orders of abstractions, and so the two fundamental errors arise. One is the mistaking of a label—a word—for an object. This error is very common and usually very difficult to avoid. It is the origin of the savage magic of words. Some call it “hypostatization” or “reification” of the older philosophers ; others, like Whitehead, use the term “misplaced concretness.” I call the error “objectification of higher abstractions,” it is a confusion of orders of abstractions. I select the common word “object” instead of some other high-sounding word because the error is common ; besides, I wish to imply the fact that every objectification is vicious and makes errors habitual, the opposite of which is believed in some academic quarters. [ . . etc. . ] Jas. C. Wood, Washington, D. C. 1926, pp. 40-41. per Collected Writings, pp. 134-35, International Non-Aristotelian Library 1990.

From MATHEMATICS AND MAN, 1926 by Cassius Jackson Keyser

There is probably nothing finer in human speech than the great term—The Humanities. Mathematics is reputed to be the austerest of the sciences. Is it one of the humanities? Two fundamental considerations show that its claims to that high distinction are unsurpassed. For what subjects are best entitled to be called humanities? The answer is: those subjects that best reveal the distinctive nature of our common humanity and best serve to guide our human life. What is the chief mark of man? What is the distinctive mark of our common humanity? Undoubtedly it is that composite ability by which the living are enabled to make the achievements of the dead the means of greater achievements, so that science breeds better science, art better art, philosophy better philosophy, justice better justice. For without that composite ability—without that time-binding power, as Count Korzybski has happily called it—progressive civilization would be impossible. Where does this power manifest itself/ In all the great fields of human activity. Where is it revealed most clearly? In mathematics, for there the continuity of progressive development, running from remote antiquity down to our own time and now abounding as never before, is seen in its nakedness. Mathematics is, then, one of the humanities because it thus reveals more clearly than does aught else the most precious thing in the world—the civilizing energy, characteristic of humankind.

( Mole Philosophy and Other Essays : Dutton 1927 ) per THE RATIONAL AND THE SUPERRATIONAL The Collected Works of Cassius Jackson Keyser, Vol. II. New York : Scripta Mathematica 1952, p. 238.

Comment : I am not here promoting anything on the order of the higher calculus, etc. Personally, I do see some interest in the foundations of mathematics. Otherwise, “In mathematics . . the continuity of progressive development, running from remote antiquity down to our own time . . is seen in its nakedness.” (WPT 6 Aug 03)

Speaking about speaking From Science and Sanity, 1933: “The subject of this work is ultimately ‘speaking about speaking’. . . . all human institutions depend upon speaking—.. " etc. Comment: by my understanding : This means speaking (3) about speaking (2) about something (1). Korzybski's general semantics certainly does not mean speaking about speaking about speaking about speaking about speaking about speaking about speaking about . . . etc. Once again, it means speaking (3) about speaking (2) about something (1).

For example:

How (3) to speak (2) about fishing (1) ? — so as to make good sense — (so as to improve the ways of fishing ?) "A word is not the thing." (AK). What is the thing (or action) which you would like to speak about ? (Paul March 2002)

From Science and Sanity, PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION 1948:

.. The origin of this work was a new functional definition of ‘man', as formulated in 1921, based on an analysis of uniquely human potentiality; namely, that each generation may begin where the former left off. This characteristic I called the ‘time-binding’ capacity. .. This new definition of ‘man’, which is neither zoological nor mythological, but functional and extensional (factual), requires a complete revision of what we know about humans. ..

In Manhood of Humanity I stressed the general human unique characteristic of time-binding, which potentially applies to all humans, leaving no place for race prejudices. The structure of science is interwoven with Asiatic influences, which through Africa and Spain spread over the continent of Europe, where it was further developed. Through the discovery of factors of sanity in physico-mathematical methods, science and sanity became linked in a structurally non-aristotelian methodology, which became the foundation of a science of man.

Lakeville, Connecticut October, 1947

Science and Sanity, 4th ed., xx-xxiii