Expanding our Consciousness through Goethe’s Theory of Colours
Our book Holonomics: Business Where People and Planet Matter introduces the reader to a dynamic way of seeing and thinking about systems. It is a way of seeing which expands our mode of consciousness from the analytical to the intuitive; one that not only is able to understand the parts of a system, but at a deeper, intuitive level of perception, is also able to understand the relationships and processes within that system — not from the perspective of a whole which is superior to the parts, but from one which is able to encounter the whole through the way in which it comes to presence in the parts. (‘Intuition’ as we use the word should not be confused with ‘feeling’ as it is used in everyday language, but as a higher level of cognition to that of our intellectual minds).
In Holonomics we write extensively about Goethe’s Theory of Colours. The reason we do so is to help people understand what is meant by a phenomenological approach to understanding the world we live in.
When we follow Goethe, we study colour as a phenomenon, and we do not try and then go past the phenomenon to explain colour in other terms, such as rays of light, packets of photons etc. In doing so, we are not trying to find alternative explanations to those of science, rather we are attempting to develop our sensory skills so that we can better appreciate the sensory world we inhabit.
In teaching Goethe’s Theory of Colour to business and other MBA students, Maria and I have found that people are better able to explore the way in which scientific thinking impacts on the way in which they consider the natural world, and the manner in which our intellectual minds dominate over the other ways of knowing: sensing, feeling and intuition.
By breaking our of abstract and symbolic thought, we are able to see and understand more of what is around us, enabling to inhabit once again a vibrant living organic world, being more open to new ideas, ones which may not necessarily fit our pre-conceptions of the world, thus developing a more creative and constructive relationship with nature, our technology, and of course other people we connect with in our daily lives.
In Holonomics we guide the reader through some of the fundamental ‘experiments’ that Goethe carried our using a glass prism. In actually doing the experiments, the reader begins to gain experiential knowledge of what is meant by a phenomenon, and how for example different colours by Goethe were thought of as belonging together.
There is an almost unbridgeable gap between reading about the experience of looking through a prism and actually looking through a prism. For this reason Goethe’s Theory of Colour and the insights that arise from understanding the implications, can only really come about by actually doing the experiments yourself. Fortunately we only need to acquire a children’s toy prism to be able to do this, and these can easily be purchased online.
In the two photographs below I have tried to recreate the sensation of looking through a prism (as opposed to studying light passing through a prism). On the computer screen you will see that it is divided into two parts — white on the top half and black on the bottom half.
This second photo is a close up of what is happening in the first photo. What we see are lines of colour at the boundaries between white and black. At the top we see the warm colours of red and yellow, and in the middle we see the cold colours of light and dark blue.
This is an example of Goethe’s approach to the study of colour. He did not try and explain these phenomena using mathematics or other forms of theoretical explanation. Goethe developed a sensory scientific methodology based on active seeing.
Maria and I actively work with Goethe’s theory of colour and have introduced these experiments into our MBA classes at Sustentare Business School, our Transformational Design Thinking classes at the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo, our Holonomics workshops and short courses, and also in our leadership programmes for business executives.
This set of photos comes from an executive leadership workshop Maria and I ran for a client, and we are extremely grateful to them for allowing us to publish these particular photos from the event in which we took people through these exercises, especially because they show the way in which the prisms and black and white cards need to be positioned to replicate Goethe’s original experiments.
The photos are quite unique, to my knowledge, as they show us taking a large group of senior executives in a through Goethe’s Theory of Colours business context, something I have not seen published before.
As you can see in the photos, small pieces of white and black card can be utilised in order to bring out the colour phenomena at the boundaries.
By actually doing these experiments ourselves, we are able to explore our own ways of seeing. When we normally do science, the general procedure is to carry out many observations and then compare them to see what they all have in common. This is induction. Goethe’s scientific methodology requires us to use a different mode of consciousness. We do not infer, deduce, or construct a scientific theory, we are able to see the principle under observation directly.
Exploring colour in this way allows Maria and I in our workshops to reconnect people in business with the phenomenal world in which we inhabit but in which we often lose sight of due to the value and emphasis which is placed on our analytical way of thinking.
The experiments are also quite shocking, as they demonstrate the way in which Newton’s optical experiments cannot fully account for all observed phenomena of *colour* (as opposed to *light*), thereby making people more aware and mindful of how scientific experiments can be impacted by both our mental models and “organising ideas about the world.
We have carried out this exercise many times now with clients and with our MBA and post-grad students, but due to confidentiality, we have not previously had permission to show these experiments as they are being carried out. The photos really help us illustrate exactly how to position the various elements of the experiments for maximum effect.
For more information please see Holonomics: Business Where People and Planet Matter, Simon Robinson and Maria Moraes Robinson (2014) Floris Books, Edinburgh
