beesontoast wrote:Good, but do they work?
Good question. I have only just started using Enzo's preparations with bees so I cannot share personal experiences that they work. However, Enzo is very clear that they do and has been working with bees since 1984. If you go to
his web site you can contact him directly. Please report back what they say.
beesontoast wrote:I would love to believe that homeopathic remedies would enable bees to return to a healthy, natural state, but when I read stuff like, "Earth is in its 4th incarnation. Old Saturn, old Sun. Old Moon and now the Earth" I do start to wonder whether he is on the same planet (if you will pardon the pun).
This is a good example of one difficulty with this research. We have no model of the action of homeopathic preparations which is at home in the modern scientific paradigm. 'There's nothing there to do anything so how the hell can it work?' This means we have to find the context and language for a more comprehensive model which encompasses the truths of the current orthodoxy and leaves room for such heretical activities - whilst remaining coherent and accurate. In my opinion, the best language we have is that forged within Anthroposophy. This acts as a deterrent to those who associate astrology with the feeble-minded. It comes parceled up with such gems as the previous incarnations of the planet to frighten off most of the rest. (The notes were those of a lecture Mr Nastati gave to those familiar with the concepts and language of previous incarnations of the Earth.) This is a mixed blessing; it's a pain because many excellent researchers don't get beyond the first meeting with this assuming (not unreasonably) that there can only be mental quicksands. It is good because at least we seem so far beyond the pale that we are not bothered too much.
So why use this language? Mainly because Rudolf Steiner did. Steiner is often bracketed with guru's, and those who read him as 'followers'. This is a good appraisal of some people's relationship - no doubt. But I hold out that one must consider him as a head of department or similar - someone who is currently the best researcher in a discipline which honours both the core features and the very best results of the philosophical and scientific traditions. But Steiner has identified and moved beyond the limits which have encrusted the scientific tradition in its brief history. Whether he has done this well, or thrown out necessary aspects and bolted on inappropriate new parts, is for each to decide.
I have also found aspects, like those you mention, which seem so absurd that I have thrown the books down. But I keep coming back to him. The wonderful experiences with Steiner are when those things that seem dead ends (logical inconsistencies etc) turn out to be avenues to wide new vistas.
Because Steiner's ideas were this apparent amalgam of the bizarre and the practical he would attract both the brilliant and the weird. As it became increasingly clear to some of the former that the strange statements were actually gems when reconsidered in context and without prejudice, his currency occasionally went up even in mainstream circles. There is a story of a time when the people excited by his work arranged a lecture in a mainstream venue and many hundreds of the establishment figures were invited to attend. What did he chose to lecture upon - something exciting and brilliant? No, to the frustration of those who wished to show what a great researcher they had discovered, Steiner lectured on the history of the Earth with Old Saturn etc in long bewildering and sleep-inducing detail! He obviously considered this stuff fundamental even if it is the most unattractive shop-window imaginable.
So hexagonal hives and all the rest emerge out of this. How?
The mainstream academic flow is from materials up. We are brought up to know that the reality of the world is physical and the subjective world is thrown up as 'emergent properties' and 'epiphenomena'. In this understanding life is a special case of matter, and consciousness is a special case of life, and self awareness is special case of awareness etc etc etc. Battling foolishly/bravely, like a salmon going back to the spawning grounds against a stream in spate, goes this work. Matter is seen as a precipitation out of the flow of life, consciousness is seen as a higher reality still. One can ascend from here to higher sovereign levels. This is not some minor adjustment to the status quo. To give this some possibility of not being greater and more dangerous nonsense it would need to be underpinned by a coherent philosophy - particularly of what knowledge is, and with that epistemology would come certainty of how we could possibly know this counter-current reality. So epistemology and history, philology and many more disciplines which currently work with the prevailing current need reappraisal. So much for the ideas (which need to complemented by homework of course).
Then we would need to find some practical outcomes which are - ideally - effective where the established disciplines are not. Since I see myself as an admiring co-researcher rather than a devotee it seems to me that if we think there might be some answers in this strange brew, then we need to check it all out - and that is what Considera is trying to do in the agricultural field.
Can homeopathy be effective? We can just try it and see. Or we do like Mr Nastati has done and alloy 30 years of experimentation with trying to elucidate the necessary language and the mechanism so that the research can be more than a dumb empiricism. We can be content to try it and look for patterns, or try and grasp a world-view which can encompass potentised preparations as real effective levers on the world, and from this understanding move on to creative experimentation. Then we would know if bees do or don't give a damn about shape (- you can see his hexagonal hive in the link above).
Form (and colour) in the organic world is an enigma to the current scientific paradigm. Perhaps it is there to boost one's reproductive index in the struggle to pass on those selfish genes. But form is a primary (subjective?) naive reality and Steiner and Nastati can make sense of this and contend that it is important. One way to see if they are right is to try what Mr Nastati suggests. That's the way I approach it - bolstered for sure by great respect for these people. Then you don't have to believe. You can know if it works or if it doesn't.
beesontoast wrote:I can't take seriously Nastati if he manipulates numbers to suit his theories:
Q – 15 days – 360 hours – 7 zodiac signs and 10 hours
W – 21 days – 504 hours – 10 zodiac signs and 4 hours
D – 25 days – 600 hours – All 12 zodiac signs
The actual numbers are 16, 21 and 24, or possibly 15, 20 and 23 on small cells.
I think he talks about this early on in his lecture. (And those notes are mine so there may be some inaccuracies. He lectures in Italian and things come thick and fast.) It is his contention that the divergence from these figures over time is a response which has accompanied their increased vulnerability to disease. If one can assist them towards their ideal then their health will be encouraged.
None of this says that he is wrong or right - that he may have massaged figures or be a total snake oil salesman is for each to decide.
beesontoast wrote:The rest of his lecture is mysticism and astrology, not beekeeping, IMO.
I hope I have sown at least a seed of doubt. I am willing to water that seed if you would like to continue this discussion.
beesontoast wrote:I am sure that I am showing my ignorance here more than my knowledge, but if anyone can point me towards something more practical, I would be grateful.
Most practical would be to try these things and see if we can overcome CCD and varroa and foul brood etc. I think that these results would be the meeting point of the paradigms.