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Bohm Dialogue
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Bohm Dialogue (also known as Bohmian Dialogue or "Dialogue in the Spirit of David Bohm") is a freely flowing group conversation in which participants attempt to reach a common understanding, experiencing everyone's point of view fully, equally and nonjudgmentally.[1] This can lead to new and deeper understanding. The purpose is to solve the communication crises that face society,[2] and indeed the whole of human nature and consciousness. It utilizes a theoretical understanding of the way thoughts relate to universal reality. It is named after physicist David Bohm who originally proposed this form of dialogue.
Bohm's original dialogue
[edit]The theory of dialogue
[edit]Bohm introduced a concept of dialogue, stating that[3]
dialogue can be considered as a free flow of meaning between people in communication, in the sense of a stream that flows between banks.
These "banks" are understood as representing the various points of view of the participants.
...it may turn out that such a form of free exchange of ideas and information is of fundamental relevance for transforming culture and freeing it of destructive misinformation, so that creativity can be liberated. – David Bohm
A dialogue has no predefined purpose, no agenda, other than that of inquiring into the movement of thought, and exploring the process of "thinking together" collectively. This activity can allow group participants to examine their preconceptions and prejudices, as well as to explore the more general movement of thought. Bohm's intention regarding the suggested minimum number of participants was to replicate a social/cultural dynamic (rather than a family dynamic). This form of dialogue seeks to enable an awareness of why communicating in the verbal sphere is so much more difficult and conflict-ridden than in all other areas of human activity and endeavor.
Dialogue should not be confused with discussion or debate, both of which, says Bohm, suggest working towards a goal or reaching a decision, rather than simply exploring and learning.[4] Meeting without an agenda or fixed objective is done to create a "free space" for something new to happen.
David Bohm said:[5]
Dialogue is really aimed at going into the whole thought process and changing the way the thought process occurs collectively. We haven't really paid much attention to thought as a process. We have engaged in thoughts, but we have only paid attention to the content, not to the process. Why does thought require attention? Everything requires attention, really. If we ran machines without paying attention to them, they would break down. Our thought, too, is a process, and it requires attention, otherwise, it's going to go wrong. (Bohm, "On Dialogue", p. 10.)
Taking reference to the work Science, Order and Creativity by Bohm and F. David Peat, Arleta Griffor – noted by Paavo Pylkkänen for her "deep and extensive knowledge of Bohm's philosophy"[6] and member of the research group of Bohm's collaborator Basil Hiley – underlines the importance of the kind of listening involved in the Bohm dialogue and points to Bohm's statement that
[A] thoroughgoing suspension of tacit individual and cultural infrastructures, in the context of full attention to their contents, frees the mind to move in new ways … The mind is then able to respond to creative new perceptions going beyond the particular points of view that have been suspended.[7]
Griffor emphasizes that in conventional discussion,
[T]he self-defensive activity of each participant's idiosyncrasy […] prevents listening"[7] and that, in contrast, giving full attention to what the other participants mean can free the mind from socio-cultural accumulation, allow a free flow of meaning between people in a dialogue and give rise to shared perception and the creation of shared meaning in the sense of shared significance, intention, purpose and value.[7] It seems then that the main trouble is that the other person is the one who is prejudiced and not listening. After all, it is easy for each one of us to see that other people are 'blocked' about certain questions, so that without being aware of it, they are avoiding the confrontation of contradictions in certain ideas that may be extremely dear to them. The very nature of such a 'block' is, however, that it is a kind of insensitivity or 'anesthesia' about one's own contradictions. Evidently then, what is crucial is to be aware of the nature of one's own 'blocks'. If one is alert and attentive, he can see for example that whenever certain questions arise, there are fleeting sensations of fear, which push him away from consideration of those questions, and of pleasure, which attract his thoughts and cause them to be occupied with other questions. So, one is able to keep away from whatever it is that he thinks may disturb him. And as a result, he can be subtle at defending his own ideas, when he supposes that he is really listening to what other people have to say. When we come together to talk, or otherwise to act in common, can each one of us be aware of the subtle fear and pleasure sensations that 'block' the ability to listen freely?
Principles of dialogue
[edit]- The group agrees that no group-level decisions will be made in the conversation. "...In the dialogue group we are not going to decide what to do about anything. This is crucial. Otherwise we are not free. We must have an empty space where we are not obliged to anything, nor to come to any conclusions, nor to say anything or not say anything. It's open and free." (Bohm, "On Dialogue", pp. 18–19.)"
- Each individual agrees to suspend judgement in the conversation. (Specifically, if the individual hears an idea he doesn't like, he does not attack that idea.) "...people in any group will bring to it assumptions, and as the group continues meeting, those assumptions will come up. What is called for is to suspend those assumptions, so that you neither carry them out nor suppress them. You don't believe them, nor do you disbelieve them; you don't judge them as good or bad...(Bohm, "On Dialogue", p. 22.)"
- As these individuals "suspend judgement" they also simultaneously are as honest and transparent as possible. (Specifically, if the individual has a "good idea" that he might otherwise hold back from the group because it is too controversial, he will share that idea in this conversation.)
- Individuals in the conversation try to build on other individuals' ideas in the conversation. (The group often comes up with ideas that are far beyond what any of the individuals thought possible before the conversation began.)
The experience of a dialogue
[edit]Twenty to forty participants sit in a circle and engage in free-flowing conversation. A dialogue typically goes on for a few hours (or for a few days in a workshop environment).
Participants "suspend" their beliefs, opinions, impulses, and judgments while speaking together, in order to see the movement of the group's thought processes and what their effects may be.
In such a dialogue, when one person says something, the other person does not, in general, respond with exactly the same meaning as that seen by the first person. Rather, the meanings are only similar and not identical. Thus, when the 2nd person replies, the 1st person sees a Difference between what he meant to say and what the other person understood. On considering this difference, he may then be able to see something new, which is relevant both to his own views and to those of the other person. And so it can go back and forth, with the continual emergence of a new content that is common to both participants. Thus, in a dialogue, each person does not attempt to make common certain ideas or items of information that are already known to him. Rather, it may be said that two people are making something in common, i.e., creating something new together. ((Bohm, On Dialogue, p. 3.))
Post-Bohm
[edit]"Bohm Dialogue" has been widely used in the field of organizational development, and has evolved beyond what David Bohm intended: rarely is the group size as large as what Bohm originally recommended, and there are often other numerous subtle differences. Specifically, any method of conversation that claims to be based on the "principles of dialogue as established by David Bohm" can be considered to be a form of Bohm Dialogue.
Usually, the goal of the various incarnations of "Bohm Dialogue" is to get the whole group to have a better understanding of itself. In other words, Bohm Dialogue is used to inform all of the participants about the current state of the group they are in.
Incarnations
[edit]- Chris Harris, the thought leader on Hyperinnovation (2002) and Building Innovative Teams (2003), outlines a multidimensional approach to Dialogue Development, enabling groups to take their collective ideas, knowledge and goals in highly creative, boundary-crossing directions. He says "...it is at the borders between different domains where true creativity, and ultimately innovation occurs ... systems/holistic thinking, mental model sharing/development, and group foresight skills are largely responsible for group communication breakthrough." "Bohm", he says, "may have agreed."
- Peter Senge in his book The Fifth Discipline (1990) recommends a type of dialogue that is based on principles he says originate with Bohm, and is part of his strategy to help groups become "learning organizations".
- Parker Palmer in his book A Hidden Wholeness (2004) seems to advocate a style of dialogue that is almost identical to what Bohm originally recommended. (Palmer calls his technique "Circles of Trust".) Palmer uses his dialogue more for personal spiritual development than for business consultation.
- Holman (1999) explains that Linda Ellinor has used "dialogue like conversation" to establish partnership in the workplace (essentially establishing informal workplace democracy):
"...there is a movement towards what we call shared leadership. Shared leadership refers to what happens as those practicing dialogue over time begin to share in the understanding of collectively held goals and purpose together. Alignment builds. Every individual sees more clearly how he or she uniquely shares and contributes to the output and end results. Formal leaders do not need to direct the activities of subordinates as much. Armed with greater understanding of the larger picture, subordinates simply take independent action when they need to without being dependent on feedback from their manager." (p. 224)
- William Isaacs (1999) claims to be building directly on Bohm's work. He describes many possible techniques and skill sets that can be used to view and enhance dialogue in a group. Isaacs focuses on a four-stage evolutionary-model of a dialogue (pp. 242–290):
Stage one is "Shared Monologues", where group members get used to talking to each other.
Stage two is "Skillful Discussion", where people are learning the skills of dialogue.
Stage three is "Reflective Dialogue", which is approximately Bohm's idea of dialogue.
Stage four is "Generative Dialogue", a special "creative" dialogue Isaacs seeks for his groups.
- Patricia Shaw distances herself from the rest of the Bohm school of dialogue, stating "...I am not trying to foster a special form or discipline of conversation... Rather than inculcating a special discipline of dialogue, I am encouraging perceptions of ensemble improvisation as an organizing craft of communicative action" (Patricia Shaw 2002, p. 164). Shaw's form of dialogue focuses on getting group members to appreciate the different roles each other can play in conversation, in the same way that jazz (improvisational) musicians appreciate each other's unplanned contribution to a performance. Shaw's dialogue variation shows that a simpler, less idealistic approach is possible. For her all conversations are on a continuum, a gray scale that ranges from the highest, purest forms of dialogue to the lowest command-and-control conversations. In this sense dialogue is a property a conversation can have more or less of.
All of the above authors and consultants are considered to be experts in "Bohm Dialogue" (amongst others). This makes Bohm himself only one of many authorities on this subject. Some of these practitioners have made contributions and adaptations completely unforeseen by Bohm himself, making the subject of "Bohm Dialogue" much greater than the dialogue theory Bohm himself originally established, which, Don Factor believes, would have delighted him if he were still alive.
See also
[edit]Footnotes
[edit]- ^ Purpose and Meaning, from Bohm's original proposal on dialogue.
- ^ Introduction to Dialogue – A Proposal
- ^ D. Bohm and J. Krishnamurti, The Ending of Time, Voctor Gollanez, London 1985, cited by Arleta Griffor: Mind and its Wholeness, ANPA West Journal, vol. 7, no. 1 Archived March 26, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, September 1997, pages 25–26
- ^ What Dialogue Is Not, from Dialogue – A Proposal
- ^ Bohm, David (2013). On Dialogue. Routledge. p. 10. ISBN 9781134593415.
- ^ Paavo Pylkkänen, Preface to: David Bohm, Charles Biederman (Paavo Pylkkänen ed.): Bohm–Biederman Correspondence: Creativity and science, Routledge, 1999, ISBN 0-415-16225-4
- ^ a b c Arleta Griffor: Mind and its Wholeness, ANPA West Journal, vol. 7, no. 1 Archived March 26, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, September 1997, pages 25–27
References
[edit]- Bohm, D., Factor, D. and Garrett, P. (1991). Dialogue – A proposal
- Bohm, D. (1996). On dialogue. New York: Routledge.
- Holman, P & Devane,T. (1999). The change handbook: Group methods for shaping the future. San Francisco: Berrett–Koehler Publishers.
- Isaacs, W. (1999). Dialogue and the Art of Thinking Together: A Pioneering Approach to Communicating in Business and in Life. Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group
- Nichol, L. (2001). Wholeness Regained
- Palmer, P.J. (2004). A Hidden Wholeness. The Journey toward an Undivided Life. San Francisco: Wiley & Sons.
- Senge, P. M. (2006). The fifth discipline: the art and practice of the learning organization. Doubleday.
- Shaw, P. (2002). Changing Conversations in Organizations. A complexity approach to change. London: Routledge.
External links
[edit]- The David Bohm Society
- A website about Bohm Dialogue
- A directory of groups exploring dialogue as proposed by David Bohm et al.
- The Bohm Krishnamurti Project: Exploring the Legacy of the David Bohm and Jiddu Krishnamurti Relationship
- David-Bohm.net features various papers written by Bohm and his colleagues, and an online dialogue by email list (facilitated by Don Factor).
- The Lancaster (UK) Dialogue
Bohm Dialogue
View on GrokipediaOrigins and Historical Development
David Bohm's Intellectual Background
David Bohm, born on December 20, 1917, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, to Jewish parents, pursued undergraduate studies in physics at Pennsylvania State College, earning a bachelor's degree in 1939.[4] He briefly attended the California Institute of Technology in 1940 before transferring to the University of California, Berkeley, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1941 under J. Robert Oppenheimer, focusing on the theory of plasma oscillations in ionized gases.[4] During World War II, Bohm contributed to research at Berkeley's Radiation Laboratory, applying his plasma work to problems in electron propulsion and collective behavior in many-particle systems.[4] In 1947, Bohm joined Princeton University as an assistant professor, where he engaged with leading physicists, including Albert Einstein, whose dissatisfaction with the probabilistic Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics influenced Bohm's own critiques.[4] There, he initially presented a textbook on quantum theory aligned with the Copenhagen view but soon developed an alternative causal, deterministic interpretation reviving Louis de Broglie's pilot-wave theory, published in 1952 as the de Broglie-Bohm theory, emphasizing hidden variables and non-locality to restore realism in quantum descriptions.[4] Political pressures from McCarthy-era investigations into his past communist associations led to a conviction for contempt of Congress in 1950 after he refused to testify; he fled the United States in 1951, first teaching theoretical physics at the University of São Paulo in Brazil, then briefly at the Technion in Israel, before settling in the United Kingdom as a research fellow at the University of Bristol in 1957 and professor at Birkbeck College, London, from 1961 to 1987.[4] During this period, collaborations like the 1959 Aharonov-Bohm effect with Yakir Aharonov demonstrated quantum effects in regions without electromagnetic fields, underscoring non-local influences.[4] Bohm's later intellectual pursuits shifted toward the philosophy of mind and physics, critiquing fragmentation in thought and society as analogous to quantum inconsistencies, proposing the implicate order—a holistic, enfolded reality underlying apparent explicate manifestations—in works like Causality and Chance in Modern Physics (1957) and Wholeness and the Implicate Order (1980).[4] A pivotal influence was Jiddu Krishnamurti, whom Bohm met in London in 1959 after reading The First and Last Freedom, leading to over 25 years of dialogues exploring thought's material nature in the brain, its role in psychological disorder, and the need for silent observation to access deeper intelligence beyond conditioned assumptions.[4][5] These exchanges, documented in The Ending of Time (1985), informed Bohm's view of dialogue as a collective process to suspend judgments, reveal shared tacit knowledge, and foster coherence, drawing parallels between quantum wholeness and undivided human inquiry.[5][6] Einstein's emphasis on underlying order in nature complemented this, as Bohm sought causal realism amid quantum paradoxes, rejecting reductionist fragmentation for an integrated ontology of mind and matter.[6]Inception and Early Sessions
David Bohm, a theoretical physicist concerned with the fragmentation of thought underlying societal issues, began experimenting with group dialogue in the early 1980s as a means to foster collective inquiry into human cognition and assumptions. Motivated by observations of incoherence in collective thinking contributing to global crises, Bohm initiated informal conversations and seminars around 1983, including a conference at Warwick University that year. These efforts evolved into structured yet open-ended sessions aimed at revealing hidden presuppositions without judgment or agenda.[7][8] The first documented large-scale dialogue session took place in May 1984 in Mickleton, Gloucestershire, England, involving approximately 40 participants who transitioned from Bohm's lectures into free-flowing group discussion in a circular formation. This gathering emphasized listening deeply and suspending personal reactions to explore shared meaning, setting the template for subsequent meetings. Early sessions typically lasted over weekends or extended periods, with groups of 20 to 40 individuals meeting without facilitation or predetermined topics, often experiencing initial frustration as participants confronted unexamined assumptions. Bohm's wife, Saral Bohm, and collaborators such as Donald Factor and psychiatrist Patrick de Maré participated in these formative groups, which initially convened in locations like Mill Hill, London.[8][9] By the mid-1980s, these sessions had formalized into ongoing dialogue groups, relocating periodically to venues such as a Quaker center near Birkbeck College in London. Bohm documented early dynamics in his 1987 book Unfolding Meaning, derived from seminar dialogues that highlighted the process of collective thought unfolding. A key 1991 proposal co-authored by Bohm, Factor, and Peter Garrett outlined the method's purpose: to investigate thought's role in fragmentation through regular, agenda-free meetings promoting awareness and creativity. These early experiments continued until Bohm's death in 1992, after which the Mill Hill group persisted for about a decade.[9][7][8]Evolution Through Bohm's Writings
David Bohm's conceptualization of dialogue as a transformative group process emerged from his reflections on thought, perception, and wholeness, with foundational ideas appearing in writings dating back to the 1970s.[10] In works like Unfolding Meaning (1985), derived from his dialogues with Jiddu Krishnamurti, Bohm began articulating dialogue's role in revealing the tacit assumptions underlying individual and collective thought, emphasizing its potential to foster undivided perception beyond fragmented opinions.[11] By the mid-1980s, Bohm's writings integrated dialogue more explicitly with his quantum mechanical concepts of implicate order, positioning it as a practice to access shared meaning and dissolve proprietary attitudes toward ideas. In Science, Order, and Creativity (1987, co-authored with F. David Peat), he described dialogue as essential for creative insight, contrasting it with debate by advocating suspension of judgment to allow emergent coherence in group inquiry.[9] This period marked a shift toward practical application, as Bohm led experimental seminars in locations like Ojai, California, starting around 1985, where participants explored free-flowing conversation without agendas.[12] Bohm formalized these insights in "Dialogue: A Proposal" (circa 1990), proposing structured yet open sessions of 20–40 people meeting regularly to probe the movement of thought collectively, aiming at cultural and perceptual transformation.[7] He continued refining the approach through the early 1990s, incorporating observations from ongoing groups into discussions of thought as a systemic process, as seen in seminar transcripts from 1989–1992. These evolutions culminated posthumously in On Dialogue (1996, edited from his essays, lectures, and talks spanning 1970–1992), which synthesizes dialogue as a microcosm for addressing societal fragmentation by enabling participants to hold multiple perspectives in a coherent field.[13][10]Theoretical Foundations
Links to Bohm's Quantum Physics and Wholeness
David Bohm's formulation of Bohm Dialogue draws directly from his interpretations of quantum mechanics, particularly his concepts of the implicate and explicate orders outlined in Wholeness and the Implicate Order (1980), where he posits reality as an undivided whole rather than a collection of separate parts.[14] In this framework, the explicate order represents the manifest, fragmented appearance of phenomena—analogous to classical physics' separable particles—while the implicate order underlies it as a holistic enfolding where "everything implicates everything" in a non-local, flowing unity.[14] Bohm argued that quantum effects, such as non-locality demonstrated in Bell's theorem violations (which he explored through hidden variables theories in the 1950s), reveal this deeper coherence, challenging reductionist views and implying that observer and observed are inseparable aspects of a single movement.[14] Bohm extended these physical insights to human cognition, viewing thought as a process that often perpetuates fragmentation, much like pre-quantum physics isolated entities from their contextual wholeness.[1] In On Dialogue (1996), he described thought emerging from a "tacit ground" of implicit assumptions, which, when defended rigidly, blocks access to collective intelligence and mirrors the illusory divisions in explicate reality.[1] Dialogue, by contrast, serves as a microcosmic enactment of the implicate order: participants suspend proprietary views to allow shared meaning to unfold organically, fostering a "total structure enfolded within" the group dynamic, akin to quantum holomovement where individual elements participate in universal coherence.[1][14] This process aims to dissolve proprietary assumptions, enabling tacit processes—unspoken, intuitive links—to surface and reveal undivided wholeness in social interaction, much as Bohm's pilot-wave theory (1952) unified particle trajectories with a guiding field.[15] Empirical parallels between quantum holism and dialogue emerge in Bohm's emphasis on non-defensive inquiry, where group coherence arises not from aggregated opinions but from an emergent "holistic meaning" that transcends parts, reflecting the implicate order's enfolding of totality in each region.[14] For instance, just as quantum particles exhibit instantaneous correlations defying spatial separation, dialogue participants report accessing a collective "tacit intelligence" that integrates diverse inputs into novel insights, bypassing fragmented debate.[15] Bohm cautioned, however, that achieving this requires vigilance against habitual thought patterns, which he likened to the "relatively invariant" abstractions that obscure quantum unity, underscoring dialogue's role in applying physical holism to mitigate societal fragmentation.[1][14]The Role of Thought and Fragmentation
David Bohm viewed thought as an active, tacit process that shapes human culture, technology, and social organization, yet it fundamentally fragments the underlying wholeness of reality by imposing divisions where none inherently exist. This fragmentation manifests as the "smashing" or breaking up of unity into isolated parts, such as national borders, religious sects, or ecological disruptions, rather than mere analytical division.[16] Thought accomplishes this through assumptions rooted in past experiences and collective conditioning, which individuals experience as self-evident truths and defend with emotional attachment or self-deception, denying thought's role in producing divisive outcomes.[16][1] In Bohm Dialogue, the examination of thought's fragmenting tendency forms a central mechanism for inquiry, shifting from individual opinions to collective observation of thought's movement. Participants suspend immediate reactions and judgments, refraining from efforts to assert or prevail with personal views, which allows the group to trace how tacit assumptions interfere with shared meaning.[1] This experiential process illuminates fragmentation not through abstract analysis alone but through direct, participatory awareness, akin to proprioception of bodily action, where thought's subtle operations become visible without distortion.[1] By fostering such collective proprioception, dialogue seeks to dissolve the barriers erected by fragmented thought, enabling emergent coherence and a sense of mutual participation in undivided perception. Bohm contrasted this with ordinary discussion, where competing opinions reinforce division; in dialogue, no one "wins" individually, but the group advances toward integrated understanding by realizing the content of each mind without premature conclusions.[16][1] This approach posits that addressing thought's fragmentation at its source could mitigate broader societal crises, as unresolved divisions perpetuate cycles of conflict.[16]Collective Intelligence and Implicate Order
David Bohm conceptualized the implicate order as an underlying, enfolded reality of undivided wholeness, where all elements of the universe interpenetrate without fragmentation, contrasting with the explicate order of apparent separateness observed in classical physics and everyday perception.[14] This framework, detailed in his 1980 book Wholeness and the Implicate Order, posits that manifest phenomena arise through a dynamic process of unfolding from this holistic ground, much like ink droplets dispersing and reforming in a rotating fluid experiment Bohm referenced to illustrate enfolding and unfolding.[14] Bohm extended this ontology to human cognition, arguing that fragmented thought—rooted in fixed assumptions and proprietary opinions—obscures access to this deeper order, contributing to societal discord and incomplete understanding.[1] In Bohm Dialogue, practiced in sessions starting in the mid-1980s, the implicate order informs the pursuit of collective intelligence as a practical unfolding of shared, tacit knowing beyond individual minds.[15] Bohm described dialogue not as debate but as a free-flowing exchange where participants suspend judgments to enable "thinking together," generating a coherent movement of meaning analogous to laser amplification, where the whole exceeds the sum of parts.[1] This process taps an emergent collective intelligence, rooted in the implicate order's holomovement—a ceaseless flux of enfolding and unfolding—allowing unspoken intelligence to surface through participatory consciousness rather than defensive assertion.[1] Practitioners in Bohm's groups, typically 20-40 participants meeting for 45-60 minutes without agenda, reported approximations of this order, where individual contributions resonate into a unified field of insight, countering thought's habitual fragmentation.[15] The linkage underscores Bohm's causal realism: collective intelligence arises causally from suspending the explicate distortions of ego-driven thought, permitting the implicate's potential to explicate as novel, holistic comprehension.[1] In On Dialogue (1996), compiled from transcripts of his 1980s-1990s reflections, Bohm emphasized that such shared meaning acts as society's "cement," fostering creativity and resolution only when dialogue mirrors the implicate order's non-local interconnections, as evidenced by quantum non-locality analogies he drew.[1] Empirical accounts from early sessions validate this, noting breakthroughs in understanding that individual reflection alone could not achieve, though Bohm cautioned that without disciplined suspension, groups risk reinforcing collective illusions rather than transcending them.[15] This integration positions Bohm Dialogue as a method for causal access to deeper reality layers, prioritizing empirical suspension over ideological conformity.Core Principles and Practice
Suspension of Assumptions and Judgment
In Bohm dialogue, suspension of assumptions and judgment entails holding personal reactions, preconceptions, and evaluative impulses in awareness without enacting, suppressing, or endorsing them, thereby enabling participants to observe these elements as they arise in the collective flow of conversation.[1] This practice originates from David Bohm's observation that ordinary thought operates tacitly and fragmentarily, often leading to defensive adherence to fixed views that hinder mutual understanding; suspension counters this by fostering a neutral stance toward one's own mental content, akin to neither believing nor disbelieving assumptions but examining their structure and implications.[1][7] The purpose of this suspension is to cultivate a shared consciousness among participants, where individual assumptions become visible to the group as a "common content" of thought, allowing for deeper inquiry into underlying incoherences and promoting coherent collective intelligence.[11] By suspending judgment, participants avoid the limitations of defensiveness—such as insisting on being "right"—which Bohm identified as blocking free movement of the mind and restricting intelligence to mere opinion reinforcement.[11] Instead, this principle facilitates proprioception of thought processes, both personal and group-wide, revealing how assumptions shape reactions and enabling a participatory exploration that transcends individual fragmentation toward wholeness.[7][1] In practice, suspension requires attentive listening to oneself and others, with participants voicing noticed impulses or judgments for group reflection rather than debate, creating an "empty space" free of agendas or leadership hierarchies.[1] Bohm emphasized that this skill develops through sustained sessions, initially demanding effort to slow automatic responses but eventually allowing natural emergence of shared meaning and creative insight, as tacit mental infrastructures loosen without force.[7] Failure to suspend can revert dialogue to discussion or argument, underscoring the principle's centrality: it distinguishes Bohmian dialogue from conventional exchange by prioritizing observation over persuasion, potentially transforming cultural patterns of thought if practiced widely.[11][1]Structure and Facilitation of Sessions
Bohm Dialogue sessions typically involve 20 to 40 participants seated in a circle to promote equality and direct eye contact among all members, avoiding hierarchical arrangements that could favor certain individuals.[7][1] This group size draws from analogies to indigenous tribal councils, balancing intimacy for open exchange with sufficient diversity to reflect broader societal dynamics; smaller groups risk superficial harmony through accommodation, while larger ones exceed manageability.[7] Sessions generally last one to two hours to allow initial exploration without overwhelming fatigue, though early meetings may be shorter to accommodate rising tensions.[1] For sustained impact, sessions occur regularly—such as weekly or bi-weekly—over periods of months or years, enabling gradual trust-building and observation of recurring thought patterns.[7][1] No fixed agenda governs sessions; participants begin with any emerging topic of mutual interest, eschewing predetermined goals, debates, or decision-making to prioritize the free flow of meaning over utility or resolution.[1][2] The process emphasizes collective inquiry into underlying assumptions, with dialogue unfolding as a shared observation of thought rather than individual persuasion. Key operational principles include:- Suspension of assumptions: Participants hold opinions lightly, neither defending nor suppressing them, to examine their origins without immediate reaction.[1]
- Non-judgmental listening: Emphasis on attentive hearing of others' views as a means to uncover collective incoherence, rather than rebuttal.[7]
- Space for expression: Each person receives time to speak without interruption, fostering a sense of fellowship over competition.[1]
