Etuaptmumk is a word that is difficult for Europeans to pronounce and belongs to the language of the Mi'kmaq nation, which is found in eastern North America, more precisely in Nova Scotia, Canada. "Etuaptmumk" means "two-eyed vision", and the idea behind it is to encourage people to use one eye to utilize the strengths of knowledge possessed by indigenous people such as the Tuareg in Algeria or the Mi'kmaq in America, and the other eye to grasp the qualities of knowledge acquired through Western traditions.
In its issue of February 6, 2025, the British magazine "Nature" devoted many pages to "Two-Eyed Seeing" in order to highlight "Indigenous perspectives on neuroscience". The article in "Nature" aims to contribute to the understanding of the human brain and its mind and to try to use two-eyed seeing to communicate with the public and to look at mental health with the two eyes that are usually distinguished as reductionism and holism. "The part and the whole", in other words, whereby these words are in quotation marks because this is the name of the autobiography of the physicist Werner Heisenberg, who 100 years ago succeeded in taking the decisive step towards quantum mechanics, which makes special two-eyed vision necessary, as light must be viewed not only as a wave but also as a particle.
" Uncertainty makes science uncomfortable "
Quantum physics ennobles two-eyed vision with the philosophical concept of complementarity, which captures opposites that contradict each other on the surface, while they are connected in depth. This has been known since the Romantic era, when people learned to see deeper with their inner eyes than with the little windows in their heads, and two-eyed vision also contrasts the truth that warms the heart with the truth that shows the way. There is no question that, in addition to expert knowledge with its theoretical justifications, there has always been and should always be the opposite indigenous ability with its aesthetic charms. The aforementioned essay on "Etuaptmumk" in "Nature" mentions the need for humility or modesty in Western science. No one needs to worry about that. It is full of unease and restlessness because it cannot see what is coming next. Two-eyed vision will not dispel this ontological uncertainty. Quite the opposite.
