Sometimes fiction can help, sort of like dreaming as scenario
planning. I rarely read fiction these days, but I recently read Kim
Stanley Robinson's "Forty Signs of Rain" and "Fifty Degrees Below",
two volumes of a planned trilogy, which basically talks about
attempted responses, particularly among scientists and the NSF, to
global warming reaching catastrophe points. There's really not much
to be done prior to any retrospectively recognized breakthroughs
except to thrash about with more of the same, kind of like babies
moving their limbs and fingers. In our case this is online
collaboration, which is certainly a sine qua non, but also not
enough. One thing the books point to is to applying the research
activities of science more decisively to points where they can make a
difference, to channel more funding to those spots, and to engage
those knowledge activities with leaders, people, and actors who care
(usually by being scared shitless). Ie, we don't even need to get
better at what we do - we just need to position it where it matters
more. (01)
But of course we also need to get better at it - and this is the
context in which I found the other thread On Intelligence and on
Peirce so fascinating and inspiring: how to build in more of that
"generalizing tendency" which evolves new laws of geo/bio/socio being. (02)
One thing I see is that it's not just the machine - the mechanics of
collaboration, let's say - that needs to be augmented. It's also the
ghost in the machine, which is us. Ie, an explicit part of the
augmentation pattern, it seems more and more, is to provide coaching,
mentoring, guiding of the humans in the carrels, so that they not
only are scared shitless (a necessary precondition for action), but
also so that they stay in that state as a discipline and practice.
Also, so that there is a human practice of dealing with stuckness,
thrashing around, knowing that there's gotta be a call-by-future that
pulls the pieces together in a new paradigm. This is in a way the
practice of navigating the U (http://www.presence.net), down the left
side of downloading - letting go, through suspension - the bottom of
the U, presencing, the creative gap, to letting come, becoming a
force of nature, up the right side of the U. Combining networking
software with that kind of leadership cultivation is I think a good
move (tm). (03)
The online collaboration harnesses, and the humans in those: both.
Having a major experience of being scared shitless, losing your world/
self, seems necessary: for Otto Scharmer this was seeing his
childhood home burn down. Following that you need a practice of
bringing that moment and intensity and care to your unfolding world.
And meeting others in that same space. And, having conversations that
matter, doing things that make a difference. Like writing those
"Forty...", "Fifty..." books. It's possible. I find http://
www.worldchanging.com inspiring. (04)
In Terrapin Station,
Mark (05)
On Jan 3, 2006, at 9:10 PM, Jack Park wrote: (06)
> As far as I can see, it's collaboration all the way down...
>
> On 1/3/06, Gary Richmond <garyrichmond@rcn.com> wrote:
>> Yes, and my sense is that this "simple but profoundly useful
>> feature or
>> service" will involve the notion of collaboration. What do you
>> think? Gary
>>
>>
>> Jack Park wrote:
>>
>> you think?
>>
>> On 1/3/06, Gary Richmond <garyrichmond@rcn.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Jack,
>>
>> You're beginning to sound a bit like Tim Berners-Lee, at least as he
>> sounded in a recent Newsweek interview (12/19/05):
>>
>> [Interviewer] When will the Semantic Web take off?
>> [B-L] What matters is the connections, and when people see the
>> value of
>> connection and what can be done with that--which is not defined by
>> me, it's
>> defined by the users--we will see the explosion. The killer app of
>> the Web
>> was making the phone directory accessible via a browser. It's
>> likely a
>> simple but profoundly useful feature or service which becomes
>> possible with
>> the Semantic Web that breaks it open. I dare not predict what it
>> might be..
>> Gary
>>
>>
>> Jack Park wrote:
>>
>> On 1/3/06, Eric Armstrong <Eric.Armstrong@sun.com> wrote:
>> <snippage>
>>
>>
>> b) As Conklin discovered, wicked problems aren't
>> amenable to online resolution.
>>
>> The word "amenable" is, imho, a bit slippery here. I recall what
>> Jeff
>> said about that, and I didn't come away with the sense that doing
>> online facilitation is useless. I'd like to think that we really must
>> start somewhere, even if the best we can do is to facilitate
>> local, in
>> your face facilitators getting the great unwashed masses to think a
>> bit more clearly. Might not need much improvement to reach some form
>> of tipping point in public understanding, awareness, and
>> sensibilities. Just think about those wonderful folks who think
>> it's a
>> great idea to rebuild their homes in a well-known flood plane. Gotta
>> start somewhere... (07)
--
This message is archived at: (08)
http://collab.blueoxen.net/forums/cgi-bin/mesg.cgi?a=yak&i=4E7BE4BC-653F-4A2F-9906-56B3C324F62C@well.com (09)
|