Questions: An essential part of life ?

I challenge you to think without asking yourself a single question for 5 minutes.

If you are able to do that then perhaps you’re probably already a Zen master or on your way to become one. But I highly doubt anyonce can stop process of internal inquiry at all levels of the human body.

The majority of thinking seems to be based on chains of questions. From our super complex thought all the way down to the very basic levels of simple organisms we seem to be asking questions.

Of course when we get to the simpler organisms we don’t call them questions. We call them “feedback loops”. In my view feedback loops are types of questions that gather information about environmental data. (internal-external)

In the same way our body asks questions. Every time you take a step your body is calculating how much weight and pressure it needs to support. This calculation varies depending on if you’re walking uphill or downhill, if the step is among sand or concrete etc. So, yes, even the simple act of walking takes hundreds of tiny and complex questions.

All our senses – if we could hear them thinking – are asking millions of questions every minute. “What’s the heart rate?”, “How far is that door?”, “Who is that person?”, “How much pressure do I need to apply on this keyboard?”, “Where is the letter “W” on this keyboard? etc.

I will dare to say that if we look at the human organism from a holistic perspective (one that includes thought/cognition at all levels of the system) – then we can’t live without asking ourselves questions.

By association we also can’t live if we don’t think (once again if you recognize cell organization, communication, organ system collaboration etc).

Thinking, breathing, eating, questions, interacting, awareness, consciousness, communication, feeling, sensing, all of these are essential to life when you look at the human organism at all levels.

Questions from the holistic perspective, are essential to life. So, why have’t we organized them, categorized them, classified them?

I realized this back in December ’06 and since then I’ve taken some action by attempting to categorize some types of questions. My hope is that we will become conscious of questions as essential tools for our lives. Hopefully as we become more conscious of how we use them we will simultaneously improve our thinking, our lives and our relationships with others.

Learning and Sharing
I have gone on to add some of the question types to Wikipedia. I am also hoping that some of you are able to contribute to the list there.

Related in this blog
Types of Questions >>

Related on Wikipedia
Wikipedia: “Questions” >>
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–Daniel Montano
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Keyword: Daniel Montano, Dan Montano, user experience design, information architect

(Possible) cycle of consciousness

Diagram: “The Cycle of Life” by Toru Sato.

Summary of “A (potential) Cycle of Consciousness pt.1”
(summarizing a blog posting from May)
We begin life without consciousness of the “self” and we move to a point where we once again discover how interconnected we are to everything and everyone else in the world. This awareness may lead to the end of the “micro self”. This may also become the beginning of a “macro-self” that includes humanity and the environment at large; (maybe more?)

Today I found this diagram by Toru Sato. According to the blog posting where I found it, [1] it is from a book called The Ever-Transcending Spirit, [2], and it deals with the “cycle of life”.

This diagram mirrors the (potential) cycle of consciousness I described above.

(Thanks to folks at the Unurthed blog for finding this great diagram.)

[1] Blog posting found at: Unurthed blog >

[2] The diagram is from diagram from Toru Sato’s The Ever-Transcending Spirit. (WorldCat Link)

Related in this blog:
A possible cycle in consciousness pt.1 >
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–Daniel Montano
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Keyword: Daniel Montano, Dan Montano, user experience design, information architect

Evolutionary psychology: Its programs, prospects, and pitfalls

Evolutionary psychology: Its programs, prospects, and pitfalls
ANDREW NEHER — Cabrillo College Abstract:

“The emerging specialty of evolutionary psychology presents a challenge to mainstream psychology. It proposes that cognitive, not just more fundamental, traits in humans are grounded in dedicated evolutionary programs. Specifically, it maintains that the common assumption in psychology—that the complexities of our psyches have been largely freed from evolutionary constraints and are instead based in a general learning capacity—is mistaken. The major premises of evolutionary psychology are examined in light of arguments and evidence presented by both supporters and detractors. Although some of these premises are well grounded, others are questionable and limit the development of the specialty and its integration into mainstream psychology.”

Source:

American Journal of Psychology. http://ajp.press.uiuc.edu/119/4/neher.html

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–Daniel Montano
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Keyword: Daniel Montano, Dan Montano, user experience design, information architect

Beyond Maslow’s hierarchy of (individual) needs

This diagram tries to show cycles of attention, from the individual to the macro-systems in which the individual exists. This diagram is a suggestion and it may be drawn differently in societies that are group-centered rather than individual-centered. The same idea applies to those groups that are family-centered or couple-centered. An individual and a society may hold changing “centers” across time.

Dynamic Center (focus) 

Perhaps more interestingly, this center may be dynamic and may change, frequently depending on many factors and variables. (this may also be the part of the cause for dissonance at many human and social levels).

Innovations that help us meet the goals of Maslow’s pyramid are important but they can be magnified in value when we integrate them with the value contained at each level of the macro-systems.

While there may be many changing centers the most stable are the high-level goals of the macrosystem. These may be: the survival and healthy development of our ecosystems and humanity. This may point us back to the need for the re-alignment of our man-designed systems with ecological interests and social causes that promote the development of human potential while in alignment with the best interstes of our planet.

How does your product or service deliver value across each of these levels?
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–Daniel Montano
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Keyword: Daniel Montano, Dan Montano, user experience design, information architect

Holistic emergence and reductionism

First, the definitions:

Reductionism:

“In philosophy, reductionism is a theory that asserts that the nature of complex things is reduced to the nature of sums of simpler or more fundamental things. This can be said of objects, phenomena, explanations, theories, and meanings. so on — are controversial. For example, aspects of evolutionary psychology and sociobiology are rejected by those who claim that complex systems are inherently irreducible or holistic.” (Read “Reductionism” in Wikipedia)

Emergence:

“Descriptive of a characteristic of a new or unexpected properties or qualities that emerge as a result of combination or rearrangement of existing elements. The most prominent examples are mind and consciousness, emerging from complex neurophysiological and bio-chemical components. The critical aspect of an emergent property is that one could not predict it from its constituent parts. Emergentism is position that stresses that objects and the phenomena (particularly psychological ones) have emergent properties. Reference is also made to emergent evolution as a way of characterizing the appearance of novel phenomena.” (Reber)

Two types of emergence:

“Emergence may be generally divided into two perspectives, that of “weak emergence” and “strong emergence”. Weak emergence describes new properties arising in systems as a result of the interactions at an elemental level. Emergence, in this case, is merely part of the language, or model that is needed to describe a system’s behavior.

But if, on the other hand, systems can have qualities not directly traceable to the system’s components, but rather to how those components interact, and one is willing to accept that a system supervenes on its components, then it is difficult to account for an emergent property’s cause. These new qualities are irreducible to the system’s constituent parts (Laughlin 2005). The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. This view of emergence is called strong emergence.” (from “Emergence” in Wikipedia)

I tend to backslide into the all-too-comfortable reductionist perspective. I believe that most of my diagrams on this blog exhibit a reductionist perspective – even while I attempt to promote a holistic perspective through them.

This renders most of my diagrams as incomplete. Explaining complexity dynamics without explaining holistic emergence and reductionism may lead to an incomplete understanding.Visual explanations, diagrams and other didactic tools tend to be associated closely with reductionism. I would think this is the result from :

• our current educational mode
• the dominance of the reductionist philosophy in some branches of science
• the abstract and dynamic nature of holistic emergence (e.g. we don’t have a symbol for emergence)
• the immeasurable, incalculable nature of holistic emergence

Figure: A complex network with an emergence dynamic (The blue bubble surrounding the network is a symbol for emergent dynamics).

Requirements for systems thinking education

Holistic emergence needs to have a literal and graphical symbol that we can include in our graphs, charts and diagrams to signify its presence and its dynamics.

We should also note that the abstract nature of holistic emergence may lead some traditional systems to reject it (e.g. some business and some sciences). The rejection may be based on our inability to measure it (e.g. how do you measure “mind” or how do you measure “consciousness” or “psyche”?)

Updated
Reductionism may be a complimentary thought phase of holistic thinking. In other words reductionism may contribute to holistic thinking. It may not be a direct (strong) relationship but it can be complimentary if used together with awareness of their limitations.

This may be one of the reasons why we find ourselves using reductionist tools to explain non-reductionist concepts.
Source:

Reber, Arthur S. and Emily Reber. The Penguin Dictionary of Psychology. 3rd Ed.

Related:

Book: The Turning Point by Fritjof Capra. Chapter 4.

Multispective problem-solving systems

Our ability to detect cause and effect in a complex system is a tremendous challenge. For example for us to understand that the lack of rain in regions in Africa may be related to the air pollution in the U.S. and Europe may be hard to understand and hard to correlate from a single perspective simple, local-phenomenology.

This may be one of the limitations of using our local cause-and-effect logical models. In order for us to understand the complexity of our difussed systems we need complex correlation systems.

These tools may remind us that a problem is usually the result of a good number of factors, variables and dynamics. Conversely we may may also understand the need for us to transform our idea of a “solution” to the idea of a “complex solution system“. The Complex solution system addresses various factors, several variables, and serveral relationships. It is a system of solutions rather than ONE single solution.

The idea of a single problem/solution may be over. The idea of a simple cause and effect may also be over.
The next step

We can also accelerate our problem-solving methodologies by integrating another perspective, Non-linear Difussed correlation systems. These systems may correlate difussed dynamics across time, and space. This may lead to a more complex perspective where we may also understand that most causes are also the results of effects (across time and space systems dynamics) and most effects are also the results of causes (across time and space systems dynamics).

Here we may arrive to the idea of the Multi-contextual non-linear difussed solution systems. Like the complex solution system it addresses several factors, several variables and several relationship dynamics. Additionally this non-linear diffused solution system seeks to contextualize issues across time, and space in order to address non-linear, non-localized diffused dynamics. This means that these solution systems reach back into the history of the understanding of the problem. It may also analyze our understanding of future projections of the problem. It should also include the multiple understandings of the present dynamics.

It broadens the lens to include global dynamics. It may also seek to re-understand and address the contextually-re-understood issue across various localities (while respecting the contextual dynamics of culture, customs, logics etc).

This may be the most complex type of solutions systems. Arguably the most challenging.

Abductive reasoning. Intuition by another word?

“The only real valuable thing is intuition.” – Albert Einstein.[*]

I have a gut feeling that abductive reasoning is just a fancy word for informed hunch or maybe even intuition. It seems to me that this type of thinking is the bridge from curiosity to creativite action. If even some science begins on this level of inquiry why is this type of thinking usually discouraged in businesses?

Well, the innovation-driven economy may be changing that.

“Designers also use and value inductive and deductive reasoning. Designers induce patterns through the close study of users and deduce answers through the application of design theories. However, designers value highly a third type of logic: abductive reasoning. Abductive reasoning, as described by Darden professor Jeanne Liedtka, embraces the logic of what might be. Designers may not be able to prove that something “is” or “must be,” but they nevertheless reason that it “may be.” This style of thinking is critical to the creative process.” BusinessWeek, [1]

“Abductive reasoning: constitutes according to Peirce the “first stage” of scientific inquiries and of any interpretive processes. “Abduction” is the process of adopting an explanatory hypothesis and covers two operations: the selection and the formation of plausible hypotheses. As process of finding premisses, it is the basis of interpretive reconstruction of causes and intentions, as well as of inventive construction of theories.” [2]

“Abduction, or inference to the best explanation, is a method of reasoning in which one chooses hypothesis which would, if true, best explain the relevant evidence. ” [3]

[1] Creativity that goes deep. BusinessWeek online >>

[2] What is Abductive Inference? >>

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abductive_reasoning

Related on this blog

Our intuitive systems. An integral part of our human intelligence >>

Mapping the web of life

This past weekend I started reading The Web of Life. A new Scientific Understanding of Living Systems, by Fritjof Capra.

This book covers systems thinking, Netsci, autopoeisis, self-organizing systems, ecology, cybernetics, fractals quantum physics and classical physics.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning more about these topics. I’m not done with this book but here are some of my favorite quotes from this book so far:

Capra quoting Maturana:

“Living systems are cognitive systems, and living as a process is a process of cognition. This statement is valid for all organisms, with and without a nervous system.”

This may provide some support towards the humane validation of the living organisms we have undervalued and dismissed.

“He, [Maturana], postulated that the nervous system is not only self-organizaing but also continually self-referring, so that perception cannot be viewed as the representation of an external reality but must be understood as the continual creation of new relationships within the neural network.”

This idea points towards an understainding of our imagination and creativity. It challenges some of the psyche-based sciences. This also points towards the possibility that we construct and create “reality” inside our cognitive systems. The self-referring, patterns within the nervous system network may point towards the possibility that our nervous system itself may be using the self-similar pattern of a fractal to construct reality.

“Patterns cannot be measured or weighted; they must be mapped. To understand a pattern we must map a configuration of relationships. In other words, structure involve quantities, while patterns involve qualities.”

This point underscores the need for new ways to visualize information and relationships, in order for us to gain a deeper understanding of systems thinking dynamics.

Innovators may want to pay close attention to this need. I would suggest that it will continue to grow. I would also suggest that those visualization systems that use 3-D graphics, and real-time approximations of interaction patterns should expect to take play a significant role in this market.

Daniel Montano

For some instpiration see:

– http://www.understandingusa.org

– http://www.dynamicdiagrams.com

The narcissistic universe and the universal mirror

Our universe and all natural living things came to have life over time. They came to have life thanks to the availability of energy, fuels, electricity, radiation, heat, sunlight etc. Living things shifted form over time. We became organisms. We became animals. We became humans.

But in some way, we are all created from the same matter – the DNA found on this planet and this universe. Because of this common connection we are all, in a way evolutions of our planet and our universe. We are all “multiple identities” “multiple images” or “versions” of the planet and the universe organism.

This notion brings forward a physicality to Lacan’s thesis of the image and of his notion of the “mirror”. The connection of our scientific understanding of the universe, evolution and integral identity may be, in a way, the “largest” notion of Lacan’s mirror. This may be the ultimate identification of the human with the “outside” image. This may be the largest conceptualization of our idea of the “self”. This may be the largest “me+we”.

But rather than understanding this “universal mirror” as a “crutch” for the human psyche we may want to understand this event as one of the “natural” psychological evolutions of the human.

We may also understand it as the integration of our scientific discoveries. Today we have notions of the “butterfly effect”, chaos theory, systems thinking, cybernetics and other multi-disciplinary notions that may simply point towards a new level of holistic awareness of our humanity and our relationship with our ecosystems.

Our universe and our planet may be regarded as a narcissistic organism that loves to replicate itself to try out many “outfits” many bodies, many voices, many talents. Roland Barthes would probably call this “the ultimate fashion system”.

Related elsewhere:

The Economy of discourse >>

The evolution of cybernetics. (an interesting link showing the long history of multidisciplinary contribution to the field) >>

Cybernetics equals psychoanalysis >>

Daniel Montano

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Lacan, ecosystems and our integral identity.

There are a few relationships betwen psychologist Jacques Lacan’s theories and the theories of biological integrity.One of the most interesting overlaps is his thesis on paranoia and the construction of our ego identity “outside” of ourselves [This concept may be related to theories that our environments are part of us and we are part of our environments].

He writes about the “fragmentation” of the “real body” [this may be related to our interconnected natural ecosystems “body”].

He writes…”the truth of the ego emerges in madness where the world seems to dissolve and the difference between self and other is radically put into question”. [Once again, this may correlated to theories of integrated human + nature system of identities.]

How many minutes can we survive without the air in our environments?

How long can we survive without the water, and fuels in our environments?My interconnectedness and dependence in the ecosystems is obvious.

Science is leading the way for the public at large to realize our “integral identity” without the need to undergo pathology of “madness” as Lacan once theorized.

Thanks to complex modern computers gathering millions of measurements and correlations. We may soon begin to realize that when we harm the environment we harm ourselves.

What was once considered to require madness simply required a new way of thinking and understanding the world.

Dynamic vocabulary:

Integral identity: a term proposed to identify an understanding that humans are dependent on their natural environments and the elements that exist in and compose our natural environments.

Related on this blog:
Paranoia as possible cognitive evolution >>