Re: [ba-unrev-talk] Re: Just the facts.
Peter, (01)
I don't think your solution scales well. Otherwise, it would make sense to
plaster images of scantily clad people into the many instructivist lectures
going on everywhere as well. (Snickers going on in the background, even
though Peter's wasn't a serious suggestion). (02)
My own reaction to the profoundly instructivist, just-in-case lectures of
high school was to allow that mysterious "inner voice" take reign. At the
time, I dreamt of building an airplane. Whilst in college, I did just that.
Dropped out of college and flew my bird until I eventually crashed it. (03)
One of the things I got from the StoryCon convention I attended
(http://www.storycon.org) was the notion that the inner voice is quite
responsive to story telling, particularly as discussed by Stephen Denning
(_The Springboard: How Storytelling Ignites Action in Knowledge-Era
Organizations_). This, I think, roams around in the space of musings about
how good ideas pop out of one's subconscious. Perhaps one of the most
lucid discussions about this is found in David Gelernter's book _The Muse
In The Machine_. (04)
My view of Dr. Engelbart's story is quite clear, my interpretation is a
simple one. There is a profound opportunity to exploit the interplay
between humans (plural) and tools (also plural) to create a space he calls
a "capabilities improvement infrastructure." The interplay of many people
in that infrastructure, when taken to the Web, opens the door to what he
calls a "networked improvement community." Nothing, I think, could be more
obvious or much simpler. The awsome reality (I think) behind that is that
Engelbart was showing how to do just that in the sixties, long before the
Web existed. (05)
Jack (06)
At 12:00 PM 10/6/2002 +0100, Peter Jones wrote:
>It's hard to know where the dividing line is though. For example, I know that
>every good idea I've ever had has just leapt out of my subconscious - or
>out of
>nowhere, if you like, since the source is not really amenable to scientific
>investigation at this time. So the kudos has to be in knowing/seeing which
>ideas
>are healthy, and working to promote them in the world through action.
>However, the type of action chosen to promote those ideas is also crucial.
>It is
>easy to take a good idea, and subject folks to it mercilessly like a mad
>tyrant.
>Inevitably people will rebel against the actions _and_ the idea.
>One of Jack Park's themes is that the orthodox school system tends to take
>this
>approach to learning - so many children just end up as big bags of resentment
>with no conceptual centeredness.
>So it's almost as though one has to publicise ideas without pushing - make
>those
>ideas tempting in themselves.
>
>Unfortunately there are all sorts of problems with ideas being tempting.
>It is possible to make ideas tempting in a way that bears no relation to their
>intrinsic rational value by weighting their popularity in respect of some
>basic
>human desire and waiting for the herd instinct to kick in.
>Or, as advertisers do these days, simply visually associate an idea with
>something shiny/sexy/funny and wait.
>
>Welcome to the meme wars.
>
>In light of this it now seems clear to me that Dr. Engelbart needs to plaster
>his papers with more pictures of scantily-clad models.
><sigh>
>
>--
>Peter (07)