Societal Reimagination: A Tale of Two Stigmergies
In a network, the best place to story knowledge is amidst, among and in between people, people who are emerging, unfolding and evolving into more intensely human versions of themselves.
Card: Zeitgeist Murmurations
Any sufficiently
attractive idea is
indistinguishable
from a zeitgeist
murmuration
instigation.
Zen and the Art of Evolving Lines of Inquiry Maintenance
Riffing and weaving Kurt Vonnegut, Procol Harum’s Pilgrims Progress, Clifford Simak’s Way Station with S-curves, because why not?
I sat me down to write a simple story
Which maybe in the end became a song
Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not only feel the time was not wasted, it instigated a beginning small step of turning stranger into friend.
In trying to find the words which might begin it
I found these were the thoughts I brought along
Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for, or, something deeply rooted in Swedish mythology, something borderline unfathomable.
At first I took my weight to be an anchor
And gathered up my fears to guide me round
Every character should want something, and that something should always be a glass of red, shared with friends, retiring comfortably at a countryside mansion
But then I clearly saw my own delusion
And found my struggles further bogged me down
Every sentence must do one of five things: reveal character, advance the action, instigate meaning-making inside the readers mind, turn the reading into seeds of phronesis, inducing continuity amidst change, and change amidst continuity.
Way Station
Let’s say you open a door, go through a portal. You will find yourself different, from having gone through, from finding yourself in a new place.
“They told me they were headed for a planet the name of which I had not heard before, and they talked among themselves, gaily and happily, but in such a way that I did not seem to be left out. From their talk I gained the fact that some form of art was being presented at the festival on this planet.
The art form was not alone of music or painting, but was composed of sound and color and emotion and form and other qualities for which there seem to be no words in the language of the Earth, and which I do not entirely recognize, only gaining the very faintest inkling of what they were talking of in this particular regard.
I gained the impression of a three-dimensional symphony, although this is not entirely the right expression, which had been composed, not by a single being, but by a team of beings.
They talked of the art form enthusiastically and I seemed to understand that it would last for not only several hours, but for days, and that it was an experience rather than a listening or seeing and that the spectators or audience did not merely sit and listen, but could, if they wished, and must, to get the most out of it, be participants.”
― Clifford D. Simak, Way Station
In starting out I thought to go exploring
And set my foot upon the nearest road
Start as close to the end as possible. At times, even closer than that.
There. Go. Do.
In vain I looked to find the promised turning
But only saw how far I was from home
Be a sensemaking equipotentialist, serendipitifying equilibrist, ever so slightly different stigmergy re-enactivist, convivial eudaimonist and local, practical and bioregional ecosystemicist. Evolving with understanding understanding understanding: thinks, things and gatherings. All our thinks, things and gatherings are going to go through structure-preserving transformations (problem spaces, paths, places, generative sequences, transition pathways). The coming fifteen years, from now, July 2021, to January 2036:
Birth pains of sustainable regions, some
which will make it, some which will not.
Card: Stigmergies
a tale of two
stigmergies
Card: Transition Pathways
In a network, the erosion of social cognition, the decay of social fabric, the information inflation (massive amounts of content, scarcity of value), the loss of meaning, the weaponization of discourse.
This is the Zeitgeist, this is the wickedness that is co-extensive with an as yet potential Enkinaesthesia, a new field emerging amidst the old.
A Tale of Two Stigmergies
Once there’s a critical mass of humans realizing the old stigmergies follows the Walter Benjamin scenario, they begin to search for (paths made by walking), and once found (luminous paths enacted by joint sauntering) pursuing adjacent strategies, conversations and strategies; strategies and conversations that mind, cultivate and matter.
Once there’s confluence forming from these new stigmergies, these new desire paths and fledgling transition pathways, there’s synkinaesthesia, synkinaesthesia functions and vectors to the qualia and field of enkinaesthesia.
Card: Synkinaesthesia
mind evolving, learning into aliveness
joint sauntering along luminous paths
— Synkinaesthesia?
— Yes, your story forming a scaffold for your own behavior, essential character and evolution purpose, spiraling through problem spaces turned possibility spaces, annealing into agency.
No matter how sweet, innocent and simple your story, make interesting things happen to it, in order that the readers may first become profoundly confused, and then, from a slightly different vantage point, they’ll get a glimpse of themselves, and begin to see what they are made of. Generativity.
In searching I forsook the paths of learning
And sought instead to find some pirate’s gold
Write to please just one person. Sometimes less than one. Stay true.
In fighting I did hurt those dearest to me
And still no hidden truths could I unfold
If you open a window and make love to the whole world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia, Covid-19 or Covid-23. See? Hold my Corona?
I sat me down to write a simple story
Which maybe in the end became a song
Give your readers way too much information, beyond their ability to grasp, as soon as possible. To heck with communication.
The words have all been writ by one before me
We’re taking turns in trying to pass them on
Readers should have such an abundance of understanding of what is going on, where and why, who, when, whereto and why not, that they could finish the unfolding story of their own lives themselves, should algorithms consume what remains of the writers lunch.
Oh, we’re taking turns in trying to pass them on
— Matthew Charles Fisher, Pilgrims Progress
— How do we pass them on?
— In conversations, in conversations that mind and matter.
In metalogue: meaning-making, moving along unfolding lines of inquiry, essential character turning evolutionary purpose.
Societal Reimagination: A Tale of Two Stigmergies
A Tale of Two Cities
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way — in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”
— Charles Dickens
The world is changing. We feel it in the water. We listen to Gaia and her songs. We sense a newfound vibrancy in the air. Much that once was is rekindled; for some now live who remember it.
A Tale of Two Stigmergies
“It was the collaborative meaning-making of times, it was the Turd Emoji Chat of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of Proprietary Platform Programming inducing shared misery, it was the epoch of less wrong, it was the epoch of fake news, it was the season of Awareness, it was the season of Grand Theft Data, it was the spring of Transition, it was the winter of Oligarch Hellscape, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Awakening, we were all hitting the Like Button Snooze Button something fierce and frantic — in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest weaponized digital discourse twitterati insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the distorted, devolved degree of content only.”
— @johnkellden riffing on Charles Dickens
