https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/public/ recent bookmarks from robertogreco 2017-07-19T22:23:35+00:00 http://www.gardnercampbell.net/blog1/?p=2170 robertogrecoIt seems that both those whose life is enriched by transcontextual gifts and those who are impoverished by transcontextual confusions are alike in one respect: for them there is always or often a “double take.” A falling leaf, the greeting of a friend, or a “primrose by the river’s brim” is not “just that and nothing more.” Exogenous experience may be framed in the contexts of dream, and internal thought may be projected into the contexts of the external world. And so on. For all this, we seek a partial explanation in learning and experience. (“Double Bind, 1969,” in Steps to an Ecology of Mind, U Chicago Press, 2000, p. 272). (EDIT: I had originally typed “eternal world,” but Bateson writes “external.” It’s an interesting typo, though, so I remember it here.) It does seem to me, very often, that we do our best to purge our learning environments of opportunities for transcontextual gifts to emerge. This is understandable, given how bad and indeed “unproductive” (by certain lights) the transcontextual confusions can be. No one enjoys the feeling of falling, unless there are environments and guides that can make the falling feel like flying–more matter for another conversation, and a difficult art indeed, and one that like all art has no guarantees (pace Madame Tussaud). 2. So now the second strand, regarding Engelbart’s “Augmenting Human Intellect: A Conceptual Framework.” Much of this essay, it seems to me, is about identifying and fostering transcontextualism (transcontextualization?) as a networked activity in which both the individual and the networked community recognize the potential for “bootstrapping” themselves into greater learning through the kind of level-crossing Bateson imagines (Douglas Hofstadter explores these ideas too, particularly in I Am A Strange Loop and, it appears, in a book Tom Woodward is exploring and brought to my attention yesterday, Surfaces and Essences: Analogy as the Fuel and Fire of Thinking. That title alone makes the recursive point very neatly). So when Engelbart switches modes from engineering-style-specification to the story of bricks-on-pens to the dialogue with “Joe,” he seems to me not to be willful or even prohibitively difficult (though some of the ideas are undeniably complex). He seems to me to be experimenting with transcontextualism as an expressive device, an analytical strategy, and a kind of self-directed learning, a true essay: an attempt: And by “complex situations” we include the professional problems of diplomats, executives, social scientists, life scientists, physical scientists, attorneys, designers–whether the problem situation exists for twenty minutes or twenty years. A list worthy of Walt Whitman, and one that explicitly (and for me, thrillingly) crosses levels and enacts transcontextualism. Here’s another list, one in which Engelbart tallies the range of “thought kernels” he wants to track in his formulative thinking (one might also say, his “research”): The “unit records” here, unlike those in the Memex example, are generally scraps of typed or handwritten text on IBM-card-sized edge-notchable cards. These represent little “kernels” of data, thought, fact, consideration, concepts, ideas, worries, etc. That are relevant to a given problem area in my professional life. Again, the listing enacts a principle: we map a problem space, a sphere of inquiry, along many dimensions–or we should. Those dimensions cross contexts–or they should. To think about this in terms of language for a moment, Engelbart’s idea seems to be that we should track our “kernels” across the indicative, the imperative, the subjunctive, the interrogative. To put it another way, we should be mindful of, and somehow make available for mindful building, many varieties of cognitive activity, including affect (which can be distinguished but not divided from cognition). 3. I don’t think this activity increases efficiency, if efficiency means “getting more done in less time.” (A “cognitive Taylorism,” as one seminarian put it.) More what is always the question. For me, Engelbart’s transcontextual gifts (and I’ll concede that there are likely transcontextual confusions in there too–it’s the price of trancontextualism, clearly) are such that the emphasis lands squarely on effectiveness, which in his essay means more work with positive potential (understanding there’s some disagreement but not total disagreement about what “positive” means). It’s an attempt to tell more of the the whole truth about experience, and to build a better world out of those double takes. Together. Is Engelbart’s essay a flawless attempt? Of course not. But for me, Bateson’s idea of transcontextualism helps to explain the character of the attempt, and to indicate how brave and necessary it is, especially within a world we can and must (and do, yet often willy nilly) build together. Not perfect; just miraculous."]]> dougengelbart transcontextualism gardnercampbell 2013 gregorybateson marshallmcluhan socraticmethod education teaching howweteach howwelearn learning hammerhand technology computers computing georgedyson food textiles texture text understanding tools secondlife seymourpapert sherryturkle alanturing johnvonneumann doublebind waltwhitman memex taylorism efficiency cognition transcontextualization https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:c45602dc28e2/ 2016-02-04T08:04:15+00:00 http://er.educause.edu/articles/2016/1/networked-learning-as-experiential-learning robertogreco networkedlearning 2016 gardnercampbell jeromebruner georgekuh experientialleaerning experience learning howwelearn education carlrogers hypertext web online internet literacy alankay dougengelbart adelegoldberg tednelson vannevarbush jcrlicklider georgedyson alanturing johnvonneumann self-actualization unschooling deschooling progressive networks social 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hypertext math mathematics algebra schools filmmaking film howwework making dougengelbart hierarchy hierarchies aristotle plato intertwingularity depth richness clarity composition arbitrary systemsthinking generalization text franklloydwright leonardodavinci coding programming teaching structure rules academia publishing self-publishing headstart preschool language languageacquisition poverty vocabulary alankay multicontextuality wikipedia youtube curiosity raspberrypi anarchy anarchism collectivism interdependence mutualaid society generalists selfpublishing https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:90cb58b01eac/ 2014-06-20T20:43:53+00:00 https://plus.google.com/events/c67c9rk920s1rd3invjtd4assf4 robertogreco alankay gardnercampbell 2014 interviews education unschooling deschooling learning howwelearn howweteach discernment skepticism power organizations control psychology technology computers internet media jeromebruner cargocult schools teaching rules conformity curriculum dougengelbart xeroxparc criticalthinking criticism highereducation autodidacts self-directedlearning literacy history anthropology children society print printing books parenting crapdetection neilpostman subversion mavericks complicity systemsthinking memorization interveninginasystem highered autodidactism suppression https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:02a05e4f83fd/ 2014-01-10T19:52:57+00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvmTSpJU-Xc robertogreco alankay towatch 2009 history web frogs hypercard personalcomputing computers hyperlinks hypertext collaboration compsci computerscience wysiwyg change progress gutenberg dougengelbart https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:f80f19bce9bf/ 2013-10-30T06:31:46+00:00 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmOZL238Tzg robertogrecopaulford talent writing www web internet emptiness 2013 practice tension tools skills experience absence annoyance frustration fixes gapfilling publishing wikis amazon twitter amaya html html5 tednelson dougengelbart bretvictor strewartbrand ios7 skeumorphs history technology skeuomorph computing accumulation time coding software culture ios stevejobs adobe design photoshop psd accretion timberners-lee colonization https://pinboard.in/ https://pinboard.in/u:robertogreco/b:5054aa6e41b6/ 2012-02-15T05:50:04+00:00 https://vimeo.com/36579366 robertogrecopurpose living life insight doing self-discovery experience modelessness causes craftsman problemsolving meaning meaningmaking specialization skills identity rightandwrong ideals richardstallman piaget jeromebruner alankay dougengelbart xeroxparc terrycavanagh larrytesler activism injustice justice morality responsibility animation mediaconnection teletype computing history analogdesign electronics comparisons data space understanding search visualization time braid making ideas programming 2012 connection discovery coding invention creativity principles bretvictor specialists jeanpiaget 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