Systems Thinking, Learning Communities, and Educational Change Kathia and Alexander Laszlo Thank you for joining us in this first Keynote presentation of Learning Millennium 99. And truly, you will be "in" the presentation since the basis for this entire virtual conference is collaborative dialogue and the interactive exploration of the emerging field of integrative learning. This first Keynote will serve as a platform to launch our learning and exploration together. We will offer some initial ideas to focus and orient our discussion, suggest a possible thematic flow to lend directionality to our joint exploration, pose some "conversation questions" for your consideration, and see where it takes us! To a very large extent, that will be up to you - your interests, your concerns, and your passions will determine where we sail this exploration during our week together. To begin with, we would like to share with you the ideas and questions that guide our inquiry at Syntony Quest - the public benefit educational organization that we operate. Our life passion and our work/play/learning are very much involved in creating the conditions for individuals and groups to engage in processes of life-long learning, and we are happy to have this opportunity to further learn and create new meaning with you. Let us give you a brief "tour" of our proposed learning journey during this week. Of course, the overall direction of the journey will be co-created with you through our interactions. This is just a guide and suggested itinerary to get things rolling. We propose exploring two conceptual "tools" with you: 1. systems approach 2. evolutionary understanding and syntony sense We would like to explore with you how these tools can be usefully applied to: * understanding the limitations and potentialities of education; * creating the conditions for integrative learning processes; and * designing what we call Evolutionary Learning Communities. Here's the way we suggest we do it: we present some quotes and some key concepts dealing with the two conceptual tools and you consider how they relate to the issues described above as determined by your interests in education and integrative learning. That way we can develop a joint understanding of systems thinking, learning communities, and educational change through the processes of on-line dialogue and collaborative exploration. -------------------------------------- 1. Systems Approach "We witness today another shift in ways of thinking: the shift toward rigorous but holistic theories. This means thinking in terms of facts and events in the context of wholes, forming integrated sets with their own properties and relationships. Looking at the world in terms of such sets of integrated relations constitutes the systems view" - Ervin Laszlo (1996), The Systems View of the World. Joanna Macy put it well when she said that a system is more a pattern than a thing. With this in mind it is possible to understand the systems approach as a field of inquiry that focuses on processes and on relationships rather than on states and on things. For example, as Fritjof Capra points out, a systems perspective of a tree would not focus on its size and shape or on the bark and the roots and the leaves. Surely, it would not ignore these aspects of the tree, but a systems thinker would focus on the dynamic processes that define the tree and establish it in relation to its broader ecology. So the focus would be on processes such as the way it exchanges nutrients - both through the leaves and through the roots; and on the interdependent relationships it has - with the birds and animals and insects, as well as with the rain and the other trees and even the microbes that live among its roots! By taking this approach to things (or rather, to processes!) systems thinking offers a way to appreciate complex dynamic phenomena and events without reducing them to either their component parts through pure analysis and dissection or to an indivisible whole that has to be "grokked" through synthesis and intuition. You see, both of these alternatives are "reductionistic" because they focus on either the parts or the whole: Analysis -->> Structure (identification of components) Synthesis -->> Function (identification of roles) | | \/ Analysis -->> Knowledge (answers to "how to" & "what" questions) Synthesis -->> Understanding (answers to "why" questions) € in order to both know and understand our environment, € € we must use analysis and synthesis | | \/ Systems Thinking involves both analysis and synthesis The systems world view seeks to provide an integral perspective on phenomena and events. The approach is one that - * sees a system as a complex whole of interdependent components with interacting relationships; * allows for probabilistic and possibilistic processes that can include creativity and unpredictability; * fosters communication and connection among individuals and links people with the natural world; * values diversity; * sees humans as willful/purposeful parts of a self-evolving whole; * promotes cooperation and interactivity; * sees science as a value-guided pursuit; and * is process and learning oriented. -------- 2. Evolutionary Understanding and Syntony Sense "In the beginning there was chaos, instability, inflation and radiation. Within almost infinitesimal fraction of a second the first microparticles evolved. After half a million years stable atoms - matter in the non-ionized state - appeared. Within five billion years the galaxies began to take shape and then the stars. In the last three billion years life has emerged on this earth. For the last hundred thousand years, hominid creatures with conscious minds roamed this planed. And for the several thousand years we sapiens have wondered: where have we come from - and where are we going?" - Ervin Laszlo (1996), Evolution: The General Theory. To interpret the direction and possible outcomes of the type of changes that alter the very fabric of society, we need to adopt an evolutionary perspective. Only such an approach can help us understand the dynamics of socio-cultural change and provide the insights needed to learn how to learn in new ways. The evolutionary trend in the universe specifies a fundamental flow, a "cosmic process" that manifests itself through particular events and sequences of events that are not limited to the domain of biological phenomenon but extend to include all aspects of change in open dynamic systems with a throughput of information and energy. In other words, evolution relates to the formation of stars from atoms, of homo sapiens from the anthropoid apes, as much as to the formation of complex societies from rudimentary social systems. We cannot direct the wind but we can adjust the sails. - Contemporary Western Proverb That captures the notion of evolutionary consciousness nicely. We used to go about the world, stirring up squalls and all sorts of wind-devils in our wake. We played at divination and soothsaying and examined the entrails of animals to prophesy where the winds might blow, but we did not really seek to understand the patterns from which they arose, nor how our very action and interaction on earth could affect them. Then we discovered meteorology and began to learn the art of forecasting. We became aware of the fact that climatological conditions involved a wide variety of factors, and that its processes were open to subtle influence, including the life-ways of the species living on this earth (and notably, though not largely to their credit, of homo sapiens). Now that we are becoming more conscious of the way in which the winds develop their puff, we could fancy doing several sorts of things: a) we could just go on with "life as usual," not bothering to see whether or not the storms we are weathering or the clouds on the horizon are in any way related to the way we are playing in the garden. b) we could seek to "master the winds" by designing technologies that will make weather prediction an old wives tale. With these new technologies that "seed attractors" all over the globe, we will be able to decide what weather we want to have tomorrow. No guessing any more. c) we could begin to re-develop our syntony sense. That is, we could try to listen to the winds - to learn how to read the messages they write in the sky. We could learn to flap our wings, or not, based on our understanding of the patterns in the dance of the clouds. - And we could learn to set our sails accordingly. Clearly, the "wind" metaphor is just that - a metaphor for our understanding of open dynamic systems that emerge through the manifestation of evolution. It is the pattern of evolution that we have to learn to read, and it is the consciousness as well as the ability to do so that is called the "syntony sense." We are already conscious of the evolutionary trend in the universe. Now we can seek to be conscious in the ways in which we act, so that we can act in ways that are "evolutionarily smart." That is what syntony means: the embodiment and manifestation of conscious evolution. Syntony is a purposeful creative aligning and tuning with the evolutionary flows of which we are a part. The term is currently relegated to the realms of radio engineering to denote tuning in to radio frequency signals or creating effective signal resonance by harmonizing the frequency of wave emission patterns. But it has been used by others, including Teihard de Chardin and Erich Jantsch, to denote a process central to evolutionary competence. Jantsch proclaims that "as we have learned (though not too well) to design social roles, we shall have to learn now to design systems of syntony" - Erich Jantsch (1975), Design for Evolution. "We humans are integral agents of evolution: we spearhead it on our planet and perhaps in our entire solar system. We are evolution and we are - to the extent of our power - responsible for it" - Erich Jantsch (1981), The Evolutionary Vision. Syntony does not involve bending nature to our whim (quite the opposite!). It means recognizing that we are not only the products of evolution, we are also the process. In the final analysis, we are evolution, just as much as all natural systems that emerged over the course of time are. However, we are one of the few forms that have reached levels of integration and diversification within ourselves to manifest consciousness (as far as we know.... big caveat here). We are "meta-cognitive." That is, we can reflect on the very process of our reflection. As far as science has been able to determine, no other living being has developed cognitive processes to this level. You might think this is good, but we think it's a curse! Here we are, stuck with the ability to reflect. We can think about what to do and deliberate over what is the "right" course of action and what is most desirable and most profitable or whatever. We can plan and scheme and plot. And we can choose wisely or foolishly, as can no other animal. So, to a large degree it is true that we had better learn to make this big evolutionary risk (called by some "intelligence" and by others "the stupid human being") into more than a sentient being -- we had better develop ecological intelligence (as Ralph Metzner puts it), or the risk of this emergent phenomenon called "consciousness" might prove not to have been worth the gamble.... Since we are evolution, it is absolutely correct to think of "us" making evolution conscious. If not us, then who else? And if not now, then what future are we stumbling into (or stumbling over, as we continue to stamp down this earth)? 2:4) 11-JAN-1999 19:25 Valerie Anne Brown [Edit] Thanks for an inspiring beginning - it gives a strong sense of affirmation of the way my own sails are set. But it also carries a sense of travelling with prevailing winds most of the time, which is far from the case, both generically and at present. There are important questions of how to move towards syntony and holistic thinking when discontinuities and upheavals are inevitable parts of the system; and we are led to believe (whether true or not) that we are moving through these at the fastest rate of any peoples ever. Are we seeking a Holy Grail that humans have never found, or have eras of humans (Greeks? Renaissance?)found it and lost it? How does the system link analysis and synthesis (agreed we must have both) ? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:5) 12-JAN-1999 0:03 Kathia Laszlo [Edit] Hi AC and Valerie! Yes, there are important questions on how to move toward syntony. And so far, we have only questions; we have to make the path as we walk. But we are also beginning to understand the dynamics of evolutionary processes --not only at the biological level, but the general forces of evolution that make us part of this amazing holistic continuum from particles to universe, from spirit to cosmos (and back again)-- and this understanding can guide our thinking and action in the collaborative and creative exploration of possible answers. For example, we now know that complex dynamic systems have stages of relative stability (homeostasis or flowing balance) but when they are not viable at that level, they go through a bifurcation (a period of "discontinuity and upheaval") were they have to evolve to a higher level of complexity. This new level of complexity does not resembles the previous one in any aspect: It involves structural and functional re-organization. Just think of the kind of transformation that a couple experience when expecting their first child: the evolution from couple (2) to family (3+)! (a very personally relevant example). But the bifurcation period is a chaotic one, and as the Chinese characters for chaos depict, it involves both crisis and opportunity. For me, this evolutionary understanding is a lens that helps me focus and put in perspective the changes of our times. The future is possibilistic (rather than probabilistic), is one of the insights of the sciences of complexity, and we can play an active role in the creation of positive and ethical possibilities. And although this lens does not provide answers on how to go about things, at least it gives me hope and keeps me working and learning with others. We believe that a basic evolutionary literacy is essential for individuals and groups to consciously participate in the choices that create our social systems and our futures. Just as it has been argued by many that we are living in an age of accelerating change, there is also the argument that we are the first privileged (or cursed?) generation that potentially can evolve the consciousness necessary to fully participate in the evolutionary dance. This might be also the first time that our species faces the possibility of extinction. The question is: are we willing to engage in the learning and participatory co-design that these things entail? 2:6) 12-JAN-1999 4:58 Chuck Estin I'm inspired to share a recent "AhHA" experience related to becoming a systems thinker. I was feeling holier than many of my co-teachers at my school because I was advocating the need to consider the interrelationships of everything we do at my school, simultaneously. (I'll discuss more of the details of these change processes, if anyone is interested). In any case, I was having a discussion with a systems-thinking friend about an "event" which I believed would be an important catalyst for helping change my school. My colleague expressed concern that my school has such a focus on "events". I knew that the most successful "change events" were those in which there was anticipatory preparation before the event and followup afterwards. I realized that I had limited my systems thinking to the static relationships, even though I myself teach about the evolutionary processes governing systems. I had limited myself to believing that when Mindwalk (the movie) was talking about the Newtonian clockworks view, it was only referring to the reductionist view of things being composed of simplistic mechanical components, like clocks are. In fact, Newton also created the TIME element of the Newtonian worldview, by inventing calculus, which breaks up PROCESSES into extremely small EVENTS. Calculus is very useful for breaking down complex processes so we can send rockets to the moon, etc. But when so many of us opt for the convenient concreteness of defining our lives as a series of EVENTS, we miss out on that necessary PROCESS perspective. As I realized how judgemental I had been of others, I thought about how difficult it is to teach new paradigms for ways of thinking. Old paradigms are entrenched because they have considerable utility. (At least for a technologically "successful" world...) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:7) 12-JAN-1999 13:12 Patsy L. Seo Use the systems approach and syntony to understand evolutionary possibilities, and create learning environment.Wow what a challenge. OK I am an "almost teacher" My concern first is with the involuntary student. first and second generation Hispanic and Asian students with families that support the learning environment do well.Others primarily the ecconomically deprived do not. It is not the language or the amount of goods (food, electronic toys etc.)available but the motivation. I watched a traveling Budhist monk on tv enjoy a root. It was his only meal for the day. More food, more toys squash appetite. Appreciation, which has been only been transferred from person to person, in the past, is the key. With TV and video games we can further create a greedy generation that believes in competition,instant gratification ,everything is disposable and should be free. Students want to be challenged to be responsible. But to overtax their abilities can make them give up totally.(develope a mental block) We need to look for the "learning moment" and take advantage of it. We have a responsibility to evaluate student abilities that makes it difficult for us to create a learning environment that allows the diverse students in our classes the appropiate challenge I am very enthusiastic with the "opportunity" programs at Moreno Valley High School that allow students kicked out of everywhere else one more chance to succeed. Among other things they operate a nursery for the children of students. I worked and missed many opportunities with my children growing up One of my daughters does and one does not. There are too many mothers forced to work to help feed their families. Their children are left with too much free time. Insurance companies have made it impossible for schools and even well intentioned parents to have extracurricular events on their premises without risking finacial disaster. My mother said "Idle hands do the devils handiwork" Vandilism, poor motivation are the result of boredom. Their is no greater joy than working for the future. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:8) 12-JAN-1999 13:23 AC Turner wolves and such Ervin Laszlo has packed a good amount of reading into a small text and for the most part, I recognize some very solid ideas. A holistic vision of systems sciences can only help to make constructive changes that are desperately needed as we move through our current paradigm shift. I also enjoyed his Gaian view as a welcome tribute to Lovelock. However on one idea, I'm forced to part from his company. Just a small point, but one none the less. I question the idea that reflective consciousness sets us above other species. Of animals, Laszlo states, "They, see, feel, know, but they do not know that they see, feel, and know. Nor can they manipulate their seeing and knowing by their own volition." (p. 70) He tempers this down a bit directly afterward by describing artificial systems, which I'm not sure I fully understand. His mechanistic explanation left me puzzled. My mind moved to other things till I hit this statement in the keynote address. Again questions were raised in my mind. "We are "meta-cognitive." That is, we can reflect on the very process of our reflection. As far as science has been able to determine, no other living being has developed cognitive processes to this level. You might think this is good, but we think it's a curse! Here we are, stuck with the ability to reflect. We can think about what to do and deliberate over what is the "right" course of action and what is most desirable and most profitable or whatever. We can plan and scheme and plot. And we can choose wisely or foolishly, as can no other animal." It seems to me that this is the same self assuming attitude that has propelled us as a culture to where we now stand. From there it is not difficult to say we are treading on very dangerous ground. If indeed we are a reflection of the ecosystem in which we live, then does it not seem to be arrogant in assuming that we are the only species that can claim the self-righteous position of reflective consciousness? Why must we set ourselves apart from nature? Ervin Laszlo describes other species' communication as, "... remarkably well, they depend on patterns of communication expressed in sound, gesture, and odor for carrying out integrative functions." He continues on precariously with, "Humans alone devised the symbol..." (p. 56) as if this might be a better way to communicate rather than the complex diversity and richness of using all of our senses rather than simply seeing something written on a piece of paper. It's the difference between hearing a Mozart concert being performed or looking at the sheet music. Symbols don't always cut it as being the best way to perceive information. But let's look at a better example, one that pits human reflective consciousness with that of animal reflective consciousness. They say not to anthropomorphize. (but I would argue Elisabet Sahtouris' point. "Science shudders at anthropomorphism - but what of mechanomorphism? It's really no better than secondhand anthropomorphism and isn't it more likely that nature in essence resembles one of it's own creatures than resembles the nonliving product of a creature?") But for this case, I find it difficult to imagine that we have evolved to a level of consciousness, beyond that of some of our neighbors. From my home in the North Fork drainage, tucked away along the western border of Glacier National Park, I hear the strains of voices whispering within the wind. These voices are of the Camas wolf pack and each one of these wild creatures bears the invasion of humans on their day to day lives; they are all fitted with radio collars. We track them up and down, in and out of every drainage watching them move, hunt, and mate, attempting to understand their lives. (Yet we are no closer to understanding ourselves let alone wolves.) When you hear these voices rise and fall, back and forth across drainages you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are speaking to one another. I have lived here for all of my life, longer than the wolves themselves, but still I cannot understand what those voices say. Not so long ago, biologists Joe Fontaine (USFS) and Mike Jimenez (USFWP), watched a very curious thing with regards to the wolf. Three grizzly bears invaded a spring time den. Despite the best efforts of defending the pups, the mother and her young were killed. The biologists were on the scene as soon as her collar showed no life signs. They assessed the attack, very easy to read in the snow and then hunkered down to see what the rest of the pack might think when they returned. According to the scientists the wolves ran around howling and raising a ruckus. They both agreed that the reaction was stunningly similar to that of humans grieving, except much louder (they joked, trying to be scientists). They were not prepared for what happened next. The wide-ranging wolf packs began gathering from all over northwest Montana and even Idaho. Within a few days, the wolves set out on a beeline tracking those three grizzlies, biologists trailing along. When the biologists found those bears (also radio collared), there wasn't much left. (The Missoulian, 1992) I would be anthropomorphisizing if I were to say the words wolves and revenge, so I lean toward reflective consciousness instead. But who's to believe a couple of biologists, who are obviously concerned with preserving wolves anyway? There are many accounts and stories told from many sources of how wolves have developed levels of consciousness that rivals human culture. I can't help but to sympathize with the Alpha female wolf who was forced to stop and give birth out in the Alaskan tundra. In the meantime the rest of the pack brought her snowshoe hares and stood by to guard against any wandering-by grizzlies. Such a lovely story, evokes a very unscientific empathy ... one that I'm not certain many humans would emulate. Is this preservation or reflective consciousness? Or look at other evolved species - dolphins and whales. At one time they could communicate over areas much larger than we could even conceive. With such a system, how can we assume they don't have reflective consciousness? Perhaps this is because we humans have done very little in trying to understand what our neighbors are saying to one another, let alone what they might have to say to us. For me, I will hold judgment until I learn to understand the doings of my neighbors a little better. And as writer Rick Bass said, "May we all never be judged by anything so harshly or held to as strict a life or unremitting of borders as the ones we try to place on and around wolves." (p. ix) Or, for that matter, any species with which this planet has graced us with their presence. Bass, Rick. (1992) The Ninemile Wolves. Livingston, MT: Clark City Press Laszlo, Ervin. (1996) The Systems View of the World: A Holistic Vision for our Time. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press Devlin, Sherry. (1992) The Missoulian, The Ninemile Wolves Sahtouris, Elisbet. Earthdance http://ratical.com/LifeWeb Orr, David W. (1992). Ecological Literacy: Education and the transition to a Postmodern world. Albany, NY: SUNY Press ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:9) 12-JAN-1999 13:51 Laurel Q Anderson I am very much a newcomer to this material and a bit overwhelmed by it. I am still confused over the meaning of "Syntony" Would someone elaborate a bit for me or refer me for more information. Thanks ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:10) 12-JAN-1999 15:46 Marsha Snow Morgan Laurel, in my experience even after being around this material for awhile it is continually challenging. Somehow that ever present challenge becomes part of the ambiguity that keeps us from complacency. The point that A.C. brings to us is an example. I know that A.C. understands very well the theory of systems and I also know that she lives systems in ways that make her direct comments compelling. I listen when she speaks because she can make distinctions between our assumed models of systems and the realness of life. It prevents the model becoming modelism just as we remember that the word is never the same as what it attempts to describe. Now I will go back and look at reflective consciousness anew. As humans we may do something differently that our fellows, yet is it entirely unique or more evolved? Spell of the Sensuous by David Abrams here I am for a re-read and more to the immediate I listen more carefully to the bird call in the garden. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:11) 12-JAN-1999 17:09 Chuck Estin Marsha's comments make sense, about the value in re-examining our understandings (of reflective consciousness). Engaging in that reprocessing is the reason we are all in this conference. I'd like to comment on AC's reference to human forms of communication "as if this might be a better way to communicate rather than the complex diversity and richness of using all of our senses rather than simply seeing something written on a piece of paper". One of my systems principles is to not take an EITHER/OR approach. Egs: It's not the big picture which is right, and the reductionist details picture which is wrong, but there is a greater perspective achieved by continually going back and forth between the two. BALANCE (Syntony?). Evolutionarily, humans are a more complex development than wolves; our brains HOLARCHICALLY contain those of wolves. We would benefit by "both modes" of communication. just as the participants in this conference are getting something out of this highly symbolized form of communication, despite inherent inadequacies in attempting to communicate without being in the physical presence of one another. They say that words comprise only 10% of the total communication which occurs when two people talk together in person. We should be reaching back to our ancestral past to revive intuitive (HEART) and telepathic (SOUL) forms of communication to augment the "HEAD" focus of modernity. The POWER of influencing reality by symbolic manipulation of information is a benefit of human reflective consciousness capabilities. Unfortunately, there is a RESPONSIBILITY which accompanies that power. I believe we are in this challenging position because of the potential for growth. Just as teenagers acquire opportunities for growth along with the power to make decisions which seriously impact their lives. We create our opportunities for evolution. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:12) 12-JAN-1999 17:33 A. James Hillelson This is Rev. A. James Hillelson (Jim) I am "reflective" as to how much knowledge, understanding and seeking that are described in the various conference responses. I will not suggest that I have a true comprehension of the material already shared, but I do have a comment or two. As already stated, I believe through experience with animals that they, too, are reflective through indicators such as body language, reaction and response to their environment which includes human interaction. I do not believe that humanity is the only source of life on this planet with a reflective consciousness. Research has been done with plants that are either nurished or oppressed by the relationship of their environment and that of humans. This is a reflective response. Even though the scientific knowledge has not been measured to the degree that states that other life-giving forms have reflective consciousness, each human being has experiences daily that will prove this theory. Perhaps it is the awareness consciousness through this kind of educational process that will allow for the experiences to be reflected upon. All of us miss so much in our daily experiences of life due to being unconscious or perhaps not having a particular interest in the interrelatedness of all life forms on our planet as well as the spiritual dynamics involved. Of course, we all have our part in the "...greater plan on earth." Self-righteous attitudes do exist in most of us, but this is not a judgement. It is an awareness that further knowledge is needed through scientific research and human experience. ('the more we know, the more we realize we don't know.') Let us all seek to focus on the righteous thought that an open mind to all possibilities is not a danger. It is an opportunity to explore, discover and create knowledge through inspiration and experience. As we merge science and spirituality, many keys will be given to open the next door(s) to future scientific concepts, theories and idealogy will spring forth into the minds of humanity. Included in this will be the spiritually progressive thought, Universal Laws at work, personal,etc. Systems ethics and integrity will shift to a more positive and equally based focus and all positive human endeavour will promote the achievement of integrative wholeness through individual awareness and the healing of humanity en masse. The union of science and spirituality will extend the necessary keys to shift the evolutionary tide of all life on our planet. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:13) 12-JAN-1999 17:51 Sharon G. Solloway The wolf story is one I haven't heard. I have read Abram's book and have been thinking about it off and on for several months. As a result, I picked up two books on shamanism. One by Wade Davis, SHADOWS IN THE SUN: TRAVELS TO LANDSCAPES OF SPIRIT AND DESIRE, has an bit of information I find as intriguing as the wolf story. It seems that there exists in the Amazon shaman who can distinguish between two plants that are so similar that a trained botanist cannot tell the difference without a microscrope. As a trained botanist, Wade Davis, traveled to the Amazon and lived with these people. Just how do the people know which plants to mix together and ingest to produce particular effects and do it safely? The plants they work with are highly toxic when mixed in particular quantities and pairings. But the shaman never makesa mistake. Trial and error could not account for their accuracy. The innovative combinations preclude trial and error as a basis for accounting for this accuracy. The people themselves account for this accuracy as the matter of fact stories of how these plants came to be know to their ancestors. Davis writes, "As a scientist I had been taught not to take these myths literally. but they do suggest a certain delicate balance, the thoughts of a people who do not distinguish the supernatural from the mundane. The Indians believe in the power of plants, accept the existence of magic, acknowledge the potency of the spirit. Magical and mystical ideas enter the very texture fof their thinking. Their botanical knowledge cannot be separated from their metaphysics. Even the way they order and label their world is different." He goes on to say that they use the "tone and key of the incatations that plants sing when taken on the night of a full moon" as the criteria for distinguising plants that otherwise could not be distinguished one from the other by taste, or sight or smell. Literally, the shaman listens like would would listen to bird calls, and knows the distinct song of one plant over another. With all that we know, can we hear plants sing? Are these shaman the embodiment of "syntony"? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:14) 12-JAN-1999 17:57 Shirley P. Grover I understand that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts...and being a "whole to part learner", I think that I can perceive the interrelatedness of the parts to the whole. So a systems approach seems to make sense in attempting to help change the limitations of schools and to orchestrate more potentialities...however, school structures have permitted few to see the whole from within or without. In trying to "broaden the view", we have flattened our organization and are working to build a democracy by promoting cooperation among teachers, students and parents within learning units through self managing teaching teams, kid councils and parent councils. We are finding that valuing diversity is easier for people to speak rather than practice. We know it is an evolutionary process, but it can be disheartening for some and agitating for others who tend to want to return to old models anyway. Since evolution is a slow process, perhaps we need to link people with the natural world to help promote cooperation? On the other hand, it may be that we have identified the components of a structure we think is good to build a dynamic learning community and identified roles in support of defined functions, but, we may not have found the answers to how to make it happen...or we are simply impatient and unwilling to witness the "dying of more trees" due to lack of nutrients and/or "proper environment". Any suggestions? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:15) 12-JAN-1999 18:38 Alexander Laszlo What excellent, thoughtful, and thought-provoking interactions here! My gosh, I want to reflect a bit on all of this and respond with equal thought and attention. Give me a moment and I'll be back -- Kathia and I have an appointment at the hospital in half an hour and that's not enough time to do justice to the flow going on here. As soon as I return I'll get on line and we'll take up the issues of flow, process, consciousness, syntony, learning, and community (among other things!). Don't wait for me, though!!! Cheers, - Alex&er P.S. and don't worry -- I won't be writing a treatise when I return!! I prefer making short comments that stimulate lively dialogue than doing the long-winded thing. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:16) 12-JAN-1999 19:32 David Liscio The notion that shaman embody syntony isn't so far off the beaten track. Mark Plotkin, the ethnobotanist who wrote "Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice," based on his 16 years of living with so-called witch doctors in the Amazon, expresses similar thoughts. As for the idea that man is not the only being with a reflective consciousness, that should be the starting point for all discussion on the topic. Anything less is egocentric and akin to believing earth is the only planet to sustain intelligent life forms. AC's wolf story is certainly a fine example. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:17) 12-JAN-1999 21:16 Patsy L. Seo During the Korean War my husband's sister died of appendicitis because she had only a Shamman to treat her. I think Holistic medicine is superior to Traditional western medicine. We need the knowledge of plants of the rain forest witchdoctor. We need the knowledge of human anatomy of western medicine. We need the knowledge of acupunture points of eastern medicine. Appreciation, is accepting truth in all the different facets of diverse life on earth. The shamman developes his telepathy and empathy in the way we develope our knowledge of the theories of science. We need to recognize and save all the hard earned knowledge of people everywhere. Not "Americanize"all americans and peoples eveywhere to compete for the "average" TV audience. We need to foster our dynamic diversity with respect and appreciation. If harmony is achieved with ignorance it is not worth the price. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:18) 12-JAN-1999 21:31 Gabriella Solis First of all, congratulations for the baby, as I told you in my introduction I´ve got 4, what an experience! I´m interested in the applications of the "tools", specially in knowing how to design Evolutionary Learning Communities.My work at school has to do with leadership, and the focus I´m exploring through TIESMEd. program is Leadership in Holistic Education. From my first research I realised that we should create a Learning community, I´ve read some information, but I would like to learn more about the theme before jumping into the pool. I have shifted a lot of ideas I used to have before, but there are still some to be changed. The wind metaphor you told us before, has helped me to be more clear about the process of change. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:19) 12-JAN-1999 21:58 Gabriella Solis I read AC story about the wolves and honestly made me think. Now talking about shamans, when I was reading The Web of Life, an idea came to my mind: so what shamans do when they communicate with the spirit of either a plant or an animal is to connect themselves to its pattern of relationships, syntonize in the same frequency and receive the information. How do they do this? Answer: ancient secrets... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:20) 12-JAN-1999 23:43 Marsha Snow Morgan This conversation is not an easy one to leave as I go about my daily tasks. It seems to follow me by seeping into my consciousness. I have been reading about neurons as they move into dynamic oscillations so maybe it is more that just the feeling or old fashioned description of "seeping in". As I return to this area there are even more comments that require the combination of grokking and detailed observation. I wanted to pick up on your introductory comments, Alexander and Kathia. I laughed when I read you interchange about who is pregnant. When my older children were born the very statement of a couple being pregnant would have been shocking. Now it seems we are finally beginning to see the truth of that fact. Clearly Kathia is the one with the obvious changes in her body and they are mighty ones. Yet, if we relate these processes that are transforming each of you individually and the two of you together can it not be just as powerful a change in consciousness in Alexander? If we consider consciousness to be an openess to the world, and humbly step around the reflective part of the definition, can we not imagine that in fact Alexander is very great with child in his every comment? Research coming from the direction of Candice Pert states strongly that the nervous, endocrine, and immune systems are neworks interconnected by peptides ( why just these three?). We know that our thoughts can change bodily structures within their patterns of organization. Perhaps each parent maintains their own pattern of organization as they bring forth a baby yet each one's structure may change in obvious and subtle ways. In denying this process occurring within the father have we created a difficulty for both parents as well as a loving community around a child to accept the response ability of parenting? Am I awkwardly trying to describe a pregnant consciousness? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:21) 13-JAN-1999 0:02 Alexander Laszlo Chuck mentions in 2:6) "... when so many of us opt for the convenient concreteness of defining our lives as a series of EVENTS, we miss out on that necessary PROCESS perspective." This shift if focus is subtle but it sure changes things (I mean, flows!)! Patsy in 2:7) says "Appreciation, which has been only been transferred from person to person, in the past, is the key," and I quite agree: appreciation is key. That is what the shaman does. True emapthy, like true listening, is almost a lost art (so much so that we use slogans like "teach tolerance" when what we really need to do is to "teach empathy" and "teach appreciation." Yes. AC write eloquently of wolves and such in 2:7). There is much food for thought there. Let's look at some of the key issues, one at a time. First, with regard to meta-cognitive abilities, I would be most interested in what he has to say about the section of Fritjof's presentation in which he deals with this same issue. I don't think Fritjof is saying anything different from what E. Laszlo says or from what we presented in our introductory keynote. However, just to clarify, I don't think that any of us would say that "reflective consciousness sets us above other species." To say so would be to say that we are better than other animals (and yes, let's be sure to call ourselves animals, for we are not anything else). No one is making such a judgement call. However, we are saying that the ability to abstract, to engage in what Chris Argyris and Donald Schon calls double-loop learning (and what Gregory Bateson further developed as triple-loop learning), and in short, to know that we know (as Fritjof put it) -- these things are not only most developed in human beings, but are also what characterizes them, by and large. Now, this is not to say that other sentient beings are not conscious, nor is it to say that there is a clear cut demarcation between where such levels of consciousness emerge -- it's a fuzzy scale, with many animals showing evidence of these abilities, and many humans showing evidence for the lack of them!!! Animals "know" much more about appropriateness than do we (or so it seems to me). With our increasing estrangement from nature (by way of technology and the societies and social relations we build through it), we have lost this sense of appropriateness, this syntony sense, that animals so clearly have. (Of course, as with all such generalizations, there are many exceptions: many humans have remarkably highly developed syntony sense, while some animals seem to act without it -- although more often than not, they tend to be domesticated or otherwise in close proximity to humans.) Your example of wolves, AC, is an excellent way to think about beings with highly developed syntony sense -- not in terms of revenge or reprisal, but in terms of a response that had "goodness of fit" with the flows of which they were a part. In 2:9) Laurel asks for more on Syntony. What's it all about? Well, there's a good way of thinking about it. But I'm going to keep you in suspenders about it until the next posting because I don't want to make this one too long. In my next post I'll get into syntony a bit (promise). Marsha, in 2:10) you ground us again in listening and learning *with* each other, and for sure, with our fellows (and even beyond that, with the flows of change of which we are a part -- with the cosmic song). As AC pointed to the wolves, Theodore Xenophone Barber (I just love his name!) pointed to the incredible intelligence of birds in his "The Human Nature of Birds: A Scientific Discovery with Startling Implications." And isn't all this showing us that we are *not* special, or rather, that *all* creatures are special -- each in their own ways. That's the key, I think. We have just to learn with them, and certainly there is much we can learn *from* them, too. Syntony is just one such thing. Chuck!!! Balance!! Syntony! Yes!!!!! When, in 2:11), Chuck says that "One of my systems principles is to not take an EITHER/OR approach. Egs: It's not the big picture which is right, and the reductionist details picture which is wrong, but there is a greater perspective achieved by continually going back and forth between the two. BALANCE (Syntony?)," all I can say is Yes! or else risk simply quoting all of what he wrote. And oh my gosh, THIS is what syntony is all about: "We should be reaching back to our ancestral past to revive intuitive (HEART) and telepathic (SOUL) forms of communication to augment the "HEAD" focus of modernity." Nicely said, Chuck. "We create our opportunities for evolution." That too. Thanks for the reflections on reflective consciousness, Rev. Jim. All I might add to what you so eloquently write about in 2:12) is, that's the spirit! 2:13) Sharon. These shaman. How tremendous! And are they the embodiment of syntony? I would say, yes - definitely! Gosh, just think how much we have to learn from these people! And we have just as much to learn from the wolves! The fact is that most of us, through the bane of civilization, have lost our syntony sense (which I will describe more in my next post -- I haven't forgot, Laurel!). We have it, but it's become such an atrophied little thing that we rarely can even find it. Like listening to bird calls... or to wolf howls... or to whale songs... or to the wind. *AND* make sense of it, learn from it, understand our relations to all of it, just by doing so. There are people who can do this, and most animals live this way. We can revive our syntony sense. Through intention. Awareness. Listening (with all of ourselves). I just read something about gentle birth options written by Frederick Leboyer in his "Birth Without Violence." What he says could be applied to how we could learn to interact with all things we meet, not just with newborn babies: "Only a little patience and humility. A little silence. Unobtrusive but real attention. Awareness of the newcomer as a person. Unselfconsciousness." Being and becoming - with. In 2:14) Shirley draws our attention back to issues of education and the creation of learning environments that can manifest the orientations we are working with here. How do we make it happen? Let's explore this a bit. Is it a matter of "making" it happen, or of creating the conditions for it to emerge? Can we design change for others, or must those who will live the change be involved in the process of its creation? And what is a learning community, and beyond that, an evolutionary learning community? What could that be, and how could we foster it? David reminds us to watch our hubris in 2:16). Yes indeed, and let's learn what it takes to couple the responsibilities we have with the responsAbilities we need to live in dynamic harmony with all that changes and flows with us and through us on this big little planet. And Patsy's back in 2:17), reminding us that "Appreciation, is accepting truth in all the different facets of diverse life on earth." This goes hand in hand with the notion of appropriateness. She further suggests that "We need to foster our dynamic diversity with respect and appreciation. If harmony is achieved with ignorance it is not worth the price." (I, for one, agree.) And Gabriella provides a bridge in 2:18): a bridge to what we could turn to focus on next. I've been "talking" for a while now (and I have still to do the syntony post), so I'm going to step aside and Kathia will jump in (as she is eagerly letting me know she's ready to do). She will be moving on to this concern of designing ELC (Evolutionary Learning Community). So I'll sign of here, collect some notes, and be back in a flash with the syntony thing. Then it's over to Kathia. Oh, and two more... In 2:19), Gabriella write of these "ancient secrets" that the shaman knows and the wolves live (and know, too -- sorry AC). So here I am, unwilling to accept that these secrets are unknowable, unsharable, by more of us. It's not a question of unlocking them with science, nor is it a questions of "knowing" them rationally. At least, that's certainly not all there is to it, and over rationalization or over analysis could lead us further away from the type of true understanding the shaman gleens. Still, we can learn..... That's the syntony quest! And Marsha. All I can say is Ho! Cheers! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:22) 13-JAN-1999 0:51 Alexander Laszlo So what's this here thing called syntony all about. You already have a more formal definition in the introductory keynote, with reference to Erich Jantsch and Teihard de Chardin. So now let me wax metaphorical... Whether or not you are a jazz fan you most likely have had the opportunity to observe a group of jazz musicians play improvisations in a "jam" session. In these sessions, nobody leads, and yet everybody leads. In fact, the leader trades off from one musician to another, each sharing in the co-creation of harmony. That's quite different from more orchestrated musical productions where they read music from a score that predetermines the arrangement of the harmonies. In the terms that Fritjof used in his audio interview, human systems tend to arrange themselves like orchestras (just think of the traditional school!), while ecological systems tend to be more like jam sessions. Let's look at an example of what a human system of syntony would be like. To describe it, I want to use a set of images presented in a corporate advertizement I once saw on television. The commercial began with a classical music quintet performing a beautiful piece of chamber music. The black of the tuxes, gowns, and music stands of the two violinists, violist, cellist, and flutist created a nice contrast with the all white space in which they played. And they played beautifully, weaving their melodies together in a harmony of classical counterpoint. Then, all of a sudden, a basket ball came sailing in from off stage, bounced once, and landed right in the cellist's lap! The startled cellist stopped playing immediately as did the other musicians who all stared incredulously at the basket ball. The cellist looked at his companions, shrugged once, got up and began dribbling the ball. The other musicians looked at each other quickly, put down their instruments, and got up to join the now former cellist. They all moved off to the right, their instruments and stands quickly forgotten and fading out of view. Soon the five of them were passing the basket ball back and forth in ways that would have made the Harlem Globe Trotters green with envy. As when they were playing music, their motions seemed to flow in a graceful harmony of interdependence and partnership. Then, just as they were really getting into it, a trapeze bar swung in from off stage and almost hit the former flutist in the head, but in the last minute she reached up and grabbed it. The others stopped to look at her, and the one with the basket ball just let it drop and roll off. She looked back at her partners, shrugged once, and began to swing, and as she did, the others moved with her as one, the scene fading out as the commercial ended. This little story illustrates syntony within a group. All five "players" acted in unison, although each did their own thing. And when something in their environment changed, they neither ignored nor reacted against it, but instead immediately adapted to it. They didn't have to stop for long discussions of the pros and cons of one course of action or another, to analyze, plan, or argue the strengths and weaknesses of one option over another, and they didn't have to go off to training seminars to learn how to deal with change. They learned together, "on the job" as it were, and in dynamic interaction with each other and their environment. Wouldn't it be excellent if we were able to cope with uncertainty and change like this group did - at work, in our teams and partnerships; at school, in our study groups and classes; at home, in our families and communities? Actually, it wouldn't. That is to say, while it might be a nice improvement over the way we lead our often fragmented and disjunct lives in contemporary Western societies, it just wouldn't be enough to make things different. You see, the people in that story demonstrated the essence of syntony - of harmonizing with, and tuning in to, each other - but they did so only *among themselves*. They were totally out of syntony with their environment. Whenever they were challenged by a change in their environment, they simply shrugged and adapted *to* it. In short, they reacted. Where were they going with this pattern of adapting to anything that came their way? I have no idea, and I'm fairly sure they didn't either. So while they may have been very much in syntony with each other - fluidly co-creating patterns of behavior among themselves - they did not go the extra step required of true systems of syntony: they did not co-create *with* their evolving environment. See you tomorrow - Alex&er ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:23) 13-JAN-1999 1:48 A. James Hillelson Alexander, syntony is a new word in my vocabulary and yet it certainly entertains the concepts and ideology that has received my active involvement in religion/spirituality, education, science and the human relationships that I continue to form. Syntony is a simple word with a complex definition and an even more complex dynamic of actualizing the breadth of its meaning. How do we begin to work with syntony in education? I would like to specifics from those who have worked with this concept in any area of life enhancing endeavours. I will say good-night to all, until tomorrow. Many blessings. Rev. Jim ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:24) 13-JAN-1999 5:35 Patsy L. Seo The scientific method is my gold standard. The object is to observe.Analyze and Make a theory. Test the theory when it fails start over observe make a theory . We learn by trying to understand our failures and our successes. The child within must be detached or objective in observation. You can not listen to the sound of the birds or of the wind if the child within is threatened. You must be quiet to listen. Then if we are secure, we can as did the musicians who switched from music to basketball give ourself to the task at hand. There is no greater joy than to lose oneself in this way. Schools that are threatened by violence and lack of community support and adolescents who lack purpose and place in life can not be secure within. They need more than others to listen observe and rationally meet the truth. Emotions will not allow it to happen. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:25) 13-JAN-1999 7:28 John Scott Fowler How incredibly rich! Alexander, thanks for calling me over here.I hardly know where to begin.Yesterday on of my students came in with a beautiful sweater, rich in mauve, yellows, deep sky blues, and shades of red. Like the place where the river meets the mountain, it was difficult to totally identify boundaries. This dialogue makes clear that such rigidity may be impossible. Isn't that part of evolutionary thinking...realizing that boundaries and distinctions, though valuable, are fleeting patterns? I love the way you brought that out with reference to the mathemtaics of transition, Kathia, 1.e. 1+1 =3. Isn't that always the case in a transformative situation? And conversely aren't all situations transformative at some level? AC, thanks for sharing the wolves! We all know how social they are but you have brought home their depth.I live in the Rockies in what I think is a more populous area than yours. Here we see elk wandering throughout our small mountain acre on a regular basis. I am beginning to establish a relationship with them. I can peek around the garage corner, see a female at the other end and murmur a hello without interrupting her grazing. This is a small instance of syntony, particularly so because we are now aware of the dangers of species extinction, a phenomena our native ancestors had not conceived at the levels which face us. Evolutionary literacy seems to involve many layers. For me, communication, perhaps first incarnate in the hydrogen atom is key. When I work with children with the Time Line of Light, I tell the story of the primordial hydrogen atom, emrging from a primordial proton which is then joined by a primordial electron perhaps a hundred thousand years later. The relative spatial distance between these two energetic events of proton and neutron is a huge. Using a model employing the home plate of a basebal diamond and a proton the size of a grain of sand, we walk the 300 plus feet of radius to where we would find the orbitng path of the electron . I ask ,"How would the electron know what to do? How would it keep moving around the proton?" Every year somebody soon offers that they must be in communication. This is primal, this is relationship, and this is part of what I take you to mean by syntony, Alexander and Kathia, to be communicating across what appear as boundaries. Shamanic? Absolutley! Describable? Of course! Teilhard de Chardin called this fundamental communication proto-communication. Isn't this a constant potential and possibility? The call of evolution if not the wild?:-)This simple awareness, that comunication is primal, seems to be a catalyst for children to open thenselves to the many possibilities of self expression, it as if the suggestion of openenness and the metpahors of the evolutionary language invite them to greater diversity within themselves. They respond through an effulgence of the emergent self. With many thnaks for who you are.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:27) 13-JAN-1999 7:42 Sharon G. Solloway Like Marsha, this discussion moves with me in my other activities and calls me back to my computer, and I want to write more than there is time for....BUT, responding to Patsy's, "Emotions will not allow it to happen." K. Oatley has a book entitled, THE BEST LAID SCHEMES: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF EMOTIONS. Briefly, the author seeks to expose false premises upon which the emotion/cognition dichotomy rest. The basic definition for emotion in this author's work is one that defines emotion as having at it's core an underlying metal state of readiness for action or a change of action. Emotions signal the various systems of being that a change may be necessary to keep everything in balance. Thinking that has been valued as "adult" thinking has been structured to fit a frame that excludes responding to a circumstance "subjectively" with a full range of congruence witn inner experience. Being an "adulti" has meant controlling inner experience and traditionally this has been associated with being "male." And also associated with "scientific, objective, rational" thinking. This privileges one way of knowing over another. Which I think syntony (if I understand it...this is a new word for me) would not embrace. Other recent neurological research points to the idea that we are incapable of making decisions when emotion is completely taken out of the picture (Antonio Damasio, DESCARTES' ERROR: EMOTION, REASON AND THE HUMAN BRAIN). Perhaps, what syntony calls for, what is needed is a kind of prescence that does not exclude anything that is happening in the moment, but that includes in a way that allows the "appreciation" of each....or another way to say it is that what is needed is a kind of prescence that excludes anything that would preclude the appreciation of every aspect of what is in the moment ....perhaps synthony is a kind of mindfulness....Gunaratana, MINDFULNESS IN PLAIN ENGLISH, describes this kind of presence as "...a completely different way to look at the universe. It is a level of functioning where the mind does not try to freeze time, where we do notgrasp onto our experience as it flows by, where we do nto try to block thingsout andignore them...it is a learnable skill."...(thanks to all of you, for your stimulating thoughts, they certainly give me reason for pause...and reflection) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:28) 13-JAN-1999 12:18 Doralice L. De Souza As I think about the concepts discussed so far I have been wondering how you would implement these ideas in the education of school-age children. Lets suppose that you were going to work with urban low and middle class children. How would your learning environment look like? How much freedoom and structure would you allow to children in this environment? How would you make sure the students would develop the skills they need to be life-long learners and also, if they want to, to pursue their own education in "competitive colleges?" (e.g. MIT, Stanford, Harvard). I know these are very hard questions--I have been struggling with them for a long period of time. But would you please share with me some of your thoughts on them? I would love to hear not only from the presenters but also from anyone else interested in the issues that my questions might bring up. Thanks! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:29) 13-JAN-1999 13:01 Marie Ruffolo What a privilege to be among such wordly scholars. There have been numerous points to which I had wanted to respond; however, they continued changing with my reading of each new post. For the sake of brevity, I will keep my response limimted to a few paragraphs. Elizabet Sahtouris writes in her book, "Earthdance," retrievable at http://www.ratical.org/LifeWeb, a must-read, that humankind is still in its adolescent stage, standing on the brink of adulthood. She states:"The proposal made in this bok is that we see ourselves in the context of our planet's biological evolution as a still new, experimental species with developmental states that paralell the stages of our individual development. From this perspetive humanity is now in adolescent crisis and, just because of that, stands on the brink of maturity-in a position to achieve true humanity in the full meaning of that word. Like an adolescent in trouble, we have tended to let our focus on the crisis itself or on the frantic search for particular political, economic, scientific, or spiritual solutions depress us and blind us to the larger picture to avenues of real assistance. If we humbly seek help instead from the nature that spawned us, we will find biological clues to solving all our biggest problems at once. We will see how to make the healthy transition into maturity" (Sahtouris, 1995, Chapter 1 of website). Dovetailing on a post I should have bookmarked, perhaps this "gamble" with evolutionary consciousness, or "self-awareness," (of consciousness)is a test to determine if we are worthy of continuing our species. Metaphorically, we are a bunch of teenagers trusted with the family car. The future of independent transportation will be judged on our responsibility or irresponsibility. The same is true for humankind. Utilizing [the] Lazlo's theory on "syntony," we must reconnect with the nuance in nature, taking with it clues on how to solve our most serious problems. As a result, we get to keep the family car: Planet Earth. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:30) 13-JAN-1999 13:37 Chris Bering So much to read! I am downloading now...will return with response later! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:31) 13-JAN-1999 14:14 Kathia Laszlo Thank you all for all the weaving of rich ideas. This is very stimulating! Before we started to use and further develop the concept of syntony, we were only making reference to processes of evolutionary learning (i.e., creative, innovative, and integrative learning that is radically different from the kind of maintenance learning focused on what is already known). But the word "learning" means different things for different people: Sometimes learning cannot be disassociated from teaching, or is taken as a synonym of teaching. Sometimes learning cannot be disassociated from schools, or is limited to a process for children and youth. Sometimes learning is limited to cognitive and verbal processes that can only handle data and knowledge but not understanding and wisdom (Alexander will share his wonderful "pyramid of meaning" that clarifies beautifully this point). So we are very interested in expanding the notion of learning, not only conceptually but also in the way we experience it throughout our lives, and syntony seems to be a means for doing so. Bela H. Banathy (my dear advisor) in his book DESIGNING SOCIAL SYSTEMS IN A CHANGING WORLD says: "The greatest source of change in social systems is the [process of] learning." As F. Capra said in his interview, living systems are learning systems. We have to remember this! Learning is an intrinsic part of our lives. But we need to learn to learn in new ways, just as "we need to learn to think in a new way" (Einstein). As educators and as learners, we all have had experiences that make us have mixed feelings about education: on the one hand, we see all the problems and deficiencies that our educational systems have; on the other, we also see the potential that education holds for a better world. The current dominant educational system was created last century to meet the needs of a society that does not exist anymore. Contemporary society is changing rapidly and global challenges, such as peace and environmental sustainability, demand competencies and values relevant for the new millennium. Yet, a host of initiatives on the "improvement," "reform," or "restructuring" of education are still focused on making adjustments to the existing system rather than on thinking afresh and designing new systems for life-long learning and the development of human potential. But education can be much more than what is now. Following Phil Gang's ideas on holistic education, we characterize education from a systems perspective as the facilitation of life-long learning processes that: (1) foster connection and integration among all knowledge areas as well as between theory and practice; (2) create a vision of the universe in which all things and beings are interconnected; (3) promote a global perspective and a sense of unity in diversity among all human beings; (4) empower individuals and groups to participate in the decisions that affect their lives and their futures; and (5) develop the values, competencies, and sensitivities to live in harmony with each other and with our natural environment. These five characteristics of education imply systemic and evolutionary understanding (1&2), community orientation (3), social systems design competence (4), and syntony sense (5) as part of the experiential learning process in which we are engaged individually and collectively throughout our lives. What do you think? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:32) 13-JAN-1999 14:21 Philip Snow Gang Kathia, your posting opens the door for people with experience in this arena to tell their stories. Doralice, the only place I have seen this kind of learning actualized is in a Montessori setting. However not all Montessori settings really understand how to do it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:33) 13-JAN-1999 18:04 Shirley P. Grover Thank you Kathia, this helps...the components may be identified, now what does the structure look like and do we know the "how to" and "what" to do? Then, of course, follows the mediation with those in the environment...all in different places with different perceptions. Within a Montessori program, there is a well defined structure (some say too much) and believers in the espoused consistent practices. Agreeing that diversity does not mean "Americanizing" others...or Montessorizing all schools, I would like to find the tools with which to build a shared understanding of education among a diverse assembly. Dialoguing is a start, creative brainstorming, lateral thinking extend...but they are not enough to anchor people through the change process...other than through a slow evolution where the transformation is not felt. So do you know of such tools? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:34) 13-JAN-1999 18:53 Chris Fritz Here reading and my mind seems so small to absorb everything right now...it feels more like a stone and not a sponge. Will be back with reflections. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:35) 13-JAN-1999 20:54 A. James Hillelson I am now back on for the first time today and it doesn't take long for the mind to feel overloaded from the scholarly dialogue that is being presented. Never the less, when reading Kathia's thoughts regarding "learning," I ask for discussion on the way in which we may know the learning style of ourselves and others as part of the whole to transform educational practices. Humanity accesses different parts of the brain and in different ways depending upon the individual. These styles can be characterized to a point, but it isn't clear just what kind of setting or environemnt or the teaching style allows for the differences. I am a visual and experiential learner. It's 'show and do.' Other people are more auditory and we are all sensory, as we utilize most of our senses in the complex learning system within us. Of course, each one of us learns from the wholeness of the sensory but are more prone toward either being a visual or auditory learner. There may be other valuable senses that come into play, as well. We all learn from experience whether consiously or unconsciously. It is not that difficult to recognize the learning style of ourselves, but it is challenging to define the style of another. Has scientific research been completed that teaches the recognition of learning styles? Once this educational process is integrated, then how do we offer education as a whole integrative approach to the different learning styles? Your thoughts and responses will be most appreciated. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:36) 14-JAN-1999 0:16 Alexander Laszlo Good, we're starting to get down. We're moving ahead on the learning flow of Conceptualize -> Crystallize -> Concretize -> Create. I'd say we're sort of moving into the Crystallize phase.... Anyway, here are a few thoughts and reflections and questions to help us along. Just to add another take on syntony and listening and learning, and to pick up on the issue of how syntony relates to such orientations as mindfulness and voluntary simplicity, let's delve just a little bit more into the issue appropriateness. "The idea of 'appropriateness' is central to the Indian experience of the natural world," says N. Scott Momaday in by Lawrence M. Hinman. He explains that in the Indian worldview writ large, appropriateness is "a basic understanding of right within the framework of relationships, and, within the framework of that relationship ... between man and the physical world. That which is appropriate within this context is that which is natural." He tells a story about appropriateness that is probably the best way to communicate how it is lived. This is what he tells: "There was a man living in a remote place on the Navajo reservation (in Southern Utah) who had lost his job and was having a difficult time making ends meet. He had a wife and several children. As a matter of fact, his wife was expecting another child. One day a friend came to visit him and perceived that his situation was bad. The friend said to him "Look, I see that you're in tight straits. I see you have many mouths to feed, that you have no wood and that there is very little food in your larder. But one thing puzzles me. I know you're a hunter, and I know, too, there are deer in the mountains very close at hand. Tell me, why don't you kill a deer so that you and your family might have fresh meat to eat?" And after a time the man replied, "No, it is inappropriate that I should take life just now when I am expecting the gift of life."" We might say that this man was "in touch" with his world, and that is the same as saying he is in syntony with it. Understanding syntony as evolutionary mindfulness seems to accord with this sense of appropriateness, of goodness of fit. It is clearly a moral sense as well, as Momaday points out: "There is this moral aspect, and it refers to perfect alignment. The appropriation of both images into one reality is what the Indian is concerned to do: to see what is really there, but also to see what is *really* there." Okay, this starts to get a bit cryptic, but we can try to understand this "perfect alignment" by considering the two visions of the relationship between humans and the natural world that the Indians (particularly among the cultures of the Plains Indians) hold simultaneously. One is physical and the other is imaginal. Momaday explains it like this: "... it's rather like looking through the viewfinder of a camera, the viewfinder which is based upon the principle of the split image. And it is a matter of trying to align the two planes of that particular view. This can be used as an example of how we look at the world around us. We see it with the physical eye. We see it as it appears to us, in one dimension of reality. But we also see it with the eye of the mind. It seems to me that the Indian has achieved a particularly effective alignment of those two planes of vision. He perceives the landscape in both ways. He realizes a whole image from the possibilities within his reach. The moral implications of this are very far-reaching..." Aligning the ideal and the real... This is starting to get at what conscious syntony is all about. The syntony quest involves creating (as in imagining/dreaming/visioning) images of reality that are both ideal and that have this "goodness of fit," or appropriateness with the world around us. And doing so in ways that relate to both the things and, perhaps more importantly, to the patterns and processes that define and sustain these things over time. To do so we have to remember (because we really do know) how to listen to and see the world around us so that we can hear the patterns and read "the writing on the wall" (or in the sand, as the case may be). Once we begin to remember how to tune in to our continually becoming world, we start to move from merely being aware of it to becoming conscious of it. The embodiment of this awareness in action is central to developing a consciously creative syntony sense. So a challenge for education is to develop ways to do this; how to develop an *awareness* of the challenges that sustainable human co-habitation with life on earth entails, and in the process develop an *evolutionary consciousness* as the platform for engaging in consciously created syntony. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:37) 14-JAN-1999 0:35 Alexander Laszlo So, back to issues of education and integrative learning... Rev. Jim's posting reminded me of the following ancient Chinese proverb: Tell me, I forget. Show me, I remember. Involve me, I understand. Tomorrow morning, Kathia will present some ideas about issues relating to educational systems design. For the moment, let me look at how considerations such as I presented in the previous post can help us move toward truly participatory educational orientations. Remember how I mentioned that through the inspiration of individuality and the aspiration of unity we can co-create this wonderful, magical, mystical and sacred dance of cosmic evolution? Well, the song and dance are ours to co-create together with all other beings in this shared universe of ours. In fact, more than beings, we are becomings - Human Becomings, to be precise. We have not arrived (as the term, "Human Being" might lead us to believe). We are in process - and hopefully, will never cease being in process! So the syntony quest is one of hope, vision, and caring - not only for our immediate selves, but for our broader, more universal self: our identity as evolving creatures of this universe. To live in harmony with all things is a way of being. To live in syntony with all things is a way of becoming. To do so with a voice of passion and compassion, rather than with a passive voice, is the challenge of becoming responsAble educational change agents - body, heart, and soul. So let's turn now to how we engage in meaning creation, and how we can foster such processes in others. In reading Lau Tsu's "Tao Te Ching," I came across the following: "Knowing others is wisdom; Knowing the self if enlightenment." [Chapter 33] This led me to consider the relationship between wisdom and enlightenment in relation to the notion of transcendence. I took the notion of the embeded order of learning content mentioned by Bela Banathy in "Systems Design of Education" (p. 77) and used it to express this relation. His order classifies the substance of learning provided as data, information, knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. To which I would add a further level of enlightenment and represent the relations as follows: [Image] What do you think? And more specifically, how do we engage in meaning creation, both individually and collectively? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:39) 14-JAN-1999 1:07 Philip Snow Gang I have been following the depth of this dialogue and the sharing of ideas. I wonder about hierarchies. I know that they exist, but I wonder if they are not part of a larger hologram where meaning exists as context. And then I ask myself... What is meaning? What is enlightenment? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:40) 14-JAN-1999 1:20 Jeff Cummings An incredible article The Wiring of America from THE ECONOMIST December 1998 just hit my desk. It is the history of barbed wire and its devistating influence on the natural systems of our nation. It is virtually impossible for any of us, even if we really strain, to clearly imagine this nation before fences and boundries. The sad part of this is that it has all has happened in the last 125 years. (barbed wire was invented in 1874). The reason I mention this is a clear example of exactly what we are searching for here and that is true syntony as I understand it. That is balance and harmony not only as a human system (society)but also humankind living as a harmonious participant in the syntony of nature. I will share one small segment of the article to make my point. "Lost with the advent of barbed wire to, was the sense of invisable boundries and markers on the open prairie. ... Barbed wire, which made other lines real and tangible, obscured this notional world completely. As a result, both cowboys and indians were disoriented. In New Mexico they said that Standing Deer, the chief of the Taos Pueblo, could no longer find his way back home from the Oklahoma Territories in 1886 because barbed wire fences had appeared. The wire did not physically prevent his passage, but it changed the lines of the landscape. It was as if he was in a completely different world, a line that could not be touched did not exist. A rare layer of abstraction in American life had been replaced by plain practicality." Chief Standing Deer, at that place in time lost his syntony with his world. I strongly believe the answers to many of todays questions concerning our relationship with our natural world, what knowledge is important to pass on for the sustainability of humankind, and how best to relate this knowledge to our children, are buried in the past and do not necessarly need to be invented but re-discovered and re-implimented. Is it possible? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:41) 14-JAN-1999 2:09 Chris Bering I have read through post 29, and here are my reflections/comments so far. I hope to make this as brief as possible. Patsy Seo: in 2:7 you say "everything is disposable and should be free." I wonder if you are acquainted with the work of Buckminster-Fuller. He has an extravagant "conspiracy theory" about global corporations that seems to be a little bit too true to be wrong. While he didn't say that things should be free, he did point to the fact they they could be drastically less expensive. AC: Your post of 2:8 was very close to the way I see it. I wonder if you have read a book called When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals, by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson & Susan McCarthy. Many similar anecdotes are given from cover to cover and they try their utmost to avoid anthropomorphism. I would highly recommend that you read this book, if you have not already. On the same topic: Chuck Estin, you say in post 2:11, "our brains HOLARCHICALLY contain those of wolves." and this is in support of the claim that humans have a more complex development than wolves. I think this is a very big assumption, and one that we can perhaps look at. I wonder, how do we KNOW that the wolf brain does not HOLARCHICALLY contain us? It seems that we cannot definitively say one way or the other. Now whether this puts us on the same plane or not is open to question, but it does take some of the wind out of our sails. Additionally you conclude with: "We create our opportunities for evolution." Yes, perhaps on some fronts. However in the larger scheme, it seems that we are merely pawns and play-things of a much more fundamental movement. Furthermore, the opportunities we can create seems to be severely restricted to mental/biological/physical constraints. Rev. Jim (I can't help but to think of the old TV show Taxi -- I hope you don't mind), in post 2:12 the whole second paragraph reminded me of something I read in a book by G. Spencer-Brown, an English mathematician and logician. In a book called Probability and Scientific Inference, he states: "If we take a cinematograph of a plant at , say, one frame a minute, and then show this moving picture speeded up, the plant appears to behave like an animal. When something is placed near it, it clearly perceives it and reacts to it. It is obviously a sentient being. Why, then, does it not ordinarily appear conscious? The answer is, perhaps, because it thinks too slowly. To beings which reacted eighteen hundred times as quickly as we reacted, we might appear as mere unconscious vegetables." (p.7) There is a point where you state, "As we merge science and spirituality..." and I am not so sure such a merger is possible. Both seem to inform one another, but science (read physical systems) operate at a different level than spirituality. Now perhaps you mean something else by science. If so, please clue us in, I would like to hear more about this! Sharon Solloway: your whole post of 2:13 reminded me of Claude Levi-Strauss. He had a concept called a bricoluer (I may have spelled it wrong). He basically states that the differences between a modern "scientist" and a "primitive" healer is not so great. Levi-Strauss sees both acting within the realm of "science." Of course, he is stretching the more rigid definition of "science" that many of us have become accustomed to. Back to Patsy in post 2:17. What do you mean by "I think Holistic medicine is superior to Traditional western medicine."? Do you really mean superior -- or perhaps just different? Because you then talk about three different types of medicine and western medicine is included. I am a bit confused, but it may be that I am just not "getting it." Gabriella! First a hug. OK. In talks with Murph (I think I forgot to mention to everyone not in LC3 -- Murph is a witch), we have compared notes on meditation, magic, trance work, etc. I think that shamanism, meditation, witchcraft, trance work, and the like are all ancient. I would even go so far to say that they are "exotic" (in the sense of different or unusual), but I would not go so far as to say secretive (as in "ancient secret"). They are available to all -- if you should chose the challenge! Marsha, in post 2:20 there a couple of things I would like to address. First is the transformation of a relationship. Now I am not so sure about having children because Murph doesn't want them, and frankly neither do I. However, I do see a transformation in two individuals forming a relationship. I am not so sure from my experience that "each one's structure may change" and you have hinted at, but I do see an expansion of "activity." For example, before I met Murph, I was just myself -- carefree & I could do what I want. That really has not changed. Murph & I respect each other's individuality (or our ability to express ourselves in unique ways?), and we are still very much our own "selves." However, our selves now work within a new (and expanded) area that is our relationship. Though we are contained within the relationship, the relationship is much larger than the two of us added together. So even without kids, 1+1=3. Also with reference to Pert's work (was this in Web of Life? I recall it from somewhere, I am not sure where though), you put forth, "We know that our thoughts can change bodily structures..." True, but I also thought to myself, "Hey, wait a minute...aren't thought also (in a certain sense) body structures as well?" I think perhaps Pert's work points to this. For example, "gut instincts" are, in a way, peptidal knowing. Alexander a couple of questions: in 2:21 you say, "these things are not only most developed in human beings, but are also what characterizes them, by and large." Is this perhaps because we are very close to ourselves and very distant from the wolves? Would things change if we were able to take the wolves perspective? I need to look up the recitation, but I do think Nietzsche has something to say about this. He was very big about removing yourself from your traditional surroundings to take a fresh look at your own perspective from afar. I will come back with a distinct quote on this. Perhaps tomorrow. Also, atoms function with a type of consciousness -- it is not only "sentient beings" that are capable of this -- or so it seems to me. Due to the attraction and repulsion of positive and negative charges, sub-atomic "particles" are able to feel each other -- to be aware of each other. Finally you comment on our "estrangement from nature" and I am not so sure that this is the case. In LC3, I also brought up this issue, and I do not mean to rehash it here. However, I come from a perspective that we ARE nature through and through and we have never -- can never -- be estranged from what we are. Conceptually there may be a sort of estrangement -- a type of nihilism -- but physically we are nature. Also in 2:21 in reply to Shirley's post in 2:14, you speak about designing change for others. Again, I am questioning if this is even possible. Rather, I see it as one will change when one WANTS to change -- and not when one id coerced to change. But then you may have meant something different, and I am just not "getting it." Alexander again! In 2:22, you point to a commercial that you describe. You then state, "they neither ignored nor reacted against it, but instead immediately adapted to it." That this is the way evolution works on a grand scale, I do not doubt. But it causes me concern that this is the way we might act as people -- as humans. Aren't there some thing we naturally react against? aren't there some thing we react against intellectually? I am thinking specifically about reductionism, mechanism, positivism, etc. FINALLY (loud applause), in 2:27 Sharon Solloway states: "Thinking that has been valued as "adult" thinking has been structured to fit a frame that excludes responding to a circumstance "subjectively" with a full range of congruence with inner experience." Perhaps this is true academically, but it does not ring true with my experiences in "every day life." Sometimes I think we in "higher education" do not have a grasp of the "average person." I think the average person usually operates from a perspective of subjectivity and emotion. Thought is less structured in the everyday world. That is a problem we have to deal with, I think. We are mostly coming from a perspective where we have trained our thought in a way that it is ordered, structured, logical, etc. Now we are expanding our horizons beyond this sphere and look at the difficulty many of us are having. The majority of people (in my estimation) have not even progressed to an ordered way of thinking about the world. How much less will they even begin to understand what we are doing at this seminar. Perhaps this is a bit pessimistic, but I do see the herd instinct, and I think it will be hard for the average person to overcome this. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:42) 14-JAN-1999 2:10 Chris Bering 10 more posts! Oh goodness! Time to read again. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:43) 14-JAN-1999 3:18 Marsha Snow Morgan I am downloading as the posting are long and many and well worth digesting at a slower pace. At this time I will add just one example of letting go of knowing where our "teachings" may go. Last April I gave a series of workshops with the organic groups of Christchurch. I presented an evolutionary systems map and we played some games to show its flexibility and adaptibility to the intended purpose of bringing the many diverse organizations present at the workshops into relationship. Some of that happened and is happening within the organic community as predicted. Last December a man who attended the workshops came to tell me the news that he and a group of musicians were forming a jazz band. The surprise in this announcement was that the group uses the systems maps to set their patterns so the structure remains fluid. The different members of the band carry the functions of the system and shift as needed. The music itself is looked at as systems. They feel very comfortable in adapting to the responses of the audience because they have a home base. Interesting living music! Your posting about the jazz band reminded me that in our rhythms of syntony we never know what chord will sing in another's heart. 2:44) 14-JAN-1999 7:17 Chris Fritz People, my eyes are complaining but my heart is warm. Learning as I go along. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:45) 14-JAN-1999 11:13 Anya Crain From Chris Bering's posting (2:41) I quote the following: FINALLY (loud applause), in 2:27 Sharon Solloway states: "Thinking that has been valued as "adult" thinking has been structured to fit a frame that excludes responding to a circumstance "subjectively" with a full range of congruence with inner experience." Perhaps this is true academically, but it does not ring true with my experiences in "every day life." Sometimes I think we in "higher education" do not have a grasp of the "average person." I think the average person usually operates from a perspective of subjectivity and emotion. Thought is less structured in the everyday world. That is a problem we have to deal with, I think. We are mostly coming from a perspective where we have trained our thought in a way that it is ordered, structured, logical, etc. Now we are expanding our horizons beyond this sphere and look at the difficulty many of us are having. The majority of people (in my estimation) have not even progressed to an ordered way of thinking about the world. How much less will they even begin to understand what we are doing at this seminar. Perhaps this is a bit pessimistic, but I do see the herd instinct, and I think it will be hard for the average person to overcome this. I am struck by these comments most of all -- not that all else that has been written is not fascinating, illuminating and simply a good read at times. I remember about one and a half years ago, when I entered a learning community doctoral programme at CIIS, my husband happened to glance at one of my text books. He saw the name of the author, then Ph.D. after the name and asked the following: "Will you have to write one of these kinds of books to complete your Ph.D.?" I wasn't really sure at the time, so I responded by saying, probably so. He then asked "will anyone other than you be able to read it?" This question has stayed with me since the day he asked it, so I try very hard to speak in a way that tries to reach my husband, my family and my friends who do not necessarily define themselves as intellectuals and certainly aren't in graduate school. I think and feel that unless we speak in a way that is very simple and that makes the effort to reach across all "boxes" of thinking, we (in higher education) will end up speaking only to ourselves. This isn't a bad idea, though, for my part, very limiting. Thanks for all that has been written. I am so appreciative of each posting and I shall continue to read, learn, think, feel and enjoy the all of it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:46) 14-JAN-1999 12:34 Chris Bering Alexander -- In regard to my citing Nietzsche above, here is a pertinant quote (though not all directly from N.). It from an essay "Questioning One's Own From the Perspective of the Foreign" by Eberhard Scheiffelle: "As is well known, Nietzsche's early idea that the 'plastic power of a [person], a people, a culture' manifests itself in the extent to which they are capable of 'transforming and incorporating what is past and foreign' (Untimely Meditations II, 1) reappeared later under the directive of his major idea of 'will to power.' Eventually he sees in this 'transforming' and 'incorporating' the basic drive of organic nature as a whole, and even of inorganic nature (Samtliche Werke: Ktitisce Studienaugsgabe 11, 36 [20-22]): 'positing as equal' is said to be in fact a 'making equal' and all 'thinking, judging, perceiving as comparing...[to be] the same as the incorporation of appropriated material in the amoeba'(Will to Power 501). At the same time, however, Nietzsche undertook again and again to take what is 'old, familiar, seen but overlooked by everyone'(Human, all too Human I/1, 200) and make it foreign by envisaging it critically from counterpositions remote from it. In the former case the appropriatin of the foreign is "interpretation [as] a means... of becoming master of something [Herr uber etwas zu werden]'; in the latter it is own's own that is interpreted and interpreted from a foreign standpoint that has precisely NOT been incorporated or assimilated. It is for Nietzsche less a case of 'doing justice to' what is foreign than of seeing one's own ANEW from a different perspective, of questioning what is familiar so as to 'get behind' it and letting what is 'obvious' appear as something STRANGE." I think this can be applied to the human/wolf discussion. Back later with new reflection on the new material... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:47) 14-JAN-1999 12:51 Patsy L. Seo Warning, Pleas read the following with the same detachment you would reports of WWII. See it clearly but not emotionally. This conference is a breath of fresh air--totally uplifting, except for me. I am out sync. I am enjoying it very much and do not mean to ruin it. Most of our students are lucky to be in this country at this time and do take advantage of some of the opportunities presented to them. I have been fixating --too much-- on those that have fallen thru the cracks. You do need emotion to learn. You remember things that are fixed by emotion and pain; but too much can be fatal. There is an excellent budhist description for working thru pain that was forwarded to me by ONN joel. It involves recognizing,and observing it. Allowing yourself to feel it. The book Death and Denying illustrates the withdrawal from educational concerns and all communication. I would like to give you a pyramid I designed. It ends before the data-(or observation of data by a living organism can begin) The bottom step of my pyramid is 1. clean air, Respiratory failure is usually followed by death. The self-evidence of this may be why we refer to the "breath of life" as synomous with "the spark of life" The Braham breaths out and universe is created the Braham breathes in and it returns to him or this spark is-god in us and all creation. 2. Warm, dry temperate environment (found only on our fragile earth)as far as we know. 3. Adequate food and rest. Yes, I did contradict myself and it is very confusing when I re-read it. sorry to be so tedious. I try to recognize diversity and pick the best from everything for myself.. Thank you for the question that pointed out how confusing, it is when I contradict myself. What I meant to say was that I think we need to consider the mental and spiritual aspects of everything we do as well as the more easily measurable physical things like minerals and vitimins, etc. The reason I prefer Holistic medicine is that it inclues the physical, mental and spiritual health. It also uses herbs instead of the concentrated medicines derrived from them. It is much easier to give doses of medicine from the "witches mushroom" when it is measurable and presenteted in measured doses and further controlled by testing it in the blood of the patient to see how much was absorbed. Here I go contradicting myself again--translation: the witches mushroom is one herb I wouldn't take under any circumstances. Western medicine only includes the easily measurable i.e. to those who are familiar with the "elements" (not chemical like Hydrogen, nitrogen and Oxygen but earth air fire and water. The measurable only includes the element earth. To put it another way, the mental and spiritual body are left out of consideration by traditional western medicine. I know there is a trend to change this by some. A clinic which follows the teaching of Edgar Cayce and is manned by Western doctors does take the spiritual into account. Recognition of the power of prayer is a big trend. There is also some excellent research in neurosurgery and endocrinology that has discovered the chemicals produced by a happy mind aid healing. This conference, except for me, is doing exactly what I desire most. Concentrating on the mental and spiritual which is too often neglected and badly needed if we are to maintain our high standards of living and thought. Education is the Rose of a highly developed culture. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:48) 14-JAN-1999 13:01 Chris Bering Patsy -- Thanks for the additional information. It is much more clear to me what you mean. Thanks for the effort! Murph (being a witch) is very much into "herbology" (if such a word exists), and yet she too draws upon "discoveries" in Western medicine. Not so much of a contradiction as an amalgamation. There is much to learn and it is best not to throw babies out with bathwater! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:50) 14-JAN-1999 13:30 A. James Hillelson Alexander, thank you for recanting the ancient Chinese Wisdom of so long ago. Truth survives the test of time as humanity evolves yet remains the same. This is a philosophical question that can be related to syntony. How does anyone else view what appears to be a dicotomy? Yet, is it? The science of philosophy 101. Chris B., thank you for your interesting thoughts and no, I am not offended as Taxi depicted every day life in an extreme which is comedic science. To attempt to answer your question regarding the definition used in progressive theology and spirituality when we consider the imparitive of merging the two, know it isn't easy and for some a new thought. I believe it is a necessity for the future of humanity. It isn't easy because those of the scientific community, for the most part, stay in the old thought of separation and not connectedness in all things. Those who are theological also keep a separation. We need not be so territorial which is thought, feeling and action from our reptillian brain. Let us progress from this state of response. A bridge is being built too slowly, perhaps for most of us, to raise the awarness that "syntony" is knowledge; knowledge of the continuity of science in all human systems and endeavour. Spirituality is the science of the human spirit. This is not theory nor is it, in my thinking even a philosophically debatable subject, yet it may need to begin there for most. Is not philosophy, in itself, a science? The question arises, what human endeavours are not based in science? I would like to hear from any of you that may want to challenge my statement. If humanity is involved then both science and spirituality must be considered. This is not a Judeo-Christian perspective but a universal human perspective. There is a connectedness that needs to be further explored, examined, theorized, if you will and discover the human spirit in science and the science in spirituality. Honestly, the bridge is already built, we must expose our limitless minds to the possibilities of what this consciousness merger will reveal. In the discussions, ethics and integrity have been brought forth. One revelation in the mind-full expression through the marriage of science and spirituality will be the emergence of integrity and ethics in business, cultural understanding, theological structures, and I dare say, all of progressive human activities. How can science and spirituality be separate and we expect to discover truth? Science is the tool to discovering the relationship of spirituality in all life and the influence of the science of spirituality on this human tool will be a transformational tool for all life on this planet. Forgive me, but faith is not enough when I talk with those more spiritually and theologically inclined. Yes, faith in ourselves and the order of the universe is the necessary step toward the revelation of the science within spirituality, but the critical mind and the limitless mind,which are different levels of consciousness, must integrate into one sovereign state to activate human exploration in all fields of positive human endeavor. I could go on and on...but I will close for now and await further discussion. Thanks for the opportunity. Rev. Jim ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:51) 14-JAN-1999 15:04 Chris Bering Rev. Jim -- Yes. I think I see where you are going. Ken Wilbur makes the same point in much of the corpus of his work. Spirituality can have a "scientific" side to it. On this I agree! I am just the type of person that needs "broad ranging words" more clearly defined, and you have done so for me. Thanks! Speaking of Wilbur, the reason why I brought up the question about science and spirituality is I have recently finished a book edited by Wilbur titled _Quantum Questions_. It is basically an collection of essays by leading physicists from earlier this century: people like Shroedinger, Hiessenburg, Pauli, Eddington... They make it clear that physics (and science in general) can tell us nothing about spirituality. Now this doesnot mean that they do not believe that such a thing exists. Quite the contratry! Pauli and Eddington especially make good cases for spirituality in general and also for a deeper exploration of spirituality. However they caution us not to base this exploration on the "new physics." They make the analogy of Plato and the cave and say quite bluntly that the "new physics" deals with the shadows on the cave wall, and spirituality deals with the illumination that casts the light that makes the shadows fall on the wall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:52) 14-JAN-1999 15:25 Shirley P. Grover Chris, I am a school administrator who wants to work with the community to remove the barriers and constraints found in schools so that the environment can invite, encourage, stimulate learning for adults and children. I believe we "grow" through our interactions with ideas, people, nature, etc...schools have such arbitrary barriers that block or deter individuals from developing as they might in a different environment. What does, for example, a "grade-level" do for a child? Why are teachers held to a set curriculum? Why are most important decisions made farthest from those whose work it affects? I consider an administrator's work to be the facilitation of teachers'and students'work, enjoyment, interactions...it is up to me to help manage the winds so that others can set the sails and safeguard the learning processes within the organization...I understand that we learn when we are ready and have no desire to force others to change..but, we are affected by the environment. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:53) 14-JAN-1999 16:35 A. James Hillelson Chris, when you stated Pauli and Eddington suggested we should not base spirituality on "new physics" utilizing the analogy of Plato's,"The Cave," please explain what they mean by "new physics" as it is the science of spiritulity that sheds the light to reveal what I perceive as the new physics. Light casting shadows on the wall is the first step to recognizing the shadows and it is only in the conscious realization of the shadow self or the shadow-spirituality or the shadow-science that will allow humanity to embrace the shadow into the light. I appreciate your comments greatly and will look forward to a greater understanding of the term new physics. We are not to be fearful of the shadows, but we must all learn to fulfill the mystery within the shadow in order to realize the shadow is made up of light or it couldn't exist. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:54) 14-JAN-1999 17:05 AC Turner listening and learning... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:55) 14-JAN-1999 21:14 Kathy Gower also here trying to digest and hold the paradoxes and contradictions and enthusiastic head-nodding that accompanies the readings here. Phil, I can't let you get away with saying Montessori is the only school that addresses syntony...Parker Palmer's work, Robert Muller curriculum and also Waldorf schools have the potential as well because they attempt to address not only the child and its relationship with its world (re environment, inner and outer), but recocgnize that the child is a spiritual being bringing a whole unconscious world that needs to be addressed as well. Its not a matter of either or, but a matter of holding what seems to be paradox in a sense of integralism and complexity. The system becomes larger to hold the either or to a both and....dialogic if you will. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:56) 14-JAN-1999 21:56 Gabriella Solis Madre santa! How much has happened here! Will download and try to catch the kayak somewhere, now it seems that it´s running along the rapids. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:57) 14-JAN-1999 22:05 John Scott Fowler Yipes!! What a crescendo of voice!! I can only hope to catch up .Right now I must prepare for tomorrow's school day. HOPE, HOPE to be back soon. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:58) 14-JAN-1999 22:22 Claudia A. Robinson Hey All, Chris offers that some quantum physicists, as suggested in Wilbur's anthology of articles by quantum physicists, say that the "new physics" says *nothing* about spirituality. I think I disagree! Consider, if life is fundamentally spiritual, then any physics worth a hoot will eventually have to say something about spirituality! There was mention of calculus. It is interesting to observe that integration is the addition of many small events. As such, the greek letter sigma is used to denote integration suggesting a summation of events which does not yet describe a process. Integration in calculus only offers a summation but not the whole (since the whole is greater than the sum of its parts). Schroedinger developed what is now known as the "wave equation" in quantum mechanics. A curiosity is that he chose the greek letter PSI to denote a quantum wave. PSI is the first letter of PSIchology and PSIche. Perhaps Schroedinger did recognize a connection between quantum waves and mind. Mind as an emergent must be greater than the sum of its parts. Cheers, Claudia ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:59) 14-JAN-1999 23:17 Amy E. Hitzig Whew! Each time I log on to respond, I begin reading again.... time for bed now. How rich this is. I look forward to tomorrow. ~Amy ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:60) 15-JAN-1999 0:16 A. James Hillelson Claudia Robinson in 2:58, I appreciate your comments and the clarification regarding "new physics." I almost yelled out..."Yeah!!! Claudia!!! when you stated that any science worth a hoot will eventually have to say something about spirituality. (parahrased) Let's take this a bit further and bring in the syntony of the direct connectedness between science and spirituality. How do we blend the two into an ever expansive educational tool? How do we educate scientists and the leadership within theology and spirituality in order to expand humanities promise? I believe a forum such as what we are experiencing through LM99 is a beginning, but let us envision your mathematical analogy which is certainly a scientific truth that the world accepts. If the 'whole is greater than its parts' in the science of mathematiques and consistent agreement with theological scholars and the science of spirituality, then perhaps the greater scientific community may begin to access the necessity for conscious and deliberate syntony between the two in relationship to humanity en masse and our planet. Perhaps the question is not so much "why?" but "how?" Yeah! Claudia! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:62) 15-JAN-1999 0:30 Kathia Laszlo Today was a particularly busy day out of our home/office. It is nice to come back home and find such an energetic flow of ideas. I have the feeling that what I am going to be writing here is going to look kind of eclectic and/or chaotic! But let's see, maybe something more systemic emerges as I reflect on the ideas so far shared. About the fascinating discussion on science and spirituality, I wonder if you have read THE DANCING WU LI MASTERS: AN OVERVIEW OF THE NEW PHYSICS by Gary Zucov. Although I have no background in the hard sciences, I found this book very accessible and beautiful. I am of the opinion that science and spirituality are starting to converge. I see spirituality as an essential aspect of the syntony quest, and I hope that we have communicated this in our previous interactions. However, working with diverse groups, we have found our that sometimes it is appropriate and sometimes it is not to explore spirituality explicitly. What is most important for us is that the learning and co-creative process reflects this spiritual/syntonic dimension. I would love to hear from those embedded in the Montessori educational world about how you have experienced syntony (or the potential for it) in your work and learning. The pyramid of meaning that Alexander shared with us has a hierarchical structure. Yet, I would like to clarify the concept of hierarchy in systems terms which is the notion of embeddedness: systems enclose and are enclosed by other systems. At higher levels, complexity increases through new levels of differentiation of the parts and their integration and coordination into a coherent whole. The different levels of the hierarchy are in constant communication. Systems hierarchies are not of rank and authority, but levels of higher or more inclusive integrity that emerge from the interplay of the components. Now, this applied to the pyramid of meaning implies that the higher levels involve higher complexity. Positivism and reductionism cannot deal with the complexity of questions such as "what is life?" or "what is enlightenment?" while systems thinking tries to move us to the exploration of these ideas (to higher levels of the pyramid of meaning) without rejecting the insights that can be obtained from empirical analysis (bottom of the pyramid). Let's consider an example: the individual letters "a, g, e, t" are just factoids at the bottom of the pyramid. The word "gate" already has some meaning, and it can have many interpretations depending on the CONTEXT, for instance "Golden Gate Bridge." We can get "objective" information about the Golden Gate, such as where is it, who designed it, when was built, etc. But if I want to know how to get to the Golden Gate Bridge then the answers depend: where are you? what is your mode of transportation? If we continue to move up in the pyramid of meaning, we can ask "why was the Golden Gate Bridge built?"--a question that has no single answer but many and very interesting ones depending on the values and perspectives of those answering. We are not attached to the labels of the different labels of the pyramid of meaning, but we believe that a syntony sense belongs to the higher levels. And again, higher just means more integrative. So, in terms of educational contexts, what does this imply? Let me share a poem that we consider a calling for the work we do. ~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~. CONFORMITY ^^^^^^^^^^ He always wanted to say things. But no one understood. He always wanted to explain things. But no one cared. So he drew. Sometimes he would draw and it wasn't anything. He wanted to carve it in stone or write it in the sky. He would lie out on the grass and look up in the sky and it would be only him and the sky and the things inside that needed saying. And it was after that that he drew the picture. It was a beautiful picture. And when it was dark, and his eyes were closed, he could still see it. And it was all of him. And he loved it. When he started school he brought it with him. Not to show anyone, but just to have with him like a friend. It was funny about school. He sat in a square, brown desk, like all of the other square, brown desks and he thought it should be red. And his room was a square, brown room. Like all of the other rooms. And it was tight and close and stiff. He hated to hold the pencil and chalk, with his arm stiff and his feet flat on the floor, stiff, with the teacher watching and watching. And then he had to write the numbers. And they weren't anything. They were worse than the letters that could be something if you put them all together. And the numbers were tight and square and he hated the whole thing. The teacher came and spoke to him. She told him to wear a tie like all of the other boys. He said he didn't like them. She said it didn't matter. After that they drew. And he drew all yellow and it was the way he felt about morning. And it was beautiful. The teacher came and smiled at him. "What's this," she said. "Why don't you draw something like Ken's drawing?" "Isn't that beautiful?" It was all questions. After that his mother bought him a tie and he always drew airplanes and rocket ships like everyone else. And he threw the old picture away. And when he lay out alone looking at the sky, it was big and blue and all of everything, but he wasn't anymore. He was square inside and brown, and his hands were stiff, and he was like everyone else. And the thing inside that needed saying didn't need saying anymore. It had stopped pushing. It was crushed. Stiff. Like everything else. [This was an English assignment for a high school senior. Two weeks after writing this, the young man committed suicide.] ~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:63) 15-JAN-1999 1:31 Chris Bering In reply to physics/science & spirituality: What is basically said by the scientists (Heisenberg, Schroedinger, Einstein. DeBroglie, Jeans, Plank, Pauli, and Eddington) is that science makes NO COMMENT on religion/spirituality. And THIS is the important point of the "new sciences." Previous to relativity theory and quantum mechanics, science and religion/spirituality stood in direct OPPOSITION. With the advent of relativity and the quantum world, science is neither in favor of nor in opposition of religion/spirituality. And it is for precisely THIS reason that there has been such headway recently (the last half of the century) in religious and spiritual pursuits. We no longer have to waste energy in JUSTIFYING our religious/spiritual beliefs in the face of a skeptical science. To take this silence as an AFFIRMATION of spiritual and religious quests is wrongly stated. We can (and I say SHOULD) make such quests but not under the mistaken idea that science condones such pursuits. As to Schroedinger's wave equation there is a twist to this that is not at all apparent. The equation is just that -- a mathematical abstraction. In Schroedinger's equation there are no waves and no particles. There is merely a mathematical equation. We talk of "waves" and "particles" because these IDEAS make the highly abstracted equation comprehensible to us by bringing it DOWN to a more concrete level. Alchemists (and this tradition survives in the practice of Hermetics) used the physical "sciences" of their day as a metaphor for their spiritual practice. Indeed there were (and are) many Alchemists/Hermetic practicianers who never set foot in a laboratory. The "Philosopher's stone" (though some claimed to have created such a thing it is not certain that anyone has) seems to me to be a metaphor for the highest type of spiritual attainment. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:64) 15-JAN-1999 1:42 Robin Postel I wonder how some of these ideas might shed light on how online conferences unfold and grow (and grow and grow...). I think offline, but when I come back things have gone on so far. Are my thoughts still relevant? Are they out of syntony with those who have gone on? Is the pace one of syntony (we co-create it)? But I will boldly post my out of sync thoughts anyway. Kathia, I was quite struck by two of the ideas you put forth, especially when you think of them as part of the same landscape: the future is possibilistic, and we can play an active role in its creation; and we know that complex dynamic systems have stages of stability and upheaval. I wonder to what extent we need to force ourselves out of complacency and comfort to create upheaval in our 'active role in its creation', and to what extent that is asking more than most people can deal with. Alexander, I like the story about the basketball. I wonder, though, about where purpose, design, and intention fit in. Sometimes it sounds like another either/or. The lack of need for dicussion seems to mythologize syntony. There was a recent management article on the metaphor of music that pointed out the shared language, culture, professional code, etc that musicians share that allows what appears to be effortless, fluid group motion. It is an interesting metaphor, and also an interesting myth. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:65) 15-JAN-1999 2:38 Kathia Laszlo Yes! The question is HOW? HOW to translate our ideas and ideals into reality? HOW to transform our social systems so that they are more fulfilling and empowering, more ethical, more interconnected with our natural environment, more responsible for future generations? How to create new learning environments for the development of our syntony senses and the emergence of our evolutionary consciousness? These are the questions that define our purpose in life! The exploration of these questions (through action and reflection, research and practice, work and learning, creation and recreation) is our syntony quest. We find ourselves working with the "creative tension" resulting from a sincere optimistic view of future possibilities and a sense of urgency derived from the entropic tendencies that we see all around us. The *process* through which we engage in inquiry is Evolutionary Systems Design (ESD). Conceptually, it is integrated by evolutionary systems theory, social systems design methodology, and transformative learning philosophy. The methodological component, social systems design, is a powerful approach that relies on participation and dialogue. It provides a "safe container" for collaborative exploration of future possibilities (what should be) grounded in present realities (what is). The group engaged in the design process moves from a generative phase dedicated to build community among themselves, to a more "strategic" phase focused on making decisions about their social system in terms of purposes, functions, structure, and processes. It may sound complicated, but it is not. All of us have the challenge and the opportunity to develop competency in these processes to facilitate change *with* our communities, and by doing so, helping people in our communities to also learn how to do it in their own ways. This is very related to the comment that Anya made before about making sure that we do not get trapped in our higher ed/ academic world of technical ideas, but that we seek to communicate to and engage with those in our families, communities, organizations... This is something that for me is very important and challenging. As a first attempt to engage with a group of people with no background on any of the ideas here discussed, Alexander and I started a project in Mexico with people of working class with an average educational level of less than 6 years. We couldn't talk to them about evolutionary theory, or systems thinking, or design, or syntony. But we created the conditions for them to *experience* the core principles behind these concepts: collaboration, emergence, self-empowerment, creativity, harmony, hope, sense of responsibility... We called this project "A Better World: Co-Creating Learning Communities in Mexico." Again, since we see learning as a powerful process for social transformation, we believe that healthy and evolutionary communities have to embrace life-long learning. The idea of Evolutionary Learning Community (ELC) is, for the moment, an attractor that we are setting to catalyze evolutionary/syntonic transformation more than descriptors of communities "out there." It is an ideal educational image. Joanna Macy says that a system is more a pattern than a thing; the same is true for an ELC. Learning communities, which can come in many shapes and forms, are like stepping stones toward ELC. For example, with the learning communities in Mexico, we feel that after have experienced for six months the process of design conversation, we can now share with the participants some conceptual tools (put some names to the experiences we shared) to engage in a second phase that is more metacognitive and intentional about where we want to go in our learning and design journey. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:66) 15-JAN-1999 2:56 Chris Bering Kathia -- At times (such as now) I wish we were together to *experience* the ideas that you and Alexander bring forth. I have at times (though this conference is but a few days old) felt that we are restricted by the words. Furthermore, we are dwelling on the words and this may lead to an incomplete understanding. I am recalling the introductory colloquium that we LC3'ers went through. That experience will not soon be forgotten. I wish we had the opportunity as a group to connect and *live* these ideas -- even if only for an hour or so. Words are words, but not the actual experience. I find it is easy to be deceived by the words. One begind to think that one "understands," but it is an intellectual understanding only, and not a "visceral" understanding. A somatic experience and understanding wants to be realized... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:67) 15-JAN-1999 7:02 Chris Fritz At a turtle's pace I am making my way through all these postings. I have a problem in that I think I may have understood systems thinking for a few fleeting seconds on the porch of Tupper Hall at Endicott College. Is there anyone out there who can refresh my memory and make me see the relevance of it in the current dialogue? Much appreciation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:68) 15-JAN-1999 7:26 John Scott Fowler The volume of this strand is somewhat intimidating, especially to a bleary eye. On science and spirit: Chris, I may have missed a beat here, but, with Ken Wilber, I maintain that the method of science is applicable everywhere and also the branch of a very natural and organic tree. Again with Ken, it is the doamain of science that is relevant. As he points out in a number of works(A Brief History of Everything, Sex, Spirituality and Ecology) if one wishes to repeat the spiritual experiment, from TM to Tantra, similar results will be had by the individual. The big difference is between the quantification of these results and their verification via mathematical models.I mighjt add that just as I woiuld not know what to look for in a particle accerator, so too the physicist who had that skill, would not recognize the subtle changed in the interior geograhy of any individual consciousness. One of the core beliefs of more integral types was often voiced by Wilis Harmon: a complete science must include a science of consciousness just because consciosness is a phenomenon of our world. Kathia, I agree with Phil when he states that syntony does not always manifest itself in "Montessori classrooms". I would add that it least it appears this way. I am always surprised at what appears to be happeining with children and what is happening. For example, some years ago I facilitated an in-depth reading of Arthurian Tales with a group of 11-12 year olds. We really got into it, on an age appropriate level, discussing,for example, the symboloism of armor as an outer badge of identity, the meaning of knighthood, etc. The children loved it.It was a great part of a very holistic approach that being both head of school and classroom teacher afforded me. Anyway, during the course of that year, a parent of one of the children came to talk to me asking ,"Where was the spirituality that Montessori so often mentioned?" My response was that I taught spirituality in an indirect and open-ended fashion and that to do otherwise would be dogmatic. Not only, I added, did I not have a dogma that I wished to pass on, but I was opposed to dogmatism in general. My goal was to offer the children a sea of open ended possibliltity and allow them to select or reject what rang true.Opportunities foor such offerings are rampant in this history of our planet. By merely mentioning that different cultures have certain beliefs and stories, the children are exposed to wonderful archetypal realms and pssoibilities. Honoring real dialogue is central to that opening. Hearing this, he mother gave a courteous and no doubt unconvinced thank you, and went on her way. She also worked at the school, was a yoga pracitioner, and deeply concerned about her child's spiritual growth. About a month later she came back asking what could she do with her son's burgeoning spiritual quest and theological questions? It was my belief that much of his revelation came visa-vis the grail stories imbedded in the Arthurian lore, as well as the rest of the offerings and inetgrations of the classroom. The overall effect was a perfect and natural catalyst for him. I have always seen my job as preparing the meal and serving it. The meal shoul be rich in versions of the hero's journey, a tale that can be seen in the examples of science as well. Montessori looked for heros, often tiny unappreciated heros who have changed the wotld. Were she alive today she would see the first oxygen metabolising bacterium as one of them. Without that hero, life on Earth would have slowly combusted nearly 2 billion years ago. With the help of the unconscious(maybe?)creativity of that dear ancestor, the atmosphere on Earth has been sufficiently balanced so that the long and rich appearance of Earthly life could gow. Syntony as an emergent classroom phenomenon requires that the teacher understands the rules of systems. There are moments of chaos. There are moments of transformation. It is wise to know the differnce. A constant mindfulness is a must. Montessori firmly believed that first of all the teacher must love the universe. Secondly she must know the material and the curriculum. Someone commented that Montessori may be too rigid. Sometimes, some places, yes. Definitly from afar. I used to be a little embarassed when observers walked into my classroom and everybody was working quietly with only paper and pencil. The observer would comment on how well the children focused, got along, etc. Secretly I wished that they had more grand projects going on. Now I realize that paper and pencil may be part of the process, part of the seeping in and settling process that learning enjoys. Analogous to meditative practice, true learning has moments which appear to be boring but, at a deeper level, are a stabilizing of the system. We all know that homeostasis is deathly to a system. Indeed that is why they are dynamic, a point made wondefully well by Marijo Grogan, over in my workshop. Nevertheless, flirting with homeostasis is part of the life cycle of any emergent system,no? As a techer I must understand this and be ready to help redirect that latent energy which is sure to rush forward in its own time. Thanks for allowing me to share. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:69) 15-JAN-1999 11:17 Anya Crain Kathia, thank you for posting #2:65 -- I am grateful for the work you and Alexander are engaged in. It does give one lots of hope and a belief in the good of life. And I particularly appreciate the beautiful language you choose to use in your writing. It is a language that touches my mind and most importantly, my heart. For me, it is the language of the heart that matters most of all. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:70) 15-JAN-1999 11:56 Shirley P. Grover Kathia, the community building you speak of sounds like what we are trying to do here. We are hoping the new "flatter structure" we have adopted as a faculty which encourages collaboration, emergence, self-empowerment, creativity, harmony, hope, sense of responsibility...can actually remove some of the barriers to learning that we set up as individuals, as a school organization...and help us become a learning community. We hold community meetings as a faculty, hoping teachers will do the same within learning units with the children and parents. We practice dialoguing, asking questions openly about what we do and why...it is so easy to fall back onto our old mental models. The workload is heavier as dialoguing and reaching decisions through consensus are harder than voting or simply grumbling about a decision someone else made. We check-in with each other about what we call "our journey" quite often and will do so again in two weeks. In spite of the difficulties, the faculty and parents continue to affirm their desire to persist. We have many miles to go before substantial change is made for children...yet, perhaps it is that I can't see the impact. I do not know that we would ever become a particular kind of school...as we tend to think we need to provide entry spaces for many differing points of view...what seems important is that there are ways to respond to learner needs and help each of us develop. We understand that we will create what we need and it may look like no other. I am curious about Evolutionary Systems Design (ESD. Could you share a reference? We have not yet discussed future possibilities as oppose to what is in terms of learning...do you have recommendations? We are getting better at dialoguing and being more open with one another as well as trying new things without a road map. Thank you for sharing your ideas. Shirley ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:71) 15-JAN-1999 12:46 Gabriella Solis This kayak is still going through the rapids, I'm writing from school because if I wait until I go back home, probably what I say will be out of the theme, eventhough not out of the larger context. Chris B, another hug! I'm impressed of the tons of books you've read and the way you link one thing with other, WOW! When I said "ancient secret" I didn't mean not available, I agree about they are ancient. I know originally, and there is a theory (I'm not as good as you to remember names, books)and a story that tells us that in the beginning of the times, when women were incharged of those "exotic" processes, they were shared with the community. But one day, men robbed this wisdom and turned it to "secret power". Nowadays the femenin energy is arising again and secrets are stopping to be anavailable. Another Hug! Now, an answer to Phil's question : What is meaning? What is enlightment? Meaning could be AHAAAA! But I'm no sure if the level is enlightment or not. Fom my experience, especially during these months that I've attendet to the TIES program,I could put some AHAAAs in the Understanding level, others in wisdom and others in enlightenment. Finally talking about Spirituality and Science, have you read that book "Belonging to the Universe"? It is a dialogue between Fritjof Capra and a benedictin monk (sorry, I don't remember his name now, but tonight at home will find it) at The Esalen Institute. There they build a very integrative comparison between religion and the new paradigm. Ok. I feel as if I've jumped into the kayak, at least for some seconds! See you later aligators! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:72) 15-JAN-1999 13:24 Chris Bering Jim -- Yes! I agree that the METHOD of science is applicable to the structuring of spiritual engagement. Indeed, we must be able to test/apply our spiritual knowledge. On this I have no qualm and stand firmly with you and Wilbur. If I may, I wolud like to include an excerpt of this very idea that I posted on the campus for our TIES program: 26-OCT-1998 2:11 Chris Bering: I would like to offer the koan as a sort of logic that I was trying to get at above. A koan can be looked at in the first definition of logic. The koan itself offers the premises, and the comclusion can be drawn from this. But this is not the way to arrive at a "solution" for a koan. It requires a logic of the second kind. We observe/look at it. We hypothesize/think about it. And we test/act on our understanding. The testing is done before the master who does not check to see if we have found *the* answer, but to see if we have understanding of the problem." Our understanding is placed against his understanding, and he adjudicates if we have percieved the understanding necessary. This is a logical/scientific process. And we must trust (or be secure in the fact) that the master has the ability to adjudicate with wisdom. Therefore, I am stating that arriving at a conclusion and reaching a judgement is not bad or evil in and of itself. It is something that must be done, less we slip and slide without a foundation from which to work. Sitting on a fence does indeed require balance, but so does working a see-saw. While fence sitting is a solitary endevour, working the see-saw requires one to balance with another's viewpoint. The see-saw analogy seems to come closer to my understanding of how dialogue may work. However it is something different to say that the discoveries in science have an equivalency, an actual counterpart, in the spiritual realm. So I am making a distinction between the discoveries in science and the method used to arrive at those discoveries. In my understanding, Wilbur posits that the scientific method will help us in one degree or another of attaining the non-dual "level" of spiritual attainment (the "Philosopher's Stone" so to speak). When this state is realized of what use are the discoveries of science? In the non-dual there is no good/bad, no right/wrong, no this/that, no self/other. Do you see where I am going? Magic works by correspondence not by equivalencies. Witchcraft, Hermeticism, Astrology, and the like all function on the idea of "as above, so below." Indeed this is symbolized in the figure of Baphomet, Buddah (when dipicted teaching), and (at times) the figure of Christ, Each has one hand pointed to the heavens and one pointed towards the earth. But the heavens are non-dual and earth is full of dualities and distinctions. There is a striving for overcoming these dualities and attaining the non-dual, and yet it is the non-dual that gives rise to all things. There is an ascent and a descent. This is seen in the Hindu formulation of: the world is illusory; Brahman alone is real; Brahman is the world. (Sri Ramana Maharishi) Ascent and descent. I guess, Jim, I would like to say that we are not far off. The term "science" is very broad and this filled me with confusion. Now that I see you mean scientific method, I could not agree more! It is through a testing -- a somatic knowledge , if you will -- that we begin to see the fruits and pitfals of our theoretical ideas. I am sure this happened in the development of the idea of "syntony." There must have been false starts. I find it hard to imagine that if fell from the sky in its present form. This is why the information is valuable! Through the hard effort of Alexander & Kathia, we are saved from some of the mistakes and missteps they have encountered along the way. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:73) 15-JAN-1999 13:28 Stephanie Kenney I wondered when someone would bring up the work Capra has done in the integration of religion and new science. What about the connections between modern physics "discoveries" and the predominent world, cosmological views of Chinese and Indian thought, explored in THE TAO OF PHYSICS? I have also been musing about the similarities of syntony and the Daoist concept of wu wei, effortless/empty mind? It has a similar frequency in my understanding. Speaking of words, could someone explain grokking to me? I'll be back with more later, this conversation is so densely packed, I'll join you in the kayak, Gabriella, if it's not already full.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:74) 15-JAN-1999 13:34 Jeff Cummings I think the reductionary nature of scientific method has contributed greatly to the disconnectedness from our intended place in nature. We need to be thinking and acting wholistically and harmoniously instead on dominating and dismanleting the complex processes that keep us alive. The "feel" we must have for our environment to gain true syntony is mostly ignored in todays world and a foreign concept to most. The challenge is, I suppose, how can we convey the urgency and importance of this concept to students without intimidating and causing them to downshift. Just as many of us try to struggle with functioning in our daily world normally AND trying to connect to something beyond our current reality, the transition to the new consienciousness of tommorrow will be extremely painful and scary for most. I do see the situation as an exciting educational challenge. Also the understanding of where we are evolutionaly certainly helps bring the time line for educational and human transition into perspective. This is only the beginning of a long long journey. I am glad to be traveling with such a diverse group of explorers!! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:75) 15-JAN-1999 13:44 Chris Bering I do not think that the scientific method itself is reductionistic. It has been used in a reductionistic manner at times, this is true. But I think we need to differentiate the method from the results gotten through the use of the method. Just a tiny thought (for once!). 2:76) 15-JAN-1999 14:29 Ray Bayliss Congratulations to Kathia and Alexander on your new baby, if this is your first you have no idea what deep joy awaits you! By the way 1+1= 4 actually, but I don't want to get into that now. Your presentation was wonderful. Whenever we discuss evolution, though, I feel more comfortable if we can be clear on what we mean. Are we just referring to "a process of change over time," or "a random process of change over time in response to external pressures."? To me there is a big difference. I see evolution not as something that just happened to happen, but as a conscious process towards an "Omega Point" goal. DON'T LISTEN TO THE POLES I appreciate Chuck's (and others') comment that we should not fall into the EITHER/OR trap, that's very important. Everything exists within the interaction between two poles. In a sense, the two poles, whether material or conceptual, are not the real reality but only the latent reality. Real reality is the relationship between them. HUMBLE HUMANS Throwing a cat among the pigeons: I don't regard humans as a reflection of the ecosystem so much as the ecosystem is a reflection of humans. By that I mean humans were designed first and then everything else in the universe was designed to symbolize some aspect of us. I know that sounds totally arrogant and insupportable by science or rational argument, so sue me! I happen to believe it is true. That doesn't mean I have an arrogant attitude toward nature, I have a parental one and no more want to abuse nature than abuse my own children. It's not about superiority/inferiority any more than parents are superior to their children. It's just about relative positioning. Harmonious relationship between two poles is dependent on them occupying correct position relative to one another. Unless we become parents to nature it will remain orphaned and "Groaning in travail," as St. Paul said, and we will be divided into two camps: those that abuse nature and those that think we humans are evil destroyers of nature. Ironically, both camps actually emphasis our divideness from nature, whereas the parental model emphasizes unity. As my buddy Marie said, we are like teenagers entrusted with the family car, we need to grow to greater responsibility, not shrink back into naiveté of childhood. It's funny, but I see Kathia & Alexander's being on the verge of parenthood as a metaphor for all mankind on the verge of fulfilling their true purpose for existence in relationship to nature. So, it is intimately tied to our study here. SPIRITUAL IN-SIGHT I loved Sharon's story about the shaman. He clearly exhibited a spiritual way of knowing that has nothing to do with the physical senses. In "Mutant Message Down Under" (thanks David!) the author tells of having her palm read by a fortuneteller who never once looked at her hand while he "read it." He didn't need to. I believe we can spiritually communicate with animals, plants and even rocks (which may be just slower forms of life than plants.) This seems to weaken my view that humans are a species apart, but I don't think it necessarily does. This is a wonderful discussion on spirituality and science. I think the point my best-roommate Chris was making was not that spirituality and science have nothing to say about each other, obviously they are indivisible, but that they speak different languages. I keep being brought back to my central philosophical question right now, which is: how can something be and no be at the same time? How can science and spirituality be the same, yet different, how can we be inseparable from nature yet be apart from it at the same time? Answers on a postcard please to... SYNTONY SYMPHONY One last thing, to me syntony sounds a lot like "harmonious unity," or the "flow" that comes from that. It seems to be the quality of unity between me and the environment, me and others, or between my mind and body. I've had the experience throwing darts when I knew the shot was perfect before it left my hand because I sensed the moment of syntony within myself between mind and body. Every Montessori teacher knows that magical moment when a child "clicks into" an activity, their mind and body harmonize and are totally absorbed in what they are doing. You can almost feel the electricity in the air. That's syntony of the self and all life is supposed to be that way. Love to all, ray ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:77) 15-JAN-1999 14:35 Marie Ruffolo Listening, learning, 'tho bleary-eyed. Kathia, thank you for that "enlightening" explanation of the pyamid; it helped me understand more fully its remarkable concept. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:78) 15-JAN-1999 14:47 Marie Ruffolo Hi Jeff & Ray! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:79) 15-JAN-1999 15:34 David Liscio To Jeff, who long long ago in (2:40) mentioned The Economist piece on barbed wire fencing and the cultural change such technology brought about. Walls and fences do make their marks in evolution. But then, if they didn't exist, nobody would have to figure out how to go over them. Think of all the mighty castles and defense perimeters that were made useless once the airplane was invented. The Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain both fell, in part, due to technology. I wonder, then, if it's merely the yin and yang of development? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:80) 15-JAN-1999 15:42 David Liscio Ray, on (2:76) in his HUMBLE HUMANS segment talks about how both camps emphasize or dividedness with nature. It's true. The ecosystem appears to be a reflection of humans. We pretend to adopt nature and care for the little animals, but most often we simply seek to maintain comfort and, if we can save a few critters by putting them on the endangered species list, so be it. If we knew, scientifically, that doing away with disposable diapers would save the purple-necked giraffe of Bongo Bongo, would we give up the convenience? Probably not. That's why, as Ray suggests, the ecosystem is a reflection of man. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:82) 15-JAN-1999 16:35 AC Turner It amazes me the diversity of definitions that keep building and growing in association with the word syntony. If I had the time I would compile a list to see what it might tell me. Perhaps it would lend an answer of some sort to the questions asked here. Never had Montessori growing up, but here's how I learned of syntony. Upon meeting my favorite musician, I asked: how do you play so perfectly? You never make a mistake! How do you do that? He explained it like this. "For me, it's a place I go." He ran his hand up the back of his neck till it rested on the base of his skull. "Here," he said, indicating a physical point. "But it could be anywhere, for anyone. Then you feel the distance to the sound." I understood, somewhat, I had experienced fleeting moments of it. But how do you hold on to it, I asked. That's when I found myself sitting across from him, guitar in hand. "I learnt it like this." His foot began to thump up and down. "If you find the underlying rhythm, you'll reach there much quicker." To emphasize this he starts tapping on my foot. "Now play it." With complete and total focus on my foot, I played through it with no mistake. You'd think that the lesson was done, but then he explained the real trick was sharing that space with others. "It's like dancing one must follow another to begin." We started playing, feet thumping out time, but in addition there was a conscious effort to play together, though we played different parts. This was the AHAA! moment as it all came together, though he only winked and asked "you see?" As if it were all so simple. Kathia eloquently writes: "These are the questions that define our purpose in life! The exploration of these questions (through action and reflection, research and practice, work and learning, creation and recreation) is our syntony quest. We find ourselves working with the "creative tension" resulting from a sincere optimistic view of future possibilities and a sense of urgency derived from the entropic tendencies that we see all around us." Well said and agreed on _The Dancing Wu Li Masters_ by Zucov Also Kathia writes: "The group engaged in the design process moves from a generative phase dedicated to build community among themselves, to a more "strategic" phase focused on making decisions about their social system in terms of purposes, functions, structure, and processes." This sounds like a good direction for this dialogue to take. Your hierarchy setup is nicely done. I hadn't seen it before, but it lays out a solid format that works well with my image of systems thinking. Right on, Kathy! "Phil, I can't let you get away with saying Montessori is the only school that addresses syntony...Parker Palmer's work, Robert Muller curriculum and also Waldorf schools..." - Kathy Gower act (... ac is short for ann catherine, just for those who still think I'm a man) Wandering on now ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:83) 15-JAN-1999 17:04 Doralice L. De Souza http://event.tmn.com/~lm99/LIB/keynote_presentations/ddesouza/synthonyzing ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:84) 15-JAN-1999 17:08 Alexander Laszlo In Response 68, John says "I have always seen my job as preparing the meal and serving it." That's a nice way of expressing the ideal of creating the conditions for learning to emerge, or fostering learning competencies, or enhancing individual and collective self-development capacities. That's what it's all about for us. Then he says, "There are moments of chaos. There are moments of transformation. It is wise to know the difference. A constant mindfulness is a must." This is important. It expresses the disposition of the evolutionary systems learner. Shirley asks, in Response 70, "I am curious about Evolutionary Systems Design (ESD). Could you share a reference?" Well, this certainly is important, but at the same time, it is hard to condense down to a few well chosen words! I teach a two-quarter doctoral course at CIIS on "Evolutionary Systems Design: Conceptual Tools for Social Change Agents," and that is meant to be introductory!! Here's what I recommend: check Barbara Vogl's intervention when it comes along here on LM99. She is in the Author section and she will be taking up this issue of ESD, particularly as it relates to educational systems design. If you want further guidance after that, please don't hesitate to contact us, either here on TMN or directly. In Response 73, Stephanie asks, "Speaking of words, could someone explain grokking to me?" Well, let me see what I can do on this, although I think Marsha would be able to guidance here, as well. According to Ralph Abraham, in his book , the word 'grok' is a translation of the technical term "Verstehen," meaning "to understand." He says that "we grok something (an archaeological find, artifact, art work, text, poem, letter, natural process, and so on) by a cycle of observing, thinking, poking, and once more again observing. This is not the same as explaining it, representing it, or translating it." For those who want to get further into this, I recommend looking into the work of Wilhelm Dilthey and the area of hermeneutics (but let's not get into all that now.) Jeff's post in Response 74 goes straight to my heart. Yes, this quest to build the bridges, create the conditions, and foster the emergence "to the new consienciousness of tomorrow" is both scary and exciting. There are no road-maps, as Shirley said of her experience with the faculty learning community of her school, and it is "up to us" (in syntony with both the larger world and the overall processes of change). Also, I would quite agree with Jeff that the scientific method is, by definition, reductionistic. It employs analysis as its key methodological process is framed within the philosophical orientation of reductionism, the first doctrine of which is that everything reduces to indivisible elements (which leads to the double quest for the holy grail of science: the basic building blocks of nature and the cause effect relationships among them -- as in atomic theory, the elements of chemistry, the cell and the gene of cellular and subcellular biology, the direct observation of psychology, the phoné of linguistics, etc.). These are definitional characterizations of science and the scientific method. - With one caveat: science taken as "traditional natural science," and scientific method as "the classical scientific method." The new sciences of complexity, as well as some (though not all) social sciences move well beyond a quest to know how the parts relate in terms of cause and effect. They adopt non-linear approaches that focus on emergent phenomena as a consequence (not a "result") of processes of "multiple-causality" (or co-producer processes). [For more on this, check "The Contribution of the Systems Sciences to the Humanities" in Vol. 14, No. 1, April 1997 (pp. 5-19) by Alexander Laszlo and Ervin Laszlo.] Ray, in Response 76, comments that "Whenever we discuss evolution, though, I feel more comfortable if we can be clear on what we mean. Are we just referring to "a process of change over time," or "a random process of change over time in response to external pressures."? To me there is a big difference. I see evolution not as something that just happened to happen, but as a conscious process towards an "Omega Point" goal." - Right, that's the spirit in which we take the term as well. Evolution is possibilistic - it is certainly not random. However, the Omega Point toward which we are moving is just like the horizon for a sailing ship: as we move toward it, it recedes. We will never reach it, but the point is to focus on the process of moving toward it, not on getting there -- and on the learning we gain in the process. Over a hundred years ago, T.H. Huxley said in : "No doubt ... man, physical intellectual, and moral, is as much a part of nature, as a purely a product of the cosmic process, as the humblest weed." He goes on to develop the horticultural analogy with evolutionary process, saying "The garden is in the same position as every work of man's art; it is a result of the cosmic process working through and by human energy and intelligence." This sort of places the human "outside" of nature by giving us the role of the gardener of nature. Fifty years later, Julian Huxley (Thomas's grandson) took issue with this idea that the gardener is not part of the evolutionary process. His notions of evolutionary ethics point to the task of fashioning the human attitudes and institutions required by a planetary community as part of the natural process. Through the study of ethics itself as part of the process, he sees the evolutionary process one where humans are both shapers and shaped at the same time. (This is familiar stuff for constructivists.) Such orientations get us closer to the notion of evolutionary stewardship. The idea is to strive for "evolution with distinction" or risk "devolution to extinction." Just flowing with it or just letting it emerge won't cut is. In terms of transformative learning, we might think of the stance the teacher takes in deciding to whether to be "the guide on the side" or "the sage on the stage." Ray also mentions that "syntony sounds a lot like "harmonious unity," or the "flow" that comes from that. It seems to be the quality of unity between me and the environment, me and others, or between my mind and body. ... That's syntony of the self and all life is supposed to be that way." YES!! And that's why I say that we must re-tune ourselves, must cultivate and re-develop that atrophied syntony sense that we all have but which has been damped down and made to lie dormant by our estrangement from nature. And Chris, please hear the intention behind my words here: I am certainly not saying that we "are not nature" or separate or above or in anyway distinct from nature. How could we stand outside of nature!? However, even though one can hear it does not mean that one listens. I believe we are no longer listening. Our technological, competitive, individualistic, and consumption based societies estrange us from nature in the sense that loud static noise estranges us from listening -- we may even forget HOW to listen! And that's what has happened with syntony. For most of us who live in the "modern Western world," although there are exceptions and even populations of exceptions. - Alex&er ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:85) 15-JAN-1999 17:11 Philip Snow Gang I am struck with the diversity here and the rich example of humanity's need is to both simplify (so that everyone understands) and to complexify (to build a personal philosophy). BTW. To AC and Kathy, I did not mean to say that it only exists within the Montessori framework; what I thought I said is that is the only place where "I" have seen it with children. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:87) 15-JAN-1999 17:21 Doralice L. De Souza [Edit] I really appreciate the concept of syntony presented here for it gave me a new vocabulary to talk about things I have been trying to implement in my personal and professional life for a long time. However, as I think about the idea of syntony and the education of school age children I see a lot of complex issues which I have been thinking about and would like to bring up here. I find it very hard to find the right syntony, or better, the right balance between different sorts of syntonies as we think about the education of children. Let me explain this better by giving a concrete example. I am working on a research project in which I have observed a school were the teachers are pretty much syntonyzed with children's needs. In this school children are allowed to be children and to be in syntony with nature: they climb trees, they watch and take care of animals in their natural environment, they play in the snow, they dance in the rain, they cook their own food, they spend a lot of time in the woods and at the beach. The problem is that the children in this school play so much that they do not do much academic work. AS a consequence, most of them are behind in their reading, writing and math skills. It seems to me that while their teachers are very much in syntony with children's immediate needs, they are a kind of out off syntony with the future needs of these children who when they grow up, might then need certain strong academic skills in order to pursue their own education and in order to be the kind professionals they would like to be. Considering what was just said above, it seems that syntonizing is not an easy endeavor. It might involve complex political decisions. For example, the parents and teachers of this school decided that they would rather syntonize with the needs of their children (let them play and explore whatever is of their interest) than syntonize with the needs of the larger system which would want these children to be trained for the job market and for the perpetuation of the status quo. While there is wisdom in the decision of these teachers and parents, there are also problems. How if these children one day regret the education they had because it didn't give them the skills to further pursue their education and/or to transform the world they live in? How if they find out that their parents and teachers were irresponsible for syntonyzing only with their immediate needs and not also with their long-term needs? Is it possible to syntonize with these different levels of needs (the needs of the child to be a happy child and the needs of the child who one day will grow up and might need highly developed academic skills)? HOW CAN WE DO SO? Does anyone have a story to tell about it? I am sorry for all my English mistakes but I am just learning the language (I am from Brazil and my native language is Portuguese). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:88) 15-JAN-1999 17:28 Alexander Laszlo [Edit] AC, your examples are so vivid and visceral that I almost feel the experience! Thank you for sharing such a powerful example of syntony in Response 82! Yes, that's quite it, although, as you point out, syntony also has other defintions (depending on whether we are talking about the experience of syntony, the notion of a syntony sense, syntony as an evolutionary process, or systems of syntony that manifest the process). As long as the usage of the term is coherent and consistent, I think it need not be pinned down too tightly =) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:89) 15-JAN-1999 17:32 Carolyn Magnussen [Edit] Whew...76 postings later..I am here. Hello everyone and thank you for your musings. I have been reading over an hour and have a few short (?) comments from the ocean of thoughts here. I wonder what we mean by science. What do we mean by spirit? The earth makes mathematically (scientifically) patterns: sunflowers , pine cones, shells, fractals, fingerprints. Isn't the science which nature does spiritual? For the people of the Paleolithic and especially the Megalithic builders of what is now England and Scotland, the Earth/Universe- and Science were intertwined.Integrated. Yin and Yang. In a book called" Linfting the Veil: The Feminie Face of Science", Linda Jean Shepherd traces the calamities of Western Science back to it's divorce from feminine attributes and a highjacking of science by the male priesthood-elite. She states ..."Because the majority of minds responsible for constructing science were male, the institution reflects masculine consciousness." She notes however that feminine attributes are re-emerging through the chaos and quantum theory . "Curiosly, the language of chaos theory borrows words from the world of women and the home. In contrast to the starkly abstract and efficient language of mathematics, concepts in chaos science are described as dust, webs, cups, foam, fudgeflakes, folded towel diffeomorphisms, smooth noodle maps, curds and whey.....metaphors and language shape our thought and affect scientific discourse.. Chaos science is shifting how we see the world and, as a voice of the Feminine, is changing science at its roots by changing its language, the language of mathematics."(91) Noteworthy is her observation that Chaos theory comes from one of the most reductionistic ways of looking at the world. She refers to Jung through out the book and states that everything eventually seeks and becomes its opposite. The pendulum swings..... If you cannot sleep some night you can pick up Joseph Campbell's "The Inner Reachers of Outer Space" and wade through this master minds integration of science/myth/religion/spirituality/and sacred mathematics. He takes various myths from over the world and does math with them. All the myths end up having the sacred number 432. "Some notion of the whole , profoundly conceived, macro-micro cosmic import of such courty mimes may be gained from the consideration of the mathematics of the mythological and actual cycles of the calendars to which such rites where attached." Here he goes on for two pages traveling the world and religions reducing to this number 432. The footnote on this page (39) NOTES THAT THE ENGINEERS IN THE WILSON SPORTING GOODS LAB TESTING FOR THE DISTANCE WHICH GOLF BALLS WITH ANYWHERE FROM 30 TO 1,212 DIMPLE WERE ADVISED BY THE COMPUTER THAT 432 WOULD YIELD THE OPTIMUM DISTANCE, AND INDEED IT DID. (TWILIGHT ZONE MUSIC PLEASE) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:90) 15-JAN-1999 17:47 Alexander Laszlo [Edit] Doralice raises a very interesting and important issue in Response 87: Are there locally appropriate syntonic relationships that may be out of syntony with broader, more general evolutionary processes of syntony? As she points out, syntonizing is not an easy thing! To get back into the musical metaphor, a chamber music quartet, or a jazz band, can learn to syntonize with each other fairly well. They then expand their skills when they perform, because then they need to pick up on the mood of the audience, and even on the type of weather at that moment (especially the jazz band in a jam session). Now, if we think of ourselves in a jam session *with everything* .... it sure get's complex! But that's why much of the concept of syntony revolves around "sense" rather than something more rational. Again, it is not "simply" going with the flow, nor is it adapting to change, but it is learning to listen -- and then to make intelligent (emotionally intelligent, too) responses *with* everything. So, in short, there are several levels of syntony, as well as various phases of the development of syntonic competency. And evolutionary syntony must be *proactive*, too -- that is, it must also align with ideals and possibilites for desirable futures. The Iriquois have what is known as the Seventh Generation Rule: whenever they take an important "life" decision, they ask how their ancestors would appreciate the decision, up to seven generations into the past. Then they ask how their offspring would appreciate the decision, up to seven generations into the future. Syntony draws on this diachronic (over time) orientation, and also adds a synchronic (at one point in time) orientation: what are the implications/consequences of this decision for the systems (e.g. communties) of which I am a part, and what are the implications/consequences for the systems (psychologically and biologically) that are a part of me? It's an art ... and something more. (Frankly, I think it is little different from the Tao -- just in contemporary guise.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:91) 15-JAN-1999 17:57 Alexander Laszlo [Edit] REALITY CHECK Remember the Keynote that got things rolling here? Well, in it we expressed our hope to do the following: -- We propose exploring two conceptual "tools" with you: 1. systems approach 2. evolutionary understanding and syntony sense We would like to explore with you how these tools can be usefully applied to: * understanding the limitations and potentialities of education; * creating the conditions for integrative learning processes; and * designing what we call Evolutionary Learning Communities. Here's the way we suggest we do it: we present some quotes and some key concepts dealing with the two conceptual tools and you consider how they relate to the issues described above as determined by your interests in education and integrative learning. That way we can develop a joint understanding of systems thinking, learning communities, and educational change through the processes of on-line dialogue and collaborative exploration. -- Okay. So how're we doing? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:92) 15-JAN-1999 18:21 Amy E. Hitzig [Edit] I'm going to try and catch one of the streams of thought dashing through my head... My background is in movement - improvised,creative movement. As I think of syntony and how it pertains to learning and connection, I think of moving spontaneously around a room with others, nothing planned, and how we sense each other. It takes practice to develop the sensitivity - the 'extra-sense' - that allows one to spin, touch, lean, separate, leap, perhaps nearly fall, but not - instead responding to THAT moment and going with it to let it become a connecting on a level beyond thought and beyond body, from there to go forward in new and unexpected direction I believe the development of this sensing ability is inherent in our mind/body/spirit - our birthright. It is so strong in children, and is the foundation of the ability to respond creatively and to be centered and not fearful of the unexpected. It grows naturally if not curtailed by unrelenting exposure to a linear, non-responsive environment. So many children never run outside in nature, never even take their shoes and socks off and know mud, dew, dust puddles, snow. This grows adults who are afraid and have forgotten- lost touch - with this birthright. How far would the greatest scientists have gotten if they were afraid to go with a hunch, to play, to experiment, to brainstorm? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:93) 15-JAN-1999 18:50 Chris Fritz [Edit] Science can only go as far as the scientist's believe. I am a proponent that humans are surrogates of information/learning and that as we pass it along it develops more... How does systems thinking impact the area of language teaching/learning? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:94) 15-JAN-1999 20:11 A. James Hillelson [Edit] Alexander, I was formulating thought while reading the responses when I read REALITY CHECK. Perhaps you do not want to continue with the discussion surrounding the Science of Spirituality or the syntonic relationship between the sciences. As an educator, I understand. I would like to indicate that Item 6 in Open Forum is a way in which to discuss the futuristic implications of Science and Spirituality. There is so much to be gained by the format within the keynote, perhaps we need to move on. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss these important and impactful points and I so appreciate ALL the comments. Rev. Jim ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:95) 15-JAN-1999 20:51 Ken Lebensold [Edit] Wow, this is truly too much to keep up with. I'll speak to only a couple of threads. Alexander speaks of the moral sense that comes from a bringing together of the ideal and the good fit (by the way, for a discussion of "fit" and other beauties I recommend the self-published book Shifting by Paul Krapfel; I can give ordering info for anyone who is interested); Ray picks up on this later with his comment that the "real reality" involves the relationship between the poles, and not the poles themselves. Since I will be doing a workshop later presenting a moral vision, these observations resonate closely with me. So many people either dismiss morality (everything is perfect just as it is; judgments come from a dualistic, "lower" or illusory "place"), or are out of synch with the dynamics of existence because they are focused entirely on images of the "ought" -- a world in which some "bad" elements are removed or destroyed to create a "good" world. Although the teachers of non-judgment emphasize that this is a non-dualistic teaching, the dualism of truth/falsity or reality/illusion emerges, since people continue to experience a sense of morality or a "should be" which demonstrates that they have not yet "seen the light". Moralists who reject "what is" clearly are in a dualistic state as well. My own vision, like Alexander's and Ray's, focuses on the reality of both "what is" and "what should be", and on the relationship between them, which is a cooperative, partnership kind of relationship, therefore non-dualistic. Ray, I think there are many models of the human and nature that are neither paternalistic nor separated, e.g. the deep ecology model. As to the "science" question, I tend to part company with Wilber and our resident philosopher Chris on this point (somewhat in agreement with those who see science as inherently reductionistic). I don't see science as irrelevant to spirituality nor in opposition to it, but I do not believe that science, as I understand it, is the only method for spiritual "knowing", nor even the preferred one. As I understand science, it is rooted in gathering of data, formulating of "falsifiable" hypotheses, and analysis, in order to discover generalized truths like the law of gravity. But how much "truth" is generalizable, and how much is simply of the moment and place in which it arises? What has the direct experience of luminosity, oneness, or unconditional love got to do with science? I have been studying the Time, Space, Knowledge vision of Tarthang Tulku intensively the last few months. His vision does not base itself on a search for "answers" in the usual sense, but in the process of inquiry itself; thus, one asks questions and experiments with different, unusual perspectives, not to settle the questions but just to explore their possibilities. "Answers" may arise, but are not taken as final; they can always be challenged or questioned, may be applicable in one sphere or range but not another. Even the fundamental qualities of linear time (e.g. progressing from past to an infinitesimal present which is the only "reality" to future in a dull, measured way over which we can have no influence), space, and knowledge are questioned and new perspectives explored. This vision to me opens many doors that other practices may have revealed (i.e. acknowledged intellectually) but not opened; and others that had not even been revealed. That's all for now. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:96) 15-JAN-1999 21:07 Gabriella Solis [Edit] Stephanie, welcome on board even I´m out again. Do you remember I talked about "Belonging to the Universe"? I´ve got the book in spanish, so here it is a brief translation of the introduction, I hope it is understandable enough. New Paradigm of the Science by Fritjof Capra 1. The change from the parts to the wohole. 2 The change from the structure to the process. 3. The change grom the objective science to the "epistemic" science. 4. The change from construction to the web as metaphor of knowledge (cognition?) 5. The change from the truth to the aproximative descriptions. New Paradigm of the Theology by Thomas Matus and David Steindle-Rest 1. The change from God as revealing of the truth to the reality as self-revealation of God. 2. The change from the revelation as timeless truth to the revelation as historic manifestation. 3. The change from Theology as an objective science to Theology as a process of cognition. 4. The cange from the construction to the web as metaphor of knowledge. 5. The change from setting the theological affirmations in the centre to the divine misteries. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:97) 16-JAN-1999 0:34 Chris Bering [Edit] RE: Reality Check. I am interested in discussing how syntony, systems thinking, and evolutionary understanding can help us understand the limits and potentials of education. I think early on some of us were interested in Capra's statement that "structure entails choises" and the seeming relation of this statement to Gardner's idea of "constraints." It seems to me that this might be a good starting point. This is, of course, provided that others would be interested in exploring this idea. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:98) 16-JAN-1999 2:22 Carolyn Magnussen [Edit] What is your definition of an evolutionary learning community? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:99) 16-JAN-1999 2:32 Carol A. Welsh [Edit] The ice storm kept me off line and the nearly 100 thoughts were fun to read at once. AC's wolf story really was a powerful way to make me question if syntony and group consciousness were somehow the same thing? To me the idea that the more complex relationships aparent in animal behavior in groups appears to have a way of taking your breath away. The part about the wolves all gathering from far and wide, for instance. We seem to be able to think of whales and wolves in this way. In 1971 I had the opportunity to work on a research project in the Florida keys on the behavior of land hermit crabs. These are the kind which you might find sold as pets and which are terrestrial. Arthropods. One night two of us observed a gathering of crabs. ( They need to change to larger shells as they grow and the shells are scarce.) Two large crabs were fighting over the right to a large shell. The rest of the 12 crabs lined up behind them in perfect size order and when the battle was over each made a change to the vacated shell of their neighbor. A kind of consciousness in arthropods? The event seemed remarkable, but in thinking about it seems so because of the coming together of many for a need and the fact that as humans we don't expect these animals to plan something. Is this syntony? And does syntony by definition always mean a group process? Alexander, how about your pyramid chart. Is syntomy enlightenment? Do you reconcile it with Chickszentmihaly's flow concept and maybe group flow. It seems like the examples of syntony are always about relationships. Doralice, I heard your question about educational opportunities for children who are behind and from the most needy areas. I work as a public school teacher in a school whose population is recorded as 78% poverty. The questions get very real here. I feel that some of the answer lies in clear articulation of curriculum and mastery and an attitude of support for a student's learning until the mastery is apparent and through whatever means, teaching to every intelligence and staying with the skill, or process or content until a light goes on so to speak. No matter what it takes. Is that a form of syntony? It feels like it to me. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:100) 16-JAN-1999 13:36 Patsy L. Seo [Edit] Doralice your English is great!! Me Espanol is muy malo y no hablo nada Portugese. Bravo!! you and Carol are really getting down to the many specific and difficult problems we face. Our task is really two problems. first we have to understand and live in syntony with this diverse and dynamic universe. Second we have to be able to bring out students up to the monumental task of doing the same in small steps. The scientific method of observing, collecting data and understanding is part of the second task for the students to do. they must find where they belong. another way is thru "Rites of Passage" but these must be appropiate for our rapidly changing environments. In other words when we teach courage it is not just to carry a sword into battle. When we teach integrity and honesty we have to also teach how to recognize and work with it in other people. For the dance to be syntony we then feel, and become one people. In the story of the dancers that changed unaminously and "effortless" we can imagine each dancer studying music, and the other things first. jam sessions work because at a minumum some rules of rythmn and music are followed. THen there is the recognition and joining in with a good tune. It takes a lot of toleration for noise to get to the sytony. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:101) 16-JAN-1999 13:51 Patsy L. Seo [Edit] Chris I am interested. You know are Constitution is great, not too long ago a group of lawyers tried to revise it and make it more "reponsive" Turkey is about to go under they have already had 7 constitutions in recent times. What the constitution did was to try and protect our inaleniable rights. The freedom we gave up was to decide independantly what kinds of gov we wanted so we have representative gov. We did not give up rights. But we freely accepted obligations.__according to Dr Ehrler my american gov prof. Our students need to understand their choices and accept their obligations. the alternative as the founding fathers knew is anarchy or as Hodges and Locke put it "The state of Nature is War of All against All" We want to continue to extend Due Process to those who have not accepted their obligations and violated the social contract between themselves and the rest of us. We do not want our students to minimize the importance of the social contract. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:102) 16-JAN-1999 13:57 Patsy L. Seo [Edit] Carol you are in Syntony with your students and your environment because you feel their needs. Your efforts to teach them the skills they need to "dance in syntony" no matter what it takes; is the solution to the second half of the problem bringing the student up to your level. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:103) 16-JAN-1999 14:19 Jeff Cummings [Edit] The term "Evolutionary Learning Communities" caught my attention. Is this similar to a "Transitional Learning Community"? I like to see myself as a facilatator. One who provides students learning opportunities and encouragement to experience personal growth and academic success while developing the ability to embrace change, appreciate diversity, and discover their responsibility of ecological and societal sensitivity and preservation. Their education and success is THEIR responsibility. If I get into the "teach" mode they become human sponges not active and engaged participants in discovering and creating. This educational structure calls for trasformation or evolution of the students in many forms: 1. Given the traditional structure of their education up to ther point when I meet them they have been spoon fed their information for the most part. They must learn to trust themselves enough to get off their butts and get involved. 2. Embracing change; "the only thing constant in this world is change". Change is scary and unsettling for most. Helping them realize that change, often including chaos, is normal and healthy helps a great deal. 3. Ecological responsibility; most of our students are not currently prepared to see the world from an expanded perspective. Realizing that our current ecological situation is relatively new and that life as we know it is not sustainable is a big leap for tratitional industrialy educated citizens. Even though many of the approaches to the above topics need to be gradual at best once the student begins to trust the safety of discovery and expression they cannot avoid transition (or educational evolution?. Opening up and experiencing personal growth is the first step ibn the process. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:105) 16-JAN-1999 14:37 Brenda Vandermeulen [Edit] My first chance to read and respond to this dialogue. Wow! I have read through response 2:82, so I may be a bit out of touch with some comments (actually, I think I'm a bit out of touch with many that I have read). First, to position my thoughts. I am not a professional educator, so when there is discussion about teaching methodologies, etc. I usually do not know specifically to what you are referring. I think that is a blessing, quite frankly, because when you place the principles behind those systems out, I can evaluate them without the label, which I find helpful. That being said, here are some ramblings as I read. Re: "We need to adopt an evolutionary perspective. Only (emphasis mine) such an approach can help us understand the dynamics of socio-cultural change and provide the insights needed to learn how to learn in new ways." Then I am perhaps hopeless in this dialogue. For I believe in the Biblical concept of creation, and find the premise that only an evolutionary perspective is useful to be incomplete and unfair to those who have a different perspective, and yet embrace concepts of systems thinking and learning communities. As I read on, to the concepts of the "meta-cognitive" abilities of humans, it occurred to me that perhaps the fact that humans are the only species to have developed cognitive processes that are "meta-cognitive" is precisely because they were created fundamentally differently than other species. I absolutely agree that we must become more conscious of systems, interdependence, the value of diversity, and how we are a part of the whole rather than independent of it, but I have trouble with the premise that only from one world-view can a holistic view of the world be understood. 2:76 - Ray, thank you for your comments. I was beginning to feel that I was really off-the-wall, but sense now that there may be at least one other like me. 2:28 - Doralice - I'd love to see the answers to the questions you raised. Again, not having an education background, I don't know the answers, but I'd love to hear perspectives from those who do. 2:31 - Kathia - When I read the 5 characteristics of education from s systems perspective as the facilitation of life-long learning processes, I couldn't help but notice that they were almost identical to the goals that I've seen come home from our school superintendent at the beginning of each school year (and we don't have a Montessori school). The only one that they would add is that all of these are taught and understood in the context of the Christian faith. My children have been challenged to think holistically, understand the environment (with a science teacher who has won several state and national awards for the way in which he teaches) and our interaction with it, and also have been challenged to give of themselves in community service. 2:35 - Rev. Jim - You asked whether scientific research has been completed that teaches the recognition of learning styles? I am currently teaching my first ever college course, and was required to complete the Hermann Brain Dominance Index as a member of the faculty at the college. We are also required to use the HBDI to demonstrate in our syllabus and teaching methods that we will work with students who learn in each of the four quadrants. As for me, I have asked my students both to recognize their own learning style, but also to learn to communicate effectively with those who have different learning styles. So in all of my assignments and teaching, I attempt to answer 4 questions - What, How, With Whom, and Why. I don't know if that's all that's needed, but at least it's a start. Well, enough for now. I think I am perhaps less scholarly than many of you, but am struggling to integrate what I am reading with a strong faith system. Am I assuming too much to read many of the comments so far as incompatible with my faith system? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:106) 16-JAN-1999 16:14 Sharon G. Solloway [Edit] ...listening... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:107) 16-JAN-1999 16:34 Kathia Laszlo [Edit] Hello dear people! You have no idea how much I am learning from your reflections and stories. Thank you all! I would like to act on Alexander's "reality check" and address some of the issues dealing with systems thinking, evolutionary systems design, and syntony as they relate to education. The first think that I would like to explore with you is the relation between systems thinking and syntony. The example of the music quintet was a case of a group of people in syntony among themselves but not necessarily in syntony with their environment. Doralice's example of the teachers and parents being attuned to the immediate needs of their children but neglecting some learning demands from the current educational system and society is a similar case of "incomplete syntony" (which for me is an oxymoron). A systems view considers the whole, the parts, the environment, and the relationships between all these levels, and syntony is intrinsically a systemic notion. A drastic position could be to say that if we are "just" in syntony with some parts of a system but not with others, then it is not syntony. Syntony is systemic in a diachronic (over time) and synchronic (at different levels in a particular moment) way. In other words, syntony involves past, present, and future, as well as individuals, communities, societies, ecologies, universe, all at the same time, in relationship. This makes syntony an ideal -- but that is why we talk about the "syntony quest" -- evolutionary, we don't have a final destination, what we have is an increasingly challenging and possibilistic journey. So if syntony involves such an integrative perspective, then our understanding of it can help us to identify the areas of opportunity for the evolution of our social systems as well as for the creation of new systems of syntony (an Evolutionary Learning Community is our proposal for an educational system of syntony (more on this later)). Going back to the example of the school where children are enjoying life but not developing the reading and math abilities expected by society, the challenge is to design a curriculum and learning environment for both... and more! In syntonic terms, our challenge is how to design educational systems were learners: - develop the capacity to appreciate our past, enjoy the present, and share responsibility for the creation of our future? - develop their uniqueness as whole, healthy, and creative individual human beings?* - develop the empathy and values to be caring members of families, local communities, and global societies? - develop the sense of connectedness to the ecosystems in which we are embedded? - develop the evolutionary consciousness to be active participants in the co-creative universal dance? - .... (etc., etc., etc.) [* This question about unique, whole, healthy, and creative human beings is, in my opinion, related to learning styles. I think that the key term here is "whole human being:" how can each of us become more whole? A learning style is a preference according to different personal features. But learning only through our "natural" learning style limits our development within the boundaries of our area of comfort when it is outside of these boundaries where the real opportunities for personal and collective evolution reside. I think that this is also related to Csikszentmihalyi's concept of flow (see below)] The concept of home schooling is new to me (in Mexico, we don't have this option). And although it has been just a couple of times that I have interacted with a home schooled youngster, I have been extremely impressed by their knowledge, abilities, and sensitivities that seem to go more in the direction of the questions above than many school-educated children. This makes me think that maybe we, educators, expect too little from our students. Carol mentioned Csikszentmihalyi's concept of flow: those moments of "optimal experience" when regardless of the risk and hard work involved, we are completely immersed in a joyful *challenging* activity that stretches our abilities and therefore, helps us to evolve (and of course! I think syntony involves flow in this sense, not just effortless "going with the flow"). I think that we need to create learning environments that take into account a multilevel and inclusive syntony quest with these kind of flow experiences. I also think that we need to involve more the learners in the design of educational experiences. We have a friend whose first grader is going to an alternative school here in San Francisco. Both our friend and his son were very happy and excited with his teacher, until she got seriously ill and had to quit teaching. The parents of the first graders got together, first to complain about the school's inability to find a replacement teacher. But then they realized that maybe they should stop complaining and start investing some of their time and energy in seeing what they can do together to ameliorate the situation. They meet periodically with their children to design their learning activities, dancing rather than following the school's curriculum. The children have been self-directing their learning, with the support and guidance of their parents and school administration, for the last 6 months without a full time teacher and with excellent performance! They all are experiencing a very powerful "lesson" about what education is all about. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:108) 16-JAN-1999 16:59 Barbara J. Smith [Edit] AC, I loved your story of the wolves. Have you ever had a feeling that a certain wolf might be addressing you? I suppose you have read Farley Mowat's 'Never Cry Wolf'...they made a movie of it ever so many years after I read the book--the movie didn't convey the wonderful subtlety in the book, but the movie is quite an experience too. ******** I see that this conference IS a learning community--and definitely an EVOLUTIONARY learning community. Certainly I am on a learning curve. This is my first experience with virtual conferencing and I am none too experienced with computers per se. And of course I am a bit on overload with the richness of the shared material here....I finally figured out how to download and take it over by the fire to study more thoughtfully while I warm my toes. There is so much to digest and I need time to let it all weave together in my innards. I am having a wonderful time with it all though, and having been away from this level of stimulation for a while, I often find myself feeling a breathless kind of excitement as I read, and I have to say to myself "Slow down now, breathe, it's there, it's not that ephemeral. You don't have to run to keep up." I am beginning to realize that cyberspace is just another dimension. The memes are out there--available to me. Needless to say, I am deeply grateful for this experience. I will be back when I have read some more. The fire feels good today. It's very wet and foggy here in the Sierras today. The lichens and mosses on the older trees are glowing in so many lovely shades of green. That too. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:109) 16-JAN-1999 17:04 A. James Hillelson [Edit] Brenda in 2:105, I would like to comment on your question regarding any of the dialogue being incompatible to your "faith system." In my opinion, this is not so. I do not know the richness of your faith, but "incompatible" is not a word I would use. We may have differences, some slight or even perhaps major differences, but faith of all religions/denominations also have a great deal of commonality. I won't take the time to write about this as this would take up a lot of time from the core of the presentation, but when theologically and spiritually one begins to study world faiths, the commonalities are easy to discover. Even the parables (stories) are similar in nature. So, I never view one faith as incompatible with another. It is only the lack of knowledge that perpetuates this separatism. The wholeness of God is expressed fluidly through all faiths. Let's stop the separatism and recognize the truth within the wholeness of God. I so appreciate your response to the Learning Styles question. As I do not educate in the traditional or non-traditional educational systems, I am interested in how the integration of the different learning styles are revealed and worked with. Bravo!!! You are doing your students a great service. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:111) 16-JAN-1999 19:07 Kathia Laszlo [Edit] Welcome Brenda! The beauty of the evolutionary perspective is that it is not imposing and it is inclusive. All my education in Mexico (from preschool to high school) was in a christian school and this is the world view that my family holds and taught me. And here I am, working with the evolutionary vision and holding the differences between these two different "stories" (and many more) and seeking to build bridges of understanding. Let me share some of the ideas that we are developing around the idea and ideal of an Evolutionary Learning Community (ELC). By the way, Jeff, although I was not aware of the notion of Transitional Learning Communities, all the ideas that you shared in terms of facilitation of learning and learning orientation are very aligned and integrated in ELC processes. Our "dictionary" definition (not in any dictionary, yet) is: ELC is a human activity system (a more technical term for social system) that strives toward sustainable pathways of evolutionary development in synergistic interaction with its milieu, through individual and collective processes of empowerment and evolutionary learning. Useful? No comments. =) Another theoretical exercise is to think of ELC as a conceptual system: it is more than the sum of community + learning + evolution; there are synergies. A learning community is a whole in itself. An evolutionary community is also another holistic notion. And as discussed before, evolutionary learning is also part of this conceptual system. And still, an ELC is more than all of these -- an indication of the level of complexity (not complication) of such a system of syntony with very challenging practical implications. We developed a model of a possible evolutionary path toward ELC (we have a graphic and I will try to upload it later). The only validation of this model is our experience as couple! (we wrote about this in a paper titled "Partners in Life: Syntony at Work"). If you remember the description of the evolutionary process from a systems perspective, there are periods of stability or flowing balance and periods of instability or bifurcations where the system needs to transcend to a higher level of complexity. This evolutionary path begins with creating healthy and authentic communities. The next level would be to become a learning community (i.e., learning how to learn together, continuously), in order to move into a designing community (a learning community that develops the competencies and sensitivities of evolutionary systems design). This empowers the designing community to self-design themselves into an ELC -- their challenge is to translate the syntony ideals into their daily lives. We see the notion of an ELC is a fuzzy guiding image that can help a designing community to translate their understanding into an unique cultural manifestation. [Note: the evolutionary path is another hierarchy in systems terms, that is, higher levels of complexity incorporate all the previous ones.] In addition, we also make a distinction between two types of ELCs (we haven't develop better terminology, so we apologize): 1) EL/C and 2) E/LC. 1) The EL/C (evolutionary-learning community) is a community dedicated to evolutionary learning (i.e., a new educational system) and evolutionary systems design as the means for facilitating the emergence of other ELCs (of both types) in the world. In a way, we co-learners at this TIES event can see ourselves as a nascent EL/C: this is our passion, this is our work, this is our life! We come together because of our interest in evolving our consciousness, understanding the processes of change of which we are a part, gaining competency in evolutionary systems design, and engaging in evolutionary praxis through the creation of systems of syntony. The EL/C is a temporal community since its members are here to gain evolutionary competence to become social change catalyzers. Learners of an EL/C are also members of other communities (potential E/LCs), and it is in those contexts where they can be catalyzers for social transformation. 2) The E/LC (evolutionary learning-community) is any human activity system that becomes a learning community and seeks the goodness of fit in syntonic terms with the evolutionary processes. An E/LC is any community that integrates learning as a central aspect of their existence based on the belief that learning should happen in all contexts of society, not only in schools. An E/LC can be any corporation, family, non-profit, neighborhood... that creates a sustainable purpose and establishes a coevolutionary relationship with its environment. An E/LC proactively engages in a design process that helps their members not only to do things right, but also to do the right things, given the dynamics of their local and global milieu. There are many real-world human activity systems that have the potential to become E/LCs. To identify them and support them in their transformation as they go through their own evolutionary path is part of our work. To further clarify this distinction through an example, Alexander and I established Syntony Quest (the organization) as an EL/C. And as family, we are striving to become an E/LC. Does this makes any sense at all? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:113) 16-JAN-1999 19:36 Kathia Laszlo [Edit] Okay. Here is the graphic of the evolutionary path toward ELC. The vertical axis is level of complexity and the horizontal is time. The "B's" represent periods of bifurcation. [Image] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:114) 16-JAN-1999 20:31 Barbara J. Smith [Edit] Brenda, Jim, Kathia, Patsy---On this theological stuff, Teilhard de Chardin was a Jesuit theologian and paleontlogist whose efforts to bring together religion and science are very beautifully expressed in his many writings, always extremely Christ centered and always firmly anchored in the evolutionary impulse. Patsy, you used a phrase 'song the universe' which reminds of Teilhard's lovely mystical work "Hymn of the Universe"...if you do not know of it you might look it up. I believe that Teilhard has truly seeded consciousness all those long years ago, and now the sprouts are showing themselves all over the earth in more tangible ways. He, of course, was forbidden to publish while he was alive. His thoughts were published posthumously...he said, "When mankind discovers love, it will be like discovering fire for the second time." There is also a lovely small volume called 'Building the Earth' which collects from different works of his some cogent synopses of large concepts. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:115) 16-JAN-1999 22:03 Claudia A. Robinson [Edit] Hello All, Whewie. I meant to say more about math and so on. But we seem to have shifted some already. Kathia asks whether we have read _The Dancing Wu-Li Masters_. I wanted to respond: Yeah, I have but I never got beyond Chapter 1 ! ;-) Breanda struggles with a Creationist perspective, poised it seems in opposition to an Evolutionary perspective. Kathia speaks of building bridges. I attended a lecture once on translational errors in the Bible. I forgot who led it: an eminent Judeo-Christion scholar of Jewish background. I suspect it was Rabbi Zalman-Schachter and his wife. Either way, the presenter said the first part that decribes the creation of the universe is mistranslated. The tenses are wrong. He then offered a corrected translation. It struck me and many others in the audience that this corrected translation allowed for *both* creationist and evolutionary perspectives! The typical debate placing these in opposition is moot, terribly moot! Brenda's message hints that she may be interpreting creationism in opposition to evolution. If this is so, then indeed this would make creationism incompatible with a systems view, I think. But if a corrected translation of the Bible with the correct tenses were readily available, then such opposition would be moot, non-existent. In that case, it doesn't matter which "faith system" we use. Cheers, Claudia ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:116) 16-JAN-1999 22:27 Barbara J. Smith [Edit] Whewie Claudia! About a year and a half ago a friend put me on to a book, 'The Bible Code' by Michael Drosnin. It seems that "world class" mathematicians from Harvard, Yale, etc. and an Israli mathematician/bible scholar who had cracked a hidden code in the bible through the use of computers discovered that indeed there is a code that reveals specifics about the future. After reading the book, two thoughts stuck in my mind: a) the Israeli scholar says that the Bible actually reads backwards, and that we are sort of looking at the wrong end, and b) a question came to mind, to wit, if this code is created/highlighted by some sort of pulse or radio wave, it would have to involve sound, of course, because the Hebrew alphabet is based on what is esoterically known as sacred sounds, then are these 'messages' also coming through the other sacred texts such as Sanskrit which are also based on sound. I had also just seen that movie....with Jodie Foster...about intergalactic communication, can't remember the name of the movie...but the thoughts still intrigue me. It seems that the author researched that book for a long time and talked to the code breakers at the U.S. National Security Agency and they confirmed that indeed there does seem to be a code there. These events predicted and highlighted by the code are also not static, so I thought there has to be pulse of some kind that plays on the sounds. I am over my head here technically, because I am an artist, not a scientist. But somehow I love to see the convergence of physics and the old sacred texts of the world. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:117) 17-JAN-1999 3:04 Doralice L. De Souza [Edit] Thanks to you all who tried to answer my questions, Phil, Alexander, Carol, Seon, Brenda and Kathia. Alexander and Kathia yes, the whole issue of syntony is indeed very complex considering that in order to syntonize with certain things we sometimes need to leave aside other things. As Carol Welsh said, when we work with children in poverty there are so many different issues we need to syntonize with that making decisions is really hard. For example, it is very common for us Brazilian teachers to work with kids who come to school so hungry that they cannot engage in the learning process. So what do we do? Do we feed them out of our personal resources even though our wages are so low that barely allow our own survival? Do we get involved in political battles to try to change the system? But how if getting involved with these issues will necessarily mean-as it is often the case-- that we won't then have enough resources, energy and time to help our students develop skills that they wouldn't be able to learn anywhere else outside school, the very same skills that might help them get out of poverty? I wonder if you--Alexander, Katia, or anyone else interested in this subject--could talk a little bit more about how you actually went about this business of syntony facing complexities such as those cited above. I did hear you Alexander and Kathia when you talked about syntony as "sensing" all that is around us and then trying to make wise decisions. But I feel that it would be great to hear more about your experiences in trying to implement this concept, concrete examples that deal not only with the beauty but also with the problems (and how you dealt with the problems) you faced in your way in trying to do so. I believe that more concrete examples of how one actually "does syntony" can ground us in a richer and deeper discussion on this subject (not that it hasn't been rich and deep, but I think we can go beyond where we have been so far!) Thanks again ! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:118) 17-JAN-1999 3:05 David Ketter [Edit] Making a late entree into this discussion. Hoping what I have to contribute ties in with the current flow. My head is spinning after reading through these 100+ postings. My how "verbal" a creature we humans are! After saturating my self in all these thoughts and peripatetic wanderings, I yearn as Chris B. does to experience syntony more directly with you all in a f2f situation. Leads to a question to ponder: In what ways, if at all, is it possible for a cyber-gathering like this one to evolve into an ELC if our physical bodies - along with the gestures, tones of voice, twinkles in our eyes, hand shakes and warm hugs - are not present to enter into the equation? Along the same line then, in what ways have we come to adapt ourselves - and our definition of what a learning community is - to this cyber-technology? The fact that this conference is happening at all and that the participants are scattered around the world is an amazing feat, one that, in my mind, shows how we have adapted this technology for a very positive purpose. Though I am enjoying and learning tremendous amounts from every one's insights, ideas and stories, something tells me I would "grok" what each of you are saying much more if we could all meet f2f. Hmmm, maybe all I'm trying to say is that it would be great to meet all of you some day. So many threads weaving such a wonderful tapestry together here! Though my head swims and the "pattern that connects" all these posting has yet to make itself evident to me, I would like to toss in a few comments that may tie a few of these threads together. Loved what Patsy had to say in 2:100 about the need to live in syntony with this diverse and dynamic universe, and that we then need to be able to "bring our students up to the monumental task of doing the same in small steps." My most recent teaching position is teaching me the hard way of the truth of Patsy's words, particularly the part about "small steps." I'd like to tell a bit of my story, then, as a 7th grade teacher in a new Montessori middle school. In August of '98 I accepted a position as a math, science, and PE teacher at a well established Montessori school here in Boulder, CO. Though I have not been trained as a Montessori teacher, I learned a bit about the Montessori philosophy from Phil, Mem, & Carolyn through the TIES MA program. I found that it resonated strongly with my own teaching philosophy. I entered into my teaching position then, thinking and hoping that I had finally found a place where my holistic, experiential, and earth centered approach to education would be honored. To keep this story short, I found out that my assumption was wrong. While I did not feel I was teaching a curriculum that was too far from the norm for this school, I discovered over time that both my students and my co-worker (who is also not Montessori trained) felt that my teaching was biased towards a pro-environment stance and had too strong of a spiritual bend to it. This was a shock to me, and one I have, unfortunately, adjusted to by returning to a more traditional science curriculum and a more teacher directed approach. To my surprise, the students clearly like what I am doing now (chemistry and labs) more than what I was doing earlier (studying the local environment through integrated studies of the watershed including lots of field trips and hands on activities outdoors). I did not discover their dislike for the watershed studies until it had gotten to the point where they had become completely sick of it. My discussions with students showed me that an immediate shift was needed in the curriculum before I lost them totally. I'm still sorting through the wreckage of this foible, but two of the more important lessons I've learned from this experience include: 1. Be careful not to stretch the rubber-band of transformation - to borrow a metaphor from Peter Senge - too much or too quickly. If it's stretched too far, there may well be a snapping back of resistance and retreat to familiarity, entrenching students further in out-moded ways of thinking and perceiving the world. 2. Caution needs to be taken to not directly threaten the familiar "worldview" of the learner. (In this case, the view that science and technology can fix most, if not all, problems, and that material and economic "progress" as defined by western capitalism is to be celebrated and held in very high regard.) Either this, or a very well constructed container needs to be developed for students to deal with their disorientation when they come up against experiences that contradict what they had been taught previously by other teachers, parents, family, or society at large. This experience with my students leaves me in agreement with Jeff C. when he says in 2:104 that "most of our students are not currently prepared to see the world from an expanded perspective. Realizing that our current ecological situation is relatively new and that life as we know it is not sustainable is a big leap for traditional industrially educated citizens." With this in mind, I (we?) are left with the big question of just how do we go about bringing forth a transformation in thinking and values in a way that honors where students are at while also moving them into different ways of thinking and being?? While I many times hear the answer to this question as, "create the conditions where students will come to their own conclusions about the environment and their relatedness to all beings" and it is a teaching philosophy I use and believe in, it does have its draw backs. First, if the "experience" the teacher is creating is designed to elicit a certain reaction or conclusion many adolescents can smell that they are being "set-up" a mile away and resist the insight we are hoping they will draw from the experience. Second, I wonder about the ethical considerations of "manipulating" students experiences to elicit a particular response from them? Though I use this form of teaching regularly, at times I wonder what gives me the "right" to do so? Seems the more I teach, the more there is to learn! Suggestions are always welcome. I appreciate Patsy's comments about the role of "Rites of Passage" work with students to parallel their learning about science and the scientific method. I will speak of the need for both of these modes of learning in my workshop on deep ecology education. Please join me then (begins the 20th) for further discussions about the role of activities in the outdoors that not only teach about nature, but also directly connect students to nature. For a discussion of rites of passages that are appropriate for today, I recommend the book "Crossroads: The Quest for Contemporary Rites of Passages" edited by Mahdi, Christopher, and Meade. Good to be part of the discussion. All for now... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:119) 17-JAN-1999 4:40 Marsha Snow Morgan [Edit] Chris Fritz (2:93) Asks about systems and how they might related to language teaching. Chris, you also ask about your moment of insight on the porch and how it might relate to this conference. I kept thinking about your questions. I don't pretend that this will solve you quandry as to how this applies to language teaching but from your context as a linguist you might see systems thinking from the view of what we call parts of speech. Essentially it seems to me that systems thinking involves a shift in emphasis from nouns and their modifiers to verbs, prepositions and conjunctions. Verbs to describe process, prepositions to indicated relationship and conjunctions to expand connections. Guess you would have to pay attention to tenses of the verb if you wanted to go into the evolutionary aspect of syntony. Sorry Laszlos if this similarity that I see is taking us too far astray. Chris there is a language exercise that students who are fairly confident with recognizing parts of speech like to play. Each part of speech has a coloured symbol. A selection from pose or poetry is selected and copied. Symbols are placed above the words. It makes a beautiful illustration of pattern. Now I am curious. Would the poets whom so often are able to indicate interconnections come out with more verbs and prepositions. New experiment! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:120) 17-JAN-1999 4:49 Cynthia Winans-Burns [Edit] This workshop is rich with inspiration and information. When I was fifteen and read Stranger in a Strange Land I came across the word grok and I have always understood it to mean: Holistic understanding. When my entire being heart, mind, body and spirit grok something. In a way it is syntony in understanding. Now many years later I find myself using that word a lot as I venture into this wonderful realization of systems thinking, holons etc. David K. I also ask how we create environments in which students experience spontaneous learning which emanates from their desire to know not the teachers intent to inform. Montessori said follow the child and really that is the key isn't it? I also find myself less inclined to "create prearranged enviornments" and (yes that does happen in Montessori classrooms) in which students can learn what I want them to know. This is not limited to students. I find myself experiencing the same thing with teachers as I work with them in developing our Living Classroom. How can we avoid the "set up"? I don't want to force them to participate but some appear to be so out of touch with the "current ecological situation" and the impact an earth based curriculm could have that I find myself considering manipulative strategies. Then again didn't Montessori say that until that moment of connection occurs a teacher can draw the student like a flower draws a bee using almost any means available? Creating learning environments that provide truthful experiences for learners should facilitate the transformation with out the need for manipulation. Meaningful activity is another key. Remaining open to discovering with the student is also important. This ability to say "I don't know, let's find out" can establish trust with the student and can also enpower them to take the lead in discovery and research. If every generation does "create it's own mind" then perhaps we can trust in this process. Knowing that in being mindful we are doing what we can do. Here is perhaps a ray of hope. I was in our school garden last week watching the students doing their various activities. That morning I had a conversation with our school naturalist in which she commented that the children have realized how hard it is to keep the garden up, and that they would really rather play when they come outside. With that in mind I observed the children. Remembering Montessori's comment that "play is a child's work" or is it "work is a child's play"? Either way I like saying it both ways. Anyway as I watched I saw that they were loving the play. And in their play they were "satisfying the needs of humans through nature". Nastursium leaves became drinking cups, large elephant ear leaves became shelter, garden produce turned into a meal, and insects were captured and released because they needed to "go home". All of this lead me to an idea. Perhaps the children are connecting with a genetic memory of their true relationship with Gaia. There is a purposefulness,and a trust in their activity that tells me that they have a relationship with the earth based in an intuitive knowing. I hope that this wasn't too eclectic or esoteric for you all because it certainly was a wonderful moment. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:121) 17-JAN-1999 10:38 Carolyn Magnussen [Edit] Enjoyed all of your comments. Kathia, might evolutionary ed. be likened to Historiography descrebed by Kincheloe? When Howard Zinn teachers History he tells his students that "you can't be neutral on a moving train" i.e.e all history is perspective, so choose a perspective and study it. Cynthia, do you work in a Montessori school? Your words resonate true for me. David yes, one does have to be careful about stretching the rubber band. One thing about Montessori is that if you are going to work in a Montessori enviroment , it is of great advantage to know how to present the material and stories. I wish I had more of this knowledge than I do. But in the absence of more extensive Montessori knowledge we do the best we can with what we otherwise know to work from public schools, and there is much (thanks to passionate teachers) which works. One of the hardest things for me in understanding Montessori has been the Play/work thing. As Cynthia says, Montessori's observations were that until the child comes in with a passion to get to work one needs to entice and even require them to do work. Marsha, "All good things in all good time" right? A few nights ago "Nattering on the Nett" fell into my hands (ordered it a long time ago). She has a very interesting section in there on language and especially SPELLING. :-) Chris F. would find that chapter interesting. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:122) 17-JAN-1999 12:02 Patsy L. Seo [Edit] Barbara I am new to computers & this is also my first conference. I am really enjoying it and have been enjoying your comments a lot. Gabriella I re-read your paradigm of science and theology. THank you for passing them on--interesting stuff? I was just getting ready to say to Brenda there is no reason you should question your faith or feel left out. I found the other answers to her comments were much better than mine. I am also new to education just my first year working as a part time substitute. I am still taking courses to get a certificate as a teacher. I think the educational system we have now was set up around 1800?? Mom was always at home then and Dad was too working on the farm.They gave personal attention, motivation and answered all the questions that came up about systems etc. We now need to supply all this in school We are not the parents but in ecconomically deprived families mom may work two 40 hour a week jobs and dad may be long gone. One of my daughters had two different classes that asked for parents to come as guest speakers. One was on ecconomics they asked the parents to say something about their jobs and one was on philosophy or ethics. In the latter she had to attend some sort of a ritual. Getting parents involved is a great idea but especially with large classes it take a lot of time away from other things. Yes we have kids in some part of the US come to school hungry and unable to learn. The school breakfast and lunch program was really great but I have heard some want to discontinue it because it costs money. One of my daughters was austracised because she couldn't qualify for free meal tickets because her parents made too much money.That's why I put a bottom on the pyramid. that started with data. These prejudice things are just like bad weather. You ignore them or deal with them and hope they will go away. The other club she wasn't allowed to join was a science one. This time because she wasn't Hispanic. She is Korean by birth. She is now a chemistry teacher, so she managed without their help. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:123) 17-JAN-1999 13:08 Marie Ruffolo [Edit] RE: Evolutionary Theory vs. Religion. As an often-times silent observer/learner, it is interesting to note that although the method of "travel" is different, the destination is the same. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:124) 17-JAN-1999 13:15 Karen R. Holt [Edit] I am jumping in here late after 120 thoughts. And am needing also a place to see if this picture is one that lends itself to the concept of "syntony". Picture: a group of young adolescents sitting in our so-called grown-up conference room collaborating with each other on their "Senior Project - Major Research Paper". They listen to each other, offer suggestions, constructive criticisms, magazines from home, web sites, interview possibilities, etc. Each one is responsible not only to his/her own project but also to the success of the whole group. Because it is collaborative - passion explodes exponentially creating a dynamic that fuels the fire for further exploration. I dare say - the content of their projects (ex. How Video Games Influence Our Views on War) may be forgotten by the time they go to their first prom in High School but hopefully, the process will remain with them until the rocking chair. So, process might have a syntonous aspect; the process of probably anything: the process of evolution, the process of creating a masterpiece, etc. Bringing in past (all that had been learned up to now), the present (being available to new connections), the future (being aware of what needs to be looked at from the perspective of 7 generations from now - this is where we, as homo sapiens, might consciously become co-creators). It is both individual and communal and is held within the context of the current culture (systems) as it displays itself. I guess, in a nutshell, it is evolutionary. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:125) 17-JAN-1999 13:45 Barbara J. Smith [Edit] Hello David, A good number of years have gone by since I have been a 'classroom' teacher, yet I remember the faces, and 'souls' if you will, of my students as though it were yesterday. And I know that 'times have changed'--but I will try to share with you here a couple of exercises that helped to create a ground/field that allowed for a lot of what seemed to me to be miraculous synchronous learning for the entire year. For 7 or 8 years I taught English to 7th,8th and 9th graders in a Calif. public school. Each September I would greet 200+ new faces. By the time I had learned to do a good job, wouldn't you know I left to do something else! But here is a story from that last year in that setting. The first week, I gave them an assignment that puzzled them. I asked them to (I gave them one week) go out and find a tree that "is in some way like you." The first few days they would come in and ask for more direction about how to go about this. I would just, "Keep looking." Oh...they were also supposed to sit down by that tree and just describe it in writing--no specific length--just describe it. When they finally brought in their papers, and they ALL responded, I played a trick on them. Over the weekend, I read through them all carefully and found short salient passages, cut them out in strips, leaving off any names or other identifications, and stapled them all over the walls in the classroom. (I had a temporary building with fairly soft walls, and the principal finally got used to my using staples and didn't complain any more!) Anyway, on Monday morning as each class came in they would walk around reading 200+ statements which obviously were deeply meaningful to all of them. That is all I did with that one, just left them up there for long enough for maximum exposure. The level of trust, the deeper understanding of each other, the realization that they could do some integrating in this class, the 'syntony' that began to develop--was a deep learning experience for me. We did a lot of writing that year. They kept journals of course. Again at first, "What shall I write ?." I began to put a short poem or a part of a poem on the board each morning before first period, and told them just to copy it into their journals and then just write whatever they wanted to. Some still felt strange about expressing from within and would ask for more direction. I would say something like, "Oh, just write whatever you had for dinner last night." To cut to the chase, they began to hunger for the poems, their own language and depth of reflection was truly remarkable. They began to drop (unassigned) poems and little compositions of their own on my desk, so that we decided to create a literary magazine for the whole school, and they got to be editors, etc....They came to love their journals as a "way to make sense my life" and since the journal was supposed to take the first 8 or 10 minutes, they all got into their seats, eyes focused on the chalkboard, while I could take role and do all that stuff. I got the idea of the trees from Sid Simon and I used another idea of his--the "I learned statement." On Fridays, I would have them review their week and write an I learned statement. Again no further direction. They were free to select whatever exercise might stand out for them. Again, it was deep learning time for me! I would wait to assign the 'formal term paper' until the science teacher would assign a researh report, and they would come begging me to help them with the form for that, so I never had to give them that old term paper assignment.That worked well. I was never comfortable with manipulating reactions, conclusions and outcomes either, but I was fortunate to be teaching a subject wherein I could find obvious ways to work with the whole person. Oh well, I loved it so much (not that it wasn't the hardest work of my life!) I could write a whole book just from the memories.... Students in the middle years do seem to be at some level needing a container as you say too--I would agree so strongly with that....don't smash that...often you have to build one, a safe one, because containers are hard to come by in today's society. I remember there was one story in the big heavy literature book, "The Silver Mine"....I never used the prepared suggestions at the end of the stories in that book. I remember asking them to respond in writing as to whether they agreed with the conclusion of the villagers. (The villagers decided to board up the silver mine and not use it because it might be too dangerous.) Most of them said they agreed, and that told me a lot about their need not to be stretched to far too soon--in any way. Now I had my share of failures....well maybe not failures...because sometimes we are doing our best work when we think we are doing our worst...I have had some surprising feedback on that. I began to learn to trust that if I could put myself in a certain'flow' what needed to be said would get said. It's a great thing when a student from 20 years ago tells you that something you said way back there was a beacon for life for him/her. Something you might not have noticed at the time or been intending at the time. In later years, I decided to specialize in the arts, and that is always a good setting for this syntony to blossom all over the place. At this point I have been writing some proposals for grants for artist-in-residence work at a Waldorf school. One grant just came in on Friday! The star must be standing over this conference! I hope I have said something here that helps, or at least encourages. Love to you. Love to all, I am feeling wonderfully nourished by this conversation sparkling through the invisible network. Oh yes...one more thing...I always worked along with them, especially with poetry. I would write in the back of the room as they were writing. Some of my best poems (I think) would come out of the very atmosphere in the room or from????? They certainly learned to observe and feel connected to nature and to themselves deeply and to begin to be able to share that with each other and with me. Again, learning, big time, for me. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:126) 17-JAN-1999 14:48 Brenda Vandermeulen [Edit] Kathia (and many others) - thank you for your thoughtful comments regarding my quesions. I especially found Kathia's comments (quote below) as helpful in finding more about what is meant by E/LC. "The E/LC (evolutionary learning-community) is any human activity system that becomes a learning community and seeks the goodness of fit in syntonic terms with the evolutionary processes. An E/LC is any community that integrates learning as a central aspect of their existence based on the belief that learning should happen in all contexts of society, not only in schools. An E/LC can be any corporation, family, non-profit, neighborhood... that creates a sustainable purpose and establishes a coevolutionary relationship with its environment. An E/LC proactively engages in a design process that helps their members not only to do things right, but also to do the right things, given the dynamics of their local and global milieu. There are many real-world human activity systems that have the potential to become E/LCs. To identify them and support them in their transformation as they go through their own evolutionary path is part of our work." Particularly I can related to the idea that learning should happen in all contexts of society - not just schools. I have for years, in the business world, tried to bring that perspective both personally in my work, and also to those with whom I have worked. Now as I consult and begin teaching at the college level, it is my highest desire to see my students see all of life as a learning opportunity. I want them to see that the lessons learned one place almost always translate to lessons someplace else. And I want them to see that there are systemic implications to every decision that we make. I am teaching in a business school, and it seems terribly important to me that students learn to think about the implications of their actions to communities as a whole, to broaden the definition of who is a stakeholder in their enterprise. And the more that students are taught this BEFORE they get into the business world, the more likely it is that they will make decisions more carefully and more holistically in the future. If this, then, is a part of what you mean by E/LC, then I think I am beginning to understand it differently than I did in the first place (hmmm...could I be learning?) Thanks again for the clarification. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:127) 17-JAN-1999 15:49 Amy E. Hitzig [Edit] 'Them hard-drive blues are gettin' me down'.......... after days of reading, thinking and finally knowing what I wanted to say, I wrote a response, and promptly lost it due to my hard-drive being over-full. Aaaaarghhhh!! So, here is what I can remember, somewhat abbreviated since it is nearly time to head down the mountain for our weekly Sunday evening with family - fun, music, kids, dogs, and FOOD! My husband just finished creating over a dozen lemon meringue tarts (mini pies)!! MMmmmm. I get to be the taste tester! Kathia, I had written of homeschooling, and the dilemma of following each child's inherent drive and the worry about "developing the reading and math abilities expected by society." I do not take exception so much to society's expectations as I do to the time-line and methods imposed. I have preferred to err on the side of freedom, and have spent many hours of the passt 8years questioning deeply whether I am doin gthe right thing. Howevce, my children, now 16, 14 and 11, are engaging, articulate, vitally interested in "Life-with-a-capital-L" (as we call it), and thoroughly enjoy the companionship of humans of all ages. My 14-yr-old has just decided he wants to go to a boarding school for 10th grade, and when we said he would have to have show academic strength in some areas that we have not put very much time into, he said, OK!, and has been very busy developing those abilities, even though they are difficult for him due to dyslexia. Motivation - internal - personnally meaningful goal.....These allow the the system to be fully engaged, and SO MUCH is learned/absorbed in a relatively short time. Regarding learning styles, please look into Dawna Markova. <> Her book THE OPEN MIND, and one co-authored with Anne Powell, HOW YOUR CHILD IS SMART, discuss her research into the way the brain interacts with incoming information, and depending upon whether the info is visual, auditory or kinesthetic, it stimulates a different brainwave response at each level of consiousness. This is my humble attempt at a Very brief explanation. It is fascinating and complex in its impact on learning and relationships. Jeff and David - (2::103, 2:118) I am out of time to re-write all the info that my computer deleted, but I recommend you check out a web site for "Tribes", <> . It is process for developing trust among a group and forming small groups within the large one (hence, tribes) so that true learning and sharing can take place. It is based on practicing group agreements - primarily Attentive listening, Appreciations/No put downs, Mutual respect, and the Right to pass. A variety of activities are offered to develop comfort and trust that come of having a sense of inclusion in the group. I am part of a volunteer group bringing the Tribes process to our local jr. high school. It is wonderful to have the support of the principal and at least half the teachers, but there are so many who are ambivilant or just don't believe in a process approach ( discipline , and nothing that resembles a lack of order will do). I will take the quote about not stretching the rubber-band of transformation to heart. We have a hard time accepting that some simply do not see as we see. We definately threaten the worldview of those we are trying to teach, students and teachers. Thank you, David for sharing this with us. I will pass your words on to those I am working with on this jr. high school project. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:128) 17-JAN-1999 15:56 Alexander Laszlo [Edit] In Response 95, Ken remarks on how he has "been studying the Time, Space, Knowledge vision of Tarthang Tulku intensively the last few months. His vision does not base itself on a search for "answers" in the usual sense, but in the process of inquiry itself; thus, one asks questions and experiments with different, unusual perspectives, not to settle the questions but just to explore their possibilities. "Answers" may arise, but are not taken as final; they can always be challenged or questioned, may be applicable in one sphere or range but not another. " -- This orientation is essential to the disposition of the life-long-learner, and is at the heart of the process of learning how to learn (continually). Jeff reminded me of a good book when he wrote about engaging in educaional experiences with students that involve "Helping them realize that change, often including chaos, is normal and healthy..." (Response 103) The book is by Uri Merry ( Praeger, 1995). It's a good one. Brenda, Rev. Jim, Patsy, Kathia, Barbara, and others have discussed "the incompatibility" of worldviews... In particular, Barbara mentions the work of Teilhard de Chardin as bridging and creating understanding in spiritual and scientific ways. In fact, Teilhard de Chardin was one of the first to use the notion of "syntony" in more than purely engineering terms. He uses the term in the widest possible sense to describe the transcendence of humanity to superhumanity which will act like one personal being, an immense self, in which the billions of individuals would basically function with one mind by direct syntony and resonance of their consciousness. Now, we (Kathia and I) employ a slightly less expansive notion of syntony, one that is more amenable to proactive intentional initiatives to "dance evolution," but we are nontheless inspired by de Chardin's brave vision. Also, still on this theme of worldviews and issues of their compatibility, I would like to share with you a little story.... It comes from the science fiction book, <> by David Zindell (Bantam, 1994, pp. 110-112), and I think it is an *excellent* way to 'grok' the systems view of syntony among humans (and especially as relates to their belief systems). Plus, it's a fun read, so here's the excerpt: "... the ideal and practice of the art of plexure. This art -- it is sometimes called plexity -- aims at moving the student through the four stages of liberation. In the first stage, that of the simplex, one is caught within the bounds of a single worldview. This is the reality of a child or an Alaloi hunter [a neanderthaloid race], who may not even be aware that other ways of perceiving reality exist. Most peoples of the Civilized Worlds, however, *are* aware of humanity's many religions, philosophies, ways, and worldviews. They suspect that adherence to their own belief system is somewhat arbitrary, that had they been born as autists or as Architects of the Infinite Life, for example, they might venerate dreams as the highest state of reality or worship artificial life as evolution's ultimate goal. In fact, they might believe *anything,* but simplex people believe only one thing, whatever reality their parents and culture have imprinted into their brains. As the Fravashi [who developed the art of plexure] say, human beings are self-satisfied creatures who love looking into the mirror for evidence that they are somehow brighter or more beautiful than they really are. It is the great and deadly vanity of human beings to convince themselves that their worldview, no matter how unlikely or bizarre, is somehow more sane, natural, pragmatic, holy, or truthful than any other. Out of choice -- or cowardice -- most people never break out of this simplex stage of viewing the world as through a single lense, and this is their damnation. "All of Old Father's students, of course, by the very act of adopting the Fravashi system, had elevated themselves to the complex stage of belief. To be complex is to hold at least two different realities, perhaps at two different times of one's life. The complex woman or man will cast away beliefs like old clothes, as they become worn or inappropriate. Using the Fravashi techniques, it is possible to progress from one belief system to another, ever growing, ever more flexible, bursting free from one worldview into another as a snake sheds an old skin. The truly complex person will move freely among these systems as the need arises. When journeying by sled across the frozen sea, he will have nineteen different words for the colors of whiteness; when studying the newtonian spectrum, she will compose wavelengths of red, green, and blue into pure white light; when visiting the Perfect on Gehenna, one will chose articles of clothing that contain no white, since it is obvious that white isn't really a color at all, but rather the absence of all color, and thus, the absence of light and life. The ideal of complexity, as Old Father liked to remind his students, was the ability to move from system to system -- or from worldview to worldview -- with the speed of thought. "'Ah, ha,' Old Father said one night, 'all of you are complex, and some of you may become very complex, but who among you has the strength to be multiplex?' "The third stage of plexure is the multiplex. If complexity is the ability to suspend and adopt different beliefs as they are useful or appropriate, one after another, then multiplexity is the holding of more than one reality at the same time. These realities may be as different -- or even contradictory -- as the old science and the magical thinking of a child. 'Truth is multiple,' as the Old Fathers say. One can never become multiplex if afraid of paradox or enslaved by the god of consistency. Multiplex vision is paradoxical vision, new logics, the sudden completion of startling patterns. The mastery of multiplexity makes it possible to see the world in many dimensions; it is like peering into a jewel of a thousand different faces. When one has attained a measure of the multiplex, the world's creation is seen as the handiworkd of a god, and a fireball exploding out of the primordial neverness, and a communal dream, and the eternal crystalli- zation of reality out of a shimmering and undifferentiated essence -- all these things and many others, all at once. The multiplex man (or alien) will see all truths as interlocking parts of a greater truth. The Fravashi teach that once in every cycle of time, one is born who will evolve from multiplexity to the omniplex, which is the fourth and final stage of liberation. This completely free individual is the asarya. Only the asarya may hold all possible realities at once. Only the asarya is able to say 'yes' to all of creation, for one must see everything as it truly is before making the final affirmation." - Alex&er ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:129) 17-JAN-1999 16:28 Carol A. Welsh [Edit] Kathia I appreciated the posting of your step design of communities which learn. Your use of time as the major factor in the development of work together makes sense. Yet some people stay working with each other for years and never reach the design community stage. Others seem to be able to get there in a few weeks if things are syntonous( Is that a word?) Patsy(102) thanks for your acknowledgement of the work with children who come to school without the basic resources to prepare them to learn. Doralice, your questions about meeting basic needs or learning needs as a future resource is a serious one. Even in my workplace in PA it is common for teachers to spend $2,000 a year for needs of students. I think though that an answer may lie with the work of Csikszentmihali and his analysis of experience where skill and the complexity of the presented task are at a perfect relationship - that the joy of learning becomes the optimal experience. Outside of the flow channel there is anxiety if the task is beyond the skill and boredom if the task is too simple for the skill a student has. It is fun learning, like in the garden described above and finding the plants thich remind children of other things. It seems to me when the learning environment and the teacher has paid close attention to the match of skill and task complexity that students who may have other things on their minds, deep and very serious things and needs, can somehow learn and have more of a future. My work has been with kinesthetic learning and multiple intelligences applied to learning situations which involve needy children who have not been able to master core content in the same time frame as classmates. Somehow the movement is a way of being in the work and putting aside the worries at risk kids seem to be full of. It is possible then to just do the work and seems to be a gate out of the worries many small children carry. As a public school teacher I appreciate the Senge quoteDavid(118) about the rubber band of transformation and the admonition not to do too much too quickly. It seems also true that passion for one "answer" leads to spending way too much time on one of the learning levels you described Kathia. Syntony might be the freeing like the electron shells to get to the next step. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:130) 17-JAN-1999 16:38 David Liscio [Edit] Catching up here seems absurb some times. But it is truly wonderful to be part of such an evolutionary learning community. Just wanted to respond to D. Ketter (2:118) about introducing a world view to students. I've met plenty who are frightened of it, a few who simply shrugged it off, but the majority embraced it with newfound awareness. It made them step beyond their immediate families and communities to see a broader picture, a new place for themselves as player in a vast drama. Nothing for me has meant more as an educator, or better yet as Jeff said, facilitator, than seeing their faces upon opening that door. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:131) 17-JAN-1999 18:23 Alexander Laszlo [Edit] Aaaargh.... I'm feeling very asynchronous here, and while I know this is *supposed* to be an asynchronous learning environment, I want to apologize for my postings being "one step behind" the current discourse. I'm cathing up, though! Soon I'll be making reference to the most recent postings (I promise!) =) Doralice asks for examples of cases in which we have sought to foster the emergence of ELC and to co-create the conditions for syntony with others -- especially in educational/learning environments. This is an excellent suggestion. I think it will help us ground our discussion, as Doralice suggests. We have a few case examples to share with you, in various types of communities (from corporate to neighborhood), but the most relevant one will be the one called "A Better World: Co-Creating Learning Communities in Mexico" -- Kathia already mentioned this project in an earlier post. (The project was supported by a grant from the Sasakawa Foundation of Japan.) Since Kathia headed up the project, she will present the summary of our experience and our learnings, as well as a brief description of what it entailed. (Sorry to keep you in suspenders, but at least you know it's coming!) In Response 119, Mem says: "Essentially it seems to me that systems thinking involves a shift in emphasis from nouns and their modifiers to verbs, prepositions and conjunctions. ... Guess you would have to pay attention to tenses of the verb if you wanted to go into the evolutionary aspect of syntony." YES!! We have to verbize our languaging to experience sytonizing! This similarity you see between systems thinking and linquistics, Mem, certainly does not take us astray. David, in %resonse (118), presents some fascinating, rich, and extremely valuable insights into "creating the conditions..." for learning. In Response 120, Cynthia gets back to this issue, commenting that "I also find myself less inclined to "create prearranged enviornments" and (yes that does happen in Montessori classrooms) in which students can learn what I want them to know. .... How can we avoid the "set up"? I don't want to force them to participate but some appear to be so out of touch with." Ha! Maybe I have something to share here, and maybe it can help. Evolutionary Systems Design (ESD), as we have mentioned before, is geared toward the conscious and proactive co-creation of the future (in syntony...). It suggests that we can never design for others, only *with* them. Bela H. Banathy, in his chapter on "Getting Ready for Design" of his book (part of the Contemporary Systems Thinking series of Plenum Press, 1996), has this to say about the process: "When it comes to the design of social and societal systems of all kinds, it is the users, the people in the system, who are the experts. Nobody has the right to design social systems for someone else. It is unethical to design social systems for someone else. Design cannot be legislated, it should not be bought from the expert, and it should not be copied from the design of others. If the privilege of and responsibility for design is "given away," others will take charge of designing our lives and our systems. They will shape our future." (p. 228) "It is unethical to design social systems *for* someone else." Even when we craft a situation in which others can come to their own learnings, we are still designing *for* them. Kathia described a process where this didn't occur in a schooling environment, where the learners were integrally involved in deciding both what to learn and how to learn it (or at least, of what direction to learn in) back in Response 107. This distinction between DESIGN FOR others and DESIGN WITH others is central to ESD. Here's a way to grok it, using the parable, "if you give a man fish, he is fed for a day. If you teach a man to fish, he is fed for a lifetime." (Recognizing that contemporary expressions of the parable should substitute "person" for "man."): Setting the Degree of Interaction: Choosing the Mode of Design -- 5 Generations ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TYPES 1 & 2: DESIGN *FOR* OTHERS: * Expert (provides the solution) - Gives a man fish * Specialist (gets feedback) - Fishes for him __________________________________________ TYPES 3, 4 & 5: DESIGN *WITH* OTHERS: * Animator (promotes design) - Teaches him how to fish * Facilitator (capacitates for design) - "Learns" him how to fish * Catalyst (enables ongoing design) - Empowers self-provision The point with this diagram is not to think that one way is "the right way" and that another is "wrong." As Cynthia pointed out, "Montessori (said) that until that moment of connection occurs a teacher can draw the student like a flower draws a bee using almost any means available." So learning facilitation will involve moving back and forth between these various "modes of design," but always tending toward the more "design with" orientations. Which mode one engages in at any particular time depends on several factors: how much time you have to work/learn/play with your group; the size and "togetherness" of the group; the amount of resources at your disposal; and the "readiness" to accept responsibility for self-direction in learning challenges of the individuals involved. ESD involves asking not only "where would you like to go today?" but also then soliciting help in creating the means to get there. It is similar to what some call "problem based learning," but there are no "problems" to be "solved" (since life is not a problem to be solved), and such orientations are still wide-open to manipulation in the design of the situation with which to engage. There is an ancient Chinese saying that relates to this: "A leader is best, not when people obey and acclaim him, but if -- when the work is done -- the people say, 'we did it ourselves.'" As with any developmental and transformative process, significant learning can only be brought about if those who are most liekly to be affected by the implications participate in soliciting the learning, choosing how it shall be engaged in and experienced. Only then is it possible to foster fundamental learning since, like in all transcendent processes of change in human social systems, human beings are the critical factor, and change must necessarily both emanate from and incorporate them. I always try to remember: "It is unethical to design social systems *for* someone else." As an example of this sort of thing, I see the co-learning style that Barbara used to use (when she taught in the classroom) as very much like this (although she may disagree). In Response 125, she says "To cut to the chase, they began to hunger for the poems, their own language and depth of reflection was truly remarkable. They began to drop (unassigned) poems and little compositions of their own on my desk, so that we decided to create a literary magazine for the whole school, and they got to be editors, etc....They came to love their journals as a "way to make sense my life" ..." In systems terms, it's like co-creating learning "attractors" that do not determine the learning path but rather nudge the learner to develop their own path and process. (Great stuff, Barbara!!! I wish you *would* write a book about this! It's so valuable! And congrats on your grant =) Amy, thank you for sharing information about Tribes and other such valuable resources in Response 127. I hope your hard-drive problem wasn't too frustrating or discouraging! Your recap of what you had prepared was great! 2:132) 17-JAN-1999 20:46 Alexander Laszlo I think I'm caught up! Wow... Of course, I haven't managed to pick up on all that I would have like to... it's just so right and so dense. Ah well, your voices will continue to resonate with me long after our little interaction here is over and past. And even though I have already learned *so much* with you in these brief few days, I'm sure that there will be much more learning in the days to come as your ideas and experiences, reflections and emotions (which do come across the Internet), settle in me and spark new insights. Thanks again! I'm not saying goodbye -- I'll be back! Hey, it's not over 'till the fat lady sings, and Kathia has yet to make a few more postings (just kidding around here, babe! I love you.) So I'll be back in a bit, but first, it's Kathia's turn. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:133) 17-JAN-1999 22:19 Cynthia Winans-Burns Carolyn in 2:122 you asked if I worked in a Montessori School Yes I am the Curriculum Director at the Montessori School of Maui. I taught in the classroom for a number of years before taking this position. By the way Montessori is the only system that I have taught in. Alexander 2:131 thank you for the insight into design with others. I absolutly agree that this should always be where we are headed with whatever age learner we are working with. It is such a delicate dance to invite people to design their own learning. I found it to be a lot easier with children than adults. Habits are hard to break sometimes, and so many of us have come from a traditional system in which we expected to be told what to do. The reactions that come from those "recorded" expeiences are fascinating. When I became Curriculum Director I thought that as adult teachers in a montessori system we could move quickly to embrace collaberation and eco literacy. I found something very different, a microcosm of the world perhaps? I try to remember my training as a Montessori teacher as we work together to create an adult learning community here at our school. These insights from you and others are very supportive and thought provoking. Many thanks folks ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:134) 17-JAN-1999 23:48 Amy E. Hitzig The links in my post, 1:127, are corrected. Sorry for the error. A good night to all~ So much to ponder and dream about. PS to Alex&der, my son shares your name, and thinks the "&" is really cool! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:135) 18-JAN-1999 0:17 John Scott Fowler I'm with you Alexander, aargh!(131) There sure is a lot here. I will try to digest a bit tomorrow but I must second your comments, and Barbara's in the cosmology and education strand . Indeed, as I believe Barbara also indicated, the weave between the first three strands of our conference is a marvel to behold. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:136) 18-JAN-1999 0:30 Marsha Snow Morgan Carolyn, One of Cynthia's mentors was also one of mine. Barbara Gordon was the director of the school where I began and arranged my scholarship to Bergamo and later worked in Hawaii. Small world it is in so many ways. This conversation is one to be read in the present and digested over time. I have no words to add as the dialogue is so full and rich. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:137) 18-JAN-1999 1:16 Kathia Laszlo Brenda, yes! The idea of the E/LC is about bringing processes of evolutionary learning to every aspect of our daily lives and to all the systems where we belong. So, our personal/professional strategy is to create and promote EL/C (educational communities) where the conditions for transformation of other social systems into E/LCs can occur. Doralice, the kind of social reality in which your work as educator is embedded is very challenging and it is an issue that really interests me. You find yourself in a difficult situation, wanting to do the best for and with your students, but there are basic human needs that are not being met. What do you do? You present two choices: feed your students from your pocket or challenge the system that permits this to happen. These are definite possible options. But I see limitations in both of them. If we look at this situation as a "design" situation, and using the ideas of generations of design that Alexander presented above, we can see that these two options are "design for others" solutions. If you dedicate part of your resources to fulfill the basic needs of your students, almost literally, you are giving them fish. If you dedicate your energy into getting the government or other authorities within or without the school system to provide for the students, it is still looking for ways to giving them fish or fishing for them. How can we create options in which we can fish with them and, through learning, empower them to provide for themselves? What about the idea shared by F. Capra in his interview about an organic vegetable garden that can provide some produce for the kids to grow, cook, and consume? Mem also mentioned that she has some experience in gardening projects. What about inviting parents and children to a brainstorm session to explore options available to them? Maybe these ideas are very off since I have very little contextual information, but I hope to have communicated the idea of exploring options that empower the students and the communities to take charge of their situations and come up with creative solutions. Your role is to catalyze this creativity that no doubt exist in each human being and the overwhelming potential synergies within each community. Although quite a different situation, let me share our experiences in our learning community project in Mexico. One of the learning communities was formed by adults who were actively involved as volunteers in their neighborhoods. However, they perceived their role as activists to convince the local government to provide the services that they were lacking. For instance, the streets illumination was very poor. Some sectors of the neighborhoods were very dark in the night, and this allowed some vandalism and other crimes. We supported this initiative-- it was very important to get attention from the local authorities to respond to this need. But in the work that we were doing together in the context of our project, we wanted them to identify areas of opportunity were they could implement actions without depending on someone else (i.e. local authorities). It was really hard to move our conversation from *complains* about what they were not receiving to *possibilities* that they could bring into being. The conversation about insecurity in the dark areas of the neighborhood finally came to a deeper level of reflection on the quality of family life and education that youth in the neighborhood were having. The gangs that were doing all the damage were formed by the teenagers of the neighborhood who didn't have enough support and guidance to do something better with their free time. This learning community decided to create more learning communities for parents, with the specific purpose of supporting each other in the challenging task of being teenagers parents, to share ideas about parenting, and to organize programs and activities in community spaces for youth, such as sports and arts events. We'll see what happens, but they were very very excited by this idea that emerged from their dialogue. Finally, I would like to share an additional clarifying idea about syntony. I think that there is a sharp distinction between "following the flow" as almost a mindless activity were we surrender to a process that we do not understand, and "dancing with the flow" as the embodiment of a deep understanding that took a lot of effort and energy but that finally we are able to integrate fully into our being. Syntony is dancing with the flow of evolutionary dynamics. But as a jazz group has to learn music and to play their instruments and practice a lot and listen to each other before they can get to a syntonic jam session, and as the dancer has to stretch and learn the steps and listen to the music, syntony does not happens spontaneously. You are probably familiar with the developmental steps from unconscious incompetence to unconscious competence. Well, we added another level, that is, after unconscious competence is when the syntony sense can emerge: 4) syntony sense --------> 3) unconscious competence --------> 2) conscious competence --------> 1) conscious incompetence --------> 0) unconscious incompetence And now, I hate to say good bye! I want to thank you all for your thoughts and good energy. This was an extremely rich week for me and I hope that we will have the chance to continue learning together. So keep in touch! Our ideas and ideals are evolving, and we would love to hear from you about your insights and experiences after this intense week of learning and dialogue. If there is any way in which we can be of further assistance in your learning journey, you can count on us! Finally, we would appreciate any feedback from you as participants to us as "keynote speakers," in terms of both content and process. With love and appreciation, Kathia+ [Image] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:138) 18-JAN-1999 1:41 Alexander Laszlo Ah yes, the wings of potential. As Mem said so well, "This conversation is one to be read in the present and digested over time." (I have learned so much with you, Mem. Thank you for being.) And now, some semi-parting thoughts (for although our week is over, LM99 has just begun, and we'll be hanging out in the cafe and other places for the duration). Foist of all, a metaphor for evolution as a direction generating (but not a directed) process: TWENTY QUESTIONS If we wish to be conscientious facilitators of learning and change who take responsibility for what we are doing and where we are going, we need to learn how to deal with the challenge of change so that it happens *through* us rather than *to* us. Not taking this responsibility would be tantamount to letting go of the tiller upon realizing that we are in the Captain's Chair and suddenly becoming aware that the ship of humanity is entering a section of white-water rapids. At a point of societal bifurcation, we just can't afford the luxury of leaving the direction of social evolution either to chance or to God -- not now -- not if we want to seize the opportunity out from this period of turbulent transition. How is it, then, that we are to account for the seeming coherence and the apparent unity in the diversity of nature that we observe all around us? I believe that the way in which objectives are chosen and purposes are determined in evolutionary processes can best be elucidated through the metaphor of a variation on the game of Twenty Questions. In the standard version of this game, one person leaves the room while the other players agree on an object or person he or she is to guess. The guessing proceeds by the player asking questions to which only "yes" or "no" answers can be given. Experienced interlocutors begin with a general category such as "is it animal?" or "is it vegetable?" and then move to more specific issues such as "is it larger than a house?" before reaching a final question such as "is it the lamp on the street corner?" The game is fully teleological, since the goal to be achieved by the player is already given: it is the person, place, or thing on which the others have agreed. There is trial-and-error, but only in regard to approaching a preestablished end. The variation I am thinking of is different. In it, there is a conspiracy *not* to set a target to be guessed -- but not to let the player know this. He or she will proceed with the trial-and-error guessing the same as if there were something specific to be guessed. Would there be no further rules to the game, the guessing would be entirely random, and the player would become thoroughly confused. But there is a rule: each answer must be consistent with those that were given before. For example, if the answer to the first question "is it animal?" is "yes", then no further answer is to contradict the possibility that the target reply be an animal. As the questions move from the general to the particular, the permissible answers become progressively limited. It can happen that within twenty questions the player will arrive at a final question to which the conspirators, bound by the consistency rule, are obliged to answer "yes." In this way, a result is produced in the game that was not known to anyone beforehand. In fact, the game generates its own objective. This modified version of Twenty Questions proceeds toward an objective that is generated in the course of the guessing. It is trial-and-error based, not teleological. If this kind of process were to occur in nature, evolutionary biologists would be satisfied. There would be trial-and-error; progress in some identifiable direction; and a total absence of any predesigned end. Significantly, the factor that allows a game without a predesigned end to proceed in an identifiable direction is the rule that each answer must be consistent with all prior answers. This, however, means that the meaning of all prior answers is fedback to inform all subsequent answers. It is a "possibilistic" process of negentropic self-structuration, i.e., it is autopoietic. What is the moral of the story? That there is a rhyme and a reason to the process of evolution that can be accounted for through reference to internal prompting rather than by having to postulate some external change agent. More specifically with reference to the stochastic nature of societal evolution, it points to the fact that during periods of relative stability -- when the rules of the game are fixed and the objectives are relatively well known -- it is hard for any one individual or group of individuals to influence the general course of societal evolution since their efforts are likely to be damped out by dominant ways of thinking and methods of doing. However, it is precisely *at* bifurcation points that the individual stands a chance to play a leading role in determining the character of the dynamic regime to come. So, given an evolutionary perspective, it seems that there might be hope for us to understand what in the world is happening in the world. And it also seems that we can understand how active intervention in the process of societal evolution is crucial during periods of bifurcation -- such as we are experiencing now as we transit from the 20th to the 21st century. Once we accept the calling to be the directors as well as the actors in the play of societal evolution, the challenge of survival in a new era becomes an issue of design through syntony. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:139) 18-JAN-1999 2:11 Alexander Laszlo And now, some closing thoughts and images. As Kathia pointed out, syntony is a conscious, future creating activity as it manifests itself in the expression of human will. It involves holding the vision of the awsome potential for what we could create with the knowledge of the terrible catastrophe we could cause. Remember how Kathia pointed out that the Chinese characters for "chaos" are crisis and opportunity? Well, that's the nature of the current bifurcation we are living on this planet, and learning to "read the signs of change" is part of the evolutionary literacy that we need to acquire in order to navigate this period of bifurcation with syntony. This, in part, is what Syntony Quest is about. -- The Challenge: € Our societies are increasingly complex and uncertain. ... Humankind is in transition. € Our ways of thinking and doing separate us from each other and nature. ... Humankind is off balance. € Our social worlds are overflowing with superficiality. ... Humankind is searching for meaning. € Our current civilizational trajectory is unsustainable and potentially catastrophic. ... Humankind is destroying the world. € Our challenge for planetary survival cannot be met with short term vision. ... Humankind could face extinction. The Vision: € Our species is on the verge of planetary consciousness. ... Humankind is transcending. € Our evolutionary potential increases with our unity in diversity. ... Humankind is differentiating and integrating. € Our understanding of complexity bolsters our change ability. ... Humankind is becoming responsAble. € Our values are shifting toward a partnership with Earth. ... Humankind is becoming a steward of evolution. € Our attitudes toward the future are becoming proactive. ... Humankind could learn syntony. [a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a[a -- The image we have created to represent this creative tension is one that shows the connection between the catastrophic attractors that threaten a downward spiral into chaos and mayhem (along the lines of the challenge presented above) and the dynamic opportunity-increasing attractors that could lead to a harmoneous flowing balance among the multitude of processes on planet Earth (along the lines of the vision). How to foster ways of being and becoming that discourage the former and favor the latter, this is the syntony quest (and the mission of our organization, Syntony Quest). [Image] Syntony arises in the dynamic, the dance, from the chaotic spiral to the harmonious spiral. It is evolutionary alchemy! The challenge for all of us is to become change agents of syntony. Here are some of the shifts we can nurture: -- From... To... ... Human Being ... Human Becoming ... either/or perspectives ... both/and perspectives ... specialized knowers ... life-long learners ... having change happen to us ... having change happen through us ... Dominator Society ... Partnership Society ... competitive attitudes ... collaborative attitudes ... representative democracy ... participatory democracy ... design for others ... design with others ... Anthropocentric Consciousness ... Planetary Consciousness ... local/national ethics ... global/biospheric ethics ... mastery over nature ... stewardship of life ... being conscious of the ... making evolution a process of evolution conscious process ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2:140) 18-JAN-1999 2:21 Philip Snow Gang With deep appreciation and profound thanks to Kathia and Alexander for launching this space. I am "freezing" this conference. This means that no more comments will appear here. However, if there are things anyone would like to continue to discuss you can create a new item in the Open Space Conference. See you in the author's workshops and Weaving for the next two days before our new presenters appear on Wednesday 20 January (EST). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1