I thought this brief outline of Five Minds for the Future by Howard Gardner from Time Online provides a sense of the cognitive abilities the LO project is helping us develop:
THE FIVE MINDS WE NEED
“The disciplined mind has mastered at least one way of thinking. It takes up to ten years to achieve mastery.
The synthesising mind takes information from disparate sources. It understands and evaluates information objectively, puts it together in ways that make sense and is more important as the tide of information increases.
The creating mind breaks new ground and raises new ideas. It poses unfamiliar questions and arrives at unexpected answers. It is impossible to hone without a foundation of discipline and synthesis.
The respectful mind welcomes differences between people, tries to understand others and seeks to work effectively with them. It is a necessity in the global village.
The ethical mind ponders the nature and purpose of work and assesses the needs and desires of society. It thinks beyond self-interest and seeks to improve the lot of all.â€Â
Five Minds for the Future by Howard Gardner
Moderator: Jim O'Bryan
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Kenneth Warren
- Posts: 489
- Joined: Sat Mar 26, 2005 7:17 pm
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Gary Rice
- Posts: 1651
- Joined: Wed Aug 23, 2006 9:59 pm
- Location: Lakewood
Hello Ken,
In 1983, Howard Gardner came out with a book "Frames of Mind", providing a theory that we have seven intelligences; sub-divided into three main categories:
Object-related intelligence- primarily mathematics and logic-related
Object-free intelligence- language and music
Personal intelligence- the perceptions that we have of others, as well as ourselves
In 1989, Gardner and Hatch expanded implication concepts in their book "Multiple Intelligences Go To School".
The idea that greater classroom success would transpire if we taught to more modalities was embraced by many in the educational family, (including yours truly) at least until the current goose-stepping crowd came along with their one-size-fits-all-or-else approach to things.
If in fact as you say, Gardner has now come out with a book "Five Minds For The Future", I have to smile.
So I have to ask rhetorically, and in a sad tongue-in-cheek way:
Have we as a people progressed from having "multiple intelligences", to something not far from schizophrenia?
In 1983, Howard Gardner came out with a book "Frames of Mind", providing a theory that we have seven intelligences; sub-divided into three main categories:
Object-related intelligence- primarily mathematics and logic-related
Object-free intelligence- language and music
Personal intelligence- the perceptions that we have of others, as well as ourselves
In 1989, Gardner and Hatch expanded implication concepts in their book "Multiple Intelligences Go To School".
The idea that greater classroom success would transpire if we taught to more modalities was embraced by many in the educational family, (including yours truly) at least until the current goose-stepping crowd came along with their one-size-fits-all-or-else approach to things.
If in fact as you say, Gardner has now come out with a book "Five Minds For The Future", I have to smile.
So I have to ask rhetorically, and in a sad tongue-in-cheek way:
Have we as a people progressed from having "multiple intelligences", to something not far from schizophrenia?
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Stephen Calhoun
- Posts: 208
- Joined: Sat Mar 26, 2005 6:51 pm
- Location: NEO
- Contact:
Actually...the number of intelligences is upwards of 125. And counting.
Before I go 'technical' here, allow me to re-introduce how intelligence was initially fit into the Visionary Alignment two years ago.
We did an experiment in the summer of 2005 where folk anthropologists were briefly trained to go out into the community and listen to Lakewood's human lifestream.
Three functional phases were implemented:
(1) Inclusion -- to take the lifestream as it naturally arose from sidewalk, venue, backyard, back door, etc. The ordinate for this was not to pick and choose; thus it was to include, be inclusive, take it in as it presented itself.
(2) Presence -- to be open and receptive to this lifestream, so as to navigate the human universe attentively, and to defer filtering and interpretation.
(3) Culmination -- (or integration) To substantiate the moment of interaction as a deep play of consciousness upon consciousness.
(These three phases constitute the somewhat oxymoronic, novel, open source, Transformative Anthropology.)
The frame of reference for this was/is: the community coming to know itself. The bar was raised very high too. This was visualized at the time as the city come to know itself better than any other.
Only in retrospect, after having harshly deactivated myself, do I step back and--yet--continue to recognize how audacious this founding, rapturous conceit is. The LO carries this effort forward. It remains out of the ordinary for any community to deploy its intelligence for the sake of really knowing itself.
(It is perhaps more cogent to substitute consciousness for intelligence so as to not get carried off into the fascinating byways of social cognition and the complex problem of varieties of intelligence.)
Ken Warren named the bundle of capabilities, 'chops.' So, yes, the thrust toward integration of knowledge is concerned with developing community chops. Lakewood remains far ahead of other communities in daring to know itself and develop capability on the ground.
This said, the challenge in general terms is many fold. I'll pick out two. First, is development of chops that allow otherwise distinct tribes to truly know one another. Second, is development of sturdy chops for the sake of knowing things one wouldn't naturally wish to know.
These two challenges are joined when it is recognized that inclusive knowledge is comprehensive; it will penetrate the 'shadow,' and, out of this, abiding integration will tend to reveal unintended consequences.
Those consequences are fundamental vis a vis community individuation.
Crucially, as I view this process of consciousness and knowledge creation in the context of community, it may allow for healing fragmentation, and integrating the often torrid fault lines between tribes. One thing I became very aware of and impressed by is that Lakewood is in fact diverse and richly multiple. This diversity is unknown outside Lakewood, and, it constitutes a singular bias--at times--in Lakewood.
Anyway...to go about this... For example, this 'chop building' can be concerned with the older knowing the younger, the richer knowing the poorer, the narrow knowing the wide, the literate knowing the post-literate. . .on and on.
If I were to suggest a fourth, transcendent (as-it-were,) phase it would be: Unity; unity in the light of knowing multiplicity; assimilating the lifestream, literally, for "all it's worth." You'd have to tell me where this is at today, but I hypothesized at the time that such an ongoing effort would, over time, transform the vibe of the community.
This all (in all,) is, profoundly, an amateur effort. Jim plunked on the table right from the beginning the voluntary feature that captures this completely.
This is why, for me, it is notable that this unfolds outside the sphere of 'professional social science,' where questions about kinds of intelligence often obscure the quest for greater consciousness. And, this extends to the wide variety of consultative tools and instruments which are sometimes 'bargained for' even though it is readily apparent the outside dimer (eg. consultant,) hasn't bothered to get to know the community that their 'services' are being employed to aid.
But once you raise the bar in the community the bar is likewise raised and it makes demands on all such 'outside' efforts.
---
(note -- Nevertheless, in a technical sense, intelligence can be typified as being multiple and differentially functional. Over the last thirty years, this has led to all sorts of means for figuring out what the different factors are which are 'in play,' during, for example, problem formulation and solving, comprehension, representation, etc. See: Wisdom, Intelligence, and Creativity Synthesized by Robert J. Sternberg for a summary circa 2003.
In terms of social cognition, and to provide a gloss, people experience, see, interpret, know their own mind and other minds in gloriously different ways! There is no normative, authoritative, thus singular and optimal, mind with which one knows.
So, even if, for example, concerns about the health of Lakewood, express commonsense, conventional, familiar and intelligent perspectives about the present and future community, the focused effort to simply know, right from the git-go of the LO, has been post-conventional, extraordinary, and, enlightening.
Actually, I laugh, because it's all about that light streaming esoteric eye, right? I don't know if Lakewood knows itself better than any other community, but, two years on, it seems possible only Lakewood--in the whole world--is making this kind of concentrated effort.
Before I go 'technical' here, allow me to re-introduce how intelligence was initially fit into the Visionary Alignment two years ago.
We did an experiment in the summer of 2005 where folk anthropologists were briefly trained to go out into the community and listen to Lakewood's human lifestream.
Three functional phases were implemented:
(1) Inclusion -- to take the lifestream as it naturally arose from sidewalk, venue, backyard, back door, etc. The ordinate for this was not to pick and choose; thus it was to include, be inclusive, take it in as it presented itself.
(2) Presence -- to be open and receptive to this lifestream, so as to navigate the human universe attentively, and to defer filtering and interpretation.
(3) Culmination -- (or integration) To substantiate the moment of interaction as a deep play of consciousness upon consciousness.
(These three phases constitute the somewhat oxymoronic, novel, open source, Transformative Anthropology.)
The frame of reference for this was/is: the community coming to know itself. The bar was raised very high too. This was visualized at the time as the city come to know itself better than any other.
Only in retrospect, after having harshly deactivated myself, do I step back and--yet--continue to recognize how audacious this founding, rapturous conceit is. The LO carries this effort forward. It remains out of the ordinary for any community to deploy its intelligence for the sake of really knowing itself.
(It is perhaps more cogent to substitute consciousness for intelligence so as to not get carried off into the fascinating byways of social cognition and the complex problem of varieties of intelligence.)
Ken Warren named the bundle of capabilities, 'chops.' So, yes, the thrust toward integration of knowledge is concerned with developing community chops. Lakewood remains far ahead of other communities in daring to know itself and develop capability on the ground.
This said, the challenge in general terms is many fold. I'll pick out two. First, is development of chops that allow otherwise distinct tribes to truly know one another. Second, is development of sturdy chops for the sake of knowing things one wouldn't naturally wish to know.
These two challenges are joined when it is recognized that inclusive knowledge is comprehensive; it will penetrate the 'shadow,' and, out of this, abiding integration will tend to reveal unintended consequences.
Those consequences are fundamental vis a vis community individuation.
Crucially, as I view this process of consciousness and knowledge creation in the context of community, it may allow for healing fragmentation, and integrating the often torrid fault lines between tribes. One thing I became very aware of and impressed by is that Lakewood is in fact diverse and richly multiple. This diversity is unknown outside Lakewood, and, it constitutes a singular bias--at times--in Lakewood.
Anyway...to go about this... For example, this 'chop building' can be concerned with the older knowing the younger, the richer knowing the poorer, the narrow knowing the wide, the literate knowing the post-literate. . .on and on.
If I were to suggest a fourth, transcendent (as-it-were,) phase it would be: Unity; unity in the light of knowing multiplicity; assimilating the lifestream, literally, for "all it's worth." You'd have to tell me where this is at today, but I hypothesized at the time that such an ongoing effort would, over time, transform the vibe of the community.
This all (in all,) is, profoundly, an amateur effort. Jim plunked on the table right from the beginning the voluntary feature that captures this completely.
This is why, for me, it is notable that this unfolds outside the sphere of 'professional social science,' where questions about kinds of intelligence often obscure the quest for greater consciousness. And, this extends to the wide variety of consultative tools and instruments which are sometimes 'bargained for' even though it is readily apparent the outside dimer (eg. consultant,) hasn't bothered to get to know the community that their 'services' are being employed to aid.
But once you raise the bar in the community the bar is likewise raised and it makes demands on all such 'outside' efforts.
---
(note -- Nevertheless, in a technical sense, intelligence can be typified as being multiple and differentially functional. Over the last thirty years, this has led to all sorts of means for figuring out what the different factors are which are 'in play,' during, for example, problem formulation and solving, comprehension, representation, etc. See: Wisdom, Intelligence, and Creativity Synthesized by Robert J. Sternberg for a summary circa 2003.
In terms of social cognition, and to provide a gloss, people experience, see, interpret, know their own mind and other minds in gloriously different ways! There is no normative, authoritative, thus singular and optimal, mind with which one knows.
So, even if, for example, concerns about the health of Lakewood, express commonsense, conventional, familiar and intelligent perspectives about the present and future community, the focused effort to simply know, right from the git-go of the LO, has been post-conventional, extraordinary, and, enlightening.
Actually, I laugh, because it's all about that light streaming esoteric eye, right? I don't know if Lakewood knows itself better than any other community, but, two years on, it seems possible only Lakewood--in the whole world--is making this kind of concentrated effort.
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Gary Rice
- Posts: 1651
- Joined: Wed Aug 23, 2006 9:59 pm
- Location: Lakewood
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Kenneth Warren
- Posts: 489
- Joined: Sat Mar 26, 2005 7:17 pm
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Tom Bullock
- Posts: 100
- Joined: Wed Mar 23, 2005 4:47 pm
- Location: Lakewood, Ohio
Here we await the extraordinary knowing that will stem from the dictation of ordinary life, of community conversation, ever intent on transforming the lips sealed to the cone of silence into murmuring Sibyls.
To transform sealed, silent lips sooner rather than later, two techniques can help:
- --Invitation, rather than criticizing: people are more successfully coaxed out of comfort zones by the open hand of friendship than the closed fist of judgment (and condemnation);
--Wiping clear our eyes, rather than projecting our assumptions (frustrations) onto experience: by owning our assumptions and clearing away our frustrations, we can better see what is actually going on (inclusive intelligence?) and unclench our fists into open hands.
So the enterprises of the mind voyage immediately into psychological territory. Mind rests on psyche; psyche swims in spirit.
The following reflection (from a Buddhist listserv) speaks to these points from another angle:
[quote]Even within the human realm, all of us have our own individual karma. Human beings look much the same, but we perceive things utterly differently, and we each live in our own unique, separate, individual world. As Kalu Rinpoche says:
“If a hundred people sleep and dream, each of them will experience a different world in his dream. Everyone’s dream might be said to be true, but it would be meaningless to ascertain that only one person’s dream was the true world and all others were fallacies. There is truth for each perceiver according to the karmic patterns conditioning his perceptions.â€Â