Memes as mental frames and cognitive templates - Design for desired emergence
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How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
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Memes as mental frames and cognitive templates - Design for desired emergence
- 1. Memes as mental frames and cognitive templates Design for desired emergence Øyvind Vada www.memetor.com/team/vada vada@memetor.com http://ecco.vub.ac.be/ ECCO Seminar, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). April 4th 2014
- 2. ”The ECCO perspective encompasses both the most abstract realms of ontology, epistemology and metaphysics, and the most concrete methods to solve problems in everyday life, organizations, technology, and society.” (Heylighen, 2011)
- 5. Ideals and principles for my work • Simplicity • Essence • Clarity
- 6. Philosophic and Scientific Point of Departure How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 7. Philosophic and Scientific Point of Departure • Evolution • Darwin 1859, Veblen 1898, Schumpeter 1911, Alchian 1950 Boulding 1961, Campbell 1965, Aldrich 1979, Mckelvey 1982, Heylighen 1991, Heylighen 2007c • Complexity • Ashby 1956, Simon 1957, 1962, Bertalanffy 1968, Prigozhin & Stengers 1986, Kaufmann 1993, Holland 1992, 1996, Axelrod & Cohen, 1999, Heylighen 2002, 2008
- 8. Philosophic and Scientific Point of Departure • Cognition • Campbell 1974 , Heylighen 1990, Thagard 1996, Varela, F. J., Thompson, E., & Rosch, E. 1991, Heylighen, Rosseel & Demeyere (eds.) 1990, Heylighen , Heath , Van 2004 • Pragmatism • Sanders-Peirce 1878, 1888, James 1890, Mead 1934, Dewey 1938, Rorty 1979
- 9. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 11. Active human agents • Individual human beings in social systems are in my work treated as active human agents. • Active human agents are in my work treated as: • Reflexive: more or less self conscious and conscious of the effects they make • Free and goal-directed entities that maximize utility, benefit and/or fitness. • They act in their environment and interact with each other according to certain rules, determined by their goals and knowledge (Heylighen 2009:6).
- 12. Active human agents • Have cognitive limitations. • Cannot foresee all global or long-term effects of their actions. • Apply their rationality to what they perceive to be the choices available to them. • Are bounded rational (Simon 1957).
- 13. Active human agents • “Strategy in action” includes coordinating and steering individual human agents – governance. • Agents have intents for their actions, both local and individual and “global” and collective on behalf of the social system they participate in optimizing (the company, the department, the team). • In most social system there is a balance between Distributed Power (among the agents) and Central Power (Management or Government)
- 15. Lead and follow
- 16. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 17. Social system • A prerequisite of a social system is interaction of at least two agents. • On the other end of the scale we can treat all individuals on the globe as a social system. • What constitutes a social system?
- 18. Social Systems as CAS • In Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS)… ”structures tend to be fuzzy, variable and to an important degree subjective [Gershenson & Heylighen, 2004; Heylighen, Cilliers & Gershenson, 2007]: different observers will typically distinguish or emphasize different components, boundaries or relationships. ” (Heylighen 2011)
- 19. Social System
- 20. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 21. Design • to have as a purpose : an intent
- 22. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 23. Desire To want
- 24. Emergence • In social systems, emergence is a consequence of the local interaction between agents. • Creativity, learning and change occur when emergence forms a new solutions to a problem and creates new outcomes. • Emerge: to become • Emergence refers to changes that occurs within a system in a non- linear way. • Self-organization: the spontaneous emergence or evolution of coordination in a complex adaptive system [Heylighen, 2002].
- 26. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 27. Within and between active human agents • Within agents: Human beings (Indviduals) • Between agents: Social System (Collective)
- 28. Black box and white box • Black box: A system viewed in terms of its input, output transfer characteristics without any knowledge of its internal workings • White box: A system viewed in terms of its internal workings that can be accessed and understood
- 29. How is it possible to design for a desired emergence within and between active human agents in social systems?
- 30. How • By treating: • indvidual agents as black boxes • social systems as white boxes • memes as forms and cognitive templates for open interpretation
- 31. Memes • Memes can be regarded as sustainable information units • Memes can be regarded as signs and objects that influence and form agents in their social systems, and spread successfully • Memes are naturally selected and adapted by agents based on “competition” of their consciousness. • The fittest and best-adapted memes will have a better diffusion than the ones who do not fit into the social systems they are “competing”
- 32. Memetics • An approach to perception, thought, communication and social action. • Derived from evolution and complexity • Uses the same research programme as genetics studying social diffusion and adaptation of signs and objects among active human agents
- 33. Memetor Memes • In my work memes are treated as tools, mental frames and cognitive templates that form and process agents actions • I treat memes as forms/templates as opposed to content • 123 memes are created for taking individual and collective strategies into action
- 34. Memetor Memes
- 35. Memetor Memes Criteria • Individual and collective applicable and relevant in all social systems and within different time frames • Connective, Complementary and Reinforcing • Generic, Replicable and Evolving
- 36. How: The process of infusion • The Memetor Memes are infused into defined social systems through different development programs facilitated by one or more Memetor facilitators. • The Memetor Programs use both the physical and digital space to achieve high levels of interaction, and create a social dynamic where the agents share thoughts and perceptions in continuously- changing small groups. • The trainers use lectures, dialogues, reflections, practical activities and exercises to make the memes accessible for individual selection. • The memes selected are the ones that fits best to the challenges and tasks at hand in the social system.
- 42. The core of my work • Governance by letting • Active Human Agents’ interpret predefined Memetor memes through facilitation • This influence how they perceive and process • themselves and others • their social system(s), and • the social system(s) context(s), • This in turn impact how they act, both individually and together.
- 43. Thank you
Hinweis der Redaktion
- The complexity of evolution The evolution of complexity I am social scientist from the University of Oslo. The constant shifts between theory and practice has always been a part of my academic journey. I am fascinated by what I experience as large gaps between sensemaking and perspectives on governance of organizations in the theoretical realms at universities and other educational institutions on one hand, and how different practitioners navigate and make organizations work in practice on the other. The complexity in operational practice, and what I see as a too strong simplification of reality in reductionist theory in traditional social science and strategy, has led me into studies of complexity, evolution and pragmatism applied to social systems. In 2003 I established Memetor. In 2005, I joined ECCO directed by prof. Francis Heylighen Since that time I have been developing a platform, both in theory and practice, for governance of complex social systems. How can governance be executed in a world where the public, private and third sectors are changing rapidly due to globalization and increased complexity? How do we, as individuals, think, talk, decide and act together in all types of social systems, both locally and globally in a more and more interwoven world? Traditional reductionist and hierarchical approaches to governance tend to fail in practice due to these changes, and we see signs of a “governance sclerosis” where national and global organizations are struggling to produce intended outcomes in an effective and efficient way. To reduce the gap between governance theory and governance practice, there is a need for approaches that embrace complexity. I will in my PhD further develop a memetic (Heylighen 1992, 1998) approach for doing so, taking into account that we as individuals belong to different formal and informal social systems. These systems can be regarded as combinations of hierarchies, networks and markets (Williamson 1975). Memetics is a post-positivist way to approach perception, thought, communication and action in social systems. Memetics is derived from natural science and genetics, and uses the same research programme studying social diffusion and adaptation of signs and objects. Individuals and groups of individuals in social systems are in my approach treated as agents. As agents, we are free and goal-directed entities that maximize utility, benefit and/or fitness (Heylighen 2009:6). We often have local and limited knowledge, and cannot always foresee effects of our individual actions on larger collective wholes (Simon 1957). Governing organizations includes governing agents. I assume it is possible to design for a desired emergent outcome, where agents interpret predefined memes that influence how they perceive and process themselves, their surroundings and the tasks at hand. Different sets of predefined memes are created as tools and cognitive templates that form and process subjective thoughts, communications and actions, both individually and collectively. My aim is to develop an alternative way of allocating resources and exercising control and coordination in social systems – a new form of governance through a method where predefined memes are instrumentally infused into social systems through processes where free and bounded rational agents are regarded as participants and players that impact their surroundings based on their own subjective agency. I will show how agents become carriers of shared information elements called memes in different arenas for diffusion and adaption. The predefined memes are formed as iconic and discrete models that can be applied to individual day-to-day situations as well as complex collective challenges. In the arenas, memes are woven into active exercises and assignments. Individual agents recognize the value of other agents’ viewpoints, make sense of the social systems they are part of and collectively create solutions that reduce the gap between the system’s strategic intent and its operational success. I will present selected empirical systems where the theoretical approach developed in the thesis is applied in practice. This will be in organizations I work for developing governance models based on my theoretical work. The presentation and investigation of practical application will be introduced with a discussion of the thesis’ methodology with a specific emphasis on validity and reliability The main task of my PhD work is to merge an improved version of Memetics with contributions within the literature of governance theory developing a replicable method for Memetic Governance. .
- Memetor is a small global company. We work with people in organizations to transform their strategy into living, breathing, and sustainable successes. We believe in making strategies work by releasing individual and collective potential. The Memetor concept is based on participation and interpretation by tailored memes. The memes are easily accessible for everyone, regardless of background and position. We are very pragmatic when we serve our clients, but also extremly conceptual. This may sound like a paradox being pragmatic and adaptive on one side, and theory driven on the other. But for the next hour I hope I can communicate HOW Theory – Parctice Strategy – Operation Generalized and Specific
- Memetor Oslo, Singapore Bruxelles. Opening in Berlin this autumn The Memetor Concept serve public organizations, third sector organizations and private commercial companies. The acumulated revenue on the concept so far is around 10 million EUROS, and we are now expaning
- Both this Seminar an the Memetor Concept in general Razoblade and depend on you aduience and the social system you work in and with. Simplicity: Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler Clarity is reached when there is nothing left to take away. If there is something there that can be removed without effecting the function, then it is an unnecessary complication and should be removed. If we take away too much then we lose information and/or utility. Essence: qualities that make a thing what it is
- Agent intent local strategies Following and leading dynamics TED talk
- First we identify areas that require strategic and operative improvement in our client’s organisations. We conduct 1:1 dialogues with a selection of key personnel from all levels, focusing on areas and interactions that they perceive as needing improvement. We then perform a quantitative survey to measure how the rest of the organisation perceives these areas and interactions. Throughout the process, we identify where there are gaps between the present situation and the desired one, as articulated by the wearers who are aware of exactly where the shoes pinches. Based on the results of the survey, and in close cooperation with Management, we design programs to reduce these gaps. All our programs are targeted, tailor-made and easy to implement and evaluate