Re: Out of Control

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lflondon@mindspring.com>]

On Wed, 21 Nov 2001 09:57:38 -0800, Toby Hemenway
<hemenway@jeffnet.org> wrote:

>
>on 11/20/01 Lawrence F. London, Jr wrote:
>
>>> Mollison talks about similar themes in the
>>> designer's manual when he discusses pattern and
>>> tribal knowledge. If I can remember, he asks us
>>> to consider first the inability of many
>>> contemporary people to retain knowledge. And this
>> 
>> I don't know how he can say something like this.
>> 
>I think I see Sean's point: I've read a zillion books and gone to thousands

I was referring to Mollison.

>of hours of school, but I don't remember 0.0001% of that information.
>(Quick: who said "the map is not the territory?" Did a couple of you guess

That's an exciting notion. There is/has been much work done to help
people who need to acquire and retain lots of knowledge on a subject,
possibly many subjects. One of the methods developed involves the use
of a technique called "chunking". The example of this I heard
described  a new way of teaching students how to take effective and
thorough notes. The goal was not to write everything the lecturer says
down but to create a group of more or less simple
words/diagrams/pictures/phrases/sentences that represent the subject
presented,  broken up into logical (or illogical) chunks of
information. Later, looking at your notes and seeing the mental
shorthand you created you realize you have the lecture(s) all there.
Pick a symbol representing a particular  topic covered in depth in a
lecture you realize in your mind's eye what it stands for and you
recall the pertinent data. Maybe someone else familiar with this can
offer a much better description of chunking.


>Gregory Bateson or Stewart Brand? No, it was Alfred Korzybski; Bateson and

What books has Alfred Korzybski written or what is he famous for? I
remember hearing about him a while ago as being someone especially
interesting, worth paying attention to for his work in some certain
field, possibly something permaculture-related. 

>Brand just made it famous, a fact I just read yesterday [literally] and will

WEC, CoEQ and WER occupy a special niche in my library, rereading them
provides a constant source of renewal and inspiration, especially 
material by J. Baldwin! :-) 

>forget in a few days. We can't keep that stuff straight.)
>
>But of fables, stories, and parables full of wisdom, and the tales from wise
>locals, I have retained a far, far greater percentage, and use that wisdom
>every day (a stitch in time saves nine; red sky at night, sailor's delight.
>. . King Philip Climbed Over Five Great Stones. . . and on and on) Oral,
>patterned learning is more efficiently retained by our meat computer and in
>our bodies. 
>> 
>>>often requiring specialized knowledge
>>> just to access, let alone commit to memory.
>
>> That is a very inadequate and short-sighted view
>> of electronic information collection, management and retreival.
>
>Again, I think the point is that electronic knowledge is available to only a
>tiny percentage of the world's (rich) people, while oral knowledge is
>available to all.

Good point, but if those who have online access will collect and
disseminate to those without online access - acquire and tailor
bodies of information, port it to paper, cd, or any other
media/multimedia and give it away or sell it for price of cost
recovery, the gap will have begun to be bridged. This has tremendous
potential especially if dedicated souls go so far as to convert
text-based information to electronic audio/video media, complete with
voice dialogue, still and motion graphics and original art.
Print media (homebrew printshop: computer/printer/copier/binding
tools; casette tapes and vcr video tapes are easy and cheap to create
and replicate.

>I used to read a lot about semantics. Some it it is dreadful, but much is
>very thought provoking. For now I stick with less technical works on the
>subject like David Abram's marvelous "Spell of the Sensuous."

That sounds interesting!

LL


L.F.London ICQ#27930345 lflondon@mindspring.com
http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech  london@ibiblio.org