[FRIAM] Up and Out vs Down and in
Prof David West
profwest at fastmail.fm
Tue Feb 11 02:21:08 EST 2020
Hi Merle,
I am sorry, but the curriculum is long buried on a Zip drive somewhere in a container in Utah.
An idea for your science fiction writer consortium: write a novel that was mostly utopian with enough conflict to make it interesting and readable that could be a point source for something like the Bellamy clubs. There are three SF novels that I know of that prompted significant social action:
Bellamy's Looking Backward of course;
Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, which led to the founding of the Church of All Worlds - still extant; and
Hubbard's Battleground Earth, which gave us Scientology.
The latter one points out the dangers of such an effort, but the first two were pretty positive.
davew
On Mon, Feb 10, 2020, at 7:38 PM, Merle Lefkoff wrote:
> Very interesting and a great idea, Prof. West. Do you still have a copy of your curriculum for the honors course?
>
> I'm just back from Ottawa, where I met with the Board of the Canadian Institute for Conflict Resolution. I discussed our (CED's) new generative dialogue process based on "the adjacent possible", and we now have a new partnership with them to develop facilitator training for leading community dialogues on climate impacts and survival strategies. I am also meeting in Seattle next month with a science fiction writer who is part of a consortium of the best current science fiction writers, offering courses to help aspiring sci/fi/fantasy writers think about the future. I have a feeling that their curriculum might help our facilitator training.
>
> On Mon, Feb 10, 2020 at 11:26 AM Prof David West <profwest at fastmail.fm> wrote:
>> Nick,
>>
>> A model for the kind of enlightened discussion / social action of the type you might want to see put in place.
>>
>> The Bellamy Clubs. Several thousand were formed in a loose confederation across the US — all inspired by Edward Bellamy's book (Science Fiction by the way), Looking Backward. They were a kind of socialist-utopian society.
>>
>> I taught an honors course on "Utopian and Dystopian futures in literature and Film" with Edwards grandson, Michael Bellamy.
>>
>> davew
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Feb 10, 2020, at 7:00 PM, thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:
>> > Glen, Marcus,
>> >
>> > Thank you for your always surprising suggestions, for your thoughts
>> > outside the box.
>> >
>> > I confess to being attracted to the pristine hypocrisy of HireAThug.com.
>> >
>> > Speaking of Thuggs, I wonder how many of you know about the Wide
>> > Awakes. These were a paramilitary organization that paraded in the
>> > streets of Northern Cities for Lincoln during the 1860 election. Black
>> > capes and torches and staves. Wikipedia has a lovely entry,
>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wide_Awakes
>> >
>> > Here is their banner:
>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wide_Awakes#/media/File:Wide_Awakes_Banner.tif FRIAM mentalists should go for the slogan, "mind, eye" and the animal behaviorists amongst should endorse the rampant ferrets.
>> >
>> > It seems like a bad idea whose time has come
>> >
>> > I wonder if the New Wide Awakes could become the youth organization of
>> > the Lincoln Project (https://lincolnproject.us/, that organization of
>> > centrist republicans that has dedicated itself to electing an
>> > anti-trump senate and president, even though, they concede, that
>> > requires them to vigorously support democrats in the current cycle.
>> >
>> > Nick
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > Nicholas Thompson
>> > Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology
>> > Clark University
>> > ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
>> > https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of u?l? ?
>> > Sent: Monday, February 10, 2020 9:04 AM
>> > To: FriAM <friam at redfish.com>
>> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Up and Out vs Down and in
>> >
>> > You've hidden the most important part of your question at the very
>> > bottom: "in the next year". As always, the system contains feedback
>> > loops. And each loop has its own speed. There are lots of things you
>> > can do in the next year that won't show any impact *within* the year,
>> > but may show impact beyond the year. If you're worried about the next
>> > president, or the next, etc., then those are viable answers to your
>> > question. There are *some* things you can do during the year that
>> > *might* show impact within the year. But just as there's a temporal
>> > scope to any action, there's also a *spatial* scope to any action. I'd
>> > argue that the actions you might take this year that might show impact
>> > within the year, will have limited spatial scope.
>> >
>> > So, I'll treat you like one of my clients and answer your question with
>> > a question. 8^) What do you *want* to see happen within the year? And
>> > your stated objective can't be vague like "reverse the authoritarian
>> > pandemic". What does that even mean? No, you have to state a particular
>> > and specific objective in order to answer my question.
>> >
>> > For example, one action *I* can take this year, that may show some
>> > impact this year, but more likely in the coming decades, is to support
>> > https://fairvotewa.org/, which I'll be doing this evening. You already
>> > have that option in Santa Fe, I think. Ideally, RCV should help protect
>> > against either your worry of right-wing authoritarians or Dave's worry
>> > of left-wing authoritarians.
>> >
>> > Another example from left field might be to help start/run an After
>> > School Satan club <https://afterschoolsatan.com/> near you. The
>> > elevation of the Adversary is critical to fighting group-think of all
>> > kinds. If your particular and specific objective is to make those
>> > around you deeper thinkers, then that sort of action will have
>> > immediate *and* long-term impact.
>> >
>> > Yet another answer is to join Antifa. Put on some body armor and
>> > protect the [counter]protesters from the (actual) fascists roaming our
>> > streets with guns, chains, and bats. (Contrary to Dave's conjecture
>> > that left-wing fascism is more likely, we have self-described
>> > right-wing fascists *actually* roaming our streets as we speak.) It
>> > doesn't matter if you're old or fat. What matters is to put some active
>> > MEAT between the fascists and the [couter]protesters. Or at least buy
>> > an Iron Front bumper sticker. 8^)
>> >
>> > There are sooooo many possible actions. But without a particular and
>> > specific objective, you're relegated to hand-wringing.
>> >
>> > On 2/8/20 9:04 PM, thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:
>> > > I have a friend who reads a lot of history and thinks HARD about what
>> > > he reads. For months he has been reassuring me about the state of American democracy because, as he said, Trump wasn’t a well focused dictator like Hitler. But I saw him last Monday and he asked me, with an air of genuine panic, “What do I do?” The reason for his new panic was his realization that Hitler had not always been a focused dictator, but had been entrained, over his career, to play just those themes that would rouse the German people to War. The impeachment process had convinced him that Trump was gradually developing the focus of a proper Hitler.
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > So I passed the question he asked me onto the group on Friday. “What
>> > > do we do?” What struck me was that many of us took the question to be, “where do we best escape to?” Options included New Zealand, Costa Rica, Bermuda, Canada, Italy, etc. These answers startled me, because, of course, the question I meant to be asking was, how do we use our considerable talent, skill, knowledge, resources, and technical knowhow to do everything in our power to reverse the authoritarian pandemic that is sweeping the world.
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > > Now some of you, perhaps many, that we in any kind of an emergency, or even if we are, that there is anything we might do about it, or even that there is any particular reason to save American democracy. I am happy to have that discussion, too. However, from those of you who share my panic, I would love to hear suggestions about what I (and others) might do in the next year .
>> > >
>> >
>> > --
>> > ☣ uǝlƃ
>> >
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>> >
>> >
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>>
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>
>
> --
> Merle Lefkoff, Ph.D.
> President, Center for Emergent Diplomacy
> emergentdiplomacy.org
> Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
>
> merlelefkoff at gmail.com <mailto:merlelefoff at gmail.com>
> mobile: (303) 859-5609
> skype: merle.lelfkoff2
> twitter: @Merle_Lefkoff
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> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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