[FRIAM] Optimizing for maximal serendipity or how Alan Turing misdirected ALife

[uǝlƃ ☣]

It depends. I think some have tried to formalize narratives. In some ways, I think of GitLaw or version controlled collaborative fiction as a partial formalization of story-telling. (There was a novel being written several years back by some big names in sci-fi that was similar to GitLaw ... but it escapes me, now.) I suppose some of the (artificial) formulations of scientific method are attempts to formalize story-telling.

But by and large, as long as humans are doing the story-telling, it'll have some informality to it. And I think *that's* the lesson. When we construct machines that tell good stories, then we'll be able to say more about how formal we can make it.

On 5/28/20 6:56 AM, Prof David West wrote:
> re: "informal systems" Is story such an informal system?
> 
> from an article targeting towards business and software development professionals
> 
> "Although all four models described above are essential, the power of Thick Description derives primarily from the Story. For several reasons:
> 
> 1.	The human brain is ‘hardwired’ for story. Humans easily absorb knowledge that is communicated to them via story while having a difficult time dealing with information presented in abstract form. One of the reasons that mathematics is difficult for so many people.
> 2.	Humans have shared knowledge via story since the invention of language. The visualizations of “cave art” preceded any form of written language but still communicate stories.
> 3.	Ninety-five percent of what a person knows was acquired via story.
> 4.	Most of what is known about your business exists “within the heads” of your employees. It is tacit knowledge that is lost if the employee is lost (via retirement or turnover).
> 5.	New hires acquire the knowledge essential to doing their work by listening to stories.
> 6.	Stories provide a compact and efficient way of communication, mostly because each story carries with it a significant amount of implicit context — connections to all the other stories we have heard and have in our repertoire of knowledge.
> 7.	Stories are “easy to think with.”
> 
> Story provides a powerful tool for software development by preserving ambiguity, deferring design and implementation decisions until “the last responsible moment.”

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