Once upon a time, in the bustling inner city of the mind, lived a rather earnest young explorer named Aha!. Aha! had a passion for collecting Truth Nuggets. They were shiny, weighty little things, each a perfect, undeniable fact. He'd polish them daily, arranging them meticulously in neat, labeled rows: "Gravity Exists," "Water is Wet," "The Sky is Blue." He believed that true understanding was simply about accumulating the largest, most impressive pile of these self-evident gems.
Patterns are everywhere we look, assuming we look. An amazing web of ideas, of things, of events, of technologies, of people ....
Unfortunately we don't teach concepts such as networks or webs such as these.
History becomes alive when we see connections or patterns.
Even in most of our museums, we see individual nuggets, not the connections of nuggets.
Schools / universities include lots of sets of nuggets, but very few relationships.
Climate change is turning out to be our most existential threat and we don't have many educational patterns of cause and effect and what it means to us over the next 5-10-20 years.
You bring to mind one of my favorite quotes from Gregory Bateson, "It's the pattern that connects." As I've pondered if over time the quote seems to have multiple meanings.
Patterns are everywhere we look, assuming we look. An amazing web of ideas, of things, of events, of technologies, of people ....
Unfortunately we don't teach concepts such as networks or webs such as these.
History becomes alive when we see connections or patterns.
Even in most of our museums, we see individual nuggets, not the connections of nuggets.
Schools / universities include lots of sets of nuggets, but very few relationships.
Climate change is turning out to be our most existential threat and we don't have many educational patterns of cause and effect and what it means to us over the next 5-10-20 years.
An excellent story, thanks!
You bring to mind one of my favorite quotes from Gregory Bateson, "It's the pattern that connects." As I've pondered if over time the quote seems to have multiple meanings.
Dear Gene
I keep on loving it !
Warm regards , Frank
Many thanks for the words of encouragement.