The No-Rock Rock & the No-Door Door.

09 Tuesday Apr 2019

Posted by petersironwood in family, psychology, story, Uncategorized, Veritas

Tags

innovation, myths, ROI, story, tracking, truth, Veritas

Shadow Walker took the first watch along with Easy Tears. After their long day’s march, it would be too easy for a single sentry to fall asleep. Shadow Walker felt as though, for him, it was an unnecessary precaution but he realized that could be a delusion. He might be more prone to sleep than he realized. Easy Tears and Shadow Walker had known each other since childhood and they were comfortable with each other. The wolf pups lay beside them and helped stave off the chill of the night air. Though the pups appeared to be in a deep sleep, he suspected they would be awake in a flash if more ambushers tried to sneak up on their search party.

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Quietly, Shadow Walker began to chat with Easy Tears, the better to keep them both awake. “We should watch out for snakes as well. They are drawn to body heat as well as the fire. I suspect this is the sort of place that many rattlesnakes may make their home.”

Easy Tears responded, “I am not so much a friend to the snakes as you are. They aren’t always so easy to see either. I recall once almost stepping on a large snake who had a rattle-tail of ten rattles.”

Shadow Walker considered this, allowing the silence to flow between them. “Those snakes can fool the eyes. That is true. A walking stick, a butterfly with the eyes of an owl. Many animals make themselves look or sound like something else…or just fade into the background.”

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A shooting star streaked across the sky. Shadow Walker had jerked his finger to share with Easy Tears and though she turned quickly, she only caught a brief glance. “Like those whom we pursue. They don’t hide their trail well at all. But then they simply disappear!”

Shadow Walker considered this. “You’re right. I suspect that once we search in daylight we will find some sign of continuing trail. I’m impatient to continue but we need the rest and … the sunlight will show us the way.” Shadow Walker noticed that the soft glow of the firelight flickered on the eyes and hair of Easy Tears in a most pleasing way. Shadow Walker thought of Many Paths and the serious conversation that they had postponed.

Easy Tears shivered slightly. Shadow Walker considered sidling up to her and putting his arm around her so that they would both enjoy the warmth of the other. It would be all right. Pleasurable even. But sometimes, it is difficult to know what is around the next bend and the one after that. Instead, he stood and got another blanket and draped it around her shoulders, then added another log onto the fire. He sat back down and reflected on his discovery that snakes could sense the heat of their prey. If only they could train a snake to be a helper. That could prove useful. He wondered aloud, “Easy Tears, if people can train horses and wolves and eagles, do you think it is possible to train snakes?”

Easy Tears chuckled slightly. “I wouldn’t think so, but you are the expert. I don’t really care for them, though I do appreciate their eating the rats and mice that try to steal our grain.” She considered for a time. “I suppose you could train them. Yes. I suspect you could train anything with enough love and patience. But you see how it is. Despite your love and patience, there is always a chance they would bite you or misunderstand your intention. I suppose it might be something that would take a long time. What would you train a snake to do?”

“I wish we could have their sense of heat. Perhaps we could use them to follow trails or find hidden enemies. Maybe we could even train them as guards. Ours did not work so well for some reason. That bothers me. How could such as these who do not cover their tracks elude our guards?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps they did not try to elude our guards at all, but simply overpowered them too quickly for them to sound the alarm. Or perhaps, they feigned being peaceful? Trunk of Tree will figure it out. I like him.” She smiled and glanced at Shadow Walker. “Do you think he likes me?”

Shadow Walker considered this. Trunk of Tree had never said anything, but judging from the actions and looks of Trunk of Tree, probably so. “Yes, I think so. He looks at you…with longing. You are a beautiful woman, after all.”

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Easy Tears smiled and Shadow Walker realized that he really found her attractive, but not in the deep way that he loved Many Paths. The half moon set and it grew darker. “It’s time to wake the next guards. He calmed his mind and thought of their serious quest in order to cool his blood. Then, he stood and walked over to Lion Slayer. He stood almost on top of Lion Slayer but Lion Slayer appeared to be a sound sleeper. He snored loudly and Shadow Walker joked, “I wonder whether he actually slew the lion with a spear…or with that snore.”

Easy Tears laughed aloud but all the others remained asleep. Shadow Walker squatted down on his haunches and shook Lion Slayer. The snoring continued. For a moment, he considered shaking Hudah Salah but decided against it. He shook Lion Slayer again and whispered his name. Hudah Salah suddenly sprang to his feet and pressed his thumbs against Shadow Walker’s windpipe. Shadow Walker smacked the hands away and jumped back, “Lion Slayer! It’s all right. It’s me. Time for your watch, as agreed.”

Lion Slayer shook his head. He looked hard at Shadow Walker and mumbled something unintelligible. At last, he seemed to come to his senses. “Yes,” he said and awakened his wife.

Easy Tears lay down and smiled at Shadow Walker. She moved her body so that sufficient space appeared next to her for the body of Shadow Walker to fit snugly. Shadow Walker sighed and lay down instead by himself and dreamt of Many Paths.

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The next thing Shadow Walker sensed was light. It was not yet dawn. The troop all awoke and had a small breakfast and then began exploring the cliffs for a sign or a path. As they explored, they continued to chew pemmican and some dried fruit. Shadow Walker had asked Fleet of Foot to explore with Easy Tears, who took the wolf pups with her. Shadow Walker walked with Eagle Eyes. It was understood now by the group that Lion Slayer and Hudah Salah were fairly inseparable.

Although Eagle Eyes had the best vision, Shadow Walker’s eyes were also sharp but he found nothing but sheer cliffs. Eagle Eyes said, “Wait.”

“What do you see?” asked Shadow Walker.

“Nothing really. But something’s not right. It does not look right here. I’m not sure why.” Eagle Eyes stood with her hands on her hips staring at the sheer cliff face. She looked up the cliff face and noted various hand holds. “This wall might be scalable to a good climber.”

“Yes, I can see that as well though it would be dangerous. But horses? They are horses, not mountain goats” Shadow Walker said without blame or sarcasm.

“I know, but still, something is not right.” Eyes of Eagle shook her head and asked herself what she was missing.

Because the pair had stopped their systematic exploring, the rest of the search party converged on them. Fleet of Foot was the first to arrive. “Did you find something?”

Eagle Eyes smiled at him. “Not really. But his does not look right.”

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Easy Tears arrived next with the wolf pups who immediately began jumping and whining. They sniffed around the base of the rocks and ran back and forth between the rocks and Easy Tears. They had clearly caught a scent of something. “Perhaps Tu-Swift?” suggested Shadow Walker.

The pups took turns trying to stick their nose into a small cleft in the rock. On impulse, Shadow Walker, put his fingers in the cleft and tried pulling. He could not budge the rock, which did not surprise him. But the feel of the rock did surprise him. It was much like flint but harder and colder. Beyond that, there was no texture to the rock. It felt, somehow, dead, even more dead than the bleached bones of a long dead buffalo. Shadow Walker lay on his back and tried to push on the cleft with his feet. Soon, all six of them pushed and pulled on the rock face though they had no hope of moving it.

And then, it did move, though very slightly. The group positioned themselves and pushed even harder. The rock slid more easily now like a smooth stick along the winter lake ice. Instead of the grinding sound of rock on rock, however, they heard an unearthly screeching sound like a very large eagle.

At last, a huge slab of the cold rock had been moved aside and behind it, all could see a large, short passageway into a sunlit path beyond. The wolf pups bounded through and out into the sunlight. The people followed. Eagle Eyes looked back at the strange rock and noticed something stranger yet. The back of the rock had many handles. She supposed they were to replace the rock. But at the bottom of the rock, she saw something that made her gasp aloud.

“What is this?” she asked. All of them turned and looked at the base of the weird rock. There were circles of rock on the bottom! What strange magic was this? Despite their hurry to find Tu-Swift and their excitement at finding the way out of the box canyon, each knelt down to marvel at the smooth circles of rock.

After some time, Shadow Walker said. “We cannot solve the mystery of this rock. We must follow the trail. Should we close this … door? If we do not, it may be apparent to any of the Stands on Horses people that we are coming for Tu-Swift. But when we return, we may be in a hurry to go through this way.”

Eagle Eyes spoke next. “We could leave it just slightly open so that we could squeeze through but no horses could. I think we could make this door, as you call it, harder yet to open or close.”

Fleet of Foot spoke. “We should hurry up and get to Tu-Swift as quickly as possible. We have no idea how badly hurt he may be.”

Shadow Walker: “We cannot know for certain the best course of action. I think it best to put it back the way it was. We are not going to be able to overwhelm our enemy with force. We must rely on secrecy. We may or may not be able to save Tu-Swift. But others of those who stand on horses find out we are on the way to their camp, they may go more swiftly and warn their people. That will make rescue impossible and even reconnaissance riskier. Let us move this back and follow the trail. We may also find another way back that is less familiar to those who ride on horses.”

I proved difficult to move the rock back, but they succeeded and they then resumed their tracking, which was again an easy task. Perhaps, thought Shadow Walker, those who stood on horses felt they were so fast they would not be pursued. Or, perhaps, they had not learned to hide their trail. Or, perhaps they thought that odd rock door would cut short any pursuit. Eagle Eyes with Easy Tears led the team with the pups trotting along side them. Next came the pair from the Nomads of the South. Shadow Walker and Fleet of Foot carried the heaviest loads and kept looking for and erasing signs of their trail. They stayed within the confines of the large swaths of changed lands that the galloping horses provided. This made “covering” their trail fairly easy. Trackers of the Veritas might wonder at the paw prints of two wolf cubs traveling without a pack, but Shadow Walker felt it likely that these would not raise suspicions among those he was tracking since they seemed so unconcerned about their own trail.

Shadow Walker was happy to concentrate on the trail ahead and to check to make sure there were no more of those who stand on horses behind them. In this way, he could avoid wondering about things that he could neither control nor prepare for. Many Paths was or was not okay with the rest of the Veritas. Tu-Swift was or was not okay. The only distraction that he really couldn’t block out was the smooth cold feel of the rock that was not rock and the circles of rock. There was also a very odd smell about that rock – something he had never smelled before, but it reminded him of death.

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Books by the Author:

The Winning Weekend Warrior focuses on strategy, tactics, & the mental game for all sports including golf, tennis, softball, basketball, etc., as well as business.

Turing’s Nightmares consists of 23 fictional scenarios of humans interacting with technology for good or evil.

Fit in Bits suggests numerous ways to work more fun and exercise into daily activities such as watching TV, sitting in meetings, shopping, playing with kids, traveling, etc.

Tales from an American Childhood recounts early experiences and then relates them to contemporary issues and events.

The Bonds of Horses and Humans

08 Monday Apr 2019

Posted by petersironwood in family, psychology, Uncategorized, Veritas

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

ethics, family, innovation, myth, politics, story, truth

The Bonds of Horses and Humans

Tu-Swift awoke in pain. He began to panic. At first he wondered and quickly then became sure that they must have beaten him again. Inventory. “Don’t jump to conclusions.” That’s what Many Paths would have said. Inventory. He quickly realized nothing was broken. No, it was just that his muscles were sore. Although he spent a lot of time running, playing, and working among the Veritas, his ride on the back of a horse and then spending a day shoveling manure used his muscles in new ways. His body was okay. As he thought of the Veritas, however, his heart sank. Up to now, he had secretly thought that he would soon be rescued. Now a new and uglier thought crept into his soul. He took deep slow breaths and tried to calm himself. Day-Nah was beginning to stir and Tu-Swift didn’t want to alarm him by appearing scared. But the truth was, all the Veritas may be killed or enslaved. He might even be the only one to transmit their long collective years of wisdom accumulated.

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That was the cold, bitter spider of doubt that clutched his heart. Though he had no idea whether or not the Veritas had survived the attack, he had been assuming that they had been alive. But there were many other possibilities. Tu-Swift set his jaw. He had always been one to leap before looking while Many Paths kept reminding him to consider other alternatives. But now — Many Paths was not here. He would have to rely on the Many Paths in his head. And, others. There were other voices Among the Veritas who he could use to help him find a means for escape. Meanwhile, he must keep his spirits up by reminding himself of what he liked; what he was grateful for. Tu-Swift realized that, among other things, he was actually grateful to have this small boy as a companion. Worrying about his small jail mate distracted Tu-Swift from his own predicament and uncertainty.

Just then, Day-Nah stirred and whimpered. He suddenly sat up and yelled. Day-Nah’s eyes returned to that wild-eyed stare that Tu-Swift had first observed. Tu-Swift patted his own chest forcefully and said, “Tu-Swift! Tu-Swift!” Then, he gestured toward Day-Nah by opening his arms and hands outward toward the youngster and said, “Day-Nah. Day-Nah!” The young boy blinked several times and seemed to recall his present circumstances. His breathing slowed, but he pulled his legs up, wrapped his arms around his knees and began rocking and silently crying.

Like all of the youth of the Veritas, Tu-Swift knew how to comfort the young of his own tribe, but he felt uncertain about approaching the boy in this state. Though tempted to hug him, he decided distraction might be a wiser course and he reviewed the language lessons they had already gone through, being a little more particular about pronunciation, both in his attempts to mimic the sounds of Day-Nah and in Day-Nah’s repetition of of Veritas. This seemed to calm the boy and his silent tears abated. Once more Tu-Swift grew both angry and troubled that anyone would steal such a young boy from his family.

The horses were stirring as well, though it was early morning, judging from the gray light that crept into the horse enclosure. In the distance, Tu-Swift could hear many people stirring and getting ready for the day. Again, he had the distinct feeling that it was like and yet very unlike mornings among the Veritas. There were footsteps, and there were voices. The accent and cadence of the voices was different, but something more profound was different. He heard birds chirping, squawking, crowing, cooing and so on, but some note was missing. Tu-Swift thought of a rainbow and imagined what it would be like to see a rainbow that was missing the blue or the red. But no! This rainbow was missing all color. Why did it sound like a colorless rainbow? That made no sense. Tu-Swift shook his head. He wished he could have a real conversation with Day-Nah, but he knew of no way to try to communicate such subtlety.

Three large, burly men came into the large horse room. One of them put down two dishes of food and a flask of water. He grumbled something at them. Tu-Swift noted that none of these people seemed very interested in trying to teach them their language. The other two stood nearby and all three watched as the boys ate whereupon they were led out to an open pit toilet and from there to a large field fenced in with logs. There were a large number of free running horses in this particular field and among them, Tu-Swift could see five foals. Working together, the three large men managed to separate one of the foals from its mother. Tu-Swift could see that the mare stomped around dangerously, whinnied, and that the whole herd seemed agitated. Every horse in the herd, however, shrunk back, terrified of the men and eventually one man managed to tie a rope around the foal’s two back legs and another around the forelegs. Tu-Swift looked to his own legs and those of Day-Nah and saw that they were in much the same predicament. They, like the foal, could walk, but not run or jump.

Tu-Swift realized how much he loved to run free. He reveled in the feeling and he felt both sadness and anger at being prevented from running. He wondered whether he would ever be able to run free again. He begin to wonder whether he — or the foal — could ever be truly happy if they could not run free. Then, Tu-Swift thought of the snails that he had so often collected from the Veritas gardens. He had looked fairly closely at the creatures. They were fairly cute actually. Of course, as Many Paths would point out, he had no way to tell how a snail felt. But there was no reason to think they wouldn’t be happy. Finding something nice to chew on would probably make the snail happy just as it made him happy. But it was not in the nature of a snail to run. At imagining this, Tu-Swift laughed.

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Day-Nah tilted his head with his brows pinched together as he regarded the older boy. Tu-Swift smiled at the boy and at his situation. How could he explain that he had been imagining a snail trying to run? Then, it suddenly hit Tu-Swift that the “color” that was missing from all the morning sound of these captor-people was laughter — not just laughter itself, but any kind of fun, or enjoyment. So far as he could tell, they did the same things that the Veritas did (except for tying up other creatures), but they didn’t seem to enjoy any of it! What a strange, gray life that must be, thought Tu-Swift. And he suddenly realized that he actually felt sorry for his captors! He imagined telling Many Paths.

Just then, all three men came over to them and shouted at the same time. Neither of the boys had even the slightest idea what they said and this must have been obvious to the three because they all switched to miming what the boys were to do. They were to do what the three grown men had just done! Somehow, they were to cull four more foals and tie their legs with rope! The Veritas had ropes, but Tu-Swift decided that it was a fair bet that Capture-People didn’t know that. The Veritas were all taught at an early age that those with more power seldom bother to learn even what would be of immense value to them if that knowledge lies with those out of power. The Capture-People had horses — and they had captured one, at least, of the Veritas. So, they would think themselves superior and be willing to believe any lack of intelligence or knowledge on the part of Tu-Swift.

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He acted quite incapable with the ropes at first, only slowly catching on. Tu-Swift had no idea how the two of them were supposed to accomplish what looked very difficult even for three large men, three who did not have their legs tethered. Cautiously, they sidled into the pen staying near the exit that only they could squeeze through. Oh, thought Tu-Swift, Eagle Eyes will love to hear about that! Although tinged with sadness, he realized that he wasn’t really away from his own village at all! They all lived in his own head! As long as he lived, the Veritas lived!

Most of the herd headed to the far end as the boys entered, but one mare and her foal chanced nearing. The mare seemed to like their company! Perhaps she could see that they were tethered as they were. Tu-Swift gently tugged at Day-Nah by the arm and positioned him so that the men could not get a clear view of the mare. The mare smelled something nice on the rope between Tu-Swift’s legs. It began chewing on the rope. Tu-Swift admired the teeth and jaws of the horse before him. He spoke to the horse in Veritas though he was under no illusion that the horse would understand him, at least in any detail or words. “I am Tu-Swift. You are?”

At this point, the horse made a sound like “Kneeeeee -Kwah”

Tu-Swift continued, “‘eee-qua’ it is then.”

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“Tu-Swift likes to run. Ee-qua like to run. We don’t like ropes. (Here he made a show of waving the ropes in the air so the three men would think they were making progress.) “We want to run free. Tu-Swift and Ee-qua run free one day. Yes, we will.”

Tu-Swift hobbled over to the foal and sat on the ground. “Hello little one. We have a predicament. I have these ropes on my legs. I don’t like them, but if we don’t wear them, they will beat us until we do. Your mother, Ee-qua chewed my ropes nearly through. So, I am going to put these ropes on you. But you will be able to run free in a few hours. I know you don’t understand a word I’m saying but maybe the sound of my voice will help you know that I am your friend regardless of how it seems.” Tu-Swift meanwhile, had succeeded in tying a rope around one of the young colt’s legs and “secured” it with a granny knot rather than the square not that the men had shown him. It was chancy to make life difficult for those that seemed to have power over him, but it had to be done; carefully, and never in the same way twice, but each day, Tu-Swift knew that he could find some way to make the lives of the Capture-People less pleasant, just as they were making his less pleasant.

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Hiding tools, wrecking tools, backing up sewage, polluting water, passing on disease, poisoning — these were just a few of the ways he might or might not be able to fight back. Meanwhile though, he also had to be careful not to be caught and to have a well-worked out and plausible excuse. As Tu-Swift tied more legs with granny knots, he planned that he would feign astonishment and excitedly show his captors how he had tied the knots. He would tie granny knots. They would smack him about a bit of course. But then they would show him the correct way. He would again copy but make a granny knot. The Capture-People would smack him around a bit, so he imagined, and then show him again. He would feign insight and make a true square knot the next time. This would serve two purposes. It would cause them grief, but it would also, he hoped, endear him to them in some perverse way. It would be as though he could learn their tricks — eventually — but being more stupid than they are — it would take him longer naturally to learn to do things correctly. And, then again, he thought, fastening the fourth leg with a granny know, I may never even be accused.

Just then it occurred to Tu-Swift that the horses could chew threw their own tethers! Why hadn’t they thought of that. Maybe that’s not the sort of thing horses “think of.” Maybe they need to be shown. If they will eat through my ropes — and she could have easily gone all the way through — they could eat through their own, but how can I get food to put on those ropes?

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Start of the Myths of the Veritas

Dialogue and Discovery

01 Monday Apr 2019

Posted by petersironwood in story, Veritas

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Defense, Design, empathy, horses, innovation, leadership, myths, politics

Many Paths had let the word spread that she wanted to dialog after supper. {Translator’s Note}: In good weather, the people often dialogued around the campfire. In this way, each told of their experiences and listened to the experiences of others during the day and what they had learned. They asked questions, shared insights, and allowed many moments of careful reflection. On this day, however, it appeared that by “calling for” a Dialogue, she was encouraging all to come and to be especially thoughtful. Apparently, though the word was the same (so far as we can tell) there was some linguistic or behavioral marking that emphasized the importance of this particular Dialogue.

Though the day had been warm, the sun left the sky early at this time of year, and the people wrapped themselves in blankets and gathered around the fire. Only Trunk of Tree and a dozen other braves were absent, serving as guards. Trunk of Tree was still talking with them and trying to understand how this surprise attack had come. As expected, Many Paths spoke first.

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“So far as we can tell, no-one was seriously hurt and nothing was stolen of value excepting only my brother, Tu-Swift. A search party has been sent but we have not heard from them.”

A woman of the muskrat clan spoke, “Can people stand atop horses?”

A woman of the deer clan said, “Apparently so. Perhaps this is not so surprising. We have learned to work with wolves and eagles. Why not horses?”

Many Paths spoke up. “Our guests from the Nomads of the South confirm that at least one tribe to their knowledge does use horses. They call themselves the ROI.”

A child of the bobcat clan said, “I saw a man on a horse once.”

silhouette of person riding horse on body of water under yellow sunset

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Many Paths could see that the child had struggled to say this out loud in this big meeting and she did not want to scare him off. “Interesting. Please. Say more.”

“We were camping near the North River and looking for stones four days ago. Stones to make sharp. And it grew dark. So we slept. And I had a dream and awoke. And I looked across the river and I thought there was a buffalo with a tree and I saw it was really a man. A man on a horse. And I was scared I might be crazy. My parents and brother slept. And I didn’t want to wake them.”

“Do you think this man saw you?” asked Many Paths.

“Oh, yes. I think so. He and his horse looked right at me. Then, the horse took him away. I’m sorry.” The child looked bewildered.

“You did nothing wrong. There’s no need to be sorry.”

“I should have told someone. But I was afraid it would sound odd.”

Many Paths spoke gently. “Can you recall anything else about this horse and man as one?”

The child thought for a moment and added, “They ran fast. Not so fast as eagle falls, but much faster than anyone of our tribe runs.”

“And…? Anything else?”

“Well,” the child said, “when the horse ran away, it sounded like a drum. The-duh-RUM, the-duh-RUM.”

“Thank you, Horse Viewer.” Many Paths looked upon the people encouraging others to speak with her eyes and her smile and her voice.

“Oh, Many Paths, there is one more thing,” said Horse Viewer. “Right before they ran as one, the man made a noise like the running horse.” The boy closed his eyes in concentration. ‘Giddy-UP, Giddy-UP!’ he had shouted and off they ran.”

“Thank you, Horse Viewer,” Many Paths said warmly.

Next, She Who Saves Many Lives spoke, “Many years ago, I heard stories of people on horses, but I had never seen it first hand. Thank you.”

Many Paths spoke again, “The Nomads of the South said that these horses were tamed with cruelty, whips, and tethering. That seems a strange way to me, but perhaps it works. I had to use love to train the wolves. At least, I should say, I thought to train them that way. I began by studying them and as I learned more about them, I loved them more and as I loved them and they became used to me, I could arrange things so that they understood me and I understood them. They could see that I was the tallest of the wolves though not the one with the sharpest teeth. This they did not test though.”

The father of Horse Viewer, Stone Chipper spoke next. “I travel quite often as far as the North River. Only recently did I begin taking the children in order for them to help me find the sharpening rocks and learn to set free the weapon inside the rock. On my many long walks through the forest, I saw many creatures such as deer, squirrels, song birds, and I always speak to them kindly for they were my only friends on such journeys. Over the years, they became quite friendly. I never really tried to “train” them for battle, but gradually, their curiosity overcame their fear. Though not for the bobcats. They stayed wary. I cannot imagine beating an animal to train it though.”

Upon this, they contemplated for a silent, unhurried time.

“Sometimes, a little one can be annoying. It is easy to swat a fly away and sometimes… as well, a child. This is always wrong though.” A large, aging man, thick muscled and large boned, like POND MUD had spoken. Now, he continued. “Eventually, you drive them away so they actually want to annoy you and then you punish them more and they become more distant and you hit them harder….it seems as though it works, because you can get your way at that moment. But the moment your back is turned…you are creating war in your own house.”

A tall young woman with dark, penetrating eyes and long luxurious silken hair said, “We must all treat each other with respect.” Here she looked deliberately into the eyes of everyone there. “Especially the weakest amongst ourselves. Cruelty is against the grain of the tree of life. It will cause great damage, in the end. Great damage, indeed.”

Many Paths waited, not wanting to rush the people. After a long silence she spoke again. “It is clear that there is much that we do not know about these people. We do not know why they stole Tu-Swift. We do not know how many of these people there are and we do not know how many horses they have. We do not know how long it takes to train a horse, or exactly how they do it. They seem very confident indeed. But cruel. After all, they stole Tu-Swift. They attacked us at feast. And, it sounds as though they may use cruelty to train these horses. Though we have never trained horses. So, perhaps this is necessary for horses though not for wolves, nor eagles, nor children.”

A-OC of the Deer Clan spoke. “We know that they are capable of speed. And we know they did at least one thing bad by stealing a child. And, they must have some stealth as well because our guards did not warn us.”

Now, her sister, P-OC spoke along similar lines, “Perhaps we can arrange to make our paths more hospitable to those on foot and less so to those astride a horse.”

“Indeed,” said a man from the Muskrat Clan, “though some day we ourselves may learn to stand atop horses.”

P-OC nodded. “Yes, we should make any such alteration a temporary thing in case we might someday use these horses in such a way as to run so fast.”

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The people began to imagine various possible ways to do this. AO-C mentioned one idea. “For all but the eldest among us, it is easy to stand but also to crawl and get back to standing. If a tree were bent across a path at about this height” she said, as she drew her hand from left to right across her belly, our runners could easily duck under such a barrier. But I don’t think a horse would have such an easy time.”

Stone Chipper spoke, “Yes, and a person may turn sideways, and sidle through a slim opening. Horses though are big. There is the cool-place path, near the entrance to the great forest. It narrows between the two cliffs, beneath the raspberry bushes. If we made other paths encouraging others to take that entrance, we could narrow it still more and it would be impossible for horses to get through. Then, our would-be invaders and child-stealers would find this out and have to retrace their steps to approach us in a different way.”

All the people knew the place he meant. Even now, people would struggle to walk two abreast. Many Path sensed a commotion near the riverbank. Someone approached the edge of the circle. It was Trunk of Tree and he was helping another man. Friend of Squirrel! He appeared hurt. Many Paths said to Trunk of Tree, “What news? What happened to Friend of Squirrel? He seems off, somehow.”

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Trunk of Tree nodded, and said, “Yes. Indeed.” Then he asked him companion more quietly, “Are you okay to tell your story now?”

Friend of Squirrel nodded. The crowd quieted even more so that he could be heard. They could tell he was not able to shout. “There were three guards and we were posted together at the north entrance to the great forest. We were imagining the feast and tempting the squirrels to approach us for small treats. Suddenly we heard a great commotion. A host of men standing on horses appeared. The first opened his hands to show he had no weapons. He spoke gently though we did not understand his words. His gestures made it clear that they came in peace, and to trade, or so we thought. Several of the men – and I believe they were all men – opened some clothing on the side of the horse and brought out some fine looking skins. We gathered round and that is the last thing I remember. When I awoke, I tried to stagger to my feet but fell back to the earth. I slept until Trunk of Tree came upon me.”

Trunk of Tree nodded, “I am sorry to say that the companions of Friend of Squirrel are both dead, their heads smashed in with a club of some kind.Two other braves are retrieving their bodies now as well, but Friend of Squirrel should rest. I believe all of our attackers came through that path.”

Friend of Squirrel spoke again, “I am sorry. We were foolish to have been so incautious. They seemed so friendly. And we were taken aback to see such men atop horses. One of us should have stayed hidden with bow drawn. And now, calamity has struck.”

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“Trunk of Tree, thank you. Friend of Squirrel, go now and rest. What is done cannot be undone, but can be learned from. We are going to make our paths less friendly to horses for now. And, we must learn much more of these people. And, then, we must see what do do about such people that kill without battle and steal children from a feast.”

The Dialogue continued till the great fire became embers. Many ideas were shared. At last, a great weariness came upon Many Paths. She had only been leader a short time and now, not only was Tu-Swift stolen, but two fine braves had been killed and another injured. Her people needed reassurance and they needed sleep, but they also needed to be better prepared for another attack. This time, the ROI, if that’s what they were, would not have the element of surprise. Or, at least not those surprises. Many Paths supposed if they could run with horses, there may be other surprising kinds of danger they could wreak upon us. She wished she could speak with Shadow Walker now, but of course she couldn’t. The search party was now far beyond the hearing even of their drums.

She rose and ended the Dialogue though several stayed and continued to discuss how to make it harder for horses to penetrate to their center place. On the one hand, she wanted to encourage such ideas, but she was tired to the bone. She found herself listening but not contributing and even drumming her ring on the side of a log. She wondered how the search party was doing and how long it would take to find Tu-Swift. She worried about all of her tribe and especially about Tu-Swift. But dwelling on that would just make her less effective as a leader. So, instead, she fantasized that she could talk with Shadow Walker. She drifted off to sleep imagining she could. She toyed with the First Ring of Empathy and reminded herself that Shadow Walker had one as well.

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Fraught Framing: The Presumed Being-ness of State-ness

17 Monday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, creativity, psychology, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

#therapy, framing, fun, HCI, human factors, innovation, learning, politics, problem formulation, sports, UX

Fraught Framing: The Presumed Being-ness of State-ness

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As I understand it, in Spanish and Portuguese, for example, there is a linguistic distinction between current state of being and habitual state of being that is signaled by the use of different verbs. In English, we say, “That is an angry dog” to mean “That is a dog who is generally and habitually angry” and also to mean, “That dog is in an angry mood right now.”

woman and man wearing brown jackets standing near tree

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But, regardless of what native languages we write and speak, we humans often make statements about something and treat something according to the unstated and untenable presupposition that what is true about the current state of affairs is true about eternity.

This habit of mind, reinforced by language, is often incredibly useful. For instance, near me right now are a table, and on the table, among other things are a coffee cup filled with coffee and a checkbook. The table is mainly composed of wood and marble. For many purposes, this is an adequate description. Of course, none of these so-called objects were always in their current state. Once, the wood was part of a tree. And, before that, the material in the tree was mainly rainwater and dirt. It was transformed into a tree by a mere seed of information using energy from the sun.

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Meanwhile, even the marble portion of the table was not always in its current state. At one point, in the distant past, this marble was limestone. The limestone was transformed by temperature and pressure into marble. Before the limestone was limestone it was mainly the shells of tiny animals living in the ocean. If we trace the table back far enough we will come to the “Big Bang” that started the universe as we know it. The transformation of the table from one sort of thing into another did not end when it became a table nor when I bought the table. Some day, it will no longer be a table. Eventually, the material nature of the wood, and eventually even the marble will be different. The checkbook and the coffee cup will likely cease to be a checkbook and a coffee cup long before that.

For the purpose of drinking my coffee, it is just fine to think of this cup as being a cup. It holds my coffee and keeps it somewhat warm. The table works just fine as a place to hold the coffee cup. I don’t need to think more deeply about the lifecycle of the table or the cup or the checkbook.

Usually.

But sometimes, it is useful to deconstruct these categories. A fairly common test of creativity, for example, is to think of alternative uses. What could this table be used for besides a table? It is a pretty sturdy looking table, so I would say it could be used as a seat by one or two people pretty safely. It could be used as a deadly if awkward weapon. The bracing cross-piece could be detached and used as less awkward weapon. It could be used as a barrier. The wood part could be used as firewood. The thing that I habitually use as a coffee cup could be used as a container for many types of liquids or solids and even, with the help of the checkbook, could be used to hold gasses though not very effectively. The checkbook can be used as a weapon against a mosquito. In a very different way, the checkbook could be used as a weapon against a person or even as a weapon against a nation; e.g., by writing checks to steal an election.

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While all of these “objects” have histories, they also have futures. Generally speaking, the people I know give little thought to the future of the objects that they interact with. But slowly, and likely too slowly, this is gradually changing. We often now recycle or reuse objects. Thinking about the future of an object also influences my choices about what I buy. This kind of thinking is particularly important to when it comes to radioactive material which can pose very long term hazards or it can be stolen and used to cause fairly short term mayhem. Collectively, the plastic that we use gets discarded and then, does not vanish into nothingness. It finds its way into the air we breathe and the water we drink. Now that the population of the earth is 7 billion, we can no longer afford to ignore how the objects we interact with were created and we cannot afford to ignore what becomes of them. What we call a “table” or a “cup” or a “checkbook” is really only a “table for now”, “a cup for now” and a “checkbook for now.”

The fluidity of things also applies to human beings. It should be pretty obvious to most adults that someone we call “a toddler” or a “teen-ager” is not in that category forever. Most people evolve over time both physically and mentally. The change from “toddler” to “teen-ager” takes many years. Physically, the person usually seems stable from one hour to the next (even physical stability is an illusion; we create over 200 billion new cells a day!). Socially and psychologically, however, we are unstable even at a macro level. A sixteen year old, for instance, may act very much like a mature adult in hundreds of different circumstances. Yet, if they are overly influenced by “friends” or under the influence of alcohol for the first time, their behavioral self-control may easily revert to that more like a ten year old or even a two year old.

girls on white red jersey playing hand game

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We Limit Others by our Categories

It is human and common but not useful to observe a small slice of someone else’s behavior and thereby make inferences about their habitual behavior. Even if we know about someone’s habitual behavior, it doesn’t mean that they always behave that way and it doesn’t mean that they can’t change over time. When we say, “Oh, don’t pick Chuck for the baseball team; he’s such a spaz” or “No, I’m sure Sally wouldn’t like to join us; she’s really a loner” or “You can’t count on Jim; he never follows through” we are almost certainly over-generalizing. Perhaps Chuck never learned baseball as a kid and he simply needs to learn and practice basic skills. Maybe Sally has no real friends precisely because no-one asks her to join them because everyone thinks she’s a loner because she’s always alone – because no-one ever asks her to join them. Or maybe her idea of a good time is hiking and she’d be happy to do that, but has no interest in going clubbing and getting drunk every day. Maybe Jim is completely overworked and/or needs to learn better time management skills.

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“How many psychologists does it take to change a light bulb? Only one, but the light bulb has to want to change.”

People may be changed by circumstances but therapy often works too. As the joke implies, it won’t work very well if the main reason the “light bulb” goes to the therapist is to feel better rather than to get better, it’s an opportunity lost. Others who frequently interact with the “light bulb” often hold views and use names that subvert therapy. For example, a person who is never assertive and wants to change that may find that when they do so, their family and colleagues at work, who have been taking advantage of them for their own purposes may say things like this: “Oh, you used to be so nice!” {Translation: I used to be able to manipulate you for my own purposes so much more easily}.

We Limit Ourselves by our Categories

While we unwittingly define others into boxes that may serve to limit what they can do, we humans are generally “equal opportunity destroyers” and also limit our own potential through self-talk as well. I like to play golf and have therefore asked many people over the course of my life, “Do you play golf?”

Take a guess what response I have heard at least two dozen times. “Golf? Oh, no. I tried that a couple times. I’m no good.”

silhouette of man playing golf during sunset

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After picking myself up off the floor, I try to explain as nicely and politely as possible that if you’ve literally tried it a couple times, you have no idea whether you would be any good at it. You very likely have no idea whether you would like it either. The same goes for painting, writing poetry, playing video games, eating healthy food, exercising regularly, and so on. In each case, your initial level of skill and your initial level of enjoyment are very poor predictors of the long term. It is most often, not our ability, but our self-definitional boundaries and self-talk that limits us.

Exercises for Flexibility.

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Life is complicated and complex so I understand that many folks may be reluctant to expand the scope of what they and others are capable of. But if you do want to become more flexible in your behavioral repertoire, there are several things you can do.

First, you can become aware of your statements about yourself and others. When you find yourself thinking, “Jim never follows through,” try to restate that in terms of empirical evidence. It could be: “Well, once I asked Jim to help plan the office party and he never showed up for the first meeting. Another time, he said he would help teach my daughter how to parallel park, but nothing ever came of it.” You might immediately see that you have precious little evidence to back up your claim that Jim never follows through. You might also ask yourself whether you ever asked Jim about these incidents. There may be hundreds of legitimate reasons that he didn’t “follow through.” His name might have been left off the distribution list for the party planning meeting. And so on. Generating these alternatives is explored in more detail in “The Iroquois Rule of Six” which basically says before acting on an explanation that is inferred you should generate five alternative explanations.

Second, you can read fiction, watch movies, attend stage plays, do some amateur theater or even answer a questionnaire from someone else’s perspective. In working with Heather Desurvire at NYNEX, on a usability evaluation of a prototype, we did a variation on heuristic evaluation in which we had people look for issues and offer suggestions from a variety of different perspectives; e.g., a behaviorist, a cognitive psychologist, a worried mother, a physical therapist and so on. With the total amount of time controlled for, people found more issues and offered more suggestions when they looked at the application from the perspectives of many people.

Third, and my current favorite, is “Attitude Dancing.” I’m not sure this is what Carly Simon and Jacob Brackman meant by their song title, but when I turn on music while I am cooking or cleaning, I spent part of my dancing time dancing as though I were in a completely different mood or even as though I were a completely different person.

Give it a try!

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Author Page on Amazon.

Desurvire, H. and Thomas, J.C. Enhancing the Performance of Interface Evaluators Using Non-Empirical Usability Methods. In the Proceedings of the Human Factors Society 37th Annual Meeting, October, l993

Fraught Framing: The Virulent “Versus” Virus

16 Sunday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, apocalypse, creativity, driverless cars, management, psychology

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Climate change, Design, environment, framing, innovation, IQ, politics, problem formulation, problem solving, school, testing, TRIZ

Fraught Framing: The Virulent “Versus” Virus

Like most of us, I spent a lot of time in grades K through 12 solving problems that others set for me. These problems were to be solved by applying prescribed methods. In math class, for example, we were given long division problems and we solved them by doing — you guessed it — long division. We were given history questions and asked who discovered [sic] America and we had to answer “Christopher Columbus” because that’s what the book said and that’s what the teacher had said.

Even today, as of this writing, when I google “problem solving” I get 332,000,000 results. When I google “problem formulation” I only get 1,430,000 results — less than 1%. (“Problem Framing,” which is a synonym, only returned 127,000). And yet, in real life, at least in my experience, far greater leverage, understanding, and practical benefit comes from attention to problem formulation or problem framing. You still need to do competent problem solving, but unless you have properly framed the problem, you will most often find yourself doing much extra work; finding a sub-optimal solution; being stymied and finding no solution; or solving completely the wrong problem. In the worst case scenario, which happens surprisingly often, you not only solve the “wrong problem.” You don’t even know that you’ve solved the wrong problem.

There are many ways to go wrong when you frame the problem. Here, I want to focus on one particularly common error in problem framing which is to cast a problem as a dichotomy, a contest, or a tradeoff between two seemingly incompatible values. We’ve all heard examples such as “Military Defense Spending versus Foreign Aid” or “Dollars for Police versus After School Programs” or “Privacy versus Convenience” or “A Woman’s Right to Choose versus the Rights of the Unborn Fetus” or “Heredity versus Environment” or “Addressing Climate Change versus Growing the Economy.”

One disadvantage of framing things as a dichotomy is that it tends to cause people to polarize in opinion. This, in turn, tends to close the minds on both sides of an issue. A person who defines themselves as a “staunch defender” of the Second Amendment “Gun Rights”, for instance, will tend not to process information or arguments of any kind. If they hear someone say something about training or safety requirements, rather than consider whether this is a good idea, they will instead immediately look for counter-arguments, or rare scenarios, or exceptional statistics. The divisive nature of framing things as dichotomies is not even what I want to focus on here. Rather, I would like to show that these kinds of “versus” framings often lead even a single problem solver astray.

Let’s examine the hidden flaws in a few of these dichotomies. At a given point in time, we may indeed only have a fixed pool of dollars to spend. So, at first blush, it seems to make sense that if we spend more money on Foreign Aid, we may have fewer dollars to spend on Military Defense and vice versa. Over a slightly longer time frame, however, relations are more complex.

woman standing on sand dune throwing hat

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It might be that a reasonable-sounding foreign aid program that spends dollars on food for those folks facing starvation due to drought is a good thing. However, it might turn on in a specific case, that the food never arrives at the destination but instead is intercepted by local War Lords who steal the food and use it get money to buy more weapons to enhance their power; in turn, this actually makes the starvation worse. Spending money right now on military operations to destroy the power of the warlords might be a necessary prerequisite to having an effective drought relief programs.

Conversely, spending money today on foreign aid, particularly if it goes toward women’s education, will be very likely to result in the need for less military intervention in the future. That there is a “fixed pie” to be divided is one underlying metaphor that leads to a false framing of issues. In the case of spending on military “versus” foreign aid, the metaphor ignores the very real interconnections that can exist among the various actions.

There are other problems with this particular framing as well. Another obvious problem is that how money is spent is often much more important than the category of spending. To take it to an absurd extreme, if you spend money on the “military” and the “military” money is actually to arm a bunch of thugs who subvert democracy in the region, it might not make us even slightly safer in the short run. Even worse, in the long run, we may find precisely these same weapons being used against us in the medium turn. Similarly, a “foreign aid” package that mostly goes to deforesting the Amazon rain forest and replacing it with land used to graze cows, will be ruinous in the long run for the very people it is supposedly aimed to help.

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False dichotomies are not limited to the economic and political arena. Say for example that you are designing a car or truck for delivering groceries. If you design an axle that is too thin, it may be too weak and subject to breakage. But if you make it too thick, it will be heavy and the car will not accelerate or corner as well and will also have worse gas mileage. On the surface, it seems like a real “versus” situation: thick versus thin, right? Maybe. Let’s see what Altshuller has to say.

Genrich Altshuller was a civil engineer and inventor in the Stalin era of Soviet Russia. He wrote a letter to Stalin explaining how Russian science and engineering could become more creative. A self-centered dictator, Stalin took such suggestions for improvement as personal insults so Altshuller was sent to the Gulags. Here, he met many other scientists and engineers who had, one way or another, gotten on the wrong side of Stalin. He discussed technical issues and solutions in many fields and developed a system called TRIZ (a Russian acronym) for technical invention. He uses the axle as one example to show the power of TRIZ. It turns out that the “obvious” trade-off between a thick, strong but heavy axle and a thin, weak, but light axle is only a strict trade-off under the assumption of a solid axle. A hollow axle can weigh much less than a solid axle but have almost all the strength of the solid version.

One may question the design assumptions even further. For instance, why is there an axle at all? If you use electric motors, for example, you could have four smaller, independent electric motors and not have any axle. Every wheel could be independent in suspension, direction, and speed. No-one would have designed such a car because no human being is likely capable of operating such a complex vehicle. Now that people are developing self-driving vehicles, such a design might be feasible.

The axle example illustrates another common limitation of the “versus” mentality. It typically presumes a whole set of assumptions, many of which may not even be stated. To take this example even further, why are you even designing a truck for delivering groceries? How else might groceries go from the farm to the store? What if farms were co-located with grocery stores? What if groceries themselves were unnecessary and people largely grew food on their own roofs, or back yards, or greenhouses?

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For many years, people debated the relative impact of environment versus heredity on various human characteristics such as intelligence. Let us put aside for a moment the considerable problems with the concept of intelligence itself and how it is tested, and focus on the question as to which is more important in determining intelligence: heredity or environment. In this case, the question can be likened to asking whether the length or height of a rectangle is a more important determiner of its area. A rectangle whose length is one mile and whose height is zero will have zero area. Similarly, a rectangle that is a mile high but has zero length will have zero area. Similarly, a child born of two extremely intelligent parents but who is abandoned in the jungle and brought up by wolves or apes will not learn the concepts of society that are necessary to score well on a typical IQ test. At the other extreme, no matter how much you love and cherish and try to educate your dog or cat, they will never score well on a typical IQ test. Length and breadth are both necessary for a rectangle to have area. The right heredity and environment are both necessary for a person to score well on an IQ test.

This is so obvious that one has to question why people would even raise the issue. Sadly, the historical answer often points toward racism. Some people wanted to argue that it was pointless to spend significant resources on educating people of color because they were limited in how intelligent they might become because of their heredity.

Similarly, it seems that in the case of framing dealing with climate change as something that is versus economic growth, the people who frame the issue this way are not simply falling into a poor thinking habit of dichotomous thinking. They are framing as a dichotomy intentionally in order to win political support from people who feel economically vulnerable. If you have lost your job in the steel mill or rubber factory, you may find it easy to be sympathetic to the view that working to stop climate change might be all well and good but it can’t be done because it kills jobs.

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If the planet becomes uninhabitable, how many jobs will be left? Even short of the complete destruction of the ecosphere, the best estimates are that there will be huge economic costs of not dealing with global climate change. These will soon be far larger than costs associated with reducing carbon emissions and reforesting the planet. Much of the human population of the planet lives close to the oceans. As ice melts and sea levels rise, many people will be displaced and large swaths of heavily populated areas will be made uninhabitable. Climate change is also increasing the frequency and severity of weather disasters such as tornados and hurricanes. These cause tremendous and wide-spread damage. They kill people and cause significant economic damage. In addition, there will be more floods and more droughts, both of which negatively impact the economy. Rather than dealing with climate change being something we must do despite the negative impact on the economy, the opposite is closer to the truth. Dealing with climate change is necessary to save the world economy from catastrophic collapse. Oligarchs whose power and wealth depend on non-renewable energy sources are well aware of this. They simply don’t care. They shrug it off. They won’t be alive in another twenty years so they are willing to try to obfuscate the truth by setting up a debate based on a false versus.

They don’t care.

Do you?

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Author Page on Amazon

Imagination

14 Friday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, creativity, management, psychology, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

creativity, Design, fun, HCI, human factors, imagination, innovation, neurosis, sports, testing, truth, UX

Imagination.

It seems odd to bother to remind people that imagination is a tool of thought. I have four kids and twelve grandkids and they all use their imaginations. I also worked as a camp counselor, Y leader, child care worker in a psychiatric hospital, and a sixth grade science teacher. Kids use their imaginations! In many cases, they do this for “fun” but they also are constantly using their imagination to do creative problem solving.

When I did therapy with adults however, I found that many had convinced themselves that they had no imagination. This is rather sad as well as being completely inaccurate. Furthermore, in the very ways that such adults exhibited neurotic symptoms, they were using their imaginations. But instead of using their imagination to further their enjoyment or to solve problems creatively, they mainly seemed to use their imaginations for one main purpose: to make themselves miserable.

For example, few of us enjoy being stuck in stop and go traffic. As it turns out, you can actually impact the traffic flow around you by driving differently. You can read about how in this link, but you can come to much the same conclusion by using your imagination to empathize with the drivers around you. Instead, the neurotic train of thought goes something like this: “WHY oh WHY are all these people out on the road?! MOVE! Oh, crap, I am going to be late. My boss is going to scream at me. Probably fire me. CRAP! MOVE! I’m going to be late. I’m getting fired. Damn! It’s not my fault. My boss doesn’t care. He hates people who are late. I should have left earlier. Where will I get another job at my age? I’m sunk. Once I lose my job, my spouse will leave me too. Crap. He won’t write a good letter of recommendation. Should I get off the highway and take surface roads? That might make me later. Damn! I’m sunk. Life sucks!”

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That train of thought certainly uses imagination!

But in all the wrong ways! That person is not using imagination to enjoy the moment, but using imagination to quite literally make themselves miserable. And it isn’t just the commuter. Plenty of people use their imagination to “awfulize” about situations. They think of the worst possible outcome and then imagine that that worst possible outcome is bound to happen.

Instead, if you are in a situation that you can’t change, you could use your imagination to have some fun. So you’re stuck in traffic. There are literally a million things you could do instead of writing a tragic screenplay in your mind’s eye. I won’t list all million, but here are a few. You could design a better transportation system. You could construct a joke to put your boss in a better mood. You could turn on the radio or listen to a podcast or a book on tape. You could look at the scenery. You could make up a rather salacious spy thriller about the people around you who are also stuck in traffic. And so on.

So too, in solving problems….hold on… someone’s at the door. I’ll be right back.

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Well, that was weird! Two of the characters from my last blog series came to the door! They wanted me to hurry up and finish this series on tools of thought so they can come back to life. I had to explain to them that my translator is on vacation and that there’s nothing else to write until more of the myths can be decoded. Right now, there is growing interest in recent, though mythological, archeological digs that will give us further clues about the Veritas. My own command of the mythical Veritas language is extremely rudimentary and I’m not even absolutely sure I understood correctly what they were asking. But I am sure it was She-of-Many-Paths and Shadow-Walker. It was definitely them, more or less as I pictured them, but taller, and more ripped than I had imagined. It’s also clear that the two of them are more than friends. Anyway, they seem to be of the opinion that I need to write their myths so that we real humans can avoid making the same errors that people made in their mythical universe. I don’t quite see how that’s possible, but I will use my imagination to try to understand how it might be done. I hope they don’t bother my neighbors.

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Meanwhile, back to the catalog of thinking tools in general and to the use of imagination in particular. Under some circumstances, of course, it is a useful skill to use imagination to think of what can go wrong. I use imagination in this vein for example, when asked to evaluate something from a user perspective. I try to imagine how various icons, words, transitions and so on can be problematic for users. Even though I am pretty good at that, when users are actually observed in real life, they still manage to demonstrate problems that neither I nor anyone else on the design team had thought of!

Even in UX work, it is also important to use your imagination to think of additional opportunities. “You know, we’ve been thinking about this calendar application as a passive recipient of the user’s information. But some users might also like seeing a weekly summary of their activity in different categories.” Or, you might think, “Suppose we tie the calendar in with the message system. The system knows where the user is; we could send a reminder when it’s time for them to leave for an appointment.” Or, you might think, “In some places the time to drive somewhere depends on traffic and weather. We could tie this calendar and reminder in with the map and weather apps to give better estimates of when to send a reminder.” Such musings could result in a better product. Of course, timing is important as well. Your colleagues will tend to appreciate these thoughts a lot more if you are not currently in beta test but instead at the conceptual design phase!

Even knowing that, your imagination might be more likely to kick in later in the project because the application seems more real. You can imagine the reactions of your colleagues and frame your response this way, “Trying this app makes me realize that we can make a number of enhancements in version 2.0, 3.0 etc. I’m going to start this shared file of potential additions, changes, and enhancements that we can all contribute to. We should take a look at this when we are doing 2.0 brainstorming.”

More generally, there are many possible triggers for using your imagination and you may find that some kinds of triggers are more fun for you. For example, you might read fiction and you enjoy following along with the story being presented. This requires a lot of imagination work.

You can also start with a goal or even desire and work outward from this internal state to imagine ways you might accomplish your goal or fulfill your desire. But you can also work inward. You look at what is before you; e.g., a computer screen like the one I am looking at now and ask yourself how it might be different in the future.

Such musings can follow a thread based on the characteristics. The screen is flat, for instance. What if it were curved, or dynamically reconfigurable, or foldable or moldable? What if I could shrink the actual screen depending on circumstances? You can inject your screen (and possibly yourself) into a different and unusual situation. What if I had the screen available on the tennis court? Well, I could project things on my glasses; e.g., as I walk over to retrieve a ball, I could be reminded of how to hit a kick serve. What if I had special lenses that I could pass over any word or icon on the screen? One might give me the history of any given word. Another might give me the definition. Another might give me alternatives that are more esoteric or are easier to understand; more general or more specific; more positive or negative in tone. Another tool might enable you to select a sentence, a paragraph or an entire article and ask, “Who has written similar things before?” Even without AI, a purely statistical approach might lead you find out about people with similar interests.

Another way to practice using your imagination is to pose a question or see how two things are or could be related. On the table beside me are a number of objects: a set of keys, an iPhone, a coffee cup, a checkbook, two of the books I wrote, copies of some papers that I reviewed for a recent conference, a quarter, some business cards. How could these be combined? It doesn’t necessarily matter at this point that the combination is feasible. Let’s just try it.

Putting together a set of keys and an iPhone suggests to me having an app wherein I could photograph all my keys and then, if I lost any (or all!) of the keys, I could have one 3-D printed at a local store or my home 3-D printer. I can also imagine that for another layer of security (at a cost of inconvenience) my iPhone would not turn on unless I took a picture of a particular physical key. A coffee cup and a checkbook seem to belong to different worlds indeed, but that only makes it more of a fun challenge! I like coffee. I don’t particularly like writing bills. On the day before the bills are due, perhaps the coffee machine might not deliver coffee till I wrote the bills. This strikes me as too controlling. For me, it might work better to have an ironic message delivered on the coffee cup such as, “Have a nice day! And save the insane interest rates for paying $25 a day late by paying your bill on time! Or, make some rich banker even richer. The choice is yours!” This approach would not be everyone’s “cup of tea” but that doesn’t matter. The point is to reawaken your imagination.

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What about a quarter and two books I wrote? I could offer a 25 cent rebate. I could write about about the history of the quarter. I could mail people books with a quarter inside. I could make an advertisement about The Winning Weekend Warrior that is aimed at tennis players and suggest that every time they lose a set, they put a quarter in a piggy bank. When they get to 40 quarters they can buy my book. I can design strategy and tactics sheets for different sports that are sold separately. The reader/user places quarters on the sheet to reinforce strategy. In tennis, for instance, such a sheet might be static and the user could use four quarters for the positions of the four players on the court. They could be asked to select smart shots, given the positions. Similarly, I might have 4 or even 18 sheets for golf and on these sheets I would show the slope and terrain and ask people to put the quarter on for their target. Eventually, I imagine, there is a way to capture the data of how the player actually hits the golf ball on real courses and that could be incorporated into what the best shot is for that particular player. This data could also be used as input to computer golf games so that a player might use the game to help select better clubs and targets. We are no longer necessarily talking about my book or about quarters. That doesn’t matter! All that really matters is that I have used these arbitrary objects to trigger my imagination. And you can do the same!

I’m done. Hold on. Doorbell. II see that it’s the Veritas power couple again. I’m inviting them in for coffee. I wonder if they’ve ever had coffee before….

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Metaphors We Live and Die By: Part 2

13 Thursday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, health, management, psychology, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

cancer, disease, HCI, human factors, innovation, politics, testing, UX, war

Metaphors We Live and Die By: Part 2

men holding rifle while walking through smoke grenade

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Today, I want to delve further into the topic of metaphors that we often unconsciously adopt. In particular, I want to look at a common metaphor in four areas: disease, business, politics, and and the role of UX in the entire cycle of product development.

Although I am fascinated by other cultures, my experience is overwhelmingly USA-centric. I am aware that all of the four areas I touch on may be quite different in other countries and cultures. If readers have examples of how different metaphors are used in their culture, I would love to hear about it.

Disease is an Enemy to be Destroyed.

In most cases, American doctors view disease as an enemy to be destroyed. In fact, this metaphor is so pervasive that American readers are likely puzzled that I used the verb “view” rather than “is” in the previous sentence. In American culture, there is also a strong thread of another metaphor about disease: “Disease is a punishment.” This latter metaphor is behind such statements as, “Oh, they had a heart attack! Oh, my! Were they overweight? Did they smoke?” Perhaps I will consider this more fully another time, but for now, I want to examine the view that disease is an enemy to be destroyed.

It seems as though it is an apt metaphor. After all, aren’t many diseases caused by other organisms invading our bodies and doing harm? There are many examples: bacteria (Lyme Disease, pneumonia, ulcers, TB, syphilis), viruses (herpes, Chicken Pox, flu, common cold), protozoa (malaria, toxoplasmosis) or even larger organisms (trichinosis, tapeworms, hookworm).

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When it comes to considering causality, our thoughts usually travel along linear chains of causes. So, we may admit that while Lyme disease is “caused by” Borrelia bacteria, the “deer tick” that spreads the disease is also partly at fault. Similarly, although malaria is caused by a protozoa, the most effective prevention is to reduce the mosquito population or to use netting to keep the mosquitos from biting people. Similarly, you might try to prevent Lyme disease by wearing light clothing, using spray to keep the ticks off, checking for ticks after being in tick infested areas, etc. So, even in common practice, we realize that saying that the little organism causes the disease is an over-simplification.

Once one “gets” a disease, however, the most commonly invoked metaphor is war. We know what the enemy is and we must destroy it! I grant you that is one approach that can be very effective, but consider this. The “human” body contains approximately as many bacterial cells as human cells. What you think of as your “human” body is only half human! It is half bacteria! Furthermore, since we all have trillions of bacteria in us when we are well, the picture of treating bacteria as an enemy to be destroyed is at best an over-simplification. In fact, more recently, medical science seems to indicate that under-exposure to bacteria in childhood can make you more not less susceptible to disease. If you use anti-antibiotics to “destroy” the “enemy” bacteria in your body, many of the “good” bacteria necessary for digestion are also destroyed. This sometimes, though rarely, requires exotic treatment to return to health.

In cancer, both doctors and the general public mainly think of the cancer cells as “enemies” who must be destroyed! And yet, it seems that people may often have mutations that could lead to cancer but don’t. There are even very rare cases of spontaneous cures of cancer. What are some alternatives to thinking of cancer as an “enemy” that must be destroyed?

Clearly, I don’t know of a definite answer or you would have already heard about it on the news! But let’s consider a couple alternatives. First, instead of thinking you have to “destroy” this enemy, imagine you thought of cancer cells as confused. People get confused all the time. Sometimes, we put them in jail. Sometimes we put them in mental hospitals. Sometimes, we simply teach them what they need to know. Sometimes, we do end up killing them. But it is not our approach to kill someone just because they make a mistake. So, we might seek a way to “re-educate” cancer cells so that they “realize” that they are part of something even larger and more wonderful – the human body! How would one go about this? Using the metaphor of a confused person, we would have to understand just why they were acting confused. Then we would have to provide situations so that they could learn (or re-learn) what they needed to know in order to become a productive member of “society.” We could “remind” a liver cell that, after all, they were born to be a liver cell and they’re potentially quite good at that. We could think of cancer as cells that are misinformed or have amnesia about their true nature.

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We might also think along a different line. We could try to discover the best possible environment for these cancer cells to thrive – and then offer it to them somewhere else. For example, perhaps they really prefer an extremely acidic environment. Say you have a skin cancer on the back of your hand that thrives in a really acidic environment. You provide a gradient of acidity next to the tumor and encourage all those acid-seeking cancer cells to migrate into a really acid tube that is next to the tumor. The farther away it gets from you, the more acidic the environment.

You might also think of cancer cells as being rebellious. For whatever reason, they “feel” as though they are not experiencing enough of the “good life” being part of your body so they “take matters into their own hands” and begin leading a rebellion of cells out to steal the food supply and multiply in an unrestrained fashion. A solution might be to “convince” them that they are better off retaining their initial function rather than becoming a lawless gang of cells. I am not sure what the best metaphor for thinking about infection or cancer is, but surely it is worth imagining others rather than sticking to just one based on war as a metaphor.

Business is a Sport.

I treat this at greater length in The Winning Weekend Warrior, but the basic idea is simple. Yes, there are many strategies and tactics from sports that apply to business. But there is at least one crucial difference. Sports are designed to be difficult. They typically require skill and training if you are to do well. The parameters of the sport are fixed at any given time though they will vary somewhat over time. In golf, for instance, the hole is small and the distances are great. Though the rules of golf are complex, there is one over-arching principle. If it would help you to do something, doing that thing is penalized!

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If golf were a business, many CEO’s would nonetheless approach it as a sport. They would try to hire the “best people” – that is, people with a proven track record of good golfing. They would then proceed to offer incentives for people to do even better. If people shot a high score repeatedly, they would be fired. Eventually, such a CEO might get good results by having skilled people who are well motivated and well trained. But why? If putting a golf ball in the hole is what gained you profit, simply shorten the fairways, widen the hole, and eliminate the hazards! Of course, as a sport this would make golf no challenge and no fun. Everyone could win. But having everyone win is exactly what you should do to maximize profit. Yet many in management are so taken with the “business is a sport” metaphor that they do not change the situation. Some do “change he game” and with spectacular results. Google and Amazon come to mind.

Politics is War.

If you belong to a political party and believe the “other” party or parties are enemies to be destroyed, you are failing to understand the dialectic value that parties with different views can bring to complex situations. Life is a balanced dance between strict replication and structure on the one hand, and variation, exploration, and diversity on the other hand. A species who had no replication of structure from one generation to the next would die off. But so too would a species that had no variation because the slightest change in environment would also cause the species to die off. So it is with human cultures. If every generation had to start from scratch in determining what was edible, how to get along, how to avoid predators and so on, humans would have died out long ago. On the other hand, if a culture were completely unable to evolve and change, they would also die out. Typically, “conservative” parties want to keep things the same for longer and “liberal” parties want to change things more quickly. There is no obvious answer here. But what is vital is that members of each party see that there is value in the debate; in the dialogue; in the dialectic.

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The other party is not an enemy; it is the balance so that you can do what you do best. If you are predisposed toward exploration, science, new experiences, and so on, great! On the other hand, if you are more predisposed toward tradition and loyalty and repetition, great! If you did not have the people of the opposite predisposition, you would have to incorporate all that within yourself. Conservatives are what allows liberals to be liberal. And liberals are what allows conservatives to be conservatives. A huge problem arises, as it has recently in American politics, when one party decides they are just “right” all on their own and “victory” is worth lying, cheating, and stealing to get it. This is not unique to contemporary America of course. History is littered with administrations who were so convinced that they were “right” that they wanted to destroy all opposition. It has always ended badly. Politics is not war. (Though the failure of politics often leads to war.)

UX is All that Matters vs. UX Does Not Matter. Development is war!

As you might guess, neither of these extreme positions is useful. Price matters. Time to market matters. Marketing matters. Having good sales people matters. Having excellent service matters. Having a good user experience matters. It all matters. Depending on the situation, various factors matter relatively more or less.

(Original artwork by Pierce Morgan)

As in the case of political ideologies, it is just fine for UX folks to push for the resources to understand users more deeply; to test interaction paradigms more thoroughly; to collect and observe from more and more users under a wider variety of circumstances. Similarly, while you are pushing for all that and doing your best to argue your case, remember that the other people who are pushing for tighter deadlines, and more superficial testing are not evil; they simply have different perspectives, payoffs, and responsibilities. Naturally, I hope the developers and financial people do not view UX folks as simply “roadblocks” to getting the product out quickly and cheaply either.

The first half of 2018, I tried to catalog many of the “best practices” in collaboration and teamwork. You might find some of these useful if you are embroiled in “UX wars.” You and your colleagues from other disciplines might also find it useful to consider that it is worth taking the time to affirm your common purpose and common ground. You are meant to work together. Development is not war!

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Systems Thinking: Positive Feedback Loops

07 Friday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, creativity, psychology, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

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Design, Feedback, innovation, learning, politics, POTUS, science, systems thinking, thinking, vicious circle

Systems Thinking: Positive Feedback Loops

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One of the most important tools of thought that anyone can learn: “Systems Thinking.” I touched on this in yesterday’s post “And Then What.” I pointed out that when you take an action that impacts a system such as a human being, a family, or a country, it does not react in a mechanical way.

Here are some examples. For many years, the United States and the USSR were involved in a cold war arms race. Every time the USSR added more nuclear missiles to their arsenal, the people in America felt less safe. Since they felt less safe, they increased their armaments. When the USA increased nuclear weapons, this made the Soviet Union feel less safe so they increased their arms again and so on. This is what is known in Systems Thinking as a “Positive Feedback Loop.” It is also popularly known as a “Vicious Circle” or “Vicious Cycle.”

Let’s say that you are in pretty good shape physically and regularly run, play tennis, or work out. The more you exercise (up to a point), the better you feel. Feeling better makes you feel more like exercise and more exercise makes you feel better. People call this a “Virtuous Cycle” or “Virtuous Circle” because we think the outcome is good. But formally, it is the same kind of cycle.

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The most important thing to recognize about a Positive Feedback Loop is that it can be run in either direction. At some point, the US reduced their nuclear arsenal and this decreased the perceived threat to folks in the Soviet Union so the soviets felt that they could also reduce their nuclear arsenal which in turn, made people in the US feel safer and led to further reductions and so on.

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Similarly, if you stop exercising for a month, you will tend to feel pretty crappy. Feeling crappy makes you feel less like exercising and this in turn makes you exercise less which in turn makes you even more out of shape, feel worse and be even less likely to exercise. You can break such a “vicious circle” by starting to exercise – even it it’s just a little to start moving the circle in the “virtuous” direction. (Incidentally, that’s why I wrote “Fit in Bits” which describes many easy exercises to get you started).

woman in white bed holding remote control while eating popcorn

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“Vicious circles” also often cause disagreements to escalate into arguments and arguments into fights. Each person feels “obligated” not to “give in” and the nastier their opponent becomes, the nastier they become.

“Fawlty Towers” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fawlty_Towers), a British sit-com uses “Positive Feedback Loops” in the escalating action of the comedy plots. John Cleese plays the co-owner Basil (with his wife, Sybil) of a small hotel. Typically, John Cleese makes some rather trivial but somewhat embarrassing mistake which he wants to hide from his wife. In the course of trying to cover up this rather small mistake, he has to lie, avoid, or obfuscate. This causes an even more egregious mistake which makes him even more embarrassed so he must result to still more outlandish lies and trickery in order to cover up the second mistake which in turn causes an even bigger mistake, and so on.

That pattern of behavior reminds me of the current POTUS who is famously unable to admit to an error or lie and uses a second and bigger error or lie to try to cover up the first lie and so on. He seems, in fact, completely incapable of “systems thinking.”

For example, he may see (and exaggerate) a real, but containable threat such as a trade deficit. He sees the US send more money out of the country than the US takes in from trade. That’s a legitimate issue. But the approach he takes is to ZAP the other parties by slapping on tariffs without any real appreciation of the fact that our trading partners are extremely unlikely to react to tariffs on their products by simply doing nothing. One could use logic, empathy, or a look at history to determine that what is much more likely is that the other countries will put tariffs on our goods (which, of course, is precisely what happened).

Similarly, he demands absolute loyalty. He repeatedly puts himself and his own interests above the law, the Constitution, the good of the country and the good of his party. He expects everyone loyal to him to do the same. But he betrays these loyal appointees, friends, and wives whenever it suits him. He thinks he is being “smart” by doing what seems to be in his best interest at that moment. But what he fails to see is that by being disloyal to so many people who have been mainly loyal to him, he encourages his allies to only be loyal to him while it suits their interests.

In the Pattern “Reality Check,” I point out that such behavior is an occupational hazard for dictators. Apparently, it can even be such a hazard for would-be dictators as well. By surrounding himself with those who always lie, cover for him, laud him, cater to his insane whims, etc., such a dictator (or would-be dictator) loses touch with what is really going on. He becomes more and more disconnected from sensible action yet those who remain loyal must say and do more and more outrageous things to keep the dictator from finding out just how bad things really are. Eventually, the Emperor with no clothes may die of hypothermia because no-one has the courage to tell him that he’s actually wearing no protection against the elements!

Positive feedback loops exist in purely natural systems as well as biological and social systems. For example, increased global mean temperatures mean less arctic ice which means more solar radiation will be absorbed by the earth’s dark oceans rather than reflected back into space by the white ice and snow. This, of course, makes the earth hotter still. In addition, the thawing of tracts of arctic tundra also releases more methane gas into the atmosphere which is even more effective at trapping the earth’s heat than is carbon dioxide. Global climate change also makes forest fires more prevalent which directly spews more carbon dioxide into the air and reduces the number of trees that help mitigate the emissions of carbon dioxide by turning it into oxygen through photosynthesis.

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A concept closely related to “Vicious Cycles” is that of “Cognitive Dissonance.” Basically, people like to believe that they are honest and competent. Much like John Cleese (Basil) in Falwty Towers, once they do something dishonest or incompetent, their first reaction is not to believe that they did something dishonest or incompetent. They will now try to distort reality by misperceiving, mis-remembering, or distracting.

For example, at the height of the Vietnam War, I was horrified at the beatings perpetrated by the police on peaceful protestors at the Democratic National Convention. I was also disturbed at the techniques the Democrats used at their convention to silence the voices of dissension within the convention. Candidate Nixon claimed he had a “secret plan” to end the War in Vietnam. I voted for Nixon. As it became clear that Nixon was a crook, I decided that I had made a mistake voting for the man. But I could have taken another path which would be to “double down” on the original mistake by continuing to support Nixon and dismiss all the growing evidence of his misdeeds. As his malfeasance became more and more egregious, it made the egregiousness of my original mistake of voting for him grow as well. So, it would be possible to become ever more invested in not believing the overwhelming evidence of his treachery. (Now, it turns out, it was even worse than we knew at the time. He actively thwarted the peace efforts of Johnson!). Perhaps because I’ve been trained as a scientist and science values the truth very highly, I did not fall prey to that particular instance of “Cognitive Dissonance.” I readily admitted it was a stupid mistake to vote for Nixon.

Of course, today, we see many people not just backed into a corner to support the current POTUS but backed into a corner of a corner. Instead of believing that a liar is lying, they protect their “integrity” by insisting that everything and everyone else is lying: the newspapers, the reporters, his opposition, people in other countries, his former business partners, his former customers, the CIA, the FBI, the NSA. Ironically, for some people, it would be easier to admit that voting for a slightly inferior candidate was a mistake than to admit that voting for a hugely inferior candidate was a mistake. Voting for a slightly inferior candidate is easily understood but if they voted for a candidate that bad and bad in so many ways it was a huge error. And now, as each new revelation comes to light, it is more and more and more embarrassing to admit what a huge mistake it was.

Another common example of a “Vicious Circle” is addiction. A small amount of alcohol, nicotine or heroine makes you feel better. But taking the drug increases your tolerance for it. So, next time, to feel better, you need to take a little more. Taking a little more increases your tolerance still further so now you need to take a still higher dosage in order to feel better. When you do, however, your tolerance increases still more. Whether it is drugs, gambling, addictive sex, or unbridled greed, the mechanism is the same. You need more and more and more over time due to the nature of the “Positive Feedback Loop.”

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A similar mechanism may be at work in the minds of apologists for the NRA (National Rifle Association). As more and more innocent people are killed partly because of easy access to guns, the mistake of supporting the NRA in their refusal to support mandatory vetting, training, and competency demonstrations for gun owners becomes an ever-more obviously egregious error. But, rather than making this more likely for supporters to admit to such an error and therefore change their position, every new slew of innocent children killed for no reason makes them actually less likely to change their position. According to Cognitive Dissonance, every such death makes their earlier decision worse – unless there is some counter-balancing argument. As the number of innocent deaths arises, and indeed, as more and more evidence of the perfidy of the NRA becomes clear, many who previously supported the NRA become ever more entrenched because they “buy into” the great value of unlimited access to guns ever more. Why? They continue their support because not to do so makes them complicit in more and more horrendous crimes.

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If you can see such patterns in your own behavior and in others, you can better choose the correct course of action for yourself and be more thoughtful in how you communicate with others about their errors. Hint: Trying to make people feel more guilty for their stupid decisions will likely backfire.

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And, then what?

06 Thursday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in creativity, psychology, Uncategorized

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Business, consequences, Feedback, innovation, learning, science, testing, thinking

And then what?

When it comes to increasing the drama in TV crime shows, westerns, and spy thrillers, both the brilliant, evil villain and the smart, brave, good-looking protagonist display one common and remarkable weakness: they rush into action without much thought as to the possible consequences of their actions.

Here’s a scene that you and I have probably seen a thousand times. The hero has a gun drawn and a bead on “The Evil One” but the Evil One has a knife to the throat of the friend or lover of The Hero. The Evil One, as both we in the audience and The Hero know, cannot be trusted. Most likely, The Evil One has caused the death of many people already, is treacherous, and lies as easily as most people breathe. Nonetheless, The Evil One promises to release the hero’s friend or lover provided only that The Hero put down their gun and slide it over to The Evil One. And The Hero complies! Often, The Hero will elicit a “promise” from The Evil One: “OK, I’ll give you my gun, but you have to let them go!” The Evil One, for whom promises mean nothing, “promises” and then The Hero slides the gun over. At this point, The Evil One is obviously free to kill both The Hero and their friend or lover immediately. Instead, The Evil One will begin chatting them up. This allows time for magic, skill, accident, God, unknown allies, or brilliance to turn the tables on The Evil One.

Here’s another scene that we’ve both witnessed. The Hero suddenly finds out some crucial piece of information that lets them know the whereabouts of The Evil One. Often this is an abandoned warehouse filled to the brim with minions of The Evil One. But, it might be the cave deep beneath the island stronghold of The Evil One; a stronghold filled to the brim with his minions. The Hero rushes in with a woefully inadequate force and without informing anyone concerning his whereabouts. He or she confronts The Evil One who not only confesses to past misdeeds but outlines their future plans to The Hero as well.

abandoned architecture building concrete

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In the TV series or the movies, the sequence of events is determined by the writer(s) so even though The Hero faces impossible odds, he or she will almost certainly overcome those impossible odds. That makes for an exciting story!

But in life?

In real life, you’ll typically do a lot better if you think about the likely consequences of your actions.

Sometimes, people fail to do this because they have simply never developed the habit of thinking ahead.

Sometimes, people let their wishes completely color their decisions. For instance, an addicted gambler, despite their actual experience, believes that gambling more will result in a favorable outcome for them rather than the truth which would be that there is an extremely small chance that they will win overall.

Sometimes, people are too ignorant to realize that there are potential negative consequences. For instance, when I was a youngster, I had a “glow in the dark” watch and cross; each glowed partly because of radium. I enjoyed putting these right up to my eyes in order to observe the flashes of individual photons. I also put together model airplanes with glue. When I applied too much glue, I dissolved it with Carbon Tetra-choloride. I loved the exotic smell of Carbon Tet. Now, it is deemed too dangerous to be used in this way.

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In many cases, it seems to me that people do think about consequences but use an overly simple model of reality on which to base their predictions. In particular, people often treat individuals and social systems as mechanical systems and base their decisions on those mechanical models rather than actuality. For example, your kid does not, in your opinion, eat enough broccoli so you simply force them to eat broccoli. Your “prediction” of the consequences of this may include that the kid will eat more broccoli, be healthier, eventually like broccoli, etc. Depending on the individual child, it may be that none of these will actually occur. In some cases, it may even happen that the exact opposite of your goals will be achieved. The kid may eat less broccoli, be unhealthier, and hate broccoli more than ever. There are many other possible consequences as well. The kid may end up hating meals with the family or hating you or hating the color green.

When it comes to individuals and social systems, it is hard to know what the net effect might be. Often though, the most significant cognitive problem that people have is that they are so sure of their prediction that they base their actions on what they think should happen rather than what actually does happen.

As recounted in some detail in the Pattern, “Reality Check,” instituting a new social reward or punishment system often does indeed change behavior, but not necessarily in the desired manner. If, for instance, programmers are now rewarded on the basis of lines of code written, they might indeed write more lines of code but many of those lines of code may be unnecessary. You might write 1000 lines of code or you could spend time thinking about the problem and then write two lines of code that accomplish the same result. Will you do so if you are only rewarded 1/500 th of the bonus?

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Similarly, you may measure the performance of service technicians by how many calls they “handle” during their shift. But if that is the main or sole measure, you may also end up having those service people tend to offer trivial or even useless advice based on insufficient information. In all these cases, if management keeps seeing what really happens, any damage done by having an inaccurate predictive model of what will happen as a result of a change will be mitigated. But in a system, whether private or governmental, where people are mainly motivated to keep management happy by telling them what they want to hear, instead of correcting a poor intervention, the problems caused by inadequate models will tend to multiply, fester, or explode.

So:

Think of possible consequences and try to determine which ones are most likely. Then, observe what really does happen. This helps avoid turning an issue into a disaster and, over time, it also helps you develop more realistic models of reality. It will also tend to put you in the habit of taking a flexible and reality-based approach to your decisions rather than one that is based on a rigid and inaccurate model of how things should be. The latter approach to decisions will not only make you individually ineffective; it will also make it almost impossible to work well with others (unless everyone involved shares the same inaccurate model).

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Many Paths

05 Wednesday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in creativity, psychology, sports

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

Business, competition, creativity, Design, divergent thinking, family, innovation, learning, life, sports, truth

Many Paths

{Translator’s Note}: Exciting news: more (mythological) archaeological evidence is being unearthed as I write this about the mythical Veritas tribes. My next series of translations will be put on hold however, until we have a chance to arrange and understand this new evidence so that I may use it to help guide the translations. In the meantime, I’ve asked one of my psychologist friends (Dr. John C. Thomas) to take over the blog for awhile and write short posts on such topics as thinking, problem solving, and creativity. Dr. Thomas has been studying these topics for fifty years. He was also trained as a Fellow in Rational Emotive Therapy. He has over 300 publications and presentations on psychology, AI, human-computer interaction, and user experience.

Hi, folks. I imagine many of you, like me, can hardly wait to see what these new findings will be regarding the Veritas tribe. Meanwhile, I’ve been asked to fill in by helping us think about thinking. One of the main characters we’ve been following in the myths of the Veritas is “She-of-Many-Paths.” She personifies the first thinking skill I’d like to discuss.

This skill goes by many names including “Alternatives Thinking,” and “Divergent Thinking.” It is also discussed in the Pattern: “The Iroquois Rule of Six.” The basic idea is simple. When we are confronted with a situation, we often “Jump to Conclusions” or “Spring into Action” before we have all the facts. Even when we have all the facts (which is rare), we also have a tendency to focus on our first interpretation. This often leads to thinking of one (and only one) course of action. And, very occasionally; for instance, in some emergencies, that is the correct thing to do.

backlit breathing apparatus danger dangerous

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Even in emergencies however, our first terrified instinct about what to do can be dead wrong. For example, people see a small fire in their homes and immediately throw water on it. But if it’s a grease fire or an electrical fire, this is not a good course of action. Soon after I first began my dozen years as Executive Director of the NYNEX AI Lab, there was a fire in a nearby Stouffer’s Hotel. The charred bodies of a dozen IBM executives were found huddled in a closet. In the smoke and panic and confusion of the fire, they had apparently grabbed at the first door and gone into a dead end closet and perished there.

In daily life, there are a great many situations where a little extra thinking time would improve the outcome. For example, while working at IBM Research in the 1970’s, I drove about 10 minutes each way to work. At one point, I had a loose fan belt and my battery went dead. In a hurry to attend a meeting, I jump-started my car and drove to the IBM parking lot. Already late to a meeting, I went to turn off the car and just before I did so, I realized that I had not driven far enough to recharge the battery. So, I decided I’d better leave the car engine running for awhile. But as I gathered up my things and began dashing off to the meeting, I realized that it was insane to leave my car unlocked with the engine running! After all, someone could simply open the door and drive off! So, still in a hurry, I locked the car — with the engine running and the keys safely locked inside.

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Most of us have done similar things. In some early experiments on design problem solving done at IBM, I found that when I asked people to come up with as many solutions as possible, they would generate ideas fairly quickly until they came up with one that they thought would really solve the problem. At that point, their idea productivity fell precipitously. It is hard for us to force ourselves to think of more than one good solution.

Why is this important? For one thing, conditions change. Something may happen that makes your first solution no longer apt. For another thing, there may be side-effects of your solution that make it unacceptable. Another class of problems is that someone may object to your first solution for reasons you could not foresee. (See also, “Who Speaks for Wolf” as a way to help minimize that chance). In the context of invention and product development it is extremely unlikely that the first solution you come upon (and indeed even the first few solutions you think of) are novel. They are instead extremely likely to be the intellectual property of someone else. The most obvious solutions have likely already been patented and may already be in products or services that many customers are already using.

I have long been interested in observing people’s strategies and tactics in sporting events (See “The Winning Weekend Warrior”). One tactic that is overwhelmingly popular in tennis, for instance, is that the harder your opponent hits the ball, the harder you try to hit the ball. For example, someone hits a very hard ball while you’re at the net. You take this as an affront and think “I’ll show you!” Trying to hit the volley even harder means you take the racquet back farther. About half the time, the extra time it takes to bring the racquet back means you’ll mis-hit the ball or miss it entirely. On most of the remaining occasions, you’ll hit the volley too hard and it will go long. If someone hits the ball at you hard, what you need to do is simply block it back and guide it to the right spot. Trying to add extra power is unnecessary and too time-consuming. What is remarkable is not that you and I try to hit a hard ball harder. What is remarkable is that we never seem to try a different tactic!

There are many issues with focusing all your energy on the first solution you come up with. But the worst consequence is that you are overly invested in that first “solution” (which may not even be a real solution). This is bad in trying to solve problems in every domain I can think of and having others involved amplifies the badness.

For instance, let’s say that after 3 years without a vacation, you and your spouse finally have time for a nice two-week vacation. You want to visit Cuba for two weeks and they want to visit Vietnam for two weeks. If you each only come up with one idea, you will almost always find yourself pitching for your idea, trying to convince the other person that Cuba is better while they will spend their energy trying to shoot down your choice and explain (patiently at first and less so as time goes on) why Vietnam is a much better idea. After many frustrating arguments that go nowhere, you may decide to compromise; e.g., you could visit an empty stretch of open sea in the Pacific Ocean half-way between the locations; or, you may decide to flip a coin. All this frustration and bad feeling might be avoidable. It could turn out that your second choice and your spouse’s second choice are both San Diego! But you’ll never even discover this because when each of you only thinks of one idea, what should be a collaborative problem solving exercise instead becomes a debate – a contest with precisely one winner and one loser.

man and woman wearing brown leather jackets

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Thinking of many alternatives will save you many headaches – at work, in your love life, in your recreational endeavors. When you force yourself to think of many alternatives, you will also be more open to the ideas of others. Over time, thinking of many alternatives whenever you get a chance will also increase your own creative potential. Who knows? You might even be chosen as the next leader.

For a leader, it is particularly important to consider many possibilities. Insisting that everyone get on board with the first idea that pops into your head will cause resentment and dissension. It will also make you far less willing to change to a different idea when circumstances necessitate it.

You may start a business and decide that you must be personally involved in every decision and with every customer contact. At first, when your company is small, this might work out wonderfully well. No-one knows the customer and the product quite so well as you do. But you are not God. You cannot be everywhere and know everything. If you never learn to delegate; never grow the capacity of your people; never take expert advice — you will drive yourself and everyone around you crazy. The very success of your business will guarantee its ultimate failure. Learn to consider many paths. You will be glad you did.

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petersironwood

~ Finding, formulating and solving life's frustrations.

Tag Archives: innovation

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