Meta-Perspective: Recent Episodes
Matt & Andy
A different type of episode from the norm, this is a short intervening passage between the first 5 episodes that we’ve released so far and future episodes to come. We recorded the first 5 episodes of the show in 2020, now we’re starting to record the next episodes and seeing where the journey takes us. In the meantime we’ve put together this interlude with a series recap of where we’ve gotten to so far along with some clues as to what to expect in the next episode.
Timestamps
- What’s different about this episode? (00:23)
- Why do an interlude? (01:51)
- What is there to do in the meantime? (02:10)
- A recap of the show so far (03:27)
- What’s next? (06:23)
Contact
- Metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io
From the utility and limitations of metaphors to an approach for building empathy in the interactions we have with others, sense-making plays a key role in how we participate in the world around us. Dive in to the episode to see how the conversation unfolds.
Date of RecordingNovember 26th 2020
Timestamps
- Summary of last episode - intro to machine and informational metaphor (02:11)
- Why metaphors are useful but insufficient (05:23)
- The flip side of using informational metaphors (12:04)
- The ineffable lived experience of culture (14:23)
- The danger of applying the mechanical or software lens too tightly (17:21)
- The informational driven patterns and human experience (19:24)
- Tool invention to sense-making (22:06)
- The decoupling of innovation and human experience (25:01)
- The blank slate fallacy (29:23)
- Rejecting the narrative (33:27)
- Psychological triggers and Forrest Landry’s three levels of perception (35:26)
- Building Sovereignty (42:16)
- Jungian sub-personalities and social media (44:13)
- Sub-personalities and the polluted information ecology (51:17)
- Reframing personal relationships as a pathway to empathy and crossing divides (52:49)
- Finding the signal in the noise (01:00:19)
- Collapsing into worldviews, sense-making and bridge building (01:02:00)
- Holding and seeking value in multiple perspectives (01:12:17)
- The psychology of anxiety in uncertainty (01:15:08)
- Stepping into the undefined and navigating the unknown as agents (01:21:30)
- The new metaphors - the surfer (01:23:07)
- Takeaways and questions to ask ourselves (01:27:38)
Questions to ponder over
- What might be some of the other ways of finding signal in the noise in our arenas as we try to navigate them? How might we do that?
- How might we hold the uncertainty that we need to hold for others and the people around us?
- How else do we use metaphors to make sense of our world?
Links to explore
- Forrest Landry - philosophy and metaphysics
- Roger Scruton - Anthropologist's gaze
- Jordan Peterson - Lobster hierarchies
- Sigmund Freud
- Carl Jung
- Sub-personalities
- Daniel Schmachtenberger - The War on Sensemaking
- Infinity Stones (01:31-03:14)
- John Vervaeke - Awakening from the Meaning Crisis
Contact
- Metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io
Knowing ourselves is a key component of navigating complexity and uncertainty. In this episode we dive into the psychological aspects of being in an ever shifting, rapidly changing world and the effects that has on us and on our sense of self.
Date Recorded
Nov 12th 2020
Timestamps
- Alienation and the good life (3:58)
- Hume’s is/ought distinction, human needs and values (8:11)
- Using mechanical and informational metaphors in sense-making (12:07)
- Sense-making coupled to our environment and interior lives (15:21)
- Barfield, original participation and the categorisation of reality (22:44)
- Identity and atomisation in large complex societies (26:28)
- Human brain tuning into context it finds itself in (29:49)
- Dynamic coupling and maladaption in the arena (31:32)
- Intergenerational technological experiences (35:12)
- Disconnect from the digital arena - Giving up a smartphone for 30 days (39:59)
- Attention, AI, Limbic system (43:14)
- Self-knowledge and identity through hardship (47:56)
- Tempering our swords, forest fires and internal validation (56:21)
- Nurturing your inner self, order, chaos, complexity and overwhelm (59:11)
- Using informational metaphors for navigating the new arena (01:05:21)
- The consequences of the collective action of multiple institutions (01:08:51)
- Machine learning and AI as part of the Information age (01:11:54)
- Importance of individual participation in the arena (01:17:13)
- Digital market forces and the infrastructure of the commons (01:19:03)
- Decentralisation as a fail safe (01:21:58)
- Could there be a new model for the informational commons? (01:24:05)
- Recursive AI, institutional philosophy and discovering our values (01:25:58)
- The plurality of ideas and participation (01:29:19)
- The golden rule and foundational principles of the human condition (01:32:17)
- The relay race of humanity (01:35:13)
Questions to ponder over
- What are some of the things in our lives that we might be maladapting to?
- Are we looking externally for identity and validation rather than cultivating within us a rich inner life?
- Are we struggling to see ourselves in the things that we’re building around us?
- Do we need to become more aware of what it takes to live well in order to not find ourselves living lives shaped by the interests of increasingly sophisticated forces operating in the arenas we inhabit?
Links to explore
- Hume is/ought distinction
- Owen Barfield and Knowledge, Poetry & Consciousness
- Stoicism
- Frederick Nietzsche and gazing into the abyss
- Maslow's hierarchy of needs
- Personal sovereignty
- Jordan Peterson - Clean your room
Contact
- Metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io
Building from Episode 2's exploration into the Agent and Arena relationship. This time round we focus in on the Arena looking at the forces that have influenced and continue to influence it today. It's useful to think of this episode and having two parts to it that are connected by the theme - legacy mindsets - the ways of thinking and perceiving the world that we carry with us from the past.
Date recordedOct 29th 2020
Timestamps
Part 1
- Previous episode recap (02:27)
- Why play a role in the arena? (06:44)
- Extracting ourselves out of our previous arenas (10:05)
- The consequences of the industrial arena (12:19)
- Metricization, education and Tolkein’s mythology (22:47)
- The education system and industrial thinking (26:29)
- Preparing for a radically different world (31:54)
- Imagination, the mechanisation of war and the importance of storytelling (35:01)
- Unintended consequences of the arena and the importance of play in learning (40:03)
- Play, imagination and creativity and their importance in the emerging arena (43:58)
Part 2
- The evolution of the industrial arena (48:56)
- Automation, meaning in work and why metricisation has been so effective (53:51)
- The tyranny of metrics, the sclerosis of bureaucracy (56:47)
- The end game of metrics. Moving towards values as organising principles (01:05:38)
- Industrial thinking vs holding a multi-perspectival view during COVID (01:16:59)
- Sensing and responding to change (01:21:31)
- Anti-fragility and moving beyond event-based transactions (01:24:05)
- The current institutional framing for seeing agents (01:29:21)
- Autonomy, sovereignty and participation (01:32:55)
- Questions to ask ourselves from the conversation (01:36:36)
Question to ponder over
- What are some of the other ways of thinking and perceiving the world that we carry with us from the past that shape our world today?
Links to explore
- JRR TOLKIEN '1892-1973' - A Study Of The Maker Of Middle-earth - (20:32-24:24 is specifically what we discussed on the show. But I recommend starting from 08:30 if you have more time on your hands)
- Jean Piaget - Play as development
- Friedrick Hayek - Market theory
- John Maynard Keynes and the future of work
- James Kerr - Legacy - this book's all about the good kind of legacy, things worth passing on generationally for the New Zealand All Blacks.
- Colin Price - Beyond Performance
- Adam Smith - The Wealth of Nations
- Adam Smith - Theory of Modern Sentiments
Contact
- Metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io
Following on from Episode 1, we take a theme that emerged from our first conversation and explore it more deeply. This time it's the intricate connections between the individual and the world in which that individual is placed. The concept of agent and arena we first came across through the work of John Vervaeke, Professor of Psychology & Cognitive Science at the University of Toronto - you can find a link to his excellent YouTube series below.
Date RecordedOct 20th 2020
Timestamps
- Defining the agent and the arena (03:14)
- The problem of internal vs external factors in agency (05:58)
- The blank slate and the agent/arena dichotomy in politics (07:43)
- Enabling the expression of the individual (10:32)
- Dynamic coupling of the agent and institutions in the arena (12:34)
- The Social Dilemma and awareness of the technological arena (14:40)
- Business models that corrupt our information sources (17:10)
- Psychologically handling the polluted information ecology (20:48)
- The importance of storytelling in the arena (25:43)
- Economics and politics in service of value (30:44)
- Legacies of the industrial age (34:40)
- The call to self-authoring your life (39:52)
- Re-evaluation and emerging opportunities in the arena (42:22)
- Know thyself, raising real self-esteem (45:12)
- Autonomous agents within the institutions in the arena (47:29)
- The beginnings of a paradigm shift? (50:20)
- Safety nets vs trampolines (56:46)
- The role of the arena and human potentiality (58:55)
- The role of emerging technology in the arena (01:03:46)
- Upgrading machines that have been downgrading humans (01:06:20)
- Encoding the shadow and the reciprocal nature of technology and the arena (01:08:52)
- A practical example of dynamic coupling (01:11:44)
- Agentic disconnect to the modern arena (01:13:09)
- Questioning modernity (1:15:01)
- Why having these kind of conversations is so important (01:20:23)
Questions to ponder over
- Are we struggling to couple to our arena effectively?
- In what ways is the arena shaping and influencing you that you might not have previously been aware of?
- If a rapidly changing world requires more agency, what does it mean to become more self-authoring of our own lives? What might that look like?
Links to explore
- John Vervaeke - Awakening from the Meaning Crisis - The Agent and Arena comes up in Episode 7 ~30min
- Nathaniel Branden - Six Pillars of Self-Esteem
- Tristan Harris - Center for humane technology
- Daniel Schmachtenberger - The War on Sensemaking
- Boyat Slat
- William B. Irvine - A Guide to the Good Life - a good primer on Stoicism
- Above the clouds scene from the Matrix
Contact
- Metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io
This conversation was recorded on September 11th 2020 where this journey begins. The genesis of this show began with Matt & Andy wanting to figure out what underlies our current moment and explore it together. We start there. Dive into this episode and see what emerges.
Timestamps
- Black swan, covid and the rise of technology (03:16)
- Stepping off the hamster wheel to find meaning (6:50)
- Why we should dig into specific topics like remote work (11:55)
- Living in a world of rapidly increasing uncertainty (16:15)
- Understanding your place in the arc of history (21:49)
- The agent and the arena (25:51)
- The unintended, unforeseen consequences of technology (34:17)
- Centralisation vs decentralisation in a complex adaptive world (43:46)
- Industrial worldview, information age and philosophical perspectives (47:56)
- Epistemic humility and the dialectic (56:29)
- Transforming information to knowledge to wisdom (01:02:56)
- Beauty, re-enchantment and wonder (01:09:02)
- Concluding with emergence (01:15:50)
Contact
- metaperspective.io
- hello@metaperspective.io