CONVERSATIONS
Contents
- 1 Federation through Action
- 1.1 Which will transform the dynamic of collapse into the dynamic of renewal.
- 1.2 Institute knowledge federation</h1> As I said—knowledge federation will be the academia's—and society's—evolutionary organ; and a practical way to to empower our next generation—and the next-generation scientists or academic researchers in particular—to be creative in ways that their situation demands; and in particular and more concretely—to re-create the systems in which we live in work, instead of learning how to fit in and compete within their confines. By instituting knowledge federation we'll also play the strongest card we have in our hands, act upon the "systemic leverage point" that we control when confronting the power structure—the information; the university's prerogative to tell the world what the information needs to be like; and on a more fundamental level—to provide a new, federated epistemology and methodology for creating truth and meaning. This can be done in a number of ways; but the concrete way, which is already in implementation is to institute the knowledge federation at the Inter University Center Dubrovnik under the patronage of the World Academy of Art and Science. The IUC has the world's leading universities as members; their students can take the IUC courses for credit, with the consent of their departments. We've had all our biennial events in Dubrovnik, for ten years. Dubrovnik is not only a Renaissance town—but was also the free republic surrounded by Otoman Empire; which has "Libertas" written on its flag. Dubrovnik is the natural catalyst for the processes we want to ignite; it also happens to be my birth place. The WAAS is an academic institution whose members are change makers; selected because they made a difference in the world. So suppose you had a membership of global change makers; what would be your strategy to take advantage of them—in the situation as is? On behalf of knowledge federation I can extend to offers to the WAAS leadership: Let's give them a voice—through the dialog; let's empower them to make a difference in the awareness of people at large Let's make them Z-players in a game-changing game; and empower the young academics to be creative in ways and degrees they need to be—concretely by being instructors in the collaborology course. At the joint workshop that knowledge federation had with the WAAS leaders in Sava Center Belgrade in 2017, after we've all shared our aspirations, I was able to conclude "You at WAAS have the mandate to (organize the global thought leades and) be the society's 'headlights'; and we in knowledge federation, we are 'lightbulb engineers'; let's collaborate! Let's actualize and begin this collaboration!
Federation through Action
In 1999 The Economist issued a challenge—to write an essay describing what the world would be like in 2050; I called my contribution "World in the year 2000". It is not possible to predict what the world will be like in 2050, I explained; but the answer will depend crucially on how we see the world and act today. I pointed to the diagnoses that we are headed towards a systemic "collapse"—where the systems in which we live and work collapse and topple one another like dominos; and concluded that our focus now needs to be on creating an embryonic new order of things or paradigm.
Which will transform the dynamic of collapse into the dynamic of renewal.
Which doesn't need to be large; but which does need to be whole—able to grow large and strong without collapsing.
This twofold action plan I am now setting in motion is designed to streamline its unfolding.
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As I said—the holotopia dialog is our new and evolving collective mind; where we'll think in a new way—which is alert, informed and co-creative; and use this new thinking to create first of all the process by which we communicate and create information; and refocus this process on the core themes of our lives and times; and then—instead of remaining passive spectators of the (media) "spectacle"—be empowered to act knowledge-based.
Considering the importance of this prototype, you won't be surprised when I tell you that I've been developing versions of it all along; I called them key point dialogs, because each of them is a way in which a community of people can collectively walk to the metaphorical mountain top and find—and then also follow—a good direction. I described a few of them in the Liberaition book.
The Liberation book itself is part of this new dialog; its function being to seed the dialog, by challenging our core beliefs, by turning them on their head. The writing of this book was my own initiation into holotopia dialog: To liberate myself sufficiently from the world, I retired early and spent about five years in a self-imposed quarantine; condensing all that's been done and giving it a clear and comprehensible form. But its main effect was that I moved to holotopia; and I don't intend to come back to the world—I cannot; and why would I? So the only option I really have is to continue living in holotopia—and see if other people may want to join me; by staging these dialogs.
The dialog is not so much a conversation as it is an endlessly fertile creative space; where we'll create through artful and judicious use of technology, ever new ways to co-create and share knowledge about the themes that matter. But here I want to be concrete—so let me give you a flavor.
A few years ago I was sailing with a couple of friends off the coast of Croatia; and they said they'd introduce me to someone. Soon we docked on a tiny island called Šćedro, near the much larger island Hvar; where they introduced me to Irena Meier, a Croatian artist living in Switzerland; who owns a house and a small bay on Šćedro, with nobody around. With at least a dozen artistically created conversation places! Some which were tiny, like this one:
And some of which were large.
Naturally, I instantly began planning a holotopia dialog in Irena's place; and Irena gladly joined me, as if she had just been waiting for this. She then took me on a five-minute walk to an adjacent bay; and showed me a church in ruin—which was another strong place, as if made for our purpose.
Here's the plan that came out of this conversation: I imagine it as a radical recreation of the conventional "reality show"; where a group of people spend say, a week, on Šćedro, with a film crew; and converse, in various combinations. I am aware, of course, that "reality show" as metaphor may turn people off; I am using it because of my passion to re-create things; and this reality show will be real reality show—because the conversations will be focused on themes that truly matter; to which we must urgently give the reality status; and also because it will reflect our inner realities—the process that each of us needs to go through to liberate ourselves from the world, and take part in the larger co-creative process that will bring us to the emerging world.
A similar event happened more recently, when another couple of friends, here in Norway, recommended me the Venabu mountain hotel; which is still run by the same family who created it; which is truly a cultural and historical jewel in the middle of Norway. And what a wonderful place it is—for another kind of dialog; where, say, twenty of us sit in a Bohm's circle for a hour and a half after breakfast, and for forty-five minutes before dinner; and the rest of the time is reserved for walking or skiing in nature—and reflecting. In this case the idea is to hand-pick international people who truly have pivotal insights; and bring them together to co-create pivotal insights for everyone. Vennabu will provide exactly the right sort of ecology of mind for it; and of course, also a great arena for filming.
A dialog can be almost anything and anywhere; you and I may be conversing over a cup of tea, or even online—and record the conversation, and contribute it to the overall dialog.
What makes all those various conversations dance together, and for a single large dialog that co-creates the collective mind, is new media technology. And here we are fortunate to have David Price himself guide our co-creative process on DebateGraph; the process that will extract points from contributed materials, relate them to each other, and use them as dots to reach even higher-order points; which will be transformative to us all.
The dialog will create further books; and not only books—but a variety of artistic renditions of those points too. Isn't this the natural way how a cultural revival may naturally happen? And isn't it exactly art (think of Boticelli; or Michelangelo) that gave its recognizable shape to the last cultural revival too?
And here we do have a representative prototype—in the Earth Sharing art installation, and dialog, which Vibeke Jensen created in Gallery 3.14 in the old city core of Bergen; and invited me to step in as co-author. This installation communicated some of the core points of knowledge federation and polyscopy.
And also created a co-creative, transformative dialog space; what a wonderful new artform this is!
I'll end here with yet another kind of dialog prototype; which may be the most important and most characteristic of holotopia; it's the dialog I've been having with Noah. The point of it is that—at the point where I am—I have no option but to do all I can to liberate my "little dude" from the world; which (you'll know, if you have teenage children) is no small challenge. Noah lives in a world of distractions! And yet he's likely to either be a victim of relentless change, during his lifetime—or an architect of good change. And so needless to say—we've been having a dialog all along; which is yet another prototype of holotopia dialog. But two people are not enough! We need a culture—where these young people can live and co-create with us; and have the sort of creative fun that the game environments now afford.