PROF. RICHARD F. CARTER

It is a common sight to see a thermometer-like depiction of progress toward reaching a goal, such as meeting a community’s needed financial support for solving one of its problems. But how about a technology to represent the whole of individual and community minding as it pertains to meeting the “all that it takes” requirements of progressing toward a solution? These requirements include a record – a memory – of where we have been and where we are relative to the problem, and relative to the path toward its solution. It’s a molecular picture of the “giant step” variety, a molecular construction that we need in order to make, and then take, such a concerted, molecularly compound step (e.g., the NASA community’s initial “giant step” on the moon’s surface).

A molecular step designed, using cognition and communication, to solve a problem. A molecular step made — not just taken, as it might have been for inveterate decision makers content with available alternatives. A molecular step for which composition, cognition, communication and community were needed functional capabilities. A molecular step intended to produce compositional change, impatient of and not dependent on favorable circumstantial change. A molecular step for which ATIT serves as a reminder of needed contributions — but a reminder that affords a cross-sectional, summary view of the contributors. A molecular step that needs a transverse (longitudinal) view of the change agency’s emergent process structure, along the path of the emergent configurational product, to bring out the functional demands and the functional and structural execution of the composing process.

All this does not lack for technological assistance to minding. Maps, recipes, algorithms, blueprints, formulas, directions, instructions, equations, myths, orchestrations and scores, choreographies, scripts, background stories, sketches, budgets, game plans, process models, conceptual maps … these and other such technological contributions constitute a kind of mid-term memory capability and capacity, supplementing the body’s short-term and long-term memory capacities. These (more or less) configurative contributions to ATIT give us pictures of the molecular composing we as change agents, individually and/or collectively, are engaged in as we try to solve problems. As of now these pictures are often incomplete and sometimes inaccurate with respect to the molecular components on which the composer depends, and from which the composer must draw. The above instances of P=> S mapping, lacking molecular specificity of configuration, are but metaphoric with respect to a full realization of minding’s needed configurative technology to aid our problem solving. What we desperately need are procedural tools for problem’s and minding’s configurative demands.

There are often many agents and many conditions that need to be involved in problem solving. How good is our grasp as we proceed? For this, configuration as process and product must help serve. (Short-term memory is too short, so much so that constructions are sometimes lost before messaged or involved in a fully composed molecule. Long-term memory is too long, and more suitable for recognition and reactive behavior. Further, age is not kind to short-term memory capacity and natural selection has not encouraged eidetic memory. Meanwhile, human brain capacity growth has favored verbal memory. Mid-term memory, a Goldilocks solution [a firm, but not vise-like grasp] – given appropriate technological development [see,], is what we need to add to our minding capacity and develop to strengthen our minding capability.)

The configuration extends the functionality of communication as a companion – more so than the short-term and long-term forms of memory do. It makes very clear why we would assume the burden of carrying along, say, a map or other such companion. And why we would talk or hum or sing to ourselves – or whitle in the dark. But the communication — and minding — functionality does not end here. It has to do with the fact of, and the method for, the human capability to produce a “Present”, from past conditions and “stolen” out of future conditions (with some risk: e.g., communicating when we may have needed to move our body to avoid a hard collision). The Nature of Things (i.e., history) has no Present. It is pure change. There is only a past and a future, depending on from where we observe and for what we observe. The Present is something we have to produce, a very distinctive step making and taking process and product (much of the minding via the aid of communication as a less committed form of moving) … and in accord with possibility. (To “live in the present” alludes to a difference in the behavioral entity’s, qua body, place – albeit at risk of missing many of life’s possibilities.) Configuration quality is a paramount consideration in improving our consequentiality – i.e., for constructively solving our problems. How good is our P=>S mapping?

When it comes to behavioral mapping, and thus for better problem solving, we are too weak. Consider, for example, the “Tragedy of the Commons” kind of problem to which Harden and Crowe contribute, respectively, “conscience” and “consciousness” as characterizations of needed functionality for individuals and communities. But where is the orchestration, the P=>S map – the technical solution which Crowe saw as unavailable? The answer, of course, is that what appears hopeless, given what we know after the fact based on the functioning of existing structures (behavioral entities), is not so hopeless if we use our before-the-fact knowledge from the Nature of Things (NofT’s) of needed functionality (NF) and its relevant principles to guide our development of functional capability (even to the invention of step structures), not just later function-enabled body structures. Thus, via development of capabilities, strength may replace weakness. We would even go so far as to say that consciousness, as a body concept, could and should be replaced by “Presence,” as a theoretical step construct, about that behavior which is concomitant with, and productive of, the Present.

(Presence thus seen may be somewhat familiar as embodied via fictional characters, such as James Bond, portrayed as possessing more than a hint of omnipotence and omniscience. It might even be said to be familiar as what DaVinci captured in his portrait of the Mona Lisa. [But it would be easy for an observer to confuse Presence, the sensery condition, with a sensory condition such as, say, a drug-induced euphoria.] Contrast Presence as behavior with our more prosaic cases of dysfunctional individual and community. These ordinary behavioral entities, confronted with the heat and pressure of situational problems, are beset with our continuing and forceful behavioral problem, , whose heat and pressure generate body states ["emotions"] more akin to long-term memory than to needed mid-term memory capability and configuration construction.)

We would not be too far from understanding what “conscience” is talking about if, given what BFPS implies, we saw it as pertaining to the usefulness of minding’s elicited criterion as a governing (e.g., braking technology for stopping) contribution to Presence and the Present. In this light, consider all that the Dynamic Profile Assay (DPA: ) offers. Its assayed imbalances provide stop signals; its assayed capabilities point to areas of needed minding development – lest we humans never come close to producing the Presence and Present we need to live more fully realized lives.

For an overall sense and grasp of what we are talking about here with respect to the potential technological contribution of P=>S mapping, consider these four stages of functionality: four consequences of consequence:

1. Nature of things => needed functionality (NofT’s => NF);
2. Needed functionality => developed functionality (NF => F);
3. Developed functionality => composed structure (F => Sb+s);
4. Structureb+s => functionality (S => F).

(Note that together these four epitomize the implications of CEM-functionalism, CEM-positivism, and CEM-pragmatism. The four stages extend functionalism beyond Stage 4′s limited coverage – and its limited, even misleading, but often assumed, “Is as does.” Stage 3 points to the best of a positivist stance, to the composing of solutions. Stage 2 points to further progress, thus positivity, through developed capabilities. And although all four address manifestations of consequentiality, Stage 1 points out the pragmatism in seeing the Nature of Things as a fundamental affirmation of consequentiality, as a general persisting condition [and more telling than "Cogito ergo sum"]. Also note: Some of the composed structure in Stage 3 is behavioral [: “Life: the double crystal”] and these behavioral molecules constitute further developed functionality [in Stage 4: routines, habits, styles].)

In producing a Present, we should want to avoid the current overemphasis on the fourth stage, . There, behavior is much neglected and subjected to biases, being understood primarily in and by particular behaviors as properties of bodies or of bodies in relationship. (See: BPO biases). There are institutionalized structures whose features abet this Stage 4 overemphasis. For example: learning over knowing and decision making over problem solving. Along with behavioral factors such as least effort, the discrepancy between control need and control capability and the stability needed for one’s difference making. But neglecting the first three stages vitiates our embrace of life. It impedes (, ) our getting turned around to work more optimally in and at the frontier of history.

However, the needed orchestration for a P=>S mapping of ATIT has to do more than remind us of the needs for Present and Presence (i.e., broaden our consciousness — if we take that to imply developing our minding) and arrange for needed braking controls. All of minding’s needs must be served. If we take the orchestral performance for an example, each performer (ATIT’s agency component) needs a distinctive tool (e.g., instrument), a procedure (indicated in and by a score), a conductor whose score comprises all the performers’ scores … and, to be sure, a composer of the piece to be performed. The configuration, like the performance, imposes other ATIT needs (e.g., support, help and circumstances). Each of us, singly or together, needs something like the composer’s and conductor’s score for each problem in which we need and/or want to participate in the solution.

We don’t often come close to having such a P=>S mapping. Consequently, when nominally engaged in an initiative => review proceeding, citizens can find themselves confronted by a decision to be made without having been party to the initiative process. “Informed decision making” can stray a long way from needed informational functionality. “Horse race” coverage by journalists doesn’t help, especially when election campaigning begins the day after the last election. The “decision making/problem solving >1″ imbalance just gets worse. The potential of the initiative => review proceeding is forfeit.

We have recipes and the rest of the mid-term memory technologies (as above), but these leave a lot untalked about. That gives us room for stylish contributions. And leaves us in awe of adept performances. But it also leads to accidents, in learning and subsequent performances. As messages these technologies leave a lot unsaid (e.g., “Some assembly required”; “Experience is the best teacher”). Points are not made or they are not made well, . Very sagely, Burt Fisher used to say that reading a newspaper was to encounter a puzzle. In addition, points may not be made honestly (as with respect to points FOR).

This is when and where “whatever it takes” (WIT) comes into play as a hopeful, but too often feckless, substitute for ATIT. (We can’t invoke the term “witness” as an adjectival form of WIT – but perhaps “witless” will do.) This is where simplistic notions of causation and notions like (merely aggregated and mobilized) “multiple factors” come into play. As if effort per se (: a necessary but not sufficient contribution) could compensate for constructive capability. As if “a more powerful stimulus” were all that was needed to produce a wanted response – and solution. (The student experimenter’s lament re message effects.) As if Ashby’s “strong interaction” (e.g., as in the workings of a clock) were not telling us something about, or at least calling our attention to, the compositional and configurative contributions to a problem solving. Of all the ATIT components, configuration is literally the most telling, especially in light of humanity’s frontier and future in a (CEM) history that is so much increasingly in consequence of composition together with communication, cognition and community, .

ATIT as portrayed (i.e., mapped) in the nine-cell matrix, with agency further elaborated for behavioral requisites and imperatives (: Diagram II), can serve us well as a reminder of what needs attention in our problem solving – as, for example, in initial agenda setting. But it is essentially a cross-sectional view of process and we need the transverse perspective, over the course of problem solving, to remind us that sequencing is an aspect of consequentiality not to be overlooked (e.g., temporal relevance) if we are to bring out the fullness of behavioral molecularity. The P=>S configurative models we have now fall short of meeting that need.

So we do a lot of ill-advised things, depending far too much on what has worked before, even when the situation (:Psit) is different and/or even if nothing has worked all that well on the behavioral problem (:Pbeh). We are unable to provide much in the way of new solutions. This though re-structuring and reinvention of processes call for attention. And danger lurks. Unprepared as composers, we may forsake problem solving for decision making, and forsake ADEPT for ADOPT and ADAPT as metastrategies. Initiative => review falters for lack of initiative and absence of a P=>S mapping for reviewers (and initiators too!) to examine the process and product of any initiative attempted. We are asking for trouble (e.g., management/leadership >1; control system/operating system >1… Decline and fall).

In conjunction with other consequential imbalancesl, , especially those of body/step >1, particulars/generality >1 and order of things/Nature of Things >1, we find ourselves trying to solve problems while unbalanced and with a weak grasp. What would that combination of imbalance and weak grasp portend for a monkey about to leap from one tree to another? What does it portend for us? To strengthen our grasp and bring ourselves into balance (: in Accord with the Nature of Things, ), we must develop needed capabilities. Ergo: (NF => F). For that, the generalities of the Nature of Things which dictate those needed capabilities (and capacities for them) tell us to approach needed functionality and with that functionality developed then compose step structures (i.e., behavioral molecules) for which configurations serve. Starting from Stage 1, from before the fact and not just from after the fact, not from where we are now (see the Vermont farmer:) … that now from where needed-but-absent functionality may be invisible (our vision blocked and/or not strong enough).

We do know, according to and with realization of the Nature of Things, something about what we don’t know. We need to make use of that in producing appropriate minding technologies – the full panoply: tools, procedures, tool (using) procedures and procedural tools. The four-stages of consequentiality perspective on functionality (see above) provides such a procedural tool. This is a map we need always have with us.

How do we proceed?

First of all, see that the 4 stages of consequentiality (above) constitute a P=>S mapping. Not only that, they offer a map whose emphasis is decidedly on suggesting the path toward solving the behavioral problem (:Pbeh), retrieving it from negligence and negligible inclusions, here and there, more or less, in this or that situational problem (:Psit). This mapping is akin to the diagram for App. XVI, which points up the continent emergent materiality (CEM) aspect of history – and which can also be usefully seen as a P=>S mapping. It, like the 4 stages of consequentiality, has the Nature of Things for its foundation, with the contributions toward human progress of composition, cognition, communication and community as capabilities given prominence. Both are clearly maps for the World of Possibility. Then too there is the more geographic P=>S mapping in the diagram for App. XII, which indicates the erosive slopes down (:Sp, Ps) and the precipitous slopes up:S-P, P) for getting ahead in the quality of life, advancing our QL-point via problem solving.

(The four stages of consequentiality [abbreviated as “NofT’s => NF => F => S => F”] could be nominated as the banner for any constructive revolution. More prosaically, however, it is enough to see it as the broom that each household, of self and/or selves, should possess for sweeping out its behavioral debris … in company with the conventional straw broom now possessed for sweeping out its entity debris. Dust, crumbs et al are not the only pollution.)

BFPS offers us a platform for these and other mappings. Some of the leverage we need may be available, interestingly enough, if we re-examine message practices and technology in the light of all four stages of consequentiality – not just as they are in Stage 4 (e.g., as in its computer-assisted Internet splendor) but also as they might and ought to be (i.e., needed functionality, especially re communication, cognition, composition and community capabilities) – in the light of BFPS. The latter asks what a BFPS message theory looks like. (See) What then of message technology in that light? What remains to be invented or reinvented? Does P => S mapping, the mid-term memory domain – all four stages of functionality respected, when developed via technology, hold promise of a new world of vocations, manufacture (of products and services) and employment as well as of other solutions to improve the human condition?

From where do we proceed?

Community as needed collective behavior, as for capability to solve our most recalcitrant problems (: P), seems obvious given the 4 stages of consequentiality. For lack of a biological body, community as behavioral entity necessarily starts from needed functionality in consequence of the Nature of Things. Community has an unavoidable behavioral problem. The behavioral problem has not been all that well examined, let alone solved. Principles inherent in the Nature of Things have not been grasped and then involved even though applicable requisites and imperatives are central to developing agency capabilities of compositional change’s “all that it takes”.

The contrast between where we are and where we need to be behaviorally (once we get to where we need to start) is very apparent in community-relevant practices and technologies like public opinion and journalism. Like the fabled Topsy, they just grew. Nothing so developed as systematic contingent emergent materiality would have it. Functional analyses such as Lasswell’s of journalism have been of the Stage 4 variety, finding utilities after the fact. Were journalism and public opinion professionals to take on the assignment of P=>S mapping development, their technological innovations could make a huge contribution to community building and performance. News and polls, for instance, were never all that we needed for collective problem solving. (A lesson that newspapers are getting from the Internet and pollsters are getting from reluctant respondents and “none of the above” responses to issue questions.)

With or without help from journalistic and/or public opinion professionals, we have to work our way through compositional change efforts toward the configurative technology required to aid that enterprise. Other institutions have vital parts to play. Formal education, for example, has to do much more to develop ADEPT – beginning with their very first engagement with children. (More art than Art, for example. Composing is to the point. Copying compositions is not.)

This is slow work. But it can help to do this work slowly at first. (As it is to be helped along the way.) How might we approach the P=>S mapping challenge slowly? It’s not going to help very much for minding to follow the example of the “time-motion studies” for moving. Those studies aimed to improve effectiveness and efficiency for Stage 4 conditions. Our challenge is to improve those capabilities via Stages 1-3 consequentiality.

Necessity may come to our rescue here. We have to develop needed minding capabilities for communities as well as for individuals – for both, lest their productive interdependence be forfeit. (Which for some of our toughest unsolved problems [: P] would be catastrophic.) Therefore, as we set about composing communities (: Diagram 2; , ), as the technologies we invent for their minding begin to emerge, via development and research, then individuals and emergent communities may come, if that orchestration is well done, to see more of possibility. (As for example, P=>S mapping giving more meat to the initiative-review strategy. As for putting the brakes on decision making as a metastrategy for behavior … and as a defacto recipe for “decline and fall”).

The four stages of consequentiality, together with message theory, can be helpful as we work toward improving our minding capability. Consider this prelude to App. XX: Our “nervous system” is like an unfinished symphony, sensory primarily and primarily due to evolution, unfinished with respect to yet-to-be developed sensery capability. For the community’s nervous system, a decent symphony has yet to be composed.

Mightn’t we, shouldn’t we, be mapping minding’s functionality, from need through development and exercise of capability to produced structures … and not just mapping brains? Perhaps, someday, nanotech hardware in response to needed functionality will cure cancer by providing brains with the message competence to detect and halt unruly cell mitosis. But what of war’s unruly community behavior and community’s needed minding functionality?

(c) 2013 R.F. Carter


FOOTNOTES (RELATED MATERIALS):