Video transcript

[Tony Deifell]

Hi Owen, I looked at the transcript. Very cool! So, I've attached my comments and questions. Biggest two things: 1) I'm not sure I understand what "what are you building on" idea... or what I'd put down for that if I was doing the assignment (more b/c I'm not sure what it is asking) 2) We need to figure out the submission thing. I'm not sure that it is clear why someone would take the time and effort to create it. So, we just have to think through the incentives. I think that this whole thing can really work well for a workshop where people do the laddering, then in the workshop create a visual representation of it.

Laddering transcipt_Tony comments.doc

[Mac Andrews]

The social constructionist perspective suggests that we are all constructing who we are, who others are and the power balances between the two moment by moment. The individual building blocks of this construction process are each elements in a complex cause and effect chain - one thing builds the possibility for the next thing, which in turn builds the possiblity for the next thing - onwards until the final result is huge. What we do, especially the habits we find ourselves repeating betray our unconscious/subconscious tendencies towards constructing stuff this way - hence I might keep scratching my left ear even though it does not itch. By using the laddering technique you can find out what are the chains of cause and effect, and what they lead to. We can also trace what we are building the avoidance of too. The question "what are you building with that?" opens up the unconscious ascending rungs on a ladder to the master-blueprint. So "I scratch my ear" might pan out as follows I scratch my ear - "What are you building with that?" - "A sense that I have not disappeared" - "WHat are you building with that" - "Presence" - "What are you building with that?" - "Imapct on the world" - "What are you building with that?" - "A reputation, respect, being someone" - "That's great, what are you building with that?" - "A better world for myself where I am the star of my show".

Hope that explains it.

Mac

[Tony Deifell]

Hey Mac, thanks for showing that example. That makes sense, and it is what I sort of understood from talking with you and Owen.

My question more is whether, as a newcomer to the activity, would they get it?

For example, you could ask it these ways:
- "What are you accomplishing with that?"
- "How does that behavior serve you?"
- Or, simply, another "why?"

Those might not be the best examples, but they are alternatives. And, I can just picture someone reacting to "What are you building with that?" by thinking, "What in the world do they mean?"

Check out my other comments embedded in the script when you get a chance (you have to download the MS Word doc from my first post).

Cheers, Tony

[Tony Deifell]

Mac you wrote in a "wall post":

Great comments on the transcript by the way.
Kids do ask "Why", this is true - and this indicates that humans default to pursuing causal questions about everything. It leads to all sorts of problems - Fudamental Attribution Errors (very entertaining stuff that), Actor/Observer effects, Categorical thinking that underlies racism and bigotry, intergroup violence...fascinating area of study.

I sort of get this, but all those terms are over my head. I'm interested into boiling it down in a way that a lay person can understand it and have it move them. So, my incredulity on the labels and concepts comes from that place.

However, the example illustrates the effect that adult (authority) forcing causal explanations for visceral desires (totally inexplicable internally experienced phenomena) in thier children educates children to make stuff up to try to make the best of the interaction within which it is iccuring. If I want an ice-cream then I have to convince the adult that it is a worthy desire against the value systems in the adult, or risk not getting it. At best the kid is honing their mind-reading skills (see Theory of Mind and the Machiavellian Hypothesis). So they are unlikely to produce rich and accurate accounts and explanations of thier internal experiences, and more likely to perform a purposive linguistic power gambit. The answer will almost certainly have absolutely nothing to do with the nature of thier desire nor what it might be constructing. "Why did you leave me?", "Why did you go back to the man sho beat you up?", "Why do you have to have a clean house?" If Freud is right and we are driven both by unconscious as well as conscious drivers, the pretence that we can fully consciously explain what we do is just that - a fantasy, a pretence. The unconscious element is left out of the mix while we believ eth face value responses that the question "why" eleicits.
Hope this makes sense.

Mac

All this sort of makes sense, but I want to to translate it into the language and action that will get the most people to understand their instructions without any education in psychology. You all are experts in the back end of what all this stuff is supposed to mean. I'm your litmus test of whether the explicit instructions will make sense to people.

So, let's tweak the transcript and try it with some folks.

I do feel like a controlled setting like a workshop is a good first step in seeing how people respond. (or something like that)

Tony

ps: get Owen in on the conversation!