TALE: A Possible Theme called “Context (Mind)”
A Unit of Analysis for Discussing Mind and Mental Moves
The above picture represents a Possible Theme called “Context (Mind)”.
- Name: Context (Mind)
- Clue: …
- Type: Knowledge Themes
- Contributors: a friend of mine
- Reference: The Curated Mind, Attachance
- Related themes: Mental Moves, Platform Ecology, Frame for Work
I had a thematic conversation about “Note-taking and Knowledge Engagement” in the past several days with a friend.
My friend’s primary theme is “Consciousness and Thoughts” from a practical perspective. He doesn’t want to develop a scientific theory of Consciousness or a philosophical theory of Consciousness. His goal is to develop a simple framework to explain how Consciousness works to high students.
Our conversation touched on several related themes such as the Note-taking System, Zettelkasten, Niklas Luhmann’s Creative Life, Semiotic System Diagram, Experience Sampling Method (ESM), The Network of Project, Mental Moves, Spontaneous Concept System, Early Discovery, Knowledge Brand, etc.
The day before yesterday, I shared my view on the Mind and the basic model of the Ecological Practice approach with him.
The Ecological Practice Approach
In a broad sense, the Ecological Practice approach has its philosophical roots in traditional Pragmatism and contemporary embodied cognitive science. In 2019, I made the first version of the Ecological Practice Approach which is a curated knowledge framework. See the diagram below.
The above diagram shows several theoretical concepts. Some concepts are adopted from theoretical resources. The concept of Selectivity is adopted from William James’ Radical Empiricism. The concept of Affordance is adopted from Ecological psychologist James J. Gibson. The concept of Reflectivity is adopted from Donald Schön. I also developed several original concepts such as Attachance, Containance, Curativity, and Themes of Practice.
In 2020, I developed a new diagram to represent the germ-cell of the Ecological Practice approach. A Germ Cell of a theoretical approach is its smallest entity which can represent the whole of thinking in different levels of analysis. The diagram below shows the germ cell of the Ecological Practice approach.
The above diagram combines three core concepts of the Ecological Practice approach together: Affordance, Attachance, and Containance. The term “Offers” is an affordance-inspired concept, it refers to opportunities afforded by the Container. The group of “Offer — Act” forms “Event” which changes the status of the Container. The new status of the Container affords new opportunities which guide the new acts and events. In a broad sense, the Ecological Practice approach has its philosophical roots in traditional Pragmatism.
The above diagram also represents the concept of Attachance at the level of Container. We can consider Entering the Container as an Attaching act and Exiting the Container as a Detaching act. However, the diagram doesn’t represent the second attachance which is inside the Container. In fact, the Ecological Practice approach considers the “Form of Act” as “Attach” or “Detach”. Any act is either an attaching act or a detaching act.
The above picture is another way of representing the germ cell of the Ecological Practice approach. The two forms of the act are represented by binary numbers. The 0 represents detaching act and the 1 represents attaching act. The parenthesis represents the Container. The right diagram shows an example of complex status which brings out other two concepts: Curativity and Themes of Practice. I also add the concept of Emergence from complexity theory to the above diagram.
Let’s move to the landscape level to view the Ecological Practice Approach.
Based on the concept of Container, I coined two related ideas: Network and Platform. The Network refers to the pre-container status which means pieces loose coupling outside the container. The Platform refers to the post-container status which means pieces loose coupling within the super large container. These three ideas form a triad: Network — Container — Platform. I consider the triad as the basic form of collective contexts.
The above diagram represents a large map of the ecological practice approach. Here we see three basic types of collective context and attaching/detaching acts inside contexts and between contexts.
The Ecological Practice approach is a radical account with its transactional worldview. The approach is inspired by ideas from multiple disciplines. Thus, it is an interdisciplinary study itself. However, the Ecological Practice approach has its own focus: ecological complexity, which means the relationship between “the structure and dynamic of environments” and “human action and social practice”.
You can find more details in Curativity Theory and The Ecological Practice Approach (v2, 2020) and The Development of Ecological Practice Approach.
Container Thinking
Since the Ecological Practice approach contains a set of concepts, I often use one concept individually for some projects. For example, the idea of Container (Containee).
One day In 2017, I saw a sideways flower pot in a local supermarket. As a guy who was not familiar with gardening, I was curious about such a container and the plants it contains. I used to think that plants always grow upward. That day, I was surprised that there are some plants that grow horizontally. I feel ashamed of my ignorance of botany.
This dramatic experience inspired me to reflect on the concept of Container. In 2017, I was fascinated with George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s conceptual metaphor Container and image schema Containment. For Lakoff and Johnson, Container refers to the in-out orientation and boundary of space. After the day, I moved my attention from the boundary of the container to the dynamic relationship between the Container and the Things it contains. For the sake of discussion, I coined a new term called “Containee” in order to simply represent “Things contained by Container”.
The sideways flower pot taught me an invaluable lesson in which I learned the initial idea of the ecological practice approach. Though a plant is held by a container, the living space occupied by the plant in the world is beyond the interior space of the container. Later, I theorized this phenomenon with the following terms and diagrams.
- Inside Space: the interior space of the container.
- Outside Space: the exterior space of the container.
- Spilling Space: the living space occupied by the containee.
We have to notice that the Spilling Space is a dynamic space because it can be smaller than the inside space or bigger than the outside space. In this way, the spilling space connects the inside space and the outside space.
In Feb 2021, I applied the above Container Thinking to develop the Platform-for-Development framework (v2.0). I defined Platform as Super Large Container. Thus, the Container Thinking can be used with the following approach:
- Platform: a super large container
- Participants: the containee of the platform
- Inside Space: the interior space of the platform.
- Outside Space: the exterior space of the platform.
- Spilling Space: the living space occupied by the Participants of a Platform
To facilitate discussion, I coined the term Platform-ba (or Platformba) to describe the sum of Containee and Spilling Space for the Platform Ecology project.
For the Platform-for-Development framework and the Supportive Cycle model, I defined Platform-ba as a platform-based sociocultural field.
The “ba” is originally found in Japanese. The concept of “ba” has been used extensively by Japanese management researcher Ikujiro Nonaka in his SECI model of knowledge creation. The platform-ba is an emergent social substance that is formed by people who have relations to a platform. While a platform is designed, managed, and controlled by its owner, its platform-ba is determined by people, the users, and stakeholders of the platform. By using the new term Platform-ba, I can highlight the active aspect of platform practice which refers to people’s activity.
You can find more details in Platform, Platform-ba, and Platform Ecology.
Two weeks ago, I applied Container Thinking to discuss the relationship between “Theme” and “Concept” for the “Strategic Thematic Exploration” project. See the diagram below.
For the Strategic Thematic Exploration framework, I made a distinction between “Theme” and “Concept”. While “Theme” emphasizes subjective experience and understanding, “Concept” is more about objective meaning and definition.
I also see “Theme” from the perspective of “Themes of Practice” which is a core concept of the Ecological Practice approach.
In this way, we can see two types of cognitive space from the perspective of “Container Thinking”.
- Container: Concept
- Containee: Theme
- Container’s boundary: Conceptual Space
- Containee’s living space: Thematic Space
As mentioned above, “the Spilling Space is a dynamic space because it can be smaller than the inside space or bigger than the outside space. In this way, the spilling space connects the inside space and the outside space.” The Thematic Space can be smaller than the Conceptual Space or bigger than the Conceptual Space because it is a dynamic space.
Now, let’s apply Container Thinking to discuss the Mind.
2022: Context (Mind) + Curativity Theory
The notion of Context (Mind) was born in March 2022 as the primary unit of analysis of the Curated Mind framework.
Inspired by the Anticipatory Activity System framework, I considered Mind as an Anticipatory Activity System which has two parts: Proximal Mind and Pervasive Mind. See the diagram below.
This model adopted the ecological approach to reflect on the Mind. While Proximal Mind corresponds to Proximal Contexts, Pervasive Mind corresponds to Pervasive Mind.
- Proximal Contexts (Proximal Mind)
- Pervasive Contexts (Pervasive Mind)
A special meta-theory behind the model is Curativity Theory. The term Curativity refers to turning pieces into a meaningful whole. The Curated Mind means the ideal status of the mind. If a person claims that her or his mind is a meaningful whole, then she or he can understand the world as a meaningful whole.
To achieve the Curated Mind, a person has to curate the following dimensions:
- Near — Far
- Self — Other
- Present — Future
- Thing — Think
- etc.
From the perspective of the Ecological Practice approach, I use Context(Mind) as the primary unit of analysis to develop the model of the Curated Mind. The above other dimensions can be considered secondary dimensions.
This is just a rough idea. It’s a starting point of the Ecological Approach to the Mind.
You can find more details in Slow Cognition: The Curated Mind.
Later, I used eight operational concepts to develop the Curated Mind framework. See the diagram below.
You can find more details in Slow Cognition: The Model of Curated Mind.
While the Curated Mind Framework uses Context(Mind) as the primary unit of analysis, its primary theoretical perspective is Curativity Theory.
One important sub-theory of the Ecological Practice approach is Curativity Theory which considers turning pieces into a meaningful whole.
The Curated Mind refers to the following three types of Curativity:
- The Curativity of Proximal Mind: Turning pieces of experiences into a meaningful whole at the loop of Proximal Mind.
- The Curativity of Pervasive Mind: Turning pieces of experiences into a meaningful whole at the loop of Pervasive Mind.
- The Curativity of Mind: Turning “Proximal Mind” and “Pervasive Mind” into a meaningful whole.
You can find more details in The Curated Mind Toolkit (v1.0).
2023: Context (Mind) + Attachance Theory
In the past two months, I worked on the Mental Moves knowledge project which is about Attachance Theory and the concept of Thematic Space.
I coined the term Attachance by combining Attach and Chance in 2018 to discuss some ideas related to Affordance, a core idea of Ecological Psychology.
Affordance means potential action opportunities offered by environments. I want to highlight the meaning and value of actual action itself, however, the term Affordance only refers to potential actions. Thus, I coined the term Attachance to emphasize the potential opportunities offered by actual actions, especially the attaching act and the detaching act.
In 2019, I started working on my own theoretical account of the Ecological Practice approach after finishing a book titled Curativity. The 2019 version of the approach is a curated toolkit version. The concept of Attachance is part of the toolkit. In May 2020, I wrote a book titled After Affordance: The Ecological Approach to Human Action in which I proposed several new theoretical ideas for expanding ecological psychology to the modern digital environment. The primary theme of After Affordance is the concept of Attachance.
The concept of Attachance is planned to develop as 1) an ecological practice concept for practice studies such as interaction design and startup innovation, and 2) a philosophical concept for developing a social theory.
The book After Affordance only achieves the first goal and it focuses on the following acts:
- Attaching to an environment
- Detaching from an environment
- Attaching to an object
- Detaching from an object
I use the concept of Attachance in many ways.
The Attachance Perspective refers to its philosophical meaning. You can find more details in D as Diagramming: The Attachance Perspective.
The theoretical concept of “Attachance” for the Ecological Practice Approach. It refers to what I explored in the 2020 book After Affordance. For example, I used it and Affordance together for discussing creative actions. You can find more details in Creative Actions: Second-order Affordance and Attachance.
The word “Attachance” is for normal discussions. I often discuss some stories or topics from the perspective of Attachance. You can find an example in Possible Practices: Attach, Detach, and Opportunities.
In 2022, the development of Attachance was tied to the development of Thematic Space. As mentioned above, Thematic Spaces refer to a specific type of container: cognitive container. You can find more details in [Slow Cognition] The Development of the concept of “Thematic Spaces”.
You can find more details about the Mental Moves project in TALE: A Possible Theme called “Mental Moves” and The Mental Moves digital board.
On June 12, 2023, I made a case study about “Multiple Moves” for the Mental Moves knowledge project. The case study is about understanding the creative cognitive process of making the following knowledge framework:
In order to use this example to discuss a special topic: the Attachance of Multiple Moves and the Movement of Connection, I developed a canvas called Mapping Multiple Moves. See the attached canvas.
The map is inspired by the “THEORY — PRACTICE” Connection between the Knowledge Discovery Canvas. You can find three major areas in the above diagram:
- Theory/Concepts
- Mental Elements
- Projects/Actions
You can find more details in Mental Moves #6: Mental Models and the Attachance of Multiple Moves.
Yesterday I realized that the case study of “Multiple Mental Moves” is also a great example of Context (Mind).
For the Mental Moves knowledge project, I used “Thematic Space” as the primary concept and used it to refer to projects, models, and other things.
If we move to the Context(Mind) project, then we can use Context to refer to projects, models, and other things.
Moreover, we can also see “Mulitple Mental Moves” as a process of Curating pieces into a meaningful whole. In this way, we return to the Curated Mind Project.
In other words, I conducted a case study for the Curated Mind project in June 2023.
Attachance and Curativity
Both Attachance and Curativity are core concepts of the Ecological Practice approach. What's the relationship between these two concepts?
Let’s see their basic models. The diagram below is the basic model of the Ecological Practice Approach.
The primary unit of analysis of Attachance Theory is “Attach — Container — Detach”.
The diagram below is the basic model of Curativity Theory. The primary unit of analysis of Curativity Theory is “Pieces — Container — Whole”.
Since they use different units of analysis, the outcome is pretty different!
However, we can connect them together if we see every single Move (attaching act/detaching act) as a Piece, then there is a Curativity behind the multiple moves.
In other words, Attachance Theory offers a micro perspective while Curativity Theory offers a macro perspective for the Context(Mind) framework.
Kinds of Context
The Curated Mind framework (2022) only uses two types of context:
- Proximal Context
- Pervasive Context
We can detach our mental focus from this simple typology and attach our mental focus to case studies.
The Curated Mind Framework (2022) used the following model to develop a framework.
I used it to connect to the “Flow — Story — Model” schema. See the diagram below.
The “Flow — Story — Model” schema is a model for developing tacit knowledge.
In 2023, the Mental Model project also considers Projects. We can use the “Platformba — Project — Platform” schema for the Mental Model project.
The Ecological Practice approach doesn’t have a concept of a Project. However, we can consider a Project as a Container at the concrete practical level because Project is a social container that has a clear boundary. We can deal with the concept of Platform-ba in the same way. The Platform-ba can be considered a Network because the human activities of a group of people can be understood from the perspective of the social network and the network of activity.
Thus, we can reduce the triad of Platform — Project — Platformba to the triad of Platform — Container — Network. You can find more details in Platform, Platform-ba, and Platform Ecology.
In this way, we have a model for modeling human activity and social practices.
If we need more types of context, we can return to the Ecological Structure Schema (ESS) framework which was introduced in my 2020 book (draft) After Affordance. The framework lists eight types of structures of context for Attachance.
1. Other as Context
a is an entity, b is another entity. This structure means Other as Context. a attaches to b, b detaches from a.
2. Network as Context
a is an entity. A is a network, B is another network. This structure means a detaches from network A and attaches to network B.
3. Whole as Context
A is a whole, a is a part of the A. This structure means a detaches from A.
4. Circuit as Context
A is a Circuit, a is an entity and part of the A. This structure means a detaches from A.
5. Container as Context
a is an entity and B is a container. This structure means a attaches to B or detaches from B.
6. Chain as Context
a is an entity and A, B, C, D, E are events and form a chain. a is at the end of an event and the beginning of the next event.
7. Levels as Context
a is an entity and A, B, C are levels. This structure shows a detaches from A and attaches to B.
8. Dimensions as Context
a is an entity and A, B, C are dimensions. This structure shows a detaches from A and attaches to B.
Since the Ecological Structure Schema (ESS) framework is an abstract model, we can’t directly apply it to the Context (Mind) project. However, we can use it as a meta-framework to classify the following moves:
- Moves between Mental Models
- Moves between Projects
- Multiple Moves
We can also use Ecological Structure Schema to reflect on mental moves and design mental moves.
Now we have a set of tools for conducting case studies for the Context(Mind) project.
