TALE: The Field of Meta-learning (V1.0)

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TALE500

11 min readJan 30, 2023

Meta-knowledge (M), Knowledge (K), and Work (W)

I am recently working on a Thematic Conversation project about “Strategic Exploration” with my friend Daiana Zavate. The above diagram is an outcome of our discussion.

You can visit the links below to follow our conversation:

Jan 17 — Oliver — How to Set Annual Themes for 2023?
Jan 18 — Daiana — Personal Project on Strategic Exploration: Thinking differently requires doing things differently
Jan 18 — Oliver — TALE: Start A Thematic Conversation
Jan 19 — Daiana — Strategic Exploration: Peeling onions without shedding tears
Jan 20 — Oliver — TALE: The Challenge of Thematic Conversation
Jan 23 — Daiana — Strategic Exploration: Breaking Symmetries
Jan 23 — Oliver — TALE: How to develop a framework for a possible theme called “Slow Talk”?
Jan 24 — Oliver — TALE: The Dynamics of Thematic Space (v2.0)
Jan 27 — Oliver — TALE: Possible Configurations of A Theme Network
Jan 27 — Daiana — Strategic Exploration: You can’t swim in the same river twice

If you are using Linkedin, you can follow this post.

Today I am going to directly respond to Daiana's new post about the notion of “Decluttering”.

Two Metaphors: “Space” and “Stuff”

In Strategic Exploration: You can’t swim in the same river twice, Daiana introduces a new notion called “Decluttering” with the following diagram about “Rethinking Waste” in the field of Meta-thinking.

It is clear that she is using two metaphors to organize her thoughts:

“Space”
“Stuff”

Daiana mentions two goals of Decluttering:

Make Space for learning
Explore different models of Creation

The first goal directly uses the “Space” metaphor for discussing learning. It maybe refers to both physical spaces and mental spaces.

The second goal is related to “Recycling Mental Waste”:

Declutter is not a way of learning, but it can be used as a method of Creation by recycling mental waste, which is the addition I want to make to the diagram. Waste puts, in contrast, unmediated narratives between Self-Development and Creation. As displayed in the previous diagram, they are mediated through the elements in the Field of Meta-Learning.

Moreover, she suggests an ambitious way: the possibility of Building Meaning out of Waste.

…it is possible to recycle certain knowledge and make Creation and Self-Development emergent in the Meta-Learning field as yet another layer of the previous diagram.

The above diagram represents her’s idea of “the circularity of learning, not just as absorption of new knowledge but as revising or refuting certain knowledge”.

This is a major step in developing a framework for “the Field of Meta-learning”. It inspires me to think about the following directions:

We need a space for “Possible Knowledge”.
We need a new diagram to use “the Field of Meta-learning” as a map for mapping various activities of Building Meaning.

I will keep using these two metaphors, but with some new terms.

“The Epoche Space” for “Possible Knowledge”

Daiana doesn’t define a new sub-space in the Field of Meta-learning. I think we can directly add a space to the main diagram. See the newest version below.

Inspired by a philosophical term called “Epoché”, I name the new sub-space “The Epoche Space”.

I use a new term called “Possible Knowledge” to refer to Daiana’s idea of “the circularity of learning, not just as absorption of new knowledge but as revising or refuting certain knowledge”.

Daiana’s idea points to the temporal dynamics of knowledge engagement. In a particular situation, we perceive something as Useful Knowledge. However, we may perceive the same thing as Not Useful Knowledge in other situations.

If “Knowledge” is always “Useful”, then the thing should be called “Possible Knowledge” because it can be both Useful and Not Useful. It all depends on the situation.

In this way, we develop an epistemology for Strategic Exploration. Every knowledge is Possible Knowledge. Everything we learned should be placed in “The Epoche Space”.

The new version diagram also adds links to connect “Self-Development” and “Creations”.

A Map for Mapping “The Field of Meta-learning”

Daiana’s new diagram inspires me to think about a question:

How can we consistently discuss various issues of Building Meaning within the Field of Meta-learning?

Usually, we make different diagrams and models for different topics. However, for a group of topics under the same theme or the same activity, it would be great to maintain a consistent visual view.

Inspired by Daiana’s new diagram, I think we can design a new diagram and use it as a map to discuss the dynamics of the Field of Meta-learning.

The design is easy to. I add the three-level hierarchy to Daiana’s new diagram. See the result below.

The previous discussions discover three zones of the field of Meta-learning. They refer to a three-level abstract structure:

The “Doing” Zone: the daily routine practices and concrete actions about a particular work such as the “Strategic Design” practice.
The “Thinking” Zone: the subject’s cognitive activity within the “Strategic Design” practice.
The “Meta” Zone: the subject’s cognitive activity with knowledge such as concepts, models, frameworks, and other epistemic tools.

Each zone has its own object, outcome, and subject. Each process has its own mechanism.

I use “M”, “K”, and “W” as three signs to represent three types of objects within the Field of Meta-learning:

M: Meta-knowledge
K: Knowledge
W: Work

There are many types of objects within the Field of Meta-learning, “M”, “K”, and “W” are most relevant to Learning and Building Meaning.

We will use the above diagram as the basic map to develop a method of mapping.

See the example below.

What does the above diagram mean?

It is a translation of Daiana’s diagram of “the circularity of learning”. Originally, Daiana uses “Learn”, “Relearn”, and “Unlearn” to build the loop. However, she doesn’t consider the three-level abstract structure.

I think “the circularity of learning” is a complex cross-level process. Since we discover the structure, we can use the structure to help us understand the complexity of “the circularity of learning”.

As mentioned above, we have an epistemology for Strategic Exploration. If we adopt this epistemology, “the circularity of learning” can be understood as the transformation between “Possible Knowledge” and “Actual Knowledge”.

Let’s give a definition to the new term “Actual Knowledge”:

We actually use it in a particular situation.
It is actually useful.

In this way, any action of Work causes a series of Validations to “Possible Knowledge.

Thus, we can use “Validate” to replace “Learn”, “Relearn”, and “Unlearn”.

This example is a prototype of the new method of mapping. The rest of the article will test it with more examples.

Change @ The “Doing” Zone

Daiana’s diagram of “the circularity of learning” has an implicit element: time.

We need to turn this implicit element into an implicit element. By adding the Time dimension, we expand the map from a 2D spatial structure to a 3D structure.

We will use “T1” and “T2” as two new signs. “T1” refers to the first timestamp while “T2” refers to the second timestamp.

The above diagram only discusses the change happening in the “Doing” Zone.

W1: a Work at the first timestamp (T1)
W2: a different Work at the second timestamp (T2)

K1 refers to a Knowledge that is used for W1.

At T1, W2 doesn’t happen. So we can only anticipate W2 at the “Meta” zone and the “Thinking” zone.

K1 — W2: We anticipate K1 could be useful for W2.
M1-W2: We anticipate W2 could be suitable by K1.

At T1, we also evaluate K1 at the “Meta” zone.

M1-K1: Is K1 really useful for W1?

If 1) K1 is performing well for W1, and 2) K1 is anticipated to be useful for W2, what does it mean?

The “Learning” wouldn’t happen.

Learn @ The “Thinking” Zone

If 1) K1 is performing well for W1, and 2) K1 is anticipated to be not useful for W2, what does it mean?

We need to learn K2 for W2 at the “Thinking” zone

At T1, we don’t actually know if K2 is useful for W2. We just anticipate.

M1 — K2: We decide to learn K2. This is Anticipation.
K2 — W2: We anticipate K2 could be useful for w2. This is Anticipation too.

It’s interesting to see the above diagram presents a new view of Learning: it is an anticipatory activity. Then, we can use the Anticipatory Activity System (AAS) framework to understand Social Learning and Collaborative Learning.

Reflection @ The “Meta” Zone

Let’s continue the story. At T2, the K2–W2 connection is actual. We can see the real performance of K2 and know the result of Validation.

If the result is bad. K2 is not unsuitable for W2.

We would move from the “Thinking” zone to the “Meta” zone.

We would reflect on the previous Anticipation of M1.

At T2, this Reflectin leads to M2.

The above diagram indicates that the deep level change is hard. We need to realize that the mistake is not what we learned, but the decision of choosing what we want to learn.

Meta-knowledge is about selecting which knowledge we should learn, evaluating knowledge’s actual performance, the way of understanding knowledge (as known as epistemology), etc.

If we work well with Knowledge at Work, we don’t have to activate the “Meta” zone.

Tournament @ The “Thinking” Zone

The above story is about performance-based learning. It suggests that we learn Knowledge in order to perform Work.

However, there is another story that doesn’t need the “Knowledge — Work” connection.

Sometimes we could explore something new and learn some new knowledge even though we don’t anticipate using them for some work in the future. This story can be called exploration-based learning.

Here we don’t want to focus on the difference between performance-based learning and exploration-based learning.

We want to discuss a typical activity within the “Thinking” Zone: Knowledge Comparison or Tournament.

The above diagram gives us a simple model of a knowledge tournament. We may learn some new knowledge called “Ka”.

We may compare “Ka” with “K1” and find differences and similarities between these two. For example, we can use “Ka” to reflect on W1.

Moreover, “Ka” may lead us to anticipate a new Work: W2. Since we know how to use “Ka”, we can search for new opportunities that match “Ka”.

If “Ka” is suitable for many works, especially work that brings significant impact to our creative life, we will prefer to use “Ka” more often than “K1”.

Re-discovery @The “Thinking” Zone

At T2, there is a possibility to evaluate “K1” and rediscover its value for “W2”.

Originally, we anticipate “K2” for “W2”. However, this anticipation fails.

If we rediscover the value of K1 for W2, we will realize that our anticipation of “K1 is anticipated to be not useful for W2” is not correct.

In this way, Re-discovery will lead to a Reflection on “M1” at the “Meta” zone too.

Curation @ The “Thinking” Zone

The above examples only consider the match between single Knowledge and single Work. For example, a knowledge framework for a strategic design project.

In fact, we often use more than one piece of knowledge together for a project. For a particular W2, we have to curate a group of knowledge such as “K1”, “Ka”, “Kb”, “Kc”, and “K2” together as a Situational Toolkit.

I’d like to call this activity “Curation”. More specifically, Situational Knowledge Curation.

Moreover, I use “Applied Knowledge Curation” for practice domains and use “Academic Knowledge Curation” for academic domains. There are several sub-categories under “Applied Knowledge Curation”.

Situational Knowledge Curation belongs to Applied Knowledge Curation. However, it is implicit because we don’t run Situational Knowledge Curation for others. Though the outcome of Situational Knowledge Curation is a new meaningful whole, however, the new whole is loose. Many people don’t perceive the new whole because they do use the “Curation” perspective to reflect on their “Building Meaning” activity.

A Mini Milestone

So far, the newest diagram represents many ideas about the Field of Meta-learning.

Now we have a concept called “The Field of Meta-learning”.
Now we know there are three types of processes within the Field of Meta-learning.
Now we have a three-level hierarchy of structure which is a possible configuration of the Field of Meta-learning.
Now we have an epistemology for Strategic Exploration.
Now we have a diagram that represents the structure of the Field of Meta-learning.
Now we have a map and a mapping method for discussing related issues.

Wow, this framework is an ambitious project! We don’t know many things about it yet.

At the early stage, this is a great outcome. Let’s call it The Field of Meta-learning (v1.0).

It’s time to celebrate a mini milestone and close the early stage.

This is a great beginning of a long journey!