MODELING EXCELLENCE SERIES (by Michael Hall -- Neuro-Semantics)

The last 2 posts in one to let the dust settle... and to let them to take root.

The First one:

THE MODELING THAT DISCOVERED META-STATES

The enrichment of modeling with Meta-States began in 1994 during my very first modeling project— Resilience.  I started the project in 1991when I became really fascinated by the quality of staying with something when set-backs occur.  It did not begin with big set-backs, but actually with little ones.  And with the smallest of set-backs.  Until then I had not even really noticed the phenomenon.

Prior to that if someone quit or gave up on something, I dismissed it with a wave of the hand as, “Well they must not really be interested.”  Or, “It just must not be their thing.”  Or, “They’ve got something else that’s more interesting.”  Then one day during an NLP class I was interviewed someone about some very small thing that the person had started, then there was a set-back, and then the person gave up on.  Using the Meta-Model questions, I probed and probed to understand the mental map of the person.  When we had chased the person’s thinking-and-feeling about that one, he remembered another thing he had started, and a set-back, and a giving that up for something else.  That led to a third memory and, of course, “Do we have a pattern here?”

His pattern was to think of something that he wanted or wanted to achieve, make a visual image of it (V^construct), then amplify it so that it was really compelling (K⁺), and in amplifying it, he would compress the time frame for achieving it so the picture came closer and closer and then he would say things like, “It’s almost here; I’m going to have it” (A^language), and then if anything got in the way of it (a set-back) like a disappointing result from an action or the realization it would take longer, he would then create another picture of it but this one would either be far, far away or a degraded version of it (V^construct) and the more he thought of it, the more it would move over and replace the original picture.  At that point he would say, “Agghh.  I don’treally want it anyway; it’s not worth the effort.”  That would create a momentary sense of dislike and then he would be off to something else.

That got me hooked.  Suddenly, I realized that there could be, for some people, a pattern of non-resilience.  Set-backs of the smallest nature would put them off.  So I started doing the interviews with just about anyone who would let me.  As that continued, I discovered bigger and bigger set-backs— real knock-downs (divorces, bankruptcy, being fired, being mugged, rape, war, accidents, and all sorts of traumas).

Now what really amazed me in the interviews was that it was not the size, magnitude, power, number, or intensity of the set-back that determined the person’s response.  For some people, the smallest set-back would knock them off-course and for others, the largest, most devastating set-back would not.  They would get up, dust themselves off, and go for it again.  Even if multiple set-backs occur at the same time— they would do the same thing.  Get up, shake off the disorientation, examine what was left, figure out something to do, and bounce back!  I was impressed.  And, I wanted that!  I wanted it for myself and I wanted it for every client that I worked with and I wanted it for those who attended every NLP course that I conducted.

“Okay, so what is the strategy of resilience, of bouncing back after a set-back?  How do people think and map out the experience so that they take it as a matter of course, ‘I will be back.’?”  That was my question and it was 1991.  Many years prior to that I had read the book from Elizabeth Kobler-Ross on grief recovery and the stages that she proposed: shock, denial, bargaining, anger, and acceptance.  I had also already read Viktor Frank’s Logo-Therapy and is story of resilience in Man’s Search for Meaning.  So I began a search of the literature to see what else had been written.  In 1991 there was not the category of Resilience as there is today so there was not much.  But there was the study of the Children of Survival from the War in Lebanon.

While I was search out those things and now interview people who “had been to hell and back” I was reading through Korzbyski’s Science and Sanity and Bateson’s Steps to an Ecology of Mind.  I was writing and publishing about the language patterns in Korzybski that were not included in the Meta-Model and writing NLP articles about Bateson’s contributions to NLP.

Then in 1994 a call for papers for the NLP Conference in Denver came and I decided to propose a workshop on “Resilience: Going for it — Again!”  I worked out the stages: The set-back (or knock-down), the emotional roller-coaster stage of dealing with the emotional shock of a world falling apart, the accessing of stabilization states and skills to stop the fall, the coping stage of putting one’s world back together, and the mastering stage of recovering a new vision and intention so that one would finally “be back.”  The strategy was straight-forward and linear.  So I gathered my materials and headed to Denver with some friends.

Then it happened.  While interview a man at the training, I asked, “How did you know to go from stage 2 to stage 3?  And he said something like, “Well, I had this larger vision, this higher state about where I was and I knew that it was just a matter of time and that I would get through this.”  Then either I reflected back to him or he said, “It’s like being in a state about my state, in a meta-state ...”  Regardless of who actually said the words, the phrase “meta-state” was an Eureka moment for me as it brought together the meta-levels, logical levels, and levels of abstracting that I had been immersed in for three years.  “Of course, at the same time that you are coping on the primary level you are also accessing your higher level thoughts-and-feelings and it is those meta-states of vision, intention, and determination that you will get through that’s infusing you with this complex state of resilience!"

The fact that we do not just operate at one level, but multiple levels simultaneously brings into focus that we cannot model most subjective experiences without tracking our self-reflexive consciousness as it creates multiple meta-states.  We are multi-layered beings.  We do not just think or feel— we are always and inevitably thinking-and-feeling (a state) about our thoughts-and-feelings and we are also experiencing states about those states.  This comprises the matrix of frames that we have about things: our beliefs, values, identities, memories, imaginations, decisions, models, intentions, and dozens and dozens of other meta-level understandings.  So to model in a full and complete way requires using the Meta-States Model for modeling out the self-reflexivity of the mind-body system.

L.  Michael Hall, Ph. D.

Neuro-Semantics homepage

The Second one:

HOW TO MODEL WITH META-STATES

In the last article I described the modeling that discovered Meta-States, now for an overview of how to model using the Meta-States Model.  This was actually the surprise that I experienced after discovering Meta-States.  While I was absolutely delighted to identify the meta-level structures of resilience(#6), I really had no ideal how extensive the Meta-States Model would apply.  And how extensive does it apply?

In any and every experience where a person’s self-reflexive consciousness is operative.

Now if you are new to Neuro-Semantics and to Neurons, self-reflexive consciousness is the kind of consciousness, the kind of mind that you have, that we humans have.  What does it mean?  It means that you never just think.  You never just feel.  As soon as you think–and–feel (create an emotional state), you think–and–feel about that first state.  You do not just get angry, you get afraid–of–your–anger or you get angry–at–your–anger, or you feel ashamed–of–your anger.  And that’s just the first level.  Then you think–and–feel something else about that first meta-state.  And so it goes.

This explains the complexity of your states.  This explains why it is often very difficult to answer the question, “What do you feel about X?”  When you think about that X, there is your first level thinking–and–feeling, then your second level, third level, and so on.  Up the levels it goes.  Nor do these “levels” stay separate.  It is their nature to combine and integrate.  We call it coalescing in Neuro-Semantics.

So if you meta-state your learning state with joy, fun, or delight and you create the meta-state of joyful learning, if you do that repeatedly, then after awhile the joy and the learning so coalesce that they operate as if they were a single primary state— joyful learning.  Then try as you will to pull the joy out of the learning and you will find it next to impossible.  Why?  Because your mind-body neurology is designed to make–actual (actualize) your thinking–and–feeling and so when you keep meta-stating learning with joy, you generate a new gestalt state so that a new emergent property arises— joyful learning.

For modeling, this is crucial.  It lies at the heart of every complex and dynamic “state” that we humans are able to generate and this goes far beyond the linear modeling of basic NLP.  And if you want to model the rich, robust, powerful, and complex states that characterizes experts— resilience, self-efficacy, seeing and seizing opportunities, entrepreneurship, leadership, etc., then you have to model out the meta-levels within the meta-states of the expert.  Ignore that and you only get the surface first level and you will never tap into the rich layered qualities that lie behind it.

Now years ago I wrote a whole book on Modeling with Meta-States, I gave it the title of NLP: Going Meta (1997) and wrote it after the formatting that Robert Dilts used in Creating NLP: The Study of the Structure of Subjective Experience, Volume I.   So I also titled it, NLP: Going Meta — Advanced Modeling Using Meta-Levels, Volume II.   

So just how do you model using Meta-States?  The answer lies in detecting and identifying the meta-levels that a person has reflexively brought to him or herself that now qualifies the experience and operates as a frame to the experience.  What this means is that as you and I access another thought–and–feeling about our first state, that second state operates dynamically to do several things—

∙           It brings another mind-body state to it and so adds qualities or qualifies the first.

∙           It sets the cognitive ideas within that state as the frame for the first.

∙           It puts the first as a member of a class, the “class” being the classification that the second one creates.

The second bullet point means that all of the so-called logical levels (beliefs, values, identity, mission, spirit, intention, permission, memory, imagination, meaning, etc.) are dynamically inside of the second state (the meta-state) and set the frame of meaning for the first.  Back to the example of “joyful learning.”  Is that a belief?  Do you believe you can joyfully learn?  Is that a value?  Do you value learning for the joy it gives you?  Is that an identity?  Are you a joyful learner?  Do you have memories of joyfully learning?  Do you imagine it in your future?  Do you anticipate, expect, desire, give yourself permission, etc. to learn joyfully?

So what is it?  It is all of those things at the same time.  It is we with our linear thinking who want to separate these things and make them different phenomenon.  Yet are they really?  Could they all be aspects of the same thing?  That’s our position in Neuro-Semantics.  We look at all of these “meta-level phenomena” and view them as facets of the “diamond of consciousness.”

What does this mean for modeling?  It means that when you discover a meta-level that’s qualifying an experience— there are beliefs in it, values in it, identities within it, intentions, permissions, prohibitions, and all of the other 100 logical levels.  Oh yes, there are one hundred logical levels (actually more).  I made a list of 104 of them in the book, Neuro-Semantics (2011).

There’s more to describe about this — especially the third bullet point on classes and categories as well as how to detect and call forth the meta-levels.  I’ll write about that next time.  To your effective modeling!

L.  Michael Hall, Ph. D.

Neuro-Semantics homepage

Everyone as best as he can...

Have Joy!
Giannicola 

THE KEY NLP MODELING TOOL (by Michael Hall -- Neuro-Semantics)

Dr Michael Hall on modeling one more time. The Meta-Model of Language in the following post is really superb and it starts with this question: "How is the Meta-Model a modeling tool?"

Let's see...

The Meta-Model of Language

The NLP is a Communication Model too and we are noting that it is a tool for modeling.  Now the interesting about it is that it arose from modeling.  It arose from modeling the language patterns of Fritz Perls and Virginia Satir and while it used Transformational Grammar (TG) to do so, the new model, “The Meta-Model of Language” soon jettisoned Transformational Grammar.  That’s why, while you will find a summary of TG at the end of the book The Structure of Magic, Volume I, you will not find it in any of the other books by the NLP originators or any of those who came later.

Why?  Why did that happen?  How is it that the model or tool that created the Meta-Model was made redundant immediately thereafter so that it was no longer used?  The reason is that NLP did not need Transformational Grammar.  The Meta-Model didn’t need it.  In the book about the 25^th year anniversary of the Meta-Model, Communication Magic (2001), I described this as resulting from two sources:

First, Noam Chomsky who created Transformation Grammar himself gave it up and tossed it out in 1976.  He gave up on that model because too many holes and inconsistencies had been discovered about it.

Second, what NLP took from TG was the idea of the levels of information processing and while TG has that (surface and deep structure) so does Koryzbski (levels of abstraction) and Bateson (levels of learning).

Question: How is the Meta-Model a modeling tool?  We know that it is a communication tool and that by using the linguistic distinguishing of the Meta-Model and the questions or challenges, a person can effectively invite a speaker to create a well-formed and precise description of an experience.  But how does one use it to model the structure of experience?

Answer:  The answer goes to the fact that experience is coded and driven by language.  When it comes to experiences, especially the key experiences that we humans value or disvalue, want to want to avoid—they are labeled, named, and given meaning by the words that we use to describe and evaluate them.  And if this is so, then no wonder the Meta-Model becomes a powerful tool to unpack an experience and given that the Meta-Model enables a person to take vague and indefinite descriptions and make them empirical and sensory-based, it becomes a wonderful tool for precision.

So, no wonder from the beginning of NLP, the Meta-Model has been used as a tool for modeling the linguistic facets of an experience.  Now I did not know this when I first learned NLP.  In fact, I read, studied, and trained in NLP all the way through Practitioner training before I discovered this.  I had even read those two original NLP books that are so unreadable, The Structure of Magic, and while I liked them, I still did not get it.  Then one day during the beginning of my Master Practitioner Training, Richard Bandler said, almost in an off-handed way, that “everything we’ve created in NLP was based on the Meta-Model.”

I was stunned.  “What?  Everything in NLP is based on the Meta-Model?  How could that be?”  I could not figure it out.  So I went back and re-read the original books very slowly and very deliberately and that was actually the beginning of my own experience in modeling.

“What did I find?” you ask?  I found that when it comes to human experiences, almost all of our most valuable experiences involve language, and that by meta-modeling the language, a modeler can identify a great deal of the structure of the experience.  He or she can put together how the person got him or herself into that state and experience.  And so if it is an experience to take onto oneself, then the linguistic model gives a person a step-by-step process for replicating it.  And if the experience represents a painful, dysfunctional, and toxic experience, then modeling it gives one numerous ways to undo it, pull it apart, and prevent it from being operational.

I thought that was great!  So when I began to play around with my first attempts at modeling, I was absolutely fascinated by how much one can discover in a person’s language.  I was astonished with how much I could learn by listening to the words of people, especially experts, and how much of how they have constructed their sense of reality and how much it suggests the steps for stepping into that same experience.

Now at the time I was doing psycho-therapeutic work as a therapist and so I began creating a model for each client.  How did this person create this or that experience?  What do this person’s words indicate or imply in terms of the processes involved— the generalizations, the deletions, and the distortions?  It was in this way that my own phenomenological studies began, first of single experiences and later of combining different models that people used to experience a similar category of experience and after that when I left the domain of therapy, to apply the same thing for such experiences as wealth creation, selling, negotiating, being an entrepreneur, leadership, etc.

As linguistic beings, we live in the house of language.  This explains why and also how we can use language for modeling experience:

"The limits of my language are the limits of my world" (Wittgenstein, 1922).

"Language is what bewitches, but language is what we must remain within in order to cure the bewitchment" (Henry Staten)

L.  Michael Hall, Ph. D.

Neuro-Semantics homepage

Everyone as best as he can...

Have Joy!
Giannicola 

MODELING: THE MAGIC OF “HOW” (by Michael Hall -- Neuro-Semantics)

Stone the flamin' crows Dr. Hall!!!

Amazing post on Modeling...

In last week’s post, I highlighted the power of focusing on the how of detailing out what is happening in the now.  For me, this was the most exciting thing when I first discovered NLP Modeling.  By asking questions and by closely observing people, a person could identify how any given person is currently, at this moment, creating his or her sense of reality.  And if we can do that, then we can figure out how that reality came into existence, operates, and can be altered.  Incredible!

Now in NLP Modeling, Wyatt Woodsmall (1990) was the person who first differentiated two dimensions or levels of modeling.  He labeled them Modeling I and Modeling II.  I think that this distinction provides a valuable way to think about the range of the modeling that we can do.

Modeling I refers to pattern detection and transference.  This kind of modeling detects a pattern of behavior that shows up in certain skills, abilities, and expertise.  By explicating the patterns of behavior in the skill or skills—the what that an expert actually does to achieve a result, this modeling focuses on reproducing the products of the expert.  This kind of modeling focuses on learning the sets of distinctions, procedures, and processes which enable a person to reach a desired outcome.

Modeling II refers to modeling the first modeling (Modeling I).  As such, it focuses on the how of an expert—how does the expert actually create and perform the expertise.  It doesn’t focus on the what is produced (that’s the first modeling), it focuses on the background competencies.  Now we focus on the processes which are necessary to generate the patterns that form the content of Modeling I.  In this modeling, we especially pay attention to the beliefs and values that outframe the expert.  Here we attend to the meta-programs, the contexts and frames, the meta-states, etc., all of the higher frames.

I like this distinction because, as Woodsmall points out, the field of NLP itself resulted from Modeling I, but not Modeling II.  Let me explain.  NLP emerged from the joint venture of John Grinder and Richard Bandler as they studied the language patterns of Fritz Perls and Virginia Satir.  First Richard used his gift of mimicking Perls’ and Satir’s speech, tonal, and language patterns.  Though untrained in psychology and psychotherapy, by simply reproducing the “magical” effects of these communication experts, he found that he could get many of the same results as the experts.  Incredible!  How was this possible?

In searching for that answer, John used Transformational Grammar and his unique skills in that field to pull apart the “surface” structures for the purpose of identifying the “deep” structures.  Both of them wanted to discover how this worked.  Frank Pucelik also was a part of all of that, and he created the context and the original group in which all of the discoveries took place.

From the theory of Transformational Grammar, the assumptions of the Cognitive Psychology (Noam Chomsky, George Miller, George Kelly, Alfred Korzybski, Gregory Bateson), and the coping of Perls and Satir, they specified what “the therapeutic wizards” actually did which had the transformative effect upon clients.  That was the original NLP modeling.

This adventure in modeling then gave birth to The Structure of Magic (1975/ 1976) which gave us the first NLP Model.  This was originally called The Meta-Model of Language in Therapy.   Today we just call it, The Meta-Model.  This is a model about the language behavior of Perls and Satir, that is, how they used words in doing change work with clients.  And that then became the central technology of NLP for modeling.

The amazing thing is that with that first model, they were able to model a great deal of the governing structure of a person’s experience.  That enabled them to peek into a person’s model of the world just by listening to the features that linguistically mark out how the person has created his or her map.  While this is not all that’s needed for modeling, it certainly gives us a set of linguistic tools for figuring out how a piece of subjective experience works.  It answers the how questions:

            How does a person depress himself?

            How does a person take “criticism” effective and use it for learning?

            How does another person look out at an audience and freak out?

The Meta-Model gave the original co-developers of NLP numerous tools for both understanding and replicating the person’s original modeling.  Soon thereafter, as they modeled Milton Erickson, they began adding all kinds of non-verbal and non-linguistic distinctions to their model, enriching the modeling process even further.   As NLP started with Modeling I and not Modeling II, the early NLP thinkers and trainers did not have access to the higher level of modeling until some time later.  Nor did they seem aware of it for some time.  Eventually this realization arose as people began asking some basic modeling questions:

What strategy did Perls use in working with clients?

            What strategy enabled Satir to do her “magic” with families?

What strategy describes Erickson’s calibration skills and use of hypnotic language patterns?

How did any one of those wizards make decisions about what to use when?

Even to this day, we do not know.  We know what they produced, but not howthey produced such.  We have the results from their magic, but not the formula that identifies the states and meta-states, the beliefs and higher frames of mind that enabled them to operate as “wizards” in the first place.   Woodsmall (1990) writes:

“In short, if NLP is the by-product of modeling Erickson, Perls, and Satir, then why are we never taught how they did anything?   All we are taught is what they did.  This means that we can imitate the powerful patterns that they used, but we don’t know how they generated and performed them to start with.  From this it is evident that the part of NLP that is the by-product of modeling is a by-product of Modeling I, but not of Modeling II.” (p. 3)

As the product of Modeling I, all that we originally received in NLP was theresult of modeling.  We received the patterns and procedures which the modelers found in Perls, Satir, and Erickson, i.e., reframing, swishing, anchoring, collapsing anchors, etc.  We received the NLP patterns. Bandler and Grinder gave us a legacy of dramatic processes that enable people to change.

Only later was it that Bandler, Grinder, DeLozier, Bandler-Cameron, Dilts, and Gordon begin to wonder about the modeling itself that they started to explore the modeling processes, assumptions, patterns, etc. about modeling.  From that came the commission from Richard and John for Robert Dilts to write the second modeling book, NLP: Volume I.  That volume made Modeling II available.

They also left their theory about change, mind, neurology, language, etc.  Of course, they did not call it “a theory.”  In fact, they pulled off a big “Sleight of Mouth” pattern as they told us that they had no theory, just a description of what worked.  “It’s a model, not a theory.”  With that mind-line, they distracted our attention and offered “the NLP Presuppositions,” telling us that they were not true, could not be proven, but seemed like really nice “lies” that would take us to more resourceful places.  So we just memorized them, only half aware (if that), that within the NLP Presuppositions they had hidden away the theory of neuro-linguistic programming.

L.  Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Neuro-Semantics homepage

Everyone as best as he can...

Have Joy!
Giannicola 

SCUOLA, POLITICA, BORSACCHIO E ALTRE STORIE...

Saffo

Oggi volevo scioperare, non volevo scrivere nulla per protesta. Poi c'ho ripensato ed ecco cosa penso sulla vicenda "censura" tra Amministrazione Comunale e Liceo Saffo di Roseto degli Abruzzi sulla questione Borsacchio.

Albert Einstein ha detto: "L'uomo ha inventato la bomba atomica, ma nessun topo al mondo costruirebbe una trappola per topi"!


Ora scomodare Einstein mi sembra un po' eccessivo per parlare di ambiente ma scomodare il Ministero per pensare di punire il liceo Saffo di Roseto mi sembra fuori luogo. Con le tante urgenti questioni di cui farsi carico, con la crisi economica da gestire localmente, con le tante mancanze ad ogni livello, l'Amministrazione non poteva fare altro che cacciarsi in questa imbarazzante situazione.


La Scuola crea Cultura e la Cultura, da un po'..., si fa con le idee! Ora le idee non sono appannaggio di nessuno. Nessuno può rivendicare l'appartenenza di un'idea ad una qualsivoglia categoria, politica o sociale o artistica o... Anche se di solito lo si fa, è una forzatura! Oggi le persone si parlano molto di più rispetto a come fa la politica (ferma ad almeno una ventina di anni fa) e in un nuovo modo. I ragazzi parlano attraverso la scuola (il loro canale naturale), attraverso i loro insegnanti (interlocutori naturali), attraverso il web (strumento naturale) e la creazione di idee diviene molto più pervasiva ed efficace. Il risultato è che i ragazzi stanno diventando più attenti, più informati, più organizzati e vivono nell'abbondanza di idde (rispetto alla scarsità nella quale molto spesso si trova impantanata e ingessata la politica). Essere parte di questi processi di interconnessione cambia profondamente le persone, le loro idee, le loro parole, le loro azioni, il loro modo di vedere il mondo. I segreti diventano sempre meno segreti (vedi cosa succede con Wikileaks nel mondo...). I ragazzi conoscono i progetti meglio di certi politici che li affrontano, anche grazie ad insegnanti che spiegano loro di cosa si tratta. Questo è scomodo, molto scomodo e si cerca di porre rimedio.


Se gli insegnanti avessero la capacità di persuadere i ragazzi sulla questione Borsacchio, vorrebbe dire che sono migliori persuasori dei politici che tirano da un'altra parte. Ora, come sappiamo, la "colpa" è sempre di qualcuno al di fuori della nostra cerchia (in questo caso della politica al potere) e allora diventano capri espiatori i professori che "istigano".
Come insegna Baetson: "se prendo io un portafogli dalla tua tasca sono uno svelto, se lo fai tu sei un ladro!"
Mi chiedo se è istigazione parlare, riflettere, confrontarsi su argomenti di cui si ha cura, passione, interesse, amore, ecc... ("giusto" o "sbagliato" che sia) o se sia persuasione (per lo più occulta) promettere posti di lavoro in cambio di voti!


Le politica non parla con la stessa lingua (appunto, vecchia di venti anni almeno) di queste nuove generazioni. Cercano di farlo, di comunicare, di coinvolgere un pubblico giovane, ma la sua voce suona arida, ridondante, monotona, aggressiva, ricattatrice, pregiudizievole. Una politica (se così si può chiamare) che parla un linguaggio come quello dell'articolo che segue è una politica che non parla a nessuno. Se la politica ancora pensa che i suoi destinatari siano gli stessi di vent'anni fa si sta sbagliando di grosso! La politica che non capisce che i suoi interlocutori sono ormai una rete tra sviluppati individui, piccole tribù sempre più organizzate e coinvolte, organizzazioni che si parlano alla velocità di un click, stanno perdendo la loro occasione di cambiare Roseto!!!

Mi sembra che di idee sulla questione Borsacchio l'Amministrazione ne abbia poche. Sarebbe utile invece ascoltare i feed-back dei ragazzi per allargare il portfolio di idee. Ecco cosa è successo a Roseto degli Abruzzi e come è stato riportato su Il Centro di ieri, mercoledì 07 marzo 2012.

Roseto. La maggioranza: «Sulla Riserva gli studenti sono strumentalizzati da docenti che fanno politica»

Il Pdl al ministro: punisci il liceo Saffo

Risoluzione votata in consiglio per censurare la protesta sul Borsacchio

In occasione della visita della commissione ambiente il Comune venne contestato

di FEDERICO CENTOLA

ROSETO. La querelle tra il centrodestra rosetano e alcuni docenti del liceo Saffo sulla questione della Riserva naturale del Borsacchio giunge sul tavolo del ministro dell’Istruzione. Durante l’ultimo consiglio comunale, infatti, il Pdl ha presentato una risoluzione urgente. Nella risoluzione, votata poi dall’intera maggioranza, si dà mandato al sindaco e alla giunta «affinché vengano informati dell’accaduto il prefetto di Teramo, il ministero della Pubblica istruzione, il dirigente scolastico provinciale e quello regionale per porre in essere ogni azione utile a tutela dell’integrità degli studenti oggetto della strumentalizzazione e del ruolo educativo, formativo e didattico che la pubblica istruzione deve mantenere nel nostro Paese». Parole durissime, che hanno origine dall’episodio che si è verificato alla fine di gennaio al liceo Saffo durante l’incontro della commissione regionale ambiente con gli studenti, cui era presente anche il sindaco, proprio sul tema della Riserva del Borsacchio. Nel locale dove si è svolto l’incontro c’erano striscioni contro la variazione dei confini della Riserva e in prima fila sedevano studenti con indosso maglie a favore dell’area protetta, tanto da provocare la critica del primo cittadino. Una vera e propria «trappola», secondo il Pdl rosetano, «messa in piedi ad arte nelle aule del liceo per contestare le scelte dell’amministrazione in modo improprio e fuori da ogni logica di confronto». Proprio in quel periodo il consiglio comunale aveva votato a favore della riperimetrazione della Riserva.  «Si è trattato una grave strumentalizzazione a fini politici di studenti che, in orario scolastico», si legge ancora nel documento, «invece di essere formati sulle materie oggetto dei programmi di studio, sono stati indotti a partecipare a una vera e propria manifestazione politica predisposta da alcuni docenti i quali militano in associazioni e partiti ambientalisti».  «Si tratta di un atto senza precedenti nel nostro comune», è la reazione della sinistra rosetana espressa dal portavoce Marco Borgatti, «segno di una forte tensione nell’amministrazione che, non sapendo più come argomentare la sua scelta di ritagliare la Riserva, cerca di intimorire chi lotta per una città diversa. I giovani hanno forse la voglia di sperare in una Roseto dove il verde delle colline e l’azzurro del mare siano i colori del futuro. Noi scegliamo di sognare con loro e lotteremo al loro fianco». Ognuno come può! Abbi Gioia Giannicola

Gregory Bateson e l'Ecologia della Mente

Sapete, un giorno, anni fa, alla fine di una lezione, uno degli studenti venne da me, si voltò indietro per sincerarsi che tutti gli altri se ne stessero andando e poi disse, esitante: "Vorrei farle una domanda". "Sì?" -dissi io. "Be'..lei vuole proprio che noi impariamo quello che ci sta raccontando?".
Ebbi un attimo di esitazione, ma egli riprese subito:
"Oppure tutto questo è una specie di esempio, un'illustrazione di qualcos'altro?".
"Certo, proprio così!".
Ma …un esempio di che cosa?
Dopo, quasi ogni anno, ci furono vaghe lamentele che di solito mi giungevano sotto forma di pettegolezzo: si sosteneva che "Bateson sa qualcosa che non ci dice", oppure "sotto quello che Bateson dice c'è qualcosa, ma lui non ci dice mai di che cosa si tratti". Evidentemente non stavo dando una risposta alla domanda: "Un esempio di che cosa?".

"Gregory Bateson e

l'Ecologia della Mente" parte 1

"Gregory Bateson e
l'Ecologia della Mente" parte 2

"Gregory Bateson e

l'Ecologia della Mente" parte 3

«Il bello e il brutto, il letterale e il metaforico, il sano e il folle, il comico e il serio... perfino l'amore e l'odio, sono tutti temi che oggi la scienza evita. Ma tra pochi anni, quando la spaccatura fra i problemi della mente e i problemi della natura cesserà di essere un fattore determinante di ciò su cui è impossibile riflettere, essi diventeranno accessibili al pensiero formale»  (Gregory Bateson, Dove gli angeli esitano)

Bateson su Wikipedia

Ognuno come puó!
Abbi Gioia
Giannicola

APPRENDIAMO AD APPRENDERE (G. Bateson)

"Tutti i sistemi biologici (organismi e organizzazioni sociali o ecologiche di organismi) sono suscettibili di cambiamenti adattativi che assumono molte forme (risposta, apprendimento, successione ecologica, evoluzione biologica, evoluzione culturale, ecc.), secondo le dimensioni e la complessità del sistema considerato.
Qualunque sia il sistema, tuttavia, i cambiamenti adattativi dipendono da anelli di reazione, siano essi quelli della selezione naturale o quelli del rinforzo individuale; di conseguenza il sistema deve sempre adottare un procedimento per tentativi ed errori e impiegare un meccanismo di confronto.
Ma il procedimento per tentativi ed errori implica sempre degli errori, i quali rappresentano sempre, dal punto di vista biologico o psichico, un costo. La conseguenza è che i cambiamenti adattativi devono essere sempre gerarchici.
C’è bisogno dunque non solo di quel cambiamento del primo ordine che soddisfa la richiesta ambientale (o fisiologica) immediata, ma anche di cambiamenti del secondo ordine, i quali ridurranno la quantità dei tentativi necessari per portare a compimento il cambiamento del primo ordine, ecc. Mediante la sovrapposizione e l’interconnessione di molti anelli di reazione, noi (e come noi tutti gli altri sistemi biologici) non solo risolviamo problemi specifici, ma ci formiamo abitudini che applichiamo alla soluzione di classi di problemi. Ci comportiamo come se un’intera classe di problemi potesse essere risolta sulla base di ipotesi e premesse meno numerose dei problemi della classe; in altre parole noi (organismi) apprendiamo ad apprendere, o, con termine più tecnico, deutero-apprendiamo.
Il risparmio sta proprio nel non riesaminare o riscoprire le premesse di un’abitudine.
Ma le abitudini, com’è noto, sono rigide, e questa loro rigidità è una conseguenza inevitabile della posizione che esse occupano nella gerarchia dell’adattamento. Il risparmio, in termini di tentativi ripetuti, che ci procura il formarsi di abitudini è possibile proprio perché esse sono programmate in modo relativamente rigido: il risparmio sta proprio nel non riesaminare o riscoprire le premesse di un’abitudine ogni volta che di tale abitudine ci serviamo. Si può dire che queste premesse sono in parte ‘inconscie’, oppure, se si vuole, che si è presa l’abitudine di non esaminarle. È importante osservare, inoltre, che le premesse dell’abitudine sono, quasi di necessità, astratte. Ogni problema è, in qualche misura, diverso da ogni altro, e quindi la sua descrizione o la sua rappresentazione della mente conterrà proposizioni uniche. Sarebbe evidentemente errato abbassare queste proposizioni uniche al livello di premesse delle abitudini, dal momento che un’abitudine può essere applicata con successo solo a proposizioni aventi un grado di verità generale o ripetitivo, e di solito queste ultime proposizioni sono a un livello di astrazione relativamente elevato.’
Ora, le proposizioni particolari che io ritengo importanti nella determinazione delle sindromi transcontestuali sono quelle astrazioni formali che descrivono e determinano un rapporto interpersonale.
Ho detto «descrivono e determinano», ma anche questo non è esatto; sarebbe meglio dire che il rapporto è lo scambio di questi messaggi, ovvero che il rapporto è immanente in questi messaggi.
Di solito gli psicologi parlano come se le astrazioni di certi rapporti (‘dipendenza, ‘ostilità ‘, ‘amore’, ecc.) fossero oggetti reali da dover descrivere o ‘esprimere’ mediante messaggi. Ma questa è epistemologia all’incontrario: in verità, sono i messaggi che costituiscono il rapporto, e termini come ‘dipendenza’ sono descrizioni verbalmente codificate di strutture immanenti nella combinazione dei messaggi scambiati".
Bateson Gregory

(“Verso un'ecologia della mente”, Adelphi, pag. 301)

GREGORY BATESON SU WIKIPEDIA