Septemper 15, 2011: "Bottom-Up or Top-Down: How Did WE Get Here?"

 
   Our thinker, Gary S. presented the first half of this article today. This writing is an original demonstration of very deep thinking. Gary has read several books which are mentioned in the article and very concisely has formulated some questions and then theories about our cosmology, our universe, our origins, and through these thought provoking ideas, asks us to question some ideas that most people accept without question. He contrasts a "Bottom-Up" theory of everything which basically says that everything comes from nothing  -- eg. Big Bang theory versus a "Top-Down" theory which says that something dictates a theory of everything -- something determines what we are and what our universe is. What is that determinism? Gary begins us thinking that this is a world of information and maybe "information" is the determining factor.

     The books he has read and used to formulate his ideas are: "The Ego Tunnel" by Thomas Metzinger; "Brain Trust" by Patricia Churchland; "Information and the Nature of Reality" by Paul Davies and Niels Henrik Gregerson; "the Ultimate Mystery of Inheritance Epi-Genetics" by Richard C. Francis; and "Mindful Universe" by Henry P. Stapp.

     If you missed today, you have another chance. Gary is presenting the second half of this article at a later date.

     Read on below to access Gary's entire article.

September 8, 2011: Sky presented Poetry of Rumi and the Wisdom of Mark Twain.

     We were again treated to the poems of Rumi in their lighthearted airy fullness versus various statements and wisdoms that a darker more cynical but nevertheless provocative Mark Twain provides to our culture. I would recommend anyone to pursue these two authors further. Sky presents these words with perfect timing and stimulates us to consider our culture through these two contrasting author's vision.

September 1, 2011: Bake Off

      A usual our Bake Off triggered some interesting discussions about our personal resolutions. Among these was a discussion of weight loss and ways to follow a more healthy lifestyle.

Sharleen forwarded this Sonjay Gupta MD journalistic report on heart attacks and their prevention. They do personify some of the things we discussed at our meeting.

http://cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/podcasts/gupta/site/2011/08/29/sgmd.last.heart.attack.cnn.html 

September 25, 2011: Rumi and Hafiz, presented by Karen and Sky.

     This session was a surprise and a treat. Our regular member, Sky and his guest Karen Kolberg, took turns to regale us with the Sufi poetry of Rumi (Sky with props) and the Hafiz poetry recited and acted out by Karen Kolberg. Sky is a comic with Rumi one-liners. He uses various hard props such as his bucket of "Industrial Strength Philosophy" or "Philosopher in a Drum"  to add to the humor and the depth of his presentation. Karen herself suffered a serious intracerebral bleed and lost all of her memorized Hafez poems except one. But she has relearned them all. She carries her "verse purse" with her which contains all the titles of Hafez poems in it. She asks someone in her audience to draw one out and she recites it with heart and vigor. The combination of these two presenters and the words of these two poets creates a performance at once deep and yet light and airy, like heaven.

Read on for information about who these two poets were and also view some photos of Rumi's Mausoleum in Konya, Turkey.

August 18, 2011: Reflective Competency and its place in the consciousness competency learning matrix, by Sharleen.

     Sharleen attended a conference on holistic medicine and participated in a session on Reflective consciousness.

The speaker presented a model to describe some key observations about learning and performance -- and the assessment of performance. The learner of a new skill begins at stage 1 -- 'unconscious incompetence', and ends of stage 4 - ' unconscious competence', having passed through stage 2 - 'conscious incompetence' and -3 'conscious competence'.

This model is a 2 X 2 matrix. See the URL sites for more details.

Various references can be found to an ancient Oriental proverb, which inverts the order of the highest two states:

He who knows not, and knows not that he knowns not, is a fool – shun him (= Unconscious Incompetent)

He who knows not, and knows that he knows not is ignorant – teach him, (= Conscious Incompetent)

He who knows, and knows not that he knows, is asleep – wake him, (=Unconscious Competent)

But he who knows, and knows that he knows, I sa wise man – follow him (=Conscious Competent

This is somewhat similar to the matrix above.

It is clear that consideration of this model can become important in teaching. If the teacher is unaware where the student fits into this matrix, the method of teaching may not be appropriate.

“Trainers often make the mistake of assuming that a learner is at state 2, and focus their effort toward achieving stage 3, when in fact the learner is still at stage 1. This is a fundamental reason for training failure – because the learner simply has not recognized the need for new learning. Until the learner has achieved awareness of a weakness or a training need (conscious incompetence), the learner has no interest, attention or motivation for the learning process. Learners only respond to training or teaching when they are aware of their own need for it, and the personal benefits they will derive from it.”

This model would be incomplete if it did not acknowledge the idea of a 5th level which has sometimes been called “reflective competence” or even “enlightened competence”. The model illustrates how skills become so integrated that they become “unconscious” and instinctual. But if we stopped there, it would give the impression that this “unconsciousness” is the highest state of learning – such as the artist, dancer, craftsman who practices their skill at the highest level but cannot articulate it or teach it to others. Of course, the level beyond this is the coach, the expert teacher, the mentor, the master craftsman, who can demonstrate a skill in practice and also articulate the fine details of the skill, art or craft.

“When someone becomes conscious of incompetence, emotions of “anxiety’, ‘happiness’, fear’ and or ‘deial’’ may be experienced. Feelings of ‘threat’ (to previous learning), ‘guilt’ (at departing from previous leanring) and possibly ‘depression’ (at having to relearn) can arise until a firm commitment is made to the new learning. If the commitment to the new learning is not strong, feelings of ‘hostilityu’ or ‘disillusionment’ can arise. The ability to demonstrate the skill partially is the beginning of a “gradual acceptance’, which through practice then naturally leads to Conscious Competence. A lack of discipline I in this area could repeat emotional sequence of earlier transitions. Mastery at this stage enables Unconscious Competence and builds confidence to teach others the skill. This is arguably the fifth ‘reflective’ stage.

“I would not call mastery ‘unconscious’. It is simply ‘wired in.’ that, literally, occurs when the neuro-cognitive system acquires new brain cells.”

If you are interested in delving deeper into this matrix and its meaning here are several URLs that go into these ideas in more details.

http://www.businessballs.com/consciouscompetencelearningmodel.htm

http://www.gordontraining.com/free-workplace-articles/learning-a-new-skill-is-easier-said-than-done/

http://www.businessballs.com/benzigerpersonalityassessment.htm

or http://www.benziger.org/

http://www.businessballs.com/personalchangeprocess.htm

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7431209&sc=emaf

August 11, 2011: Sue presented Whatchamacallit!

     Our sched ule will be a little off from the listing in the previous post. Jean couldn't be with us last week nor will she be with us this weel. Therefore, last week Sue did her presentation. Her Whatchamacallit was a discussion of improving friendship relationships. Several readings and writings about this topic were discussed.

Scheule for next 2 months.

A Schedule for the next two months of SpiritMindbody Group

August 11, 2011   Jean H. will discuss Listening  with Presence.

August 18, 2011   Sue D will present Whatchamacallit.

August 25, 2011  Rumi and Mark Twain by Sky

September 1, 2011  Bake Off

September 8, 2011  Rumi and Mark Twain by Sky

September 15, 2011  Gary  A Topdown Perspective

September 29, 2011 Gunther Pohlmann Society

October 6, 2011  Topdown Perspective continued

October 13, 2011  Reflective Competency  and its place in the consciousness competency learning matrix, by Sharleen.

October 20, 2011 Dick will present something on the 18 Voids.

October 27, 2011  Nick