Monday, May 18, 2015
Intentional Focus Element - Pontiac Moving Forward/OU Pontiac Partnership
http://www.georgetown.edu/news/poverty-summit-2015-with-obama.html
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
Update on CRYPTOMNESIA - (You Heard It Here First)
The Science of ‘Accidental’ Joke-Stealing and Plagiarism
Over the past 20 years, attempts have been made to understand through experimentation a phenomenon known as “cryptomnesia,” whereby you arrive at an apparently original idea that you later turn out to have heard from someone else or to have read somewhere. It can occasionally be the cause of what has perhaps rather generously been called “unconscious plagiarism.” In the laboratory, cryptomnesia can be replicated through subtle manipulation of the processes of forgetting. The trick is to mix just enough forgetting with remembering at just the right moment, such that the memory concerned does not disappear but is no longer recognized as memory.
Cryptomnesia, which means “hidden memory,” is fairly common. A person may be firmly convinced he or she has thought of a solution that was in fact proposed by a colleague at an earlier meeting. Cryptomnesia has been suggested as an explanation for the publication in a plastic surgery journal of a “new” surgical technique that in reality had been part of the training given to surgeons over many years. Rather more everyday examples might include thinking you had invented a new cocktail, an original pun or an exercise for basketball training. Bitter conflicts can arise in the workplace as a result of our tendency to come up with other people’s ideas from time to time.
The most famous example of cryptomnesia concerns George Harrison. In 1969 he wrote “My Sweet Lord,” which topped the charts worldwide. A writ was issued against him by the production company Bright Tunes, pointing out the song’s resemblance to “He’s So Fine,” a major number one hit for the Chiffons in 1963. Bright Tunes accused Harrison of plagiarism, saying the melodies of the two songs were virtually identical. Harrison admitted that he knew the number by the Chiffons but denied having copied it. The judge – perhaps he had dabbled in psychoanalysis – issued a verdict that was worded in such a way as to spare Harrison’s feelings. It must, he said, be a case of “inadvertent copying of what was in Mr Harrison’s subconscious memory.”5 But unintentional or not, it was still copying. Harrison was ordered to pay more than half a million dollars in royalties. To be done with the whole business he later bought the rights to “He’s So Fine.” Anyone clicking on that song on YouTube can indeed sing along to it with the lyrics of “My Sweet Lord.”
In 1989, two American psychologists, Alan Brown and Dana Murphy, attempted to gain an experimental grip on cryptomnesia. They developed an approach that set the pattern for later researchers. In the first session, test participants are asked to come up with ideas. Typically they have to brainstorm about solutions to complex problems, such as a medical diagnosis. During the second session, several weeks or months later, they are required to indicate what their contribution was on the previous occasion. In a third and final session they are challenged to come up with ideas that have not been proposed before.
Several dozen experiments along these lines have been carried out over the past 20 years and every time it turns out that in the second session participants tend to present other people’s ideas as their own. In the third session they often come up with ideas that they think are new but in reality have been proposed before, usually by one of the other participants. The cause is not simply confusion about ownership, since occasionally participants attribute their own ideas to others, although the number of times that happens is negligible compared to the times when ideas generated by other people are claimed by participants as their own. All this happens in good faith. Even when test participants have the chance to win considerable sums of money by attributing ideas correctly (and know this in advance), they still claim now and then to be the source of other people’s ideas. Sincerity is not the same as impartiality. The unavoidable consequence is that all individuals gain the impression that cryptomnesia is mainly something their colleagues suffer from. People who repeatedly see themselves cheated out of their own ideas must surely feel like an honest person surrounded by thieves.
The basic form of this kind of experiment is borrowed from earlier research into “source amnesia,” or forgetting the origin of things you recall. Source amnesia can mean that you tell a piece of juicy gossip you have just heard to a number of different acquaintances and eventually to the person who told it to you (who, you suddenly recall, impressed upon you that you must tell no one else). Cryptomnesia is rather different. With source amnesia you forget the origin of what you have heard or read, but you remember that there was a source. In a pure and authentic case of cryptomnesia you forget even that. The brilliant plan, the great invention, the timely bright idea that suddenly comes to you actually has its origins in your memory yet is not recognized as a memory.
It is of course true that forgetting who or what the source was will take you a long way in the art of coming up with other people’s ideas. Research shows that the factors that contribute to source amnesia increase the likelihood of cryptomnesia as well. The longer the interval in time, the more cases of cryptomnesia there will be. If the sources closely resemble each other, because they are all fellow students for example, this too makes cryptomnesia more common. Even sex makes a difference; it is easier for women to appropriate the ideas of other women, men those of other men. There is a “next-in-line” effect: those who came immediately before you in the brainstorming session run a slightly higher risk of having their ideas stolen by you, probably because you were already thinking about your own contribution as you listened. Ideas presented in chaotic circumstances, such as during brainstorming sessions or disorganized meetings, are also more likely to be incorrectly claimed at a later date.
Most likely of all to increase the occurrence of cryptomnesia is an invitation to participants to improve on ideas already proposed. Nothing separates the true owner so rapidly and efficiently from his or her ideas as a minimal addition or insignificant variation. Even after just a few weeks, the slightest contribution is sufficient to convince you that you have improved upon an idea of your own.
The identification of factors that contribute to cryptomnesia is not the same, of course, as an explanation. What actually happens?
Imagine you were at a meeting last week about some kind of complicated problem to which you proposed a clever solution. Then the conversation moved on, no one picked up on your idea, a colleague presented a different solution and the decision was made to try that first. At the next meeting it becomes clear that the solution is not going to work. Fortunately your colleague has come up with a different idea in the meantime, a better idea, a brilliant idea: yours. You glance around the table. To your horror you see that you are the only person who realizes it was your idea. What has gone on in your colleague’s brain?
A case like this is the result of that intriguing difference between two types of memory: semantic memory and autobiographical memory. The semantic memory contains material we might tend to call “knowledge” rather than recollection, such as knowing what “incubation” means, what a “joint and reciprocal will” is, or what the stretch of water between Britain and France is called. You once acquired that knowledge, but in most cases you will have forgotten the circumstances in which you learned it. Few people can say how or when they discovered that Stockholm is the capital of Sweden.
Autobiographical memory deals with the things we experience. This type of memory records the circumstances, or at any rate makes a valiant attempt to do so. Over time all kinds of things may be forgotten, but often you can still recall where something happened or who was there, whether it took place in the evening or during the day, at home, outdoors or at work. Recollections drawn from our autobiographical memories usually have a context.
When you presented your idea at the previous meeting you remained for a very short time in your colleagues’ autobiographical memories as part of their recollection of the suggested solution. The solution itself went into their semantic memories and there, with yourself as the rapidly fading context, it became linked up with all the knowledge they already had of the issue at hand.
Cryptomnesia is therefore not simply the consequence of a failing memory. It arises because a different part of the memory – in the case of your colleague the semantic memory, in the case of George Harrison the musical memory – has retained it extremely effectively. It is the discrepancy between the two memory processes that produces cryptomnesia. Seen from a broader evolutionary perspective, there is something to be said for such an arrangement. Confronted with a problem, it is not particularly helpful for the survival of the individual or group to remember just who came up with the brilliant idea, but it may prove invaluable to be able to recall what it was.
Adapted from Forgetting: Myths, Perils and Compensations by Douwe Draaisma, published in 2015 by Yale University Press. Copyright ©2015 by Douwe Draaisma. Reprinted by permission of Yale University press.
Sunday, May 10, 2015
Studio and Project-Based Learning is for EVERYONE! (submitted by David Leibowitz)
What Hollywood Can Teach Us About the Future of Work
Recently I visited a movie set. It was the first day of production, and I arrived just as the sun was coming up, but already, around 150 people were busy setting up that day’s shot in an abandoned office building. Crew members were laying electric cables and hanging lights. The cinematographer was in one corner with his team, discussing how the sun’s rays filtered through the window blinds. Carpenters were putting the finishing touches on a convincing prop elevator — I pushed the call button and waited, until I finally realized it was a fake.
I was there as a “technical adviser”: The movie involved some financial events that I’ve reported on, and the filmmakers wanted to ask me questions as they set up their scenes. But I spent much of the day asking questions of my own, trying to figure out something that mystified me as the day went on: Why was this process so smooth? The team had never worked together before, and the scenes they were shooting that day required many different complex tasks to happen in harmony: lighting, makeup, hair, costumes, sets, props, acting. And yet there was no transition time; everybody worked together seamlessly, instantly. The set designer told me about the shade of off-white that he chose for the walls, how it supported the feel of the scene. The costume designer had agonized over precisely which sandals the lead actor should wear. They told me all this, but they didn’t need to tell one another. They just got to work, and somehow it all fit together.
More of us will see our working lives structured around short-term, project-based teams, rather than long-term, open-ended jobs.
This approach to business is sometimes called the “Hollywood model.” A project is identified; a team is assembled; it works together for precisely as long as is needed to complete the task; then the team disbands. This short-term, project-based business structure is an alternative to the corporate model, in which capital is spent up front to build a business, which then hires workers for long-term, open-ended jobs that can last for years, even a lifetime. It’s also distinct from the Uber-style “gig economy,” which is designed to take care of extremely short-term tasks, manageable by one person, typically in less than a day.
With the Hollywood model, ad hoc teams carry out projects that are large and complex, requiring many different people with complementary skills. The Hollywood model is now used to build bridges, design apps or start restaurants. Many cosmetics companies assemble a temporary team of aestheticians and technical experts to develop new products, then hand off the actual production to a factory, which does have long-term employees. (The big studios, actually, work the same way: While the production of the movie is done by temps, marketing and distribution are typically handled by professionals with long-term jobs.)
Our economy is in the midst of a grand shift toward the Hollywood model. More of us will see our working lives structured around short-term, project-based teams rather than long-term, open-ended jobs. There are many reasons this change is happening right now, but perhaps the best way to understand it is that we have reached the end of a hundred-year fluke, an odd moment in economic history that was dominated by big businesses offering essentially identical products. Competition came largely by focusing on the cost side, through making production cheaper and more efficient; this process required businesses to invest tremendous amounts in physical capital — machines and factories — and then to populate those factories with workers who performed routine activities.
Nonmanufacturing corporations followed a similar model: Think of all those office towers filled with clerical staff or accountants or lawyers. That system began to fray in the United States during the 1960s, first in manufacturing, with the economic rise of Germany and Japan. It was then ripped apart by Chinese competition during the 2000s. Enter the Hollywood model, which is far more adaptable. Each new team can be assembled based on the specific needs of that moment and with a limited financial commitment.
Nonmanufacturing corporations followed a similar model: Think of all those office towers filled with clerical staff or accountants or lawyers. That system began to fray in the United States during the 1960s, first in manufacturing, with the economic rise of Germany and Japan. It was then ripped apart by Chinese competition during the 2000s. Enter the Hollywood model, which is far more adaptable. Each new team can be assembled based on the specific needs of that moment and with a limited financial commitment.
Obviously this is good news for management and the owners of capital. But as I saw on set, it’s a surprisingly good system for many workers too, in particular those with highly-sought-after skills. Ask Hollywood producers, and they’ll confirm that there are only a limited number of proven, reliable craftspeople for any given task. Projects tend to come together quickly, with strict deadlines, so those important workers are in a relatively strong negotiating position. Wages among, say, makeup and hair professionals on shoots are much higher than among their counterparts at high-end salons.
Similarly, set builders make more than carpenters and electricians working on more traditional construction sites. It helps that, despite the work’s fleeting nature, Hollywood is strongly unionized, which keeps wages high. According to the rate card of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 728, which represents union film-lighting crews in Los Angeles, even entry-level electricians on a major film set make more than $35 an hour — i.e., more than 40 percent higher than the national average for electricians — and make that wage over 12-hour days.
The Hollywood system offers another advantage for workers: Every weekend’s box-office results provide new information about which skills in their field are valuable. I spoke with one makeup artist about the sudden explosion of zombies on TV and in the movies. One result, she explained, is that a handful of zombie-makeup specialists have profited, and others have begun to study the art. This continual signaling can be upsetting, of course; every year, some workers in the system learn that they have no marketable skills. But on the whole, it is surely kinder than the factory system, in which workers are able to assess their market value only occasionally: when they first start working, when they switch jobs, when they ask for a raise or — worst of all — when they are fired, often en masse.
Automation has long been central to Hollywood, too, but it has less of a disruptive impact because of Hollywood’s project-based model. Some projects, like the CGI-laden work of James Cameron, begin with the sort of large capital outlay in new technology that we normally associate with manufacturing. But most films use technology incrementally, as individual craftspeople in each subfield decide to adopt these innovations.
I spoke with one cinematographer recently who said he was quite worried about the latest Hollywood technology: cameras operated by robots. The movie “Gravity,” for example, used cameras mounted on intelligent robotic arms, which laid the groundwork for the film’s dizzyingly realistic rendering of outer space. But that robot didn’t so much eliminate the need for a traditional cinematographer as clarify what it is, precisely, that cinematographers are able to do. If a cinematographer’s entire skill set was the ability to operate a camera, he surely would struggle to find work in an age of robotic camera operators. But a cinematographer’s value lies in his eye, the deep understanding about how an image moves or thrills an audience. (Grips, the workers who help move the camera through complex shots, might have cause for concern.)
Across the economy as a whole, we’re ending one era of robots and automation — the era of giant, clunky, expensive machines that require enormous technical training to operate — and entering a new era of the human-robot partnership, in which robots can be told what to do without the use of difficult programming languages but with fairly straightforward gestures and commands. The challenge will not be learning how to operate robots; it will be figuring out what, exactly, needs to be done and then using the robot to achieve that.
It’s probably not coincidental that the Hollywood model is ascendant at a time when telling stories, broadly speaking, is at the heart of American business. Because of automation, as well as the expansion of trade with so many low-wage nations, it is all but impossible to make a healthy profit in the United States by simply competing as the low-cost provider of a commoditized product or service. Profits need to come from that extra something that only your company can give, something for which customers are willing to pay a premium. I recently visited a cement factory where I was told a well-practiced story about how this quarry-and-kiln operation was part of the green revolution. Creating and communicating added value comes from many of the same skills that go into a movie: making sure that all of the elements of a product are harmonious, that they communicate the same values.
The Hollywood model isn’t good news for everybody. It clearly rewards education and cultural fluency, which are not distributed evenly throughout the population. But the Hollywood model does suggest that the winners in the new economy will be much greater than just some tiny 1 percent. It will be tens of millions of Americans, many of whom won’t have advanced degrees in engineering, but will have curiosity, creativity and more tools available to help them connect with their audience, whoever that may be.
Adam Davidson is a co-founder of NPR’s “Planet Money” and a contributing writer for the magazine.
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LIVELY Meeting Today! (Seymour Papert video and reference submitted by Bob Leonard)
Lively meeting today
Felt
like traction...loved Lisa's Sphero. It takes a page from, and updates
...Seymour Papert's Mindstorm... LOGO (turtle moving) language for kids
from the 60's.
Papert vid
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xMzojQFyMo0
Papert vid
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=
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Tuesday, May 5, 2015
Non-Profits Challenged by New Knowledge
Message for nonprofits: Changing world will pass you by unless you act now
EmailMessage for nonprofits: Changing world will pass you by unless you act now
"Threads Detroit" was the second of 14 conversations with nonprofit leaders across the country set to take place between late April and late August.
More than 1 million nonprofits provide for the common good, yet some of these organizations were created in a different time, for a different world, said Independent Sector’s President and CEO Diana Aviv.
“Is the nonprofit world positioned to succeed in a world changing at eye-popping speed?” Aviv asked.
As part of a strategic visioning process that began in December 2013, Independent Sector worked with Deloitte Consulting’s Monitor Institute to identify 40 trends facing the sector.
During the "Threads Detroit" conversation Monday, Aviv discussed the nine most urgent trends facing nonprofits over the next 15-20 years. The national organization lays them out fully on its website, but here’s the short version:
- Disruption from the unequal distribution of power and wealth and accelerating degradation of the environment, which together are expected to lead to social disruption and unforeseen innovation in political governance.
- Greater ethnic diversity in the country’s population and new generations of leadership as the millennials become senior leaders and baby boomers exit the workforce.
- Technology transforming learning, gathering and associations.
- Individuals “swarming” in loose networks around a shared purpose, joining forces as voters, consumers and community members and connecting with institutions as such.
- Businesses becoming increasingly engaged in social and environmental issues.
- New models for social welfare and social change emerging.
- The public’s voice possibly making a resurgence in policymaking, even as the wealthy with money to spend on political influence drive it.
- Partisan deadlock at the national level coming and going, while cities and states continue to respond to the needs of residents with local innovation, acting as the “laboratories of democracy.”
- Federal policymakers facing increasing pressure to make choices between the need to raise additional revenue and/or cut payouts or do some combination of the two, given national debt levels and the rising percentage of people eligible for assistance.
The world is changing at such a fast pace, “it will pass (nonprofits) by unless we take action” in responding to the trends, Aviv said.
The Detroit conversation and others taking place across the U.S. are meant to spur nonprofit leaders to ask questions about the issues discussed, she said. Are they considering diversity as they operate? Are they collaborating? Are they able to communicate with and relate to tech-savvy millennials?
“If people aren’t leaving here doing this, it’s at their own peril,” Aviv said. “The clock is ticking; we don’t have time to wait on these issues.”
After reviewing the national environment facing nonprofits, Aviv asked Detroit leaders to identify challenges they face in their efforts every day.
Nonprofits said that within their organizations, short-term measuring demands that don’t indicate systemic impact, the need to be nimble and get the public to support programs the government previously funded are among the issues presenting hurdles.
At the same time, the image of nonprofits, the need to apologize for fair compensation for top talent and competition among organizations with like missions rather than collaboration are holding the sector back, leaders said.
At the societal level, nonprofit leaders said racism, self-interest, declining educational levels of citizens and mistrust of public bodies, among other thing, are hampering their efforts.
Aviv said it was notable that nonprofit leaders in Detroit were thinking about issues far beyond the fundraising concerns the whole sector faces.
There was no shortage of challenges, to be sure, but Detroit also has plenty of bright spots.
Among the things nonprofit leaders in the region said they are proudest of: blight removal efforts in Detroit, revitalization in Midtown, the Washtenaw County funders collaborative for safety-net services, events such as Dlectricity and Art X Detroit, the “Grand Bargain” that preserved the Detroit Institute of Arts’ collection while shoring up Detroit pension plans, “greenway” walking and bicycling paths, the New Economy Initiative and other nonprofit efforts to help entrepreneurs across the region
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