Toward a Unified Metaphysical Understanding: Invitation to a Conversation    
 Invitation to a Conversation5 comments
2008-06-22, by John Ringland

I cordially invite all interested readers to engage in a conversation about the issues raised on this blog.

In this article I first explain my motivations for the invitation. Secondly, I identify some potential pitfalls in collective communication that we must seek to avoid. And finally I provide a flow-chart for a rational discourse that serves as a clear and binding guarantee / commitment that all participants will be civil, rational, impersonal and detached.

Motivation

The ideas that are expressed on this blog are NOT presented as part of a manipulative propaganda exercise but are presented so that they can be rigorously tested in a rational manner. I believe that they are potentially very accurate and very important ideas. If you agree or disagree then please explain why and we can test their accuracy and importance.

Whilst I will be gracious in regards to statements of opinion, these add nothing of real value to the conversation. Unlike many people I am not trying to build a 'following'. I do not present the ideas as “my ideas” to which the ego is personally attached, but as ideas that need to be tested in an impersonal, detached and rational manner, by as many people and from as many perspectives as possible.

My hope is that many diverse perspectives can come together in an impersonal, detached and rational manner to engage in civil conversation that systematically explores and tests the ideas themselves and their relevance to issues of contemporary importance.

I am passionate about the clarity and integrity of ideas and if egos try to play manipulative games (including my own ego) then I am passionate about setting them straight. This passion does not stem from ego defence mechanisms but from a love of truth and reality, what ever it may be. It is only through clarity and integrity of ideas that we may come to better know truth and reality, and thereby escape the prison of habitual delusions.

Pitfalls to Avoid

There is a malignant cynicism that infests the internet and more generally our human collective discourse. Hence I would not be surprised if many/most people coming by this blog assumed that I am just another one of the many ego maniacs on the internet, pushing 'my' ideas and mindlessly defending them through devious and manipulative means. I may be self-deceived but to the best of my knowledge that is NOT the case here. If you feel that it is then I especially invite you to discuss this issue. Overcoming the manipulative agendas of my own and other people's egos is my primary concern. The ego is a delusional tyrant that is the greatest enemy of Truth. When one's own ego is manipulating one's mind it is virtually impossible to discern for oneself. Honest and direct feedback from others can help one liberate oneself from the oppression of the ego.

Due to the malignant cynicism, there is an inherent inability for people to come together in meaningful ways, which makes us all victims of the propaganda war being waged against our minds. If we are to self-organise in effective ways we need to understand the situation. Below I paraphrase remarks from the book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team to illustrate some of the pitfalls that we must watch out for:

This book explores the fundamental causes of organizational politics and team failure. The five primary dysfunctions are:

(1)Absence of Trust: which stems from people's unwillingness to be vulnerable within the conversation. People who are not genuinely open with one another about their mistakes and weaknesses make it impossible to build a foundation for trust.

(2)Fear of Conflict: Failure to build trust is damaging because it results in fear of conflict. Conversations that lack trust are incapable of engaging in unfiltered passionate debate of ideas. Instead, they resort to veiled discussions and guarded comments.

(3)Lack of Commitment: Fear of conflict ensures a lack of commitment. Without having aired their opinions in the course of passionate and open debate, people rarely, if ever, buy in and commit to decisions or realisations, though they may feign agreement during the conversation.

(4)Avoidance of Accountability: Lack of real commitment ensures an avoidance of accountability. Without committing to decisions or realisations, even the most focused and driven people often hesitate to call their peers on actions and behaviours that seem counter-productive to the good of the conversation.

(5)Inattention to Results: Failure to hold one another accountable ensures inattention to results, which occurs when people put their individual needs (such as ego, opinions, unquestioned beliefs or reputation) above the collective goal of impersonal, detached and rational testing of ideas that may potentially be of great importance to the survival of humanity.

The list of know cognitive biases is very long and most people assume that they are unbiased, which leads to great confusion and frustration for them. One particularly disruptive type of bias is ego defence mechanisms, which are unconscious processes that seek to cling to cherished opinions regardless of how confused and arbitrary they may be, and to unconsciously use all manner of devious tactics to defend these opinions against any form of enquiry or possible revision. This bias is incompatible with rational discourse or clarity or intellectual integrity.

Flow-Chart for a Rational Discourse

It is only within conversational contexts that encourage the ego to “play the game of rational truth seeker” that effective reasoning is possible. In light of this I have drawn up a flow-chart. Think of it as a game board upon which we can play the game of rational truth seeker. The structure of the board is not set in stone and is open to discussion and revision, but it serves as a basic guide to help us create an impersonal, detached and rational conversation. Note that because this is a 'game' that does not make it meaningless and trivial. It may become very important and involve intense clashes of ideas, but it will remain within the scope of rational truth seeking and will not devolve into ego battles and propaganda war.

The flow-chart also serves as a common contract. If you enter the conversation you must abide by this contract and you can also expect other participants to abide by it as well. Hence it is a guarantee that you will receive civil, rational treatment and that there isn't some ego maniac lurking in the forum that will try to bight your head off as soon as you say something controversial.

The core features of a rational discourse, according to the above 'game' are: All participants make a commitment to the rational testing of ideas without personal attachment. They agree to abide by scepticism (open-minded enquiry), to mutual respect, to clear rational discourse and to a common agreement to avoid disruptive ego defence mechanisms such as cynicism, denial, personal attacks, etc. All participants in the discourse must also commit to engage in a primary-conversation as well as a meta-conversation about the primary-conversation to help clarify it and resolve issues that arise, not as part of the subject of the primary-conversation, but due to its form or conduct. If any participant perceives that another participant is engaging in cynicism or disruptive ego defence mechanisms within the primary-conversation then it is their duty to raise this in the meta-conversation where it can be clarified. Of course, if a person feels that they have been wrongly accused of such behaviour this can be addressed in the meta-conversation. If the disruptions continue in the meta-conversation the disruptive participant will be barred from the conversation until they calm down enough to re-engage with it. If the disruptions cannot be avoided then the conversation must relocate to a more favourable forum. Any disruptive and uncivil behaviour will NOT be tolerated and will be brought up in a meta-conversation to be dealt with.

These are core requirements but it is also desirable that people have some understanding of what knowledge is (epistemology), what logic is, what a rational argument is, what naïve realism is and also some understanding of facts, evidence, proof, etc. (see What is Knowledge, Science and Reasoning? for more information)

If you just wish to state an opinion these will be accepted graciously, but any uncivil behaviour will not be tolerated. A rational forum is not a place to vent anger and frustration; all such comments will be brought up in a meta-conversation and if the participant does not revise their comments into a more civil form they will be deleted.

If you simply wish to ask a question or provide some information then you will be met with a civil response.

The structure of the game will reside in the background whilst ever the conversation is flowing in a civil and rational manner. However its structure can be called upon by any participant whenever required. For example, someone enters the conversation ranting their opinions in an uncivil manner and is defensive toward any approach. Another participant can declare that the conversation should now move from state (16 to 19), I.e. a statement of opinion expressed in an uncivil manner that should be dealt with in a meta-conversation. This will either result in the statements being revised into a more civil form (19 to 17) or being deleted (19 to 18).

Another aspect, not obvious from the flow-chart, is that if a conversational stream gets locked into a loop there is a mechanism for breaking the loop. For example, say that someone is being civil but they present an incoherent, irrational or irrelevant argument, which then goes to a meta-discourse (4 to 14) in which they are required to explain or modify their argument (14 to 13) which is then reconsidered (13 to 4). This may need to loop several times, but if the person is simply unable or unwilling to present a coherent, rational and relevant argument but they keep persisting, then we could potentially get locked into the loop. Hence when we pass through a loop several times without any meaningful gain it will be questioned whether or not the loop is to continue. This does not result in expulsion, like with uncivil disruptions, but merely in the termination of the loop, whereupon the submitted 'argument' is reclassified as an 'opinion' and simply held on the record.

Note that if you are not an NCN member and are commenting via the public interface you will be required to provide a valid email address or a URL to your personal website. Anonymous or unverifiable comments will be deleted unless they make a meaningful contribution that stands on its own merits. This is to protect the conversation and its participants from anonymous, cynical disruption.

Given that on the game board persistent 'uncivil' behaviour results in expulsion from the conversation, I will clarify what I mean by 'uncivil'. It is applied in both an interpersonal context as well as an intellectual context. If a person is abusive, cynical, defensive to the point of interpreting any critique as an attack, a victim of their own ego defence mechanisms to a degree that makes them unable to engage in a rational dialogue or is otherwise disruptive and recalcitrant in a manner that creates a serious obstacle to open, direct, impersonal, detached, rational debate, then their behaviour will be considered uncivil. Other more subtle manifestations of uncivil behaviour are twisting other peoples words in order to misrepresent them, ignoring key arguments that one finds challenging whilst obsessing over others in order to avoid the key arguments, heaping irrelevant issues into the conversation in an attempt to complicate and confuse the issue and so on. If the charge of uncivil behaviour is made against someone they have every right to defend themselves in the meta-conversation but only in a civil manner.

The manner in which I use the term 'civil' is any behaviour that is conducive to open, direct, impersonal, detached, rational debate. It involves being reasonably polite, willing to give other's space in which to formulate their arguments without trying to 'stomp' on them, encouraging collective enquiry rather than factional dispute, willingness to enquire into arguments rather than just acting from one's own conditioned perceptions and trying to force the argument to fit into those, and actually thinking about what is being said rather than just poking around to find things to object to whilst not having any clear idea what the conversation is actually about.

It is my hope that people will be able to manage the game play in an autonomous manner, however as the 'moderator' I reserve final judgement in cases where this does not occur.



So please, feel free to be open and direct, there is no need for “veiled discussions and guarded comments” on this particular blog, indeed such things would be enquired into until they were openly and directly understood. You can play casually or play hard-ball, but only about the ideas. Be civil to the other participants! Enjoy the game!



Before joining the conversation, please read and accept this Invitation to a Conversation.



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5 comments

22 Jun 2008 @ 17:55 by Nathan Ives @74.237.55.215 : Organizational Accountability
StrategyDriven contributors believe accountable organizations are unique creatures; standing out from others because of their superior performance, greater employee loyalty, and higher customer satisfaction. Although the rewards are great, many companies will not embark on the journey to accountability because attaining and maintaining high levels of organizational accountability is extremely difficult.

Organizational accountability exists when all members of the workforce individually and collectively act to consequentially promote the timely accomplishment of the organization’s mission. Examined more closely, this means that:

* all members of the workforce: Includes executives, managers, and individual contributors. Executives and managers are responsible for holding their subordinates accountable for the effective and efficient conduct of activities supporting mission achievement. Subordinates, through their actions, set an example by which positive pressure is applied to their peers and seniors for greater accountability.

* individually act: Enough individuals throughout the organization must act accountably in order to achieve the critical mass necessary for the existence of an accountable organization. Some individuals, such as the chief executive officer, must exhibit and reinforce accountable behaviors for the organization to be truly accountable.

* collectively act: Often, groups of executives, managers, or individual contributors make and execute the organization’s decisions. Under these circumstances, it is critical that the group act in accordance with the organization’s values to accomplish its mission and avoid easy outs and the tendency to fall into a mode of group think.

* consequentially promote: Accountability cannot exist without both positive and negative consequences. To consequentially promote the organization’s mission implies that individuals and groups will not only act in ways that seek to accomplish the mission but will recognize and reward those who do so exceptionally and appropriately act to minimize behaviors less supportive of the organization’s goals.

* timely accomplishment of the organization’s mission: For accountability to exist, one must know what is to be accomplished and within what timeframe. No one can be accountable for accomplishing an undetermined goal for there is no basis against which to measure their accomplishments. Likewise, a goal that is not bound by time can never be considered to be incomplete or have insufficient progress because the individual or group working toward such a goal has an infinite amount of time to reach it.

Posts in our member’s only Organizational Accountability category explore the key attributes of accountable organizations and why many executives and managers intentionally or unconsciously avoid raising their organization’s accountability. Our posts identify the programs, processes, and actions that can be taken to help promote increased accountability. Finally, we examine the many benefits that accompany higher levels of organizational accountability and why accountable organizations realize them while others don’t.

Registered Members of the StrategyDriven website (www.StrategyDriven.com) receive access to the many StrategyDriven whitepapers, models, and members only categories Organizational Accountability and Decision-Making. Registration is FREE! If you have not already done so, please click here to register and join the conversation.

All the Best,
Nathan Ives
Principal Contributor and
co-Host, StrategyDriven Podcast
StrategyDriven

www.StrategyDriven.com  

22 Jun 2008 @ 18:13 by skookum : actually
I prefer telepathy... gets those pesky words out of the equation.

good for you though on your ideas.. very concise.. well thought..

a bit muddling for a right brain thinker like myself

forgive me on that one

I do believe there will be many who can benefit from your ideas.

marissa  

23 Jun 2008 @ 04:44 by anandavala : Organizational Accountability
Thank you Nathan and Marissa for your comments,

Regarding organisational accountability:
It is good to see such a clear focus on organisational accountability, it is a vitally important issue. The information provided shows clear insight into the issue. The article on Fact Based Management mentions that "accountable organizations strive to eliminate the subjectivity and raw opinion that is sometimes injected into the decision-making process; grounding decisions on a more tangible, objective foundation." In light of this approach I will offer a little analysis of the broader context and scope of organisations and organisational accountability.

It is a great idea but it seems to me to be too narrowly defined, or at least, its scope of applicability is not made clear. I see that by the terminology it is aimed specifically at corporate organisations but they exist within a real-world context and also, these things often get applied more broadly than their original context so I will consider it here within a broader context of human organisations in general. I'll run this idea by you all so that we can maybe look into some of the complexities of the situation. It may also shed some light on the specifically corporate context.

First I'll give some background and work towards clarifying what I mean. I will consider mainly the ideas contained within the statement: "Organizational accountability exists when all members of the workforce individually and collectively act to consequentially promote the timely accomplishment of the organization’s mission." I focus on this because it seems to be quite representative of the core of the ideas.

An organisation can be described as a system composed of an informal structure and a formal structure (link). The informal structure consists of individual humans, human relations, traditions, norms, the grape-vine, etc. The formal structure consists of teams, departments, inter-departmental relations, organisational mission statements, organisational rules, enforcement, incentives, monitoring, assets and equipment, etc. The formal structure attempts to control the energetic potential of the informal structure, by controlling the memetic flow throughout the system, in order to harness and channel its energy to meet the organisational goals. A human mind is a kind of memetic processor so by controlling the flow of memes the organisation controls the people's behaviour and weaves their collective behaviour into the organisation itself (link).

The situation of informal and formal structures is played out in all organisations to different degrees from families, to peer or professional groups, to community organisations, NGO's, corporations, industry groups, nations, economic blocs and human civilisation as a whole.

Organisations don't exist in isolation. There are organisations within organisations, just as in system theory there are systems within systems. And just as systems inter-penetrate each other, with sub-systems occupying roles within numerous super-systems, so too people and sub-organisations inter-penetrate numerous organisations. Each formal structure tries to control the individual in terms of its own agendas and often these agendas are in competition for the "human resource". This can create memetic conflict or tension within the individuals and sub-organisations involved.

If one defines an 'organisation' in a narrow sense, such as an individual corporation or NGO etc, then this complexity can seemingly be ignored but the complexity still remains to be dealt with in order for the organisation be truly accountable and able to perform effectively in the actual, and not just the idealised, context.

Given this more complex view of the organisational ecosystem I have a few questions. Which organisation's mission needs to be accomplished in order for there to be organisational accountability? What about the case of nested or inter-penetrating organisations? Each organisation will perceive the situation differently from its own perspective, so is it a purely relative term? The missions of family, company and nation may be at odds with each other in regards to the control of an individual. Although they don't necessarily need to be, but what if they are? Is it possible to derive a definition for organisational accountability within this wider context? If we cannot or do not, then can the more narrow definition be truly effective in providing real accountability?

Each organisation will tend to define its idea of 'mission' and 'accountability' from its own perspective and attempt to impose this on the situation. Hence there is an inherent multiplicity of subjective organisational perspectives, between which there are inevitable power struggles. This results in a Le Différand which is a term coined by the postmodern philosopher Lyotard who was seeking "a logical basis for support for epistemological multiplicity, for the positive value of non-totalizing argument." The term "marks[s] the boundaries between discourses that are unbridgeable by the ambitions of a total theory."(ref, link). Lyotard explored this phenomenon in depth in regards to the criminal justice system and its position of being the final arbiter of who is guilty and who is innocent. The justice system declares that its perspective is "the perspective" from which all such things are to be judged. However pragmatic this may be, it often leads to injustices because it fails to take proper account of other perspectives. This is particularly pronounced in cases where the laws are flawed in some way and thus there arises non-violent and open civil disobedience to help remedy the situation, in which case many people are penalised for doing what is required to safeguard their society.

The postmodern philosophy of Lyotard suggests that it would be impossible to define the concept of organisational accountability within the broader and more complex situation, simply because of the multiplicity of subjective organisational perspectives. It could still be a useful, but idealised, measure within a narrowly defined context but if considered to be objective and broadly applicable to organisations in general it could become a totalizing argument that denies other equally valid perspectives and thereby unintentionally allows for injustices to be perpetrated under the guise of organisational accountability. The more powerful organisations would impose their perspective and thereby do injustice to other organisational perspectives.

In my humble opinion, the only way around this dilemma and to make the idea more broadly applicable, would be to remove the subjective aspect from the definition. That is, it should not be defined in terms of the "accomplishment of the organization’s mission" but in other terms that can be applied to the whole, complex situation. Exactly what they may be I could only guess right now, perhaps "contribution to the overall harmony and sustainability of the entire civilisation and ecosystem". Given our current knowledge, such an indicator is only theoretical but may still be a useful guide.

The article on fact based management may provide some clue: "For instance, it is often said that organizations value their employee’s experience. Individual experience is an extremely difficult quality to quantify and therefore measure. Should experience be measured based on time? Or education? Or positions held? Or some combination of all of these things? Ultimately, organizations value experience because of the benefits it brings, namely, a combination of higher-quality results and improved productivity. Both of these qualities are far more quantifiable than the more subjective quality of experience." So perhaps there is some measurable quantifier that can be found that spans the true complexity of the situation. Systems theory might be a good place to look as well.

But if organisational accountability is defined in terms of particular organisations and their particular perspectives then there will be inevitable Le Différands. If true organisational accountability is what is sought then the approach needs to explicitly take account of this complexity and multiplicity of perspectives, at least to provide an understanding of the limits of the scope of its applicability, otherwise it is likely to be applied beyond its safe limits. If this is neglected then organisational conflict may arise that would be damaging to the whole situation. The sub-organisations and individual humans involved may be torn between competing memetic forces, creating serious confusion and conflict. It can potentially result in loss of productivity, nervous breakdown, depression, sociopathic behaviour, terrorism and suicide for the individuals (link) and analogous problems for the sub-organisations.

These ideas are suggestive of some underlying issues in our current organisational context. They might be worth considering. What do you think?

This comment was also posted to the article Organizational Accountability Introduction in the Organisational Accountability category on www.StrategyDriven.com.  

23 Jun 2008 @ 19:16 by a-d : still working
on this one! : )
Some good points here.Thanks!.../A-d  

2 Aug 2008 @ 18:29 by David Ricks @70.10.209.18 : I like your approach
Nathan,
You have formalized, expanded and made explicit some of the basic tenets of conversation generally and Internet etiquette particularly.
I would like to explore the site and perhaps ask questions when I understand a bit more.
Thank you,
David  

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