Making the case for STA:C in 15 slides: How and why people’s space-time-action cognitions should be studied as a triplex — Part II

Again, this 15-slide briefing-style post an earlier incomplete version I posted in 2017 (here). Because this newly expanded revised updated post is rather long for a blog post and way too long for a simultaneous Facebook page post, I’m issuing it in three separate sections: Part I, this Part II, plus an Addendum.

This new post assumes a passing familiarity with the STA:C framework. If you are unfamiliar but interested, see prior posts throughout this blog, starting with a background story (here) and a preliminary overview (here).

PART II

Slide 10: Idealized Depiction of STA:C Framework

The depiction recapitulates what a mind (or culture) should look like, at its comprehensive best: developed, balanced, knowledgeable, and attentive in all three cognitive domains. All three — space, time, action — are recognized and weighted equally, as are their overlaps (i.e., fusions, interactions). What may be a cognitive “sweet spot” lies at the core. I’ve added a feedback arrow to indicate that reciprocal adjustments and adaptations (OODA Loops?) are bound to occur as actors apply their cognitions to real-world thinking and doing.

Of course, many minds and cultures may not conform to this idealized depiction. They may be more emphatic and elaborate about one element, less so about another. If so, the diagram can be altered to depict that particular mind or culture. I should also note that the diagram implies that there is content, yet here it is devoid of specific content — e.g., about whether a time sense is more future- or past-oriented. That would have to be identified, and a display methodology determined (“word clouds”?), for the particular person or culture being studied. I doubt there is an ideal content for each cognitive domain; instead, what may be “ideal” is that it vary from individual to individual and from culture to culture (in accordance with Darwinian principles?). For example, as noted in other blog posts here, there is a large literature about differences between Western and Asian cultures and related modes of perception, and much of it comes down to differences in space, time, and action perspectives. Which I’d say further confirms that STA:C offers a sound way to make comparisons.

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Note: Diagraming with 2-D circles must suffice for now. 3-D shapes, if I knew how to draw them, could convey better that the three STA:C elements may fit and function together much like a molecular bundle.

Slide 11: Space, Time, & Action As Our Cardinal Cognitions

As a result of the above, space, time, and action (or agency) may be deemed people’s cardinal or prime social cognitions, the fundaments of consciousness itself. They emerge and develop during infancy and are sine qua non for the rest of people’s lives, as a triad or triplex. The same goes for cultures. Every culture around the world develops its own distinctive nature in large part because of the dispositions it instills in people about social space, time, and action.

These three social cognitions form, function, and should be studied as a triplex — not singly. Consider frequent claims that space and time orientations are important as a pair — that’s common in the social sciences. Yet, without the addition of the action orientations to the cognitive bundle, subjects would simply sit there, inert, and their space-time orientations would mean nothing for cause or consequence. It may be a leap, from showing that experts studying any one of the three cognitive-cultural elements will inevitably recognize all three, to showing that the three combined are our primary or cardinal cognitions and should be viewed and studied as a triplex. But I am suggesting that it can and will be shown eventually — even if I am not the one to do it.

Whenever I question whether space, time, and action are sufficient to comprise our cardinal cognitions, I keep looking for what else may be cardinal — what I may be missing. So far, I don’t see what else. For example, some studies treat “the self” as a key cognition. But then the discussion is about the self as an entity that senses differentiations from and connections to others — which is a spatial orientation. Or that the self is expressed through expectations and aspirations — a time orientation. Or that the sense of self evolves as one learns to use tools and see cause-effect relations — an action or agency orientation. In other words, the ensuing discussion is about the self as a set of space-time-action orientations. I take this to mean that “the self” (not to mention perception of “the other”) is not a separate cognition that lies outside STA:C — it fits fine under or into STA:C’s triad. (Of course, there are cognitions that don’t obviously fit STA:C — e.g., the cognition of “beauty”. But I don’t see that as a problem that invalidates STA:C.)

While lots of literatures exist about the importance of each of the three cognitive domains, I can’t find any literature claiming the triplex is as cardinal as I am hypothesizing. Thus I cannot do much more than offer the hypothesis. But I’d further insist on it by noting parallels from physics and philosophy: Space, time, and action may be the cardinal cognitions, much as red, blue, and yellow are the primary colors; and space, time, and energy/mass (or something akin) are the fundaments of physics. Isaac Newton posited that physics rested on observations about space, time, and momentum. Immanuel Kant posited that the mind rests on conceptions of space, time, and causality. Sheldon Wolin argued that political metaphysics rest on ideas about space, time, and energy (the last in the form of power). STA:C amounts to an extension of all this.

Slide 12: What STA:C Can Be Good At: Improving Theory & Practice

As a triplex framework, STA:C is potentially better for everything the experts say their single- and dual-element frameworks are good for. Indeed, STA:C is a more inclusive, comprehensive, and accurate way to approach the fundaments of cognition and culture.

This and the next slide list some topics where I’d propose applying STA:C. Each topic is broad and could take up an entire blog post, but I offer only brief sketchy remarks here. This is just a partial list, for most of these topics reflect my limited personal interests in national-security matters. Of all the slides in this post, these may be the two most in need of future revisions, including to better reflect non-security matters.

• Analyzing cognition and culture — all mentalities and all cultures rest on space-time-action presumptions, principles: I’ve made this point so many times throughout this post that I shall refrain from elaborating again here. But it deserves to lead this list.

• Analyzing evolutionary progress & regress — both personal and social evolution depend on all three STA:C elements, not just one: STA:C offers a better way to understand evolutionary progress and regress, be that in the form of personal or social evolution. Jean Piaget’s space- and time-focused writings about the cognitive growth of children speaks to this at the personal level. So do Zimbardo & Boyd’s time-centric writings about cognitive therapy for adolescents and adults. As for social evolution, I’m a proponent of TIMN, and I’ve previously noted that each TIMN form (Tribes, Institutions, Markets, Networks) is associated with different STA:C orientations. More could be done with this. (For clarification, see sidebar and table titled “TIMN vis à vis STA” here.)

• Tracking & anticipating cultural shifts — from reversions to tribalism, to prospects for a better future for America; a new look at “human terrain” analysis abroad: What I mostly have in mind is rethinking opinion polls and attitude surveys. They are regularly used to track American’s views about consumer confidence, or government performance, or social policy, etc. The ones I’ve seen often contain questions, scales, and other measures that try to get at people’s space-time-action perceptions — but not deliberately and systematically, in ways that cover all three cognitions. I’d suggest that STA:C may provide a sound theoretical basis for designing polls and surveys that are supposed to reflect people’s key cognitions. A concern I’d raise is understanding and tracking the reversions to tribalism spreading all across America, as people lose confidence in our leaders and institutions and become polarized. Much of this is reflected in shifts in people’s space-time-action perceptions — a reason to propose new kinds of surveys so they covered all of STA:C’s principles, the better to track tribalization trends.

Meanwhile, as a TIMN quadriformist, I keep looking for positive signs that a new +N/network sector is emerging — maybe a “commons sector” that will function very differently from our established public and private sectors. If/as it takes shape, it will mean a profound systemic transformation for our society. While I usually discuss this prospect in TIMN’s organizational terms, STA:C’s cognitive elements are at stake too. For it will mean recognizing and approving an entirely new “space” where the “future” is reimagined and “agency” operates differently. Which makes me wonder, speculatively, whether STA:C (not to mention TIMN) could be used to track, anticipate, and even shape such a transformative future prospect.

Finally, the Pentagon’s ill-fated Human Terrain System (HTS) is also relevant to mention here. Its teams were supposed to improve cultural awareness and cultural intelligence for U.S forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. But it floundered from lack of competence and acceptance, among other reasons. I initially thought HTS was a good idea, when Montgomery McFate proposed it. But it soon became clear that, in practice, HTS and its trainers were unable to provide clear conceptual directions. I think something like STA:C (combined with TIMN) could have provided a coherent incisive framework for proceeding.

Slide 13: What STA:C Can Be Good At, cont.

Again, STA:C is good for everything that the single- and dual-element frameworks are said to be good for. This second slide continues in the fashion of the first, specifying particular topics where STA:C could improve upon existing single- and dual-element approaches to analyzing people’s cognitions and the implications for behavior.

• Analyzing & explaining extremist mindsets — terrorist, millenarian, other radical mentalities; CVE analysis: Many terrorism analyses, some related to CVE (countering violent extremism) efforts, emphasize psychological conditions — e.g., humiliation, alienation, etc. They could do better by digging into terrorists’ space, time, and action orientations. When they come close to doing so, most analysts have emphasized aspects of terrorists’ time and/or action orientations. Yet, their space orientations (e.g., sense of isolation from and/or connectedness to other) may be more determinative. STA:C urges a comprehensive approach. I’ve already written various posts about this, including here and in my post about Zimbardo & Boyd’s time-perspective theory.)

• Thinking about strategy & tactics — positioning for spatial, temporal, agentic advantages: STA:C may provide a fresh way to think about strategy. Strategy is traditionally treated as the art of relating ends, ways, and means, and sometimes as the art of positioning. STA:C implies that strategy is the art of positioning for spatial, temporal, and agentic (actional) advantages. To think about strategy, STA:C says to assess space, time, and action factors as a set. Don’t focus just on time and space factors, treating action mostly as a dependent variable, as some strategy writers tend to do, however insightful their work (e.g., Cunningham & Tomes, 2004).

• Waging cognitive warfare: Adopting a STA:C view of strategy may help particularly with the newest form of warfare we face: cognitive warfare — strategic information warfare waged to affect people’s hearts and minds, by means of information operations that deploy “militarized narratives” and “toxic memes” to polarize, tribalize, and atomize a society. As recent events involving Russian “active measures” reveal, we must learn to counter and conduct cognitive warfare more competently. STA:C (not to mention TIMN) identifies where some of the keys lie — they’re in people’s space-time-action cognitions that incline them to extreme tribalism.

• Constructing cognitive architectures for AIs: Finally, whenever I occasionally read about the prospects for cognition and consciousness in artificial intelligences (AIs), I wonder how much that will may depend on the development of technologies to generate space, time, and action senses. After all, isn’t the Google self-driving car a set of technologies — sensors, modules, algorithms — for just that? I’ve never seen AI discussed in STA:C-like terms; but I’ve long mused that doing so could prove conceptually and technically useful.

Slide 14: Thinking Back — Looking Ahead

• The idea that space-time-action orientations form and function together, and that a framework / theory could be constructed around the idea, occurred to me during a nap in 1966 or 1967, almost as an epiphany, back when I was in graduate school. So, STA:C has been obvious to me since then — over fifty years ago. Meanwhile, perhaps fortuitously for me, no on else has come up and run with the idea. I still have a chance to originate it. Yet, why hasn’t it been obvious to others? I remain baffled.

• A good explanation may be the nature of academia — the ways it fosters specialization, compartmentalization, and credentialism, along with conceptual and departmental rivalries. The study of social space seems centered around postmodern, often neo-Marxist sociologists who are politicized. The study of time perspectives seems mostly in the hands of psychologists, as does the study of agency — but separate from each other. Plus, there are cognitive scientists (e.g., George Lakoff, Steven Pinker) whose writings delve into space and time perspectives, but again on their own. I’ve noticed conferences being held about space, or time, or agency orientations — but never about any two together, though an isolated presentation or paper occasionally addresses space and time perspectives together. In other words, cross-field communication seems absent; the specialists seem siloed; and academia seems rife with obstacles to what I am proposing. Over the decades, I’ve made a dozen or so email efforts to contact selected academic experts about STA:C, usually to point out a blog post, but always to no real avail, no expressions of interest. They may have good reasons for being unresponsive, and I stand ready to be corrected if my impressions above are poorly informed — yet I can’t help but wonder whether the “Parable of the Elephant and the Blind Men” may apply here.

• (Re)naming STA:C might help: I use that acronym (and earlier ones) as short-hand, so I don’t have to write out every time that I mean “my prospective framework about people’s space-time-action orientations and their significance for consciousness, cognition, and culture”. But acronyms are surely not the best way to go. A short name could help. The term “social cognitive theory” (or “social cognition theory”) seems apt — but it’s already taken, for it’s the name used by Bandura and his colleagues for his/their agency-centered theory. Maybe try “mindframe analysis” or “cognitive-cultural theory”, or, better yet, “triplex cognition theory”. Maybe a reader can come up with something better. A good name could help with garnering an identity and acceptance for STA:C.

• I keep saying that space-time-action cognitions form and function as an embedded triplex in people’s minds, and should be studied as such. Yet I have no proof; and I’m not in a position to prove that this space-time-action triplex truly exists in people’s minds. There is plenty of scholarly proof about each single element. But proving that all three form and function as a bundle, much like a module, seems like a grand challenge — one that will have to be taken up by aspiring theorists other than myself.

• My closing exhortation, then, is that if any readers are in the process of studying any one of the three cognitions, you/they should change direction and turn to analyzing all three, as a bundle. Try it out. See what happens. Go transcend the conventional practice of focusing on just one of the three.

Slide 15: Wrap-Up Advice for Fully Developing STA:C

At this lateness in my life, I’ll keep working on writing up bits and pieces about STA:C. But I won’t be able to fully develop STA:C, least of all write the book-length treatment it deserves. Nonetheless, I still say STA:C is full of promise, and others would be well-advised to pick it up and work it out.

Here’s some advice I have for you who may do so:

• Make an evermore convincing case for treating space, time, and action (agency) cognitions as a triplex bundle: I just discussed this above, but it deserves a further mention in this advice column.

• Identify propositions for each that may generalize across all three: For example, minds that are orderly, and intent on being orderly, in one dimension may also tend to be orderly in the other two. If so, they may focus on restoring such order if a cognitive disturbance occurs. Thus, a mind that prefers to focus far more on the future than on the past or present, or far more on the self than on the world at large, may prove difficult to shift away from that focus. However, if orientations along one dimension do shift sharply, this may induce a shift in one or both of the other two dimensions. I’ve wondered about this before (here). Furthermore, as I tried to propose here, basic distinctions about conservative and progressive mentalities may reduce to differences in their respective space, time, and action orientations, particularly their sensitivities about boundaries and horizons. My point is, look for propositions that include consideration of all three elements, not just one or two. Thus, to give another example, if a single-element specialist claims that a contraction or deformation in that element may make a person’s life much more difficult to cope with — or vice-versa that extreme life difficulties can lead to a contraction or deformation in a person’s agency (or spatial, or temporal) orientations — then go ask whether this is true for all three cognitive domains and what the interactions are. Put limits on single-element thinking and analysis.

• Specify typologies for each of the three — and relate them to each other: Easier said than done, but I’d sure urge working on it. I’ve seen plenty of typologies about time, fewer about space or action/agency orientations, and no effort to relate them to each other and propose a composite typology, not even by theorists who write about space and then about time (e.g., Gurvitch). Time orientations seem easiest to typologize for research purposes since they can be easily separated into past, present, and future orientations (e.g., à la Zimbardo & Boyd). But that barely captures the richness and variety of people’s actual time orientations, as seen in more convoluted typologies (e.g., Gurvitch). Meanwhile, I’ve yet to see a typology of space or agency orientations that looks pertinent for triplex cognition theory. My own view of space orientations is that identification of the following should be included: the actors, objects, and structures defining the space — their identity, distribution, scope, relative size and strength; connections and pathways that link them; layout in terms of centers, distances, boundaries, horizons; divisions or partitions into realms, domains, layers; as well as organization of all the above into whole systems (as I noted here). But how to turn that into a manageable typology, one that can be criss-crossed with parallel time and agency typologies, is beyond me at the moment. I just sense it’s a potentially valuable agenda item for triplex cognition analysis.

• Design methodologies — e.g., questionnaires, indicators, scales, etc. — for measuring and mapping people’s views across all three cognitive domains: Separate methodologies have long existed for each of the three, and many incidentally include questions, indicators, or scales that actually measure one of the other two elements, not the one purportedly being studied. Combing through these while seeking to combine them may be useful. But my sense is that new methodologies may need to be developed, especially if they are to get at interactions and fusions among the three cognitions.

• Seek recognition and feedback from experts on each of the three cognitions. So far, I’ve not been able to succeed at that. Meanwhile, present write-ups to spread the word — persuade new scholars to join in developing and applying triplex cognition theory.

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SEE ADDENDUM NEXT

Making the case for STA:C in 15 slides: How and why people’s space-time-action cognitions should be studied as a triplex — Part I

This 15-slide briefing-style post supersedes an earlier incomplete version I posted in 2017 (here). Because this newly expanded revised updated post is rather long for a blog post and way too long for a simultaneous Facebook page post, I’m issuing it in three separate sections: Part I, Part II, plus an Addendum.

This new post assumes a passing familiarity with the STA:C framework. If you are unfamiliar but interested, see prior posts throughout this blog, starting with a background story (here) and a preliminary overview (here).

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Slide 1: People’s space-time-action perspectives: How they’ve been studied. How they should be studied.

After brief opening points about why people’s space-time-action beliefs are so interesting to know, Part I surveys how experts have usually studied them. I provide detailed depictions of renowned writings by Henri Lefebvre, Philip Zimbardo & John Boyd, and Albert Bandura. Part II then proceeds to argue how and why STA:C offers a better way to go, once the framework is fully developed.

PART I

Slide 2: Why Study People’s Space, Time, and Action Beliefs

Myriad anthropology, psychology, sociology, cognitive science, history, and other studies — in my case, starting with anthropologist Edward T. Hall’s The Silent Language (1959) and The Hidden Dimension (1966) — have shown that people’s space, time, and action beliefs are powerful pervasive shapers of cognition and culture.

Consider, for example, the following observation about time: “[Man's] image of the future is his propelling power. … [T]he rise and fall of images of the future precedes or accompanies the rise and fall of cultures.” (Fred Polak, The Image of the Future, 1955). That’s a keen observation, not only in general, but also for wondering about current trends here in America, as well as Europe.

And that’s just a single quote from many about the significance of people’s time orientations. In addition, there are numerous equally powerful observations about the import of people’s space and action perspectives. For further quotes see the Addendum that accompanies this post.

What all this means is that the better we can ascertain people’s space-time-action perceptions, the better we can figure out why people think and behave as they do, and why societies and cultures evolve as they do. Motivated by this understanding of why to study space-time-action orientations, this post seeks to improve our understanding of how to study them.

Slide 3: How People’s Space, Time, and Action Perspectives Have Been Studied

The idea that people’s space, time, and action orientations — all three together — are key elements of cognition and culture first struck me in 1966 or 1967. Back then, lots of studies dwelled on each orientation by itself, but never as a triplex. Wherever I looked, space, time, or action perspectives were mostly studied singularly — still the case today. Thus most studies have resembled the diagrams on the left, where each element is treated separately, though one or both of the other two might be raised tangentially, marginally.

Most of these single-element studies were about space or time orientations, and were mostly done by psychologists, sociologists, or anthropologists. Handy examples include Nigel Thrift’s “Space” (2006) and Margaret Wertheim’s The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet (1999), along with Jean Piaget’s The Child’s Conception of Time (1969 [1946]) and John Hassard’s edited collection on The Sociology of Time (1990). Studies that focused on people’s action (agency, efficacy) orientations were less common, and were mostly by psychologists — e.g., Albert Bandura’s Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control (1997). Or they appeared in histories about the idea of “progress” that studied shifts ages ago from ancient beliefs that supernatural forces determined one’s fate, to modern beliefs that a person could make changes and control one’s destiny by means of one’s own efforts.

Dual-element studies, as depicted in the upper-right diagram, are infrequent by comparison. A handful or so of theorists (e.g., Jean Piaget, Georges Gurvitch, Edward T. Hall, David Harvey) have studied both space and time orientations, though not always integratedly. Very unusual, thus not depicted here, are instances where space and action (as in Steven Pinker, 1997) or time and action (à la Karl Friston, 2017) are deemed the key dual cognitions. Meanwhile, I’ve rarely seen methodological or theoretical exhortations that a dual- should be preferred to a single-element approach.

Since my initial epiphany in 1966, I’ve dithered at focusing on the idea that people’s space-time-action orientations should be studied as a bundled triplex. But what I’ve read over the years indicates, to my surprise, that no one else has yet gone on to do so. So I’ve remained resolute that my initial idea is still fairly original and worth pursuing. Hence, the depiction on the bottom-right shows what STA:C looks like to me. All three cognitive domains — space, time, and action — exist as independent but interactive variables, roughly equal in importance.

Thus I contend that the singular and dual approaches represented by these diagrams, though not entirely wrong, are incomplete and thus inherently self-limiting and misleading. The STA:C diagram points to a more accurate productive way to study these three cardinal elements of consciousness, cognition, and culture.

Slide 4: What This Briefing-Style Post Does

In trying to analyze how theorists have studied people’s space, time, and action orientations, I’ve been unable to do original research to verify and advance STA:C. But what I can do, as a partial substitute, is review expert studies on each of the three cognitive elements, in order to see whether they ultimately turn to attend to all three to some degree. So I chose to review three renowned studies: Henri Lefebvre’s The Production of Space (1974), Philip Zimbardo & John Boyd’s The Paradox of Time (2008), and Albert Bandura’s Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control (1997).

My goal was to ascertain whether, and to what degree, these experts on one STA:C element inevitably include some attention to all three. STA:C says to attend to all three; it also implies that, to be analytically sound, an expert on any one element is bound to bring up the other two, if only marginally, for there is no way to avoid doing so. But do these scholars do so? To what extent? In what terms?

Along the way, I came up with a comparative diagramming method for depicting each expert’s effort. As will be evident in subsequent slides, I found their efforts be incomplete — grist for validating STA:C and arguing it can do better.

Slide 5: How the STA:C Diagnostic Diagrams Are Laid Out

As a way to represent an analyst’s view, I’ve settled on drawing diagrams that use a circle to represent each STA:C element — space, time, and action — and then I’ve drawn and arranged these circles so that:

• Circle sizes — large to small — represent the relative importance attributed to a STA:C element.
• Circle locations — overlaps, separations — indicate the degree of interaction an analyst notices among the three STA:C elements.
• Circle line densities — from solid and thick, to dotted and thin — indicate my sense of the relative clarity of each element in an analyst’s treatment.

For example, look at the two diagrams on this slide. The one on the left shows what the STA:C framework aspires to look like — all three elements are equally represented and interlaced. In contrast, the diagram on the right displays one of innumerable other possible outcomes where the space, time, and action elements may each receive different emphases. (Actually, it’s the diagram from the next slide depicting Lefebvre’s analysis.)

Besides enabling a display of how any one analyst approaches space-time-action analysis, this kind of diagraming also offers a way to compare different analysts’ approaches. To this end, the diagrams in the next slides display what I found in reading Lefebvre on space, Zimbardo & Boyd on time, and Bandura on action. All diagrams are preliminary and impressionistic on my part. Your view may differ — in which case, draw your own version, or suggest I redraw.

Slide 6: Henri Lefebvre’s Approach in The Production of Space (1974)

French philosopher/sociologist Henri Lefebvre’s The Production of Space (1974 [translation, 1991]) remains a favorite landmark text among postmodern, mostly Marxist theorists who are caught up in the “spatial turn” in sociology that began a few decades ago. I like the book too.

Lefebvre proposed that space is a cardinal mental and social concept that merits far more attention from theorists and strategists. Indeed, he says, “the production of space” — all kinds of spaces, by all kinds of actors — has become a paramount activity in advanced societies. Producing spaces is now a defining activity of capitalism, more than producing commodities. Thus he not only advocates space as a grand analytical concept; he forecasts that societies are moving into an era when producing and controlling space will be increasingly viewed as a key strategic purpose.

While he does not offer a typology, he identifies innumerable categories and distinctions about physical, mental, and social spaces. Accordingly, “social space” first took form ages ago as a mostly “natural space”; then as modern forces took hold, it evolved into “absolute space” and “abstract space”. What’s important analytically is to figure out how to “decode” space and identify “spatial codes” that powerful actors use. In particular, he observes, “The ideologically dominant tendency divides space up into parts and parcels” — it works to separate all sorts of spaces from each other (e.g., public and private) and treat each as a “passive receptacle”.

While Lefebvre focuses on space, he devotes great attention to time as well. Indeed, he views time as a co-equal concept in terms of nature, physics, and philosophy. But much as he would like for space and time to operate in “unity” in the social world, he finds that one or the other has tended to prevail in different historical periods. In the current period, he argues, time has been “confined”, even “murdered” by the modern state and capitalism — hence the growing significance of space, especially “abstract space”.

Lefebvre doesn’t write explicitly about the action element, but his treatment of “strategy” is somewhat cognate. In places, his treatment seems to be about people having an independent capacity for agency; but in other places, his treatment seems to treat strategy as a dependent implication of his space-time analysis. His forecast that societies are moving into an era when producing and controlling space is a key strategic purpose presumes, I would say, an action perspective, as does his view that the powers-that-be operate to split spaces up into parts and pieces they can dominate. But he also pushes two strategy points that read like dependent implications about what people should do: reunite disassociated spaces and generate bottom-up pluralism, including to create local self-managed autonomous zones outside the control of the state and its attendant networks

Hence, in my depiction of Lefebvre, the largest circle is about space. Time merits a large circle too. And the space and time circles deserve a strong overlap. But his treatment of action in terms of “strategy” figures less strongly and less clearly — so I’ve rendered it with a small circle, sketchy line density, and little overlap.

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Source: my three blog posts reviewing his book, beginning here.

Slide 7: Philip Zimbardo & John Boyd’s Approach in The Paradox of Time (2008)

This slide depicts what I conclude from reading psychologists Philip Zimbardo & John Boyd’s book The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That Will Change Your Life (2008) — a significant psychological study in the guise of a self-help therapy book.

Here, the largest circle by far goes to time, for, in their view, “time perspective” is “one of the most powerful influences on human thought, feeling, and action”. At the core of their study is a typology that identifies “six time perspectives: two past, two present, and two future” that are “the six most common time perspectives in the Western world”. These are: past-negative; past-positive, present-fatalistic, present-hedonistic, future, and transcendental-future — lately modified to distinguish between future-positive and future-negative. This typology organizes their analysis about the significance of people’s time perspectives for their individual lives and for societies as a whole.

As for action, Zimbardo & Boyd recognize the importance of “control” and “efficacy”. But their discussion tends to suborn and embed “control” within their treatment of time. Thus, in my depiction, action merits a medium-size circle, with a sketchy line density, that ends up almost entirely engulfed within the time circle.

There is no discussion of space as a distinct perceptual domain — only scattered disparate references to various spatial elements (e.g., a person’s perceptions about self-worth, family, government). Hence, I’ve drawn the space circle quite small, with the sketchiest line density, and placed it almost entirely outside (though maybe it too belongs inside) the time circle.

Their approach and its limitations is most evident when they try to explain why somebody may become a terrorist. The authors emphasize having “a “transcendental-future time perspective” as a condition. And they propose that U.S. policy and strategy should deal with this and other matters by focusing on changing people’s time perspectives. It’s a potentially useful notion; but it makes only limited sense, for they play down crucial space and agency perceptions that are embedded in their write-up (and widely written about by experts elsewhere).

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Source: my four posts reviewing their book, beginning here.

Slide 8: Albert Bandura’s Approach in “Toward a Psychology of Human Agency” (2006 [1997])

For psychologist Albert Bandura, agency — the ability “to influence intentionally one’s functioning and life circumstances” — is crucial to cognition, because “malleability and agentic capability are the hallmark of human nature.” Developing an “agentic self” is one of life’s most meaningful endeavors, for it means a person “can generate a wider array of options”. Personal efficacy beliefs are thus the “foundation of human agency”.

His article “Toward a Psychology of Human Agency” (2006) analyzes psychological agency and efficacy in ways that match what action means in the STA:C framework. Thus, in my depiction, action receives the largest, boldest circle. Since he and other experts in his field prefer the terms agency and efficacy, maybe I should do so too. But for now I am sticking with action as the A in STA:C. Readers who prefer agency to action should just go ahead and do so.

Bandura does not name time as a factor that affects agency and efficacy. But he does attend to the importance of “forethought” and other aspects of people’s future orientations (e.g., anticipation, expectation, optimism, pessimism). So my depiction renders time as a medium-sized circle that is not clearly defined but has a strong interaction with the action element. To my puzzlement, he regards forethought as “the temporal extension of agency” — suborning time to action, rather than treating time as a separate cognitive domain.

Bandura affords space no explicit theoretical attention. But spatial qualities do appear, at least implicitly, in what he writes about the formation of individual identities and the perception of other actors in one’s environment. Indeed, spatial cognitions lie behind the “three modes of agency” he identifies: personal, proxy, and collective agency. From a STA:C standpoint, these modes are more spatial than agentic in nature, for they presume that one’s environment — or space — contains other actors who can connect to each other. As a result, space receives the smallest, vaguest circle in my depiction.

Finally, like Lefebvre and Zimbardo & Boyd, Bandura draws some implications for policy and strategy. As a result of the information revolution, other technological advances, and economic globalization, he says that agency is being amplified in all sorts of ways around the world, for positive as well as “hazardous” purposes. And he warns that “Through collective practices driven by a foreshortened perspective, humans may be well on the road to outsmarting themselves into irreversible ecological crises”. Maybe so, but while Bandura emphasizes how people’s agency is being amplified nowadays, many people also sense, to the contrary, that globalization has deprived them of agency — just look at recent shifts in public opinion in the United States and Europe. Also, his reference to a “foreshortened perspective” means he is again obliquely inserting a time element in his theorizing about agency — another reason for preferring STA:C.

(Source: my two posts reviewing his paper, beginning here — they explain why I chose to rely on his 2006 article instead of his renowned but very long book Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control (1997)).

Slide 9: Comparing Experts’ Views Helps Validate STA:C

Here’s what I conclude from this small survey of writings by Lefebvre on space, Zimbardo & Boyd on time, and Bandura on action:

• Each expert emphasizes his singular specialty — space, time, or action/agency — but each eventually turns to incorporate some aspects of all three elements, more-or-less. Indeed, from a STA:C perspective there is no way to avoid doing so. These specialists are actually studying a cognitive and cultural bundle that consists of all three orientations — but they are doing so narrowly, and evidently unknowingly, from their singular angles. Indeed, my three reviews here are less about each writing itself than about an overarching purpose that serves STA:C — to show that each expert, despite dwelling on a single element, must eventually say at least a little something about all three.

• Inspection of these writings thus helps confirm that people’s space-time-action orientations tend to function as a bundle — a requisite set of interlaced cognitive-knowledge elements that no mind or culture can do without, and whose details shape the distinctive nature of all minds and cultures. The more we learn about analyzing people’s space-time-action orientations, the more we shall realize that all three are so deeply interlaced in our minds and cultures that they form an essential cognitive “module”.

• If I’m right about that, then the unfolding of that realization should / will matter not only across academic disciplines, but also to real-world strategists of all stripes. But getting there won’t be quick and easy. Specialized academic fields tend to resist change; thus it may take lots of effort to “prove” that space-time-action orientations exist and function as a triplex, and should be studied as such rather than singly. As for national-security and military strategists, some writings show they are more aware than academics that spatial and temporal factors should be analyzed jointly (as I will document later), but I’ve yet to see an integrated triplex analysis by a strategist even though action/agency is their end concern.

• No matter the current resistance to triplex cognition analysis, my comparison of the three expert writings leads me to reiterate anew the maxim I posited way up front: Figure out people’s space-time-action orientations as a trifold bundle, and you will be able to assess how people will think and act better than ever.

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NOTE: I keep referring to space-time-action orientations as a “module”. But I don’t mean this literally. Neuroscientist Patricia Churchland explains better than I can when she proposes that the term “module” be retired from neuroscience:

“The concept of ‘module’ in neuroscience (meaning sufficient for a function, given gas-in-the-tank background conditions) invariably causes more confusion than clarity. The problem is that any neuronal business of any significant complexity is underpinned by spatially distributed networks, and not just incidentally but essentially — and not just cortically, but between cortical and subcortical networks.” (source)

Nonetheless, until a better term comes along, I’m going to keep referring to a STA:C “module”. But I mean it more metaphorically than literally. There is no specific pop-in / pop-out module for a mind’s (or culture’s) space-time-action cognitions. Something distributed yet interwoven is going on. I wish I knew a better term for it. Maybe “nexus”?

SEE PART II NEXT

Readings in cognitive warfare at the societal level — #9: Roger McNamee, “How to Fix Facebook — Before It Fixes Us” (2018)

In this instructive article, former Facebook insider Roger McNamee reveals how he first noticed something was amiss on Facebook, figured out Russians were behind it, tried reporting it to Facebook executives, didn’t get taken seriously, and formed his own group for coming up with warnings and remedies.

Here are a few highlights:

“Our final hypothesis was that 2016 was just the beginning. Without immediate and aggressive action from Washington, bad actors of all kinds would be able to use Facebook and other platforms to manipulate the American electorate in future elections.

“These were just hypotheses, but the people we met in Washington heard us out. Thanks to the hard work of journalists and investigators, virtually all of these hypotheses would be confirmed over the ensuing six weeks. Almost every day brought new revelations of how Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other platforms had been manipulated by the Russians.

“We now know, for instance, that the Russians indeed exploited topics like Black Lives Matter and white nativism to promote fear and distrust, and that this had the benefit of laying the groundwork for the most divisive presidential candidate in history, Donald Trump. The Russians appear to have invested heavily in weakening the candidacy of Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primary by promoting emotionally charged content to supporters of Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein, as well as to likely Clinton supporters who might be discouraged from voting. Once the nominations were set, the Russians continued to undermine Clinton with social media targeted at likely Demo- cratic voters. We also have evidence now that Russia used its social media tactics to manipulate the Brexit vote. A team of researchers reported in November, for instance, that more than 150,000 Russian-language Twitter accounts posted pro-Leave messages in the run-up to the referendum. …

“We still don’t know the exact degree of collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign. But the debate over collusion, while important, risks missing what should be an obvious point: Facebook, Google, Twitter, and other platforms were manipulated by the Russians to shift outcomes in Brexit and the U.S. presidential election, and unless major changes are made, they will be manipulated again. Next time, there is no telling who the manipulators will be.”

He didn’t have success raising these concerns with Facebook or Google executives, who replied with stock notions about self-regulation:

“Facebook and Google responded by reiterating their opposition to government regulation, insisting that it would kill innovation and hurt the country’s global competitiveness, and that self-regulation would produce better results.

“But we’ve seen where self-regulation leads, and it isn’t pretty. Unfortunately, there is no regulatory silver bullet. The scope of the problem requires a multi-pronged approach.”

Disappointed but resolute, he and his colleagues, notably Tristan Harris, an expert on cults, have designed an approach around two points. The first is that “we must address the resistance to facts created by filter bubbles.” The second is that “the chief executive officers of Facebook, Google, Twitter, and others — not just their lawyers — must testify before congressional committees in open session.”

This is accompanied by proposals for eight regulatory remedies. These include: banning digital bots that impersonate people; prohibiting the companies from buying new acquisitions until they’ve addressed the preceding damage; making the platforms far more transparent; limiting the commercial exploitation of consumer data; and enabling users to own their data. He and his colleagues are now trying to get Congress to attend to these matters.

In conclusion, McNamee writes,

“Increasing awareness of the threat posed by platform monopolies creates an opportunity to re- frame the discussion about concentration of market power. Limiting the power of Facebook and Google not only won’t harm America, it will almost certainly unleash levels of creativity and innovation that have not been seen in the technology industry since the early days of, well, Facebook and Google.”

Lots of good points, I’d say. Worth more attention than I can give this reading these days. To read for yourself, go here:

https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/january-february-march-2018/how-to-fix-facebook-before-it-fixes-us/

Brief blurts about tribes and tribalism — Harold Jarche on “tribal values are not democratic” (2017)

Harold Jarche, an independent consultant who specializes in new organizational models for workplace transformation, ranks among the very few analysts / theorists who have taken TIMN seriously enough that it is used in their writings. I hope to say more about this in the future. Meanwhile, here is one incisive TIMN-related post that not only addresses the T/tribal form but also looks ahead to what the rise of the +N/network form may mean:

“We have observed that the Tribal form (e.g. families, clans) continues to exist even when Institutions or Markets are the dominant organizational form. The challenge today is that many people no longer trust traditional institutions (e.g. church, government, banks) and there is diminishing faith in our Markets (e.g. repeal of TPP, Brexit). What is missing is an appealing network model that represents not globalism but rather internationalism, where diverse people can connect without the intermediation of global platforms and companies running on a market agenda. Platform co-ops are one such option.

“If we want to avoid a return to Tribal conflict and a narrow view of society, we need to build and test alternative network models: now. We are in desperate need of new models for living, working, and learning. The great work of our time is to design, build, and test new organizational models that reflect our democratic values and can function in an interconnected world. Failure by current generations to do so will leave the next ones to deal with the reactionary forces of tribalism, corporatism, and perhaps even fascism.

“Open information and access to our common knowledge assets is required. We can only deal with complex systems and problems collectively. I used to think that the great work to be done at the beginning of this century was the democratization of the workplace. This is no longer enough. Our great work today is the re-democratization of society. Everything is now being communicated, and fragmented, at an electric pace. Change happens quickly in an electric, and now digital, age.”

https://jarche.com/2017/01/tribal-values-are-not-democratic/

Brief blurts about tribes and tribalism in America — David Brooks, “The retreat to tribalism” (December 2017)

David Brooks remains on a roll trying to inform us about the tribalization of America. This time he draws on observations from Jonathan Haidt about identity politics having “dropped its centripetal elements and become entirely centrifugal”, and from Pascal Bruckner about how excessive individualism “paradoxically leads to in-group/out-group tribalism.”

Against this background, Brooks concludes that:

“Haidt and Bruckner are very different writers, with different philosophies. But they both point to the fact that we’ve regressed from a sophisticated moral ethos to a primitive one. The crooked timber school of humanity says the line between good and evil runs through each person and we fight injustice on the basis of our common humanity. The oppressor/oppressed morality says the line runs between tribes. That makes it easy to feel good about yourself. But it makes you very hard to live with.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/01/opinion/the-retreat-to-tribalism.html

Readings about tribes and tribalism in America — #23: David Brooks on “The Philosophical Assault on Trumpism”

NYT columnist David Brooks continues to provide deep critiques along with contingent hopes about America’s current condition. In this column — “The Philosophical Assault on Trumpism” (October 2017) — he points out that Trumpian populists have fallen for “a tribal story”. That fits with what TIMN theory says is happening from a social-evolution perspective. Then Brooks says this tribal story looks more to the past than the future, and is more about walls, divisions, and fences than frontiers and horizons. That fits with what the STA:C framework says to watch out for, from a cognition-and-culture perspective. So not only does Brook make solid points, his piece is a double-whammy for the two theories — TIMN and STA:C — I think help make sense of the world.

Brooks’ argument is not only that pro-Trump populists have fallen for the tribal story told by Trump, but also that it “is a deeply wrong and un-American story”, for America is “not a tribe” but “a universal nation”:

“The only way to beat Trump is to beat him philosophically. Right now the populists have a story to tell the country about what’s gone wrong. It’s a coherent story, which they tell with great conviction. The regular Republicans have no story, no conviction and no argument. They just hem and haw and get run over.

“The Trump story is that good honest Americans are being screwed by aliens. Regular Americans are being oppressed by a snobbish elite that rigs the game in its favor. White Americans are being invaded by immigrants who take their wealth and divide their culture. Normal Americans are threatened by an Islamic radicalism that murders their children.

“This is a tribal story. The tribe needs a strong warrior in a hostile world. We need to build walls to keep out illegals, erect barriers to hold off foreign threats, wage endless war on the globalist elites.

“Somebody is going to have to arise to point out that this is a deeply wrong and un-American story. The whole point of America is that we are not a tribe. We are a universal nation, founded on universal principles, attracting talented people from across the globe, active across the world on behalf of all people who seek democracy and dignity.”

Brooks goes on to point out that “The core American idea is not the fortress, it’s the frontier. … The core American attitude has been looking hopefully to the future, not looking resentfully toward some receding greatness.” As I noted above, these are crucial observations about what it means to be American, cognitively and culturally.

Ever the Republican, Brooks reminds his readers what Republicans used to envision and champion for our country: in particular, social mobility. “The original Republicans were not for or against government, they were for government that sparked mobility; they were against government that enervated ambition.” Thus he lauds past government programs that built our schools and roads, for example.

But now the fearful Trumpian populists seek to amplify division instead of mobility, to favor fences over frontiers, all in contradiction to what the Republican Party is supposed to be:

“Today, the main enemy is not aliens; it’s division — between rich and poor, white and black, educated and less educated, right and left. Where there is division there are fences. Mobility is retarded and the frontier is destroyed. Trumpist populists want to widen the divisions and rearrange the fences. They want to turn us into an old, settled and fearful nation.

“The Republican Party is supposed to be the party that stokes dynamism by giving everybody the chance to venture out into the frontier of their own choosing — with education reform that encourages lifelong learning, with entitlement reform that spends less on the affluent elderly and more on the enterprising young families, with regulatory reform that breaks monopolies and rules that hamper start-ups, with tax reform that creates a fair playing field, with immigration reform that welcomes the skilled and the hungry.”

Against this background, Brooks urges those of us who still believe in the American dream to go “say no to tribe, yes to universal nation”:

“It may be dormant, but this striving American dream is still lurking in every heart. It’s waiting for somebody who has the guts to say no to tribe, yes to universal nation, no to fences, yes to the frontier, no to closed, and yes to the open future, no to the fear-driven homogeneity of the old continent and yes to the diverse hopefulness of the new one.”

I’m enthused by what he says here, from both TIMN and STA:C standpoints. And my wish for the new year is that you all too will come to believe in the importance of quadriformist evolution and triplex cognition.


To read, go here:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/03/opinion/philosophical-assault-on-trumpism.html

Brief blurts about tribes and tribalism in America — Ronald Brownstein

“The tragedy of all this tribalism is that Trump is forfeiting the opportunity to build wider consensus around real challenges. Demonizing immigrants instills a bunker mentality — one that only makes it more difficult to devise reasonable means to combat domestic radicalization, or identify the undocumented immigrants who present genuine risks of violence and crime. (It doesn’t help that Trump and congressional Republicans further diminish their credibility by sublimating the national interest in combating gun violence to the tribal interest of gun owners who oppose limits on possession.)

“The tax bill’s economic tribalism is equally myopic. To fund the payroll taxes that will support Social Security and Medicare during their retirement, older white America needs more of diverse younger America to reach the middle class. The best way to ensure the elderly’s long-term financial security is to invest in the lives of those future generations who will fund the programs sustaining future retirees. And that requires preserving tax revenue and limiting entitlements in order to free up funds.

“No matter the issue, policies that resist tribal separatism and balance the interests of all Americans almost always have the best chance to succeed — and, for that matter, to pay political dividends.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/11/the-tragedy-of-president-trumps-tribalism/544739/