jonathan on zak’s liminal ed

jonathan rowson on zak stein’s essay on ed and liminality:

via michel bauwens tweet [https://x.com/mbauwens/status/1828696605031330061]:

* The Role of Liminal Individuals in Time Between Worlds Who Do Not Belong To Either World

Zak Stein:

“During times between worlds there emerge certain ideas and thinkers that are, properly speaking, without a world. Their work is about creating a new world, by necessity. Let us call their workspace the liminal. Not within the old world or the world to come, the liminal is exactly that which is the bridge and fulcrum between worlds. The focus of work in the liminal is on foundations, metaphysics, religion, and the deeper codes and sources of culture—education in its broadest sense. Individuals working here are often “beyond [conventional notion of] good and evil” in the Nietzschean sense, having stepped out past the edges of the old world, while doing the work of creating a new one.

This is dangerous work and the stakes are high, as the choices and actions made in the liminal set the trajectory and shape of the new emerging world. The old world sees the liminal with fear and disbelief, persecuting those who work there. Jesus was neither part of the Pagan or Jewish world, nor was he part of the Christian world that was emerging. The Buddha was neither part of the Hindu anciency, nor was he a Buddhist. Work in the liminal is work in a time between worlds.

From the perspective of the world to come—future historians—the liminal of recent memory is not always good, the choices made are questionable, and actors suspect. The so-called founders of modernity (people like Descartes, Kant, and then Darwin, Jefferson, Ford, etc.) are now the focus of critique by those inhabiting the world they created.”

(https://systems-souls-society.com/education-must-make-history-again)

notes/quotes from essay:

Foreword by Jonathan Rowson

For those working for a better world, the stories we are part of may be climate change mitigation, or reducing political polarisation, or the promise of new technologies, or an image to guide action, like doughnut economics. *But these endeavours are all part of a bigger story that needs to be inhabited today. Until we grasp that we are in a time between worlds it is hard to see the deep structures of societal immunity to change that keep the old world on life support. Without trusting that a new world will be born it is hard to see the possibilities for radical renewal, possibilities that are neglected because they can’t be perceived within the prism of the world to which we are habituated.

*and/or simply cancerous distractions

Perspectiva takes the idea that we are in a time between worlds seriously and I would even call it a premise of our ‘urgent one-hundred-year project’. A key paragraph about half-way through Zak’s essay chimed with my experience of running the organisation and the challenge of explaining what we are about:

“The point I am making is that during times between worlds there emerge certain ideas and thinkers that are, properly speaking, without a world. Their work is about creating a new world, by necessity. Let us call their workspace the liminal. Not within the old world or the world to come, the liminal is exactly that which is the bridge and fulcrum between worlds. The focus of work in the liminal is on foundations, metaphysics, religion, and the deeper codes and sources of culture—education in its broadest sense.”

The need to rediscover and reinvigorate education as the deeper codes and sources of culture is aided by Zak’s skilful reviving of the spirit of John Amos Comenius, an educator of world-historical importance.

But why education exactly? Because education is not just children in uniform with their feet under desks holding pencils expectantly while looking at their teacher. Zak understands Education – as I believe we all should – in the expansive Deweyian sense as a practice of social autopoiesis – the process by which society renews itself, including an intelligent patterning of institutional deaths and cultural births. We are called upon to be enlightened undertakers and visionary midwives.

i think this is compromising ed as ‘to draw forth from w/in’ .. intellectness as cancerous distraction.. esp if focus on intelligent patterning of institutional deaths and cutlural briths (to me.. to date.. that is all history ness of sea world.. so whalespeak

we need to focus on and listen to the itch-in-8b-souls 1st thing everyday & use that data to connect us (tech as it could be.. ai as augmenting interconnectedness as nonjudgmental expo labeling)

As this essay reminds us, Education is the means by which we make it possible for new worlds to be born within worlds that are dying. It is in this sense that Zak rightly argues that Education must make history again.

Education Must Make History Again: Remembering Comenius in a Time Between Worlds – Zachary Stein

I argue further that educational innovation is one of the major catalysts of fundamental historical change. Other drivers of history, such as technology, warfare, and economics, presuppose and stem from educational realities. Humans make history when they make intentional changes to the dynamics of intergenerational transmission. *This means literally changing how we “pass on” the knowledge, skills, and character traits that make possible the unfolding of what we call history. When looking at prior times of great change seeking lessons for today, I suggest keeping an eye on things like socialization, enculturation, contexts of human development, dynamics of teaching and learning, and intergenerational transmission. **This is all “education”—as I broadly construe it.

*this is whalespeak.. aka: how sea world works.. not how legit free people dance.. ie: pass on ness is not drawing forth from w/in ness

**so if this is zak’s ed.. it’s just another form of people telling other people what to do

Thinking this way about history allows me to say that, today, education is the meta-crisis. Education is the root of all more specific crises such as climate change, governance breakdowns, impending war, and social unrest. There is a hidden crisis that is giving rise to the many obvious crises: it is unfolding in our own minds, and within newly complex and problematic dynamics of intergenerational transmission.

we do need to go deeper.. but again.. the depth we need is that from w/in each heart

Our civilization is starting to mishandle the *basic task of equipping the next generation with the requisite skills, personality structures, and cultural resources needed to maintain essential social systems. This is what might be called “social autopoiesis” —the self-(re)creation of the social body—and it can **only be accomplished through intentional practices of education. Drastic educational crises that remain unresolved result in failures of social autopoiesis and eventually civilizational collapse.

*yep.. he’s all about people telling other people what to do

**aka: supposed to’s of school/work.. killing us softly w/its song

Times between worlds—liminal epochs—always involve profound educational crises, which can rapidly cascade into total civilizational breakdowns. The ideal response has been to “reboot” the social structure using an updated educational operating system. The best example from recent history—the last time this happened at scale—is the story I tell in this essay.

only updated ed we need is to org around legit needs – aka: draw forth from w/in

This story, as I tell it here, also focuses on the historical epoch in which Comenius lived, specifically the “metahistorical patterns” that were in play, which reveal great similarities between his time and our own.

IWhen I first discovered this story, I experienced déjà vu. We are once again tasked with countering social breakdown resulting from information technologies by means of educational innovation..t

there’s a legit use of tech (nonjudgmental expo labeling).. to facil the seeming chaos of a global detox leap.. for (blank)’s sake.. and we’re missing it

legit freedom will only happen if it’s all of us.. and in order to be all of us.. has to be sans any form of measuring, accounting, people telling other people what to do

Education becomes a radically transformative enterprise during times spent “between worlds,” when cultural and social patterns are fundamentally changing.

hasn’t to date.. because we can’t let go and just try ‘to bring forth from w/in’.. the unconditional part of left to own devices ness

The point I am making is that during times between worlds there emerge certain ideas and thinkers that are, properly speaking, without a world. Their work is about creating a new world, by necessity. Let us call their workspace the liminal. Not within the old world or the world to come, the liminal is exactly that which is the bridge and fulcrum between worlds. The focus of work in the liminal is on foundations, metaphysics, religion, and the deeper codes and sources of culture—education in its broadest sense. Individuals working here are often “beyond [conventional notion of] good and evil” in the Nietzschean sense, having stepped out past the edges of the old world, while doing the work of creating a new one.

This is dangerous work and the stakes are high, as the choices and actions made in the liminal set the trajectory and shape of the new emerging world. The old world sees the liminal with fear and disbelief, persecuting those who work there. Jesus was neither part of the Pagan or Jewish world, nor was he part of the Christian world that was emerging. The Buddha was neither part of the Hindu anciency, nor was he a Buddhist. Work in the liminal is work in a time between worlds. From the perspective of the world to come—future historians—the liminal of recent memory is not always good, the choices made are questionable, and actors suspect. The so-called founders of modernity (people like Descartes, Kant, and then Darwin, Jefferson, Ford, etc.) are now the focus of critique by those inhabiting the world they created.

Anti-education occurs in the absence of wisdom, when coercion becomes the cause of identity formation and belief structure.

coercion comes from any form of people telling other people what to do.. ie: as ed is described in this essay

*Educative and humane digital technologies can be created if the incentives and ideas driving technologists can be aligned with humanitarian ends. “The same technologies that brainwash us now could provide for a kind of education more powerful than any modern school system. **The tools of algorithmic curation used to capture our attention to deliver advertisements could be used to promote individualized learning and to protect our attention from being degraded. This is entirely possible. Schools, communities, governments, and markets can be reimagined based on the use of social media, but this requires rethinking both social media’s purpose and beneficiaries.” ***A way must be found to either redirect or to make obsolete through better innovation the largest companies ever created (Alphabet and Facebook dwarf the Dutch East India Company). And we must find that way fast.

*mufleh humanity law: we have seen advances in every aspect of our lives except our humanity– Luma Mufleh

need 1st/most: means to undo our hierarchical listening to self/others/nature ie: tech as it could be

**’promote individualized learning’ = people telling other people what to do..

imagine if we listened to the itch-in-8b-souls 1st thing everyday & used that data to connect us (tech as it could be.. ai as augmenting interconnectedness as nonjudgmental expo labeling)

***ie: a nother way

Make no mistake, the task before us is more daunting than that faced by Comenius. We are not dealing with printing presses and gun powder, but circuit boards and hydrogen bombs. Comenius had plagues and the Thirty Years’ War raging around him; the world system was indeed coming apart. But it was a civilizational collapse limited in space to Europe and without technologies capable of ending all life on the planet Earth as we know it. The stakes are higher, and the educational crises are deeper.

*Education can be made the fulcrum of civilizational transition..t The unfolding of human potential is a frontier into which we have only first ventured. As Comenius knew, the human is an unfinished project, with cosmic potentials, thus evolved as an image of God. If the center of these efforts that we call civilization were to become education itself, then human development would constitute our shared aim as a species. This would create a state of almost ideal social autopoiesis, radically opening the gates of learning, calling humanity out into its own potentials in perpetuity. This was for Comenius our fate and density as a species: to create an education-centric planetary society, for all people, for the sake of world peace

*not if ed is to ‘“pass on” the knowledge, skills, and character traits‘ .. that is just another form of people telling other people what to do.. need ed (or whatever) as ‘to draw forth from w/in’..

for that we need means (nonjudgmental expo labeling) to undo hierarchical listening as global detox so we can org around legit needs

if we keep adding on ‘intellect this/that’ et al.. we’re just perpetuating same song.. not new/diff/liminal..

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