Ties Between Memory and Imagination

"I remember the winter when it didn't start to snow until March. It was a long way between the out house and the cottage and it was cold.... "

“Psychologists use fMRI to Understand Ties between Memories and the Imagination?”

A theory of memory states that recalling the past uses the same neurological pathways as envisioning the future. Therefore, scientists think that if one cannot remember the past, it is very hard to envision the future. If one does not have memories of their own, it is still possible to substitute the general knowledge we have of the world around us, researchers found. Retelling of memories includes physical, visual and other memory fragments related to just that memory. Sitting around with good friends is the right time to exercise you story telling. You know how some people tell stories about the time something embarrassing happened to them and they laugh at themselves and how funny they were? That is one way to build up your memory. There doesn't have to be a joke at the end, it could be sad, or an experience you learned from, that you relate to others. Try to put in the details that make the story more memorable. Another time think about a time in the future and how you would like things to be. If it is a future that isn't just about you, but about your community, country, the world, and it is generally positive, then you are creating a vision of the future. Creating future visions gives you something to work towards. It provides material for future dreams and successes. Good Luck!

“Can Ranking Employees Do More Harm Than Good?”

The trend of ranking employees by giving them grades based on a Bell Curve is not going to be long-lived, in spite of its popularity. I say this because anyone in the management world soon begins to realize that trends change from one year to another. In 14 years, Bain, a global business consulting firm, has done 11 multi-year surveys. The lists change from year to year, with some management tools and trends lasting and others disappearing.
In the recent past it was considered progressive to treat both employees and students as individuals. No one really knew how to do this, but they did realize that it made sense, given that no two individuals were ever alike, sometimes similar, but not alike. (Recent research shows that even identical twins have small genetic differences). During the time it has taken to develop truly individualized learning and evaluation methods, the world has moved on. Immigration has increased worldwide and forced people together from very different cultures, both in schools and in the workplace. Parents and workers, in many cases were from collective cultures, where a case of bad grades or performance reflected upon the family more than on the individual.
Economic shifts towards increasingly strict interpretations of market economy demand high performance and the ability to predict that performance. Stock prices and incomes must be kept high in order to deliver to stockholders. So the search for the best predictors of future performance is driven by the need to grade.
A series of changes, the movement from fossil fuel based energy to renewable energy, the worry of climate change, changes war from being country against country to internal conflicts and international terrorist activity, the need to change our live styles and much more make us nervous and unsure. We sometimes tend to grab onto the things we know best and in this case grades are the choice. Those who made good grades will probably be the most interested in using them as a measure. Here are three answers in a Metro newspaper article in response to the question “Is it good that employees get grades on the job?”:
“Yes, then one can fight a little more and get better results”, “Yes, it is, of course good, it keeps on working properly.” And “Yes, if management and personnel are in agreement, and help is given to help personnel be better.” Yet, this writer is not convinced.
There is a method that has been tried successfully in both schools and in the workplace. That is to measure one’s self against one’s own past performance not against others in the group. It takes more time, as employees have to learn how to evaluate themselves and then discuss differences with the boss or the teacher. The skills must be clearly defined, especially skills in personal relations and social competence. It has been known for some time that the individual always is tougher in evaluating themselves than is the boss or teacher. Instead of going ahead and perfecting this method, which admittedly is not easy in the beginning, the tendency is to fall back upon what is known i.e. grades. If grades are so good, why are students not getting them? In Sweden, many students are leaving school without fullfilling their gymnasium requirements. This gives students and employees a low picture of their worth, their place in society and expectations for their future.
In the business world, grading employees is more a fad than of a trend. See http://www.framtidsbygget.se/E/trender/index.htm The real trend might be the search for ways to measure performance.

The functioning of not-for-profit, philanthropic, or “civil society” organizations

Let me wish you a happy new year! Maybe I should say I hope you had a happy 2007 and fulfilled everyone’s wishes for you! As you may have noticed, we took our usual break in December. This time we were busy moving both Visionscentret Framtidsbygget (The Vision Center) and our household. For a Futurist it was a very short-term, strategic thing to do. The logistics was unbelievable.

Now we are here in the country and I am writing from our new office. The naked trees still stand out in front of a grey-blue sky as darkness approaches.I have written before about alternative money systems and the need for revision of corporate legislation, that is give incorporated business more social and environmental responsibility.

This current Sign-of-the-Times has an American University and the United Nations working together to look at unsung contributors to the DNP (Gross Domestic Product), non-profit and volunteer sectors. In 1978, Hazel Henderson opened the subject for me with her book “Paradigms in Progress: Life Beyond Economics”. In it she has a cake with each layer representing a different contribution to the economy. Most of the layers have never been considered a part of the official economic measure, GDP; the earth's resources (Mother Earth) and Sweat Equity, the whole non-profit and volunteer sector including home based production, unpaid household and parenting and more were left out. The only thing that counted was the private and public sectors.
I spoke to Hazel and asked her where she thought we were now in the trend to change how we measure the economy, figuring that it started with her book in 1978. Think of a trend as an "S" curve.




Hazel indicated she thought we were still on the upswing, but not at the highest part of the curve yet. She said that acceptance for change was high but that the biggest hinder was academicians who were deeply invested in their market economic paradigm. The inference here is that more inclusive ways of measuring our economic and social success will revolutionize our economy and that is a scary proposition for those invested in current methods. There is evidence that high percentages of Europeans understand that GDP doesn’t work, so there is growing grass-roots support for new ways to define success. Many new ways of measuring our success on the planet are already developed and have been described in earlier Signs of the Times. See “Previous signs of the times”, August 21, 2003 titled “Increase in holistic measurement of human development and quality of life” (near the bottom of the page) at: http://www.framtidsbygget.se/signs/prev6.htm. There may be a measurement for your city, region or organization.

Social Hugging

In Sweden, The Red Cross has initiated a campaign, Hugs for the Lonely. They say that "The hug is the simplest gesture with which one can give another human being support, encouragement, comfort and human feeling. Hugs are wordless; exist in every language and expresses sympathy, friendship and belonging. They exist in all cultures and mean about the same thing the whole world over. Medical research shows that touch has a healing effect, primarily psychologically. The Red Cross states that no one should feel lonely" (my translation).

At the same time, at an American school a thirteen year old girl was punished for hugging two girlfriends. The term "public display of affection" is so ingrained that it has a shortened version, a "PDA". A distinction is made between those who are simply showing one of the emotions listed in the Red Cross definition and those seeking attention as in a couple engaging in activity with purely sexual overtones. In American schools, the problem seems to land in schools where twelve to fourteen year olds are attending. Many are feeling the first flush of hormones which will turn them adults with full reproductive potential. Another aspect of the problem is the mixing of cultures (increased migration and travel) blend expose individuals to more or less public affection between the sexes and between genders than their culture allows. Still other situations are found in the workplace where men and women are together many hours and often far from home (military, business trips, conferences.

One response is to eliminate public affection altogether (as has occurred in many American schools) and another is to define and then teach the differences between healthy touching, affection and unwanted or attention seeking advances. The response of making touching, like holding hands or giving hugs, a crime is a linear response. In linear thinking judgments come from one end or another of a continuum. Something is absolute, right or wrong, black or white, good or bad. In systemic thinking, there are a variety of responses along a continuum which could be better or worse choices given the situation. It means that parents and educators, managers and bosses have to be able to understand and describe behavioral nuances. This takes time and energy while allowing for the diversity of human behavior within clearly defined contexts. Linear thinking is simple, do and take the punishment or don't and loose any positive results that acceptance, inclusion and sympathy can provide.

Use less gasoline or fight more wars!

Recently, I started getting notices that the major car manufacturers are coming out with hydrogen concept cars (see example URL below) and further that they will be ready for customers in mid 2008. They will be leased. Interesting that they are using this lease system again, just like they did with electric cars.

A monthly leasing fee, while not cheap, is still a more sellable amount than the $103,000 price of a new hydro car. That is understandable. During the leasing period, manufacturers get important feedback on the car and the whole system. What will be interesting is to see if they will scrap the cars at the end of the leasing period like they did with electric care. It is easy to get the feeling that car manfacturers are testing the market to see which type of fuel and matching car takes off among the public while still assuring the kinds of profit margins they were used to with petrolium vehicles. A lot of their profit has come from repairs and if hydrogen cars have fewer moving parts, it could take a bite out of their parts and repair businesses. Have a look at this article for more detail.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8139d758-92e0-11dc-ad39-0000779fd2ac.html

Niche communities for those who think alike

We are living longer and can have as much as twenty plus years after the currently official retirement age (they are on their way up however). This period of retirement is already know as “active retirement” and it appears that those people, particularly in the Baby Boom generation want to retire with people who believe or have the same interests as themselves.

There are several ways to look at this phenomenon. As a trend, it may only last until the last Baby Boomer retires. However, children and grandchildren visiting their parents and grandparents might accept this as the natural way to live past a certain age. One could say that this is an American trend and so far I have no evidence to say it is true of not. We do know that people like to have friends that are like them. They may be from totally different backgrounds, but share the same values and views on life, they may be from the same cultural/religions background. We see this in immigrants who tend to move to areas where there are people who speak their language and who share a common cultural experience.

Some might say that all this forming of communities of likes is the opposite direction of diversity. It is one thing when older people want to be with their “own kind”, but if everyone did, what kind of world would it be? Would young people ever meet an older person? Would everyone live in their own community only going out for necessities and then returning? It could be positive if the communities were small enough where it was possible to know all or most of the members. Democracy is at its best when everyone can vote on the rules and matters of the group. It could be negative if communities get into arguments with other communities over common services or infrastructure. It could be that these communities become more self- contained with their own power sources and waste water treatment. It could be positive if communities were in contact with one another and even visited one another. Life might be less stressful in a community where the group made many decisions that individual’s make today at the same time individual control might increase because everyone has a say. The whole concept of smaller communities within the larger context could increase the feeling of security which Americans have seemed to have lost. Who will move to these communities when the Baby Boomers are no longer around, will it be their children, who also were a large demographic group?


There are many who feel that our cities are too large. Currently, half the world’s people live in cities more than ever before. We all are familiar with the negative side of cities, the isolation, not knowing your neighbors, having trouble meeting like minded people, crime, pollution, traffic. Will we be tired enough of all these irritations and inconveniences to move into smaller communities? Of course people who moved from small towns were often looking for anonymity, finding like minded people a little excitement and often a job. Electronic technologies mean that jobs can be performed anywhere. A little community out in the countryside might be just the thing!

Changing paradigms

A paradigm of course is a world view. In this case we are referring to the scientific paradigm, which seems to be loosing ground to creation theory. That is, God created the world in seven days. We human's like challanges and understanding how that creation came about is huge. We of course, also want to know why it occured, what God's message is in this.

For perspective, we need to look back before the change into the Scientific Theory. Most people believed in God as creator. Many rulers were still considered part god and part man. Mathmatical knowledge and other branches had built up enough information that individuals like Newton got excited about the new rules and theories. Decartes, who is also connected with the new scientific paradigm, was a philosoper. The beginnings of the field of science were know as natural philosophy, the philosophy of nature. Philosophers of the time sought knowledge or scienta in Latin. The word Science came from this latin word. From around the 1200's to until the 1840's science was known as natural philosophy. So, you see science started as philosophy.

Science has had a great deal of status for over four hundred years. Philosophy has remained in university courses catalogues because it is such a time honored clasic and gets at the existance questions that today's Science doesn't address.

Is it time for a switch back to philosophy and religion? Intelligent Design accepts science under the umbrella of religion. New Age movements have swung over North America and Europe and some of it's expressions are becoming mainstream. Eastern European countries long denied their religions are going back to them. The great changes in weather, fuel insecurity are causing great alarm. Where do we turn, to science or to a god?

Unpressidented change is what appears to be driving people to believe in god again. Has the secular trend has run its course.? Many changes occuring at once have left people with questions neither science or philosophy seem to be able to answer. Yet, science has brought us too far just to dump it, so it keeps a place in the new paradigm just under God.

Having said that, it will take some time, and possibly more than one lifetime to see how this change will play out. Science is still very strong. This may just be a little bump on the screen or the indication of a definate paradigm change. Chanses are strong that there will be new definitions for science, philosophy and religion.

If you are interested in this question see The Future of Religion at http://www.wnrf.org/cms/faq.shtml