PAGE IN PROGRESS What you see here is a page of my hypertext book POWER of meanings // MEANINGS of power. Initially empty, this page will slowly be filled with thoughts, notes, and quotes. One day, I will use them to write a coherent entry, similar to these completed pages. Thank you for your interest and patience!
People organize information about the world into stories in their mind. Stories are easier to remember. But stories can be traps we fall into. In fact, we often do. We tell ourelves a story to remember things (not a concious decision) and then we start believing in this strory and look for information that supports it (confirmation bias).
Stories we tell ourselves: there is logic, there is closure, that’s not so in the actual life. We crave meaning, connections, closure, clear binaries (that’s why superhero stories are so popular).
Thoughts about AI mirror It is presenting this a new problem of a problem of a scale that has not been seen before. But people have always created mirrors of themselves through stories they told to make sense of the world and survive in it (making sense is human survival strategy). Three main story-telling meaning-making strategies: science, religion, and art Religion: god did not create people in their image; people created god(s) in their image (if lions had gods, their gods would be lions)
"Courageous Conversations" (?) - we do not respond to the other person, we respond to a story we tell about ourselves, the other person, the world...
Stories we tell, like meanings we attach to things, take a life if their own
From Harari book - power of stories, fictitious language: examples: Peugeot, religion.
We all have our narratives. And then in any relationships these narratives get complicated, mixed up. If becomes more difficult to stand where my story ends asks your story begins.
[see Stories We Tell in Me, Looking for Meaning]
Stories we tell; media; media representations most cricticized (race, gender, disability); but the problem is bigger; it’s the way we tell ourselves stories about how people are are how they relate to reach other; villains and victims; closure and orderliness that is absent in life; events having purpose, reason, important connections that are easy to see and all other connections as less important; the whole idea about unicorn that is a dead horse, etc.