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Sloww Sunday Newsletter 059 (May 2, 2021) — A Cultural Renaissance, Smart Villages, Multidisciplinary Thinking, & More
Hi friends,
Sloww Sunday is a free newsletter delivering the latest from Sloww along with the most interesting modern knowledge and timeless wisdom I discovered last week.
To respect your time and attention, every newsletter can be read in under 5 minutes. Enjoy!
Sloww Stuff
New Public Post:
🧠 The Consilience Project 101: An Introduction to the Catalyzing of a Cultural Renaissance
I’ve been tracking the progress of The Consilience Project—the latest initiative from social philosopher Daniel Schmachtenberger—since the first time I heard it mentioned. Consider this 101 post your “quick start guide” that covers everything you should know before you jump into the new beta site that just recently launched.
In Case You Missed It:
🔒 Daniel Schmachtenberger Synthesis: How to Think Holistically about Civilization
Daniel Schmachtenberger is one of the most exciting thinkers alive on the planet right now. This Premium post is a deeper dive into his incredibly complex and holistic thinking. Since most of Daniel’s content is audio and video, this seems to be one of the few places where you can find this much of his thinking synthesized and written in one place.
Modern Knowledge
🧠 An Introduction to Multidisciplinary Thinking
(45 mins | SoundCloud)
It’s nearly impossible to search for “multidisciplinary thinking” and not quickly come across billionaire investor Charlie Munger. And, there may be no bigger expert on Charlie Munger than Peter Kaufman, the editor of the book “Poor Charlie’s Almanack.” In this talk, Kaufman gives a nice overview of why multidisciplinary thinking will positively change your life.
You can also find a full transcript of the talk here (Farnam Street).
“Why do you need to be multidisciplinary in your thinking? Because as the Japanese proverb says, ‘The frog in the well knows nothing of the mighty ocean.’ You may know everything there is to know about your specialty, your silo, your ‘well,’ but how are you going to make any good decisions in life—the complex systems of life, the dynamic system of life—if all you know is one well?” — Peter Kaufman
Timeless Wisdom
🌎 Building a Modern Smart Village with Ancient Lessons
(40 mins | YouTube)
Something a little different this week! Mike & Euvie from Future Thinkers are working on a Smart Village project. While moving to an intentional community in the beautiful nature of British Columbia is certainly tempting, I was most interested to hear about all the new things they are learning about regenerative civilization design. Are we at the beginning of what Euvie calls a “Regenaissance” (renaissance of regenerative villages)?
A Few Highlights:
- Whole Systems Thinking & Design: Allowing nature to be our teacher and mimicking how nature does things. Nature starts from principles that allow for emergence and adaptiveness in the environment over time. Note: I highlighted the concept of “biomimicry” in Sloww Sunday #56.
- Permaculture: A land management philosophy of observing and working with natural ecosystems, whole systems thinking, and indigenous knowledge in sustainable and self-sufficient ways.
- Regenerative Stigmergy: The basic principle of stigmergy is that what an individual does in their environment may feed back on them and others—a trace left in the environment by an individual action stimulates the performance of a succeeding action by the individual or others. The idea of “regenerative stigmergy” is that people and their environment mutually shape each other for better overall health.
“We’re just taking best practices from different industries and putting them together … One of the most interesting things is that we’re not inventing any of these components. We’re just putting them together in a creative way.” — Euvie Ivanova
🤯 Mind Expanding
Mind-blowing, jaw-dropping, awe-inspiring content has the power to shift your perspective in an instant.
Human drama continues. Nature goes on. “Dendrochronology” is the scientific method of dating tree rings to the exact year they were formed.
💭 Deep Quote
“I’ve learned that the key to mastering the ‘art of living’ is learning how to pay attention. When you are mindful, you are in the moment. When you are in the moment, you are mastering the ‘art of living.'” — Marissa Boisvert
Pair with 25+ of my favorite art of living quotes.
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Have an attentive week!
Kyle Kowalski
Founder, Sloww
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