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Sloww Sunday Newsletter 083 (Nov 7, 2021) — What is Truth, Ego Development, Meta-Memes, & More
Happy Sunday!
Here’s the latest from Sloww along with the most interesting things I discovered last week. To respect your time and attention, every newsletter can be read in under 5 minutes. 🙏
🆕 Sloww Stuff
This new page is a comprehensive list of all my book summaries—what I truly believe are the highest quality and most detailed book summaries anywhere online. Why are they the most useful? There are at least a few things that set them apart: author quotes, key themes, visual formatting, and concise comprehensiveness. You may also like my book recommendations of 25+ books and my full reading list of 250+ books (Google Sheet). Enjoy!
Where Good Ideas Come From: The “Slow Hunch” with Steven Johnson (Short Read)
Society often recognizes and praises lightbulb / eureka / aha moments. But, the vast majority of the credit should go to everything that led up to those moments. The most important ideas that trigger change often have long incubation and development periods—what Steven Johnson calls the “slow hunch.”
🔒 Premium Mini-Guide to Building Your Memetic Immune System:
- Is Free Thinking Even Possible?
- Do You Control Your Life Path?
- Do You Live Life, or Does Life Live You?
🧠 Modern Knowledge
The Latest on Ego Development Theory — Susanne Cook-Greuter
(70 mins | YouTube)
It’s a pure joy when Susanne Cook-Greuter’s name pops up in my social feed, and this new video did not disappoint. If you aren’t familiar with Susanne, she is an independent scholar who is recognized for her ground-breaking work in ego development theory and the function of language in meaning making (and has a doctorate in human development and psychology from Harvard).
“Mature integration as a human being entails an increasing capacity to notice ego’s workings … You have to develop a mature ego before you can transcend and let it go.” — Susanne Cook-Greuter
Pair with:
- An Intro to Ego Development Theory (EDT Summary)
- Humanity’s Critical Evolution to the EDT “Watershed Stage”
- 🔒 Behind the Scenes: My EDT Self-Assessment
🦉 Timeless Wisdom
What is Truth? — David Deutsch
(10 mins | YouTube)
I’ve been making the rounds on quite a bit of David Deutsch content lately. This is a short video where he describes his key principle of good explanations.
- What is an explanation? “An explanation is a statement of what is there in reality, and how it works, and why.”
- What is a good explanation? “Good explanations are extremely hard to come by, and this is what the growth of knowledge is actually about. A good explanation is one that is hard to vary while still explaining what it purports to explain.”
“All progress, historically and today, comes from the quest for good explanations.” — David Deutsch
🤯 Mind Expanding
You’ve been exposed to the meta-meme
(12 mins | We are Hosts for Memes)
Fair warning: only read this if you have an open mind.
- Meme examples: ideas, stories, ideologies, jokes, narratives, brands, identities, habits, practices, etc.
- Memetics in a nutshell: an evolutionary model of cultural transmission of information patterns from one individual that hosts it to another.
- Meta-meme: memes that spread awareness about the existence of memes.
“Awareness of memes can be useful in the sense that it creates a sort of memetic immunity. It’s harder to fall for a trick once you know how the trick works.”
💡 New Learning
I have hundreds of Wikipedia pages saved. Each Wednesday, I read at least one new page and share a short summary on Twitter for Wikipedia Wednesday. Here’s the new learning this week:
Original Position (or “Veil of Ignorance”):
(Wikipedia)
- Thought experiment used for reasoning about the principles that should structure a society—assuming you had no knowledge ahead of time what position you would end up having in that society.
- You make choices about the society from an “original position” of equality—behind a “veil of ignorance”—without knowing what ethnicity, gender, abilities, tastes, wealth, or social status in society you will have.
- How would you structure the society? Would you select principles impartially and rationally based on reason and fairness?
PS: Sounds like the lottery of birth or ovarian lottery.
💭 Deep Thought
Three things you can’t outsource:
1. Body: physical health/wealth (no one can do your push-ups for you).
2. Mind: mental health/wealth (no one can do your learning for you).
3. Spirit: spiritual health/wealth (no one can do your spiritual growth for you).
💬 Wise Words
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.” — Unknown
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Support: Sloww is a one-human labor of love. If you’re interested in supporting me, there are several financial and non-financial ways to support.
Feedback: Have something you want to say, or just want to say hi? It’s always much appreciated. Just send me an email or reach out socially.
Have a truthful week!
Kyle Kowalski
Synthesizer & Solopreneur, Sloww
