The perceiving of patterns is mind in its natural state. We think in analogy, the interconnections between our perceptions are patterns, patterns both there in the world and also projected from us.

One pattern is “cyclicality”, and we see it in the rhythm of birdsong, the texture of waves and bark, the passage of day and night, and that of the seasons. Another is “boundary” or “membrane” which we see in our skin, in the cell membrane, in the coastline, in the precise moments a cricket’s call arises and ceases.

Join us for a Pattern Foraging workshop where we walk the land to practice and play with the contemplation of patterns. Intentionally tuning to pattern creates a gestalt shift, everything changes, some elements move to the foreground, others to the background. New objects and new structures are revealed. This experience radically expands your awareness of the richness of the world. This is the essence of science.

We will forage new patterns we find on our walk, and reflect as a group on where we might bring these patterns into our organizations, our lives, and our relationships. We will commit to remembering the natural world as the place from which we harvested these patterns, and consider our duty of reciprocity.

The perceiving of patterns is mind in its natural state. We think in analogy, the interconnections between our perceptions are patterns, patterns both there in the world and also projected from us.

One pattern is “cyclicality”, and we see it in the rhythm of birdsong, the texture of waves and bark, the passage of day and night, and that of the seasons. Another is “boundary” or “membrane” which we see in our skin, in the cell membrane, in the coastline, in the precise moments a cricket’s call arises and ceases.

Join us for a Pattern Foraging workshop where we walk the land to practice and play with the contemplation of patterns. Intentionally tuning to pattern creates a gestalt shift, everything changes, some elements move to the foreground, others to the background. New objects and new structures are revealed. This experience radically expands your awareness of the richness of the world. This is the essence of science.

We will forage new patterns we find on our walk, and reflect as a group on where we might bring these patterns into our organizations, our lives, and our relationships. We will commit to remembering the natural world as the place from which we harvested these patterns, and consider our duty of reciprocity.

This series is now complete.

This is a 3-part series culminating in an informed discussion of the Vatican’s paper Antiqua Et Nova. Each session centers on a specific text, and while sessions are self-contained, we encourage attending all three to build a deeper understanding as we explore the material together.

Session 1: The Brain Abstracted
Our first reading will be the introduction to The Brain Abstracted: Simplification in the History and Philosophy of Neuroscience by M. Chirimuuta, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. This text speaks to the incredible complexity of the human brain, the historical background of philosophies of organism and philosophies of mechanism, and the role of abstraction, simplification and analogy in scientific explanation.

Session 2: Living Things Are Not Machines (Also, They Totally Are)
Our second reading will be much less academic, reading the somehow omnipresent developmental and synthetic biologist Michael Levin’s piece in Noema magazine Living Things Are Not Machines (Also, They Totally Are).

Session 3: Antiqua et Nova
Finally we will read the Vatican’s position paper on AI, Antiqua et Nova: Note on the Relationship Between Artificial Intelligence and Human Intelligence.