Matthew Taylor's video on the idea of 21st Century Enlightenment is certainly one of the more substantive videos I've watched over the course of the MSLD program, and certainly one that's taken quite a bit of thought to chew over. Admittedly, I still have a 100% grasp on what makes 21st Century Enlightenment what it is, but it may well warrant further thinking and an examination of the last major Enlightenment.
As best as I can gather from Taylor's talk, what makes the idea, and hence the title, of 21st Century Enlightenment is taking the principals of the Great Enlightenment of delving into what shaped modern peoples values, norms, and principals, and reassessing what we have now based on the circumstances of an increasingly diverse and globalized 21st Century. It's been quite some time since our last Enlightenment, and I think Taylor is getting at the idea of our society as a whole taking some time to look around and reassess our direction as a society. He says in relation to this that "to live differently, you have to think differently," by which I think he means we have to see to see the word and ourselves in a new perspective, and exercise critical thinking processes.
Taylor made an interesting point in stating that people need to try and "...resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange." It brings to mind the argumentative fallacy of appealing to tradition, or perhaps even confirmation bias. To paraphrase what I thought he was taking from Robert Kegan, people would do well to be conscious of this tendency to accept the familiar and reject the unfamiliar. Within my office, I can see traditional communication types in cases rejecting the sense of urgency with their work as the idea of communications being critical for the military is still fairly new. In contrast, our clients don't always understand that we can't make absolute guarantees for fixing things by a certain time, or track with the idea that there are some things beyond our control either physically or administratively. In the span of greater society, take any national level debate on controversial issues such as gun control or foreign policy, and you're nearly guaranteed to see this concept at work. For the gun issue, there might be those unwilling to entertain any limitations on their magazines or otherwise, and there might be those that refuse to see a gun as anything but a great danger to society.
Taylor went on to discuss the idea of eschewing the elements of pop culture that degrade people, and encouraging the development of empathetic citizens. I think to some measure, this has already started. Pop culture fairly regularly makes fun of pop culture, and the rapid increase in global connectivity via the spread of web access services and the rise of social networks enables people the world over to be connect to the experiences of others across the globe. I think people are already taking major steps to putting themselves into other people's shoes. However, I still think that for the most part, society tends to hit a major logjam anytime there's a divisive argument, with many not putting into practice the idea of maintaining healthy disagreement, and with people often falling into the old habit of resisting ideas contrary to what they know. Any major shift towards this idea would likely require a massive paradigm shift across all of society.
I couldn't draw out an exact answer on the prompt about atomizing people from collaborative environments, but I can certainly understand how removing people from that can be detrimental. When individuals are broken off from a collaborative group, they lose the benefit of additional perspectives and the "force multiplier" effect of having additional minds considering an issue. If this becomes the case for organizational change efforts, it's likely that an organization might simply stagnate under the single perspective being worked with at the top, or that they will simply fail to innovate and possible become a non-competitor. There are some instances where sole individuals can be of more effect than a collaborative group, but more often than not collaboration brings rapid idea development and great power.
If nothing else, the notion that people are thinking about change at the societal level is somewhat heartening. My organization is currently undergoing multiple shifts in how they view the world and their role, and it seems a much more manageable task than all of society. Additionally, Taylor brought to bear a number of interesting points to bear in mind as I go through the working day, especially in his highlight of the "tendency of familiarity," and by sounding a call for conscientious thought.
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