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Re: Fw: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?



Then read the relevant chapter or essay, Larry. I do not write in any way other than by means of cultural-historical realization of a concept.
a
Larry Purss wrote:
Andy, your article on Vygotsky's unit of analysis [the general in the particular] contrasted with the particular [in its ideographic concreteness] is an excellent source, However, the Wikipedia article captures the multiple transformations and expansion AS a cultural-historical perspective that was intriguing. larry

On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 6:30 AM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com <mailto:lpscholar2@gmail.com>> wrote:

    Andy,
As I read through this article on THE system concept [or system
    concepts?] I was reflecting on the process of the *development* of
    a concept, using the term *system* as an example of this
    developmental process through time. The transformation and
    expansion of the concept since 1945 has been breathtaking and the
    way it has risen to the concrete is phenomenal.
Is there a similar article which *defines* the concept of *unit of
    analysis* and the expansion of this concept through time?
This approach used in the Wikipedia article seems to be an
    effective strategy for *grasping* a concept [such as *system*
    or *unit of analysis*]
Thanks Andy for this Wikipedia source. larry

    On Sun, Jun 9, 2013 at 11:20 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
    <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:

        Antti, here is a link to th eWikipedia on "System concept"
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System
        Why do Activity Theorists in Engstrom's current of thinking
        mix up the idea of a system concept with a unit of analysis?

        Andy


        Antti Rajala wrote:

            Greg,

            You asked:
            ”My question is getting at where we locate "agency". In
            individuals alone?
            Or as possibly being distributed among multiple people and
            perhaps in
            amanner that isn't recognizable to the individual. But
            maybe there is
            aconcept for that that is different from "double stimulation.”

            I think that double stimulation can be analyzed not only
            at the individual
            level but at the collective level as well. Actually, the
            study of Engeström
            and Sannino (2013) that I referred to in my earlier email
            gives a nice
            example. The study also involves in some respects a
            similar situation as
            the one that you described having taken place with the
            workers in Malaysia.

            According to my reading, the study describes a change
            laboratory
            intervention taking place in a university library. The
            library as invited
            researchers to help them find new forms of work with
            research groups. A
            first stimulus emerges in the course of the change
            laboratory intervention,
            as a member of one of the research groups that the
            university library is
            delivering services says that they can find these services
            in the internet
            without the help of the library. Thus a problem emerges
            for the librarians
            to collectively produce a service that would be genuinely
            helpful for the
            research groups.

            In solving this problem, they organize their collective
            action with the
            help of a second stimulus, namely the concept of
            knotworking (Engeström,
            Engeström & Vähäaho, 1999) that the researchers have
            introduced in the
            beginning of the change laboratory. In particular, a new
            working group, a
            knot, is formed that starts to work with the emergent
            problem of inventing
            a useful service.

            What is in my opinion very innovative, Engeström and
            Sannino also provide
            an example of this second stimulus, the concept of
            knotworking, becoming an
            initial theoretical generalization that is reworked and
            enriched through a
            process of ascending from abstract to concrete as the
            intervention evolves.
            Specifically, in the end of the intervention, the concept
            of knotworking
            gives rise to many concrete, practical applications of the
            librarians' work
            at multiple levels of hierarchy.

            As for the unit of analysis, I think that the unit of
            analysis in the study
            is the intersection of several activity systems, the
            university libarary
            and the research groups, In terms of agency, one can maybe
            talk about
            shared transformative agency in which the subject is not
            an individual but
            a collective. (More about shared transformative agency,
            see Virkkunen’s
            paper in http://www.activites.org/v3n1/v3n1.book.pdf#page=43)

            Best wishes, Antti


            On Thu, Jun 6, 2013 at 6:57 PM, <ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org
            <mailto:ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org>> wrote:

                forgot to send this to XMCA

                -----Forwarded by ERIC RAMBERG/spps on 06/06/2013
                10:56AM -----
                To: ablunden@mira.net <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
                From: ERIC RAMBERG/spps
                Date: 06/06/2013 09:05AM

                Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                True true, the history of philosophy does lead there
                Andy.  But that leads
                to my trepidations regarding ideology lacking in practice.

                What substance within conscious formation is measurable?

                I believe that answer has yet to be found
                perhaps?

                eric

                -----xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu> wrote: -----
                 To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity"
                <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>>
                From: Andy Blunden
                Sent by: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu>
                Date: 06/05/2013 08:42PM
                Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                Eric,
                By posiing the problem as that of the Kantian dilemma,
                of unifying two
                disparate abstractions, you determine the answer as
                from the history of
                philosophy and the answer is Hegel's answer: "a
                formation of
                consciousness" or Gestalt des Bewusstsein.

                Andy

                ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org <mailto:ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org>
                wrote:
                    I believe that this discussion needs to involve
                    "unit of analysis" for
                    what it is that provides the mediational method.
                    What unit of study can properly encapsulate that
                    which is being observed?
                    Activity? Concept? Word? Mirror Neuron?
                    Oh my what a great temptest LSV did let out of the
                    teapot
                    eric

                    -----xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                    <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu> wrote: -----
                    To: "xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
                    <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
                    <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>>
                    From: Achilles Delari Junior
                    Sent by: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu
                    <mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu>
                    Date: 06/05/2013 07:04AM
                    Subject: RE: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                    Sure, Greg,
                    Well, seems to me that "draw analogies between
                    different domains of
                    their worlds" is closer to "meaning construction"
                    than to choice a
                    "stimulus medium" to help memory tasks, for
                    instance. The "double
                    stimulation" is fine because introduces a kind of
                    mediation between a
                    stimulus and our response to the stimulus. But,
                    following Vygotsky's
                    formulations at that time this new series of
                    "stimulus" (a nude, a
                    word, etc) act also as a stimulus, a conditioned
                    one. If you change
                    you paradigm to the proposition that all sign
                    implies any kind of
                    "generalization process" (meaning) that differs in
                    their structure and
                    has a genetic construction (see the studies about
                    concepts, for
                    instance), a sign could not be only a second
                    series of stimuli ruled
                    by the same laws that a conditional reflex... As
                    in "Instrumental
                    method": S-------X-------R. Where the relation
                    S---------R is a direct
                    stimulus response relationship, but when you
                    introduce a second series
                    of stimulus "X" (double stimulation) you have an
                    indirect stimulus
                    response relationship, but the relation between S
                    and X, and X and R
                    remain a conditioned reflex relationship... "Draw
                    analogies between
                    different domains of our worlds" seem to mean that
                    we are in transit
                    between different words of signification, and
                    culture is a human
                    production that involves the "generalization" from
                    a world to another,
                    broader, maybe not exactly more precise, but
                    "broader", in my opinion.
                    I don't know...


                    "In natural memory a direct associative
                    (conditional reflex)
                    connection A?B is established between two stimuli
                    A and B. In
                    artificial, mnemotechnic memory of the same
                    impression, by means of a
                    psychological tool X (a knot in a handkerchief, a
                    mnemonic scheme)
                    instead of the direct connection A?B two new ones
                    are established: A?X
                    and X?B Just like the connection A?B each of them
                    is a natural
                    conditional reflex process, determined, by the
                    properties of the brain
                    tissue. What is new, artificial, and instrumental
                    is the fact of the
                    replacement of one connection A?B by two
                    connections: A?X and X?B They
                    lead to the same result, but by a different path.
                    What is new is the
                    artificial direction which the instrument gives to
                    the natural process
                    of establishing a conditional connection, i.e.,
                    the active utilization
                    of the natural properties of brain tissue."
                    Vygotsky "The Instumental
                    Method" (this is 1930)
                    http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1930/instrumental.htm

                    But already in 1928:

                    "Let us now compare the natural and cultural
                    mnemonics of a child. The
                    relation between the two forms can be graphically
                    expressed by means
                    of a triangle: in case of natural memorization a
                    direct associative or
                    conditional reflexive connection is set up between
                    two points, A and
                    B. In case of mnemotechnical memorization,
                    utilizing some sign,
                    instead of one associative connection AB, the
                    others are set up AX and
                    BX, which bring us to the same result, but in a
                    roundabout way. Each
                    of these connections AX and BX is the same kind of
                    conditional-reflexive process of connection as
                    AB." Vygotsky (1928)

                http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1929/cultural_development.htm
                    See: "AX and BX is the same kind of
                    conditional-reflexive process of
                    connection as AB." --> The same kind... This
                    paradigm will not be the
                    same in 1933-34...

                    "(Introduction: the importance of the sign; its
                    social meaning). In
                    older works we ignored that the sign has meaning.
                    < But there is “a
                    time to cast away stones, and a time to gather
                    stones together”
                    (Ecclesiastes). > We proceeded from the principle
                    of the constancy of
                    meaning, we discounted meaning. But the problem of
                    meaning was already
                    present in the older investigations. Whereas
                    before our task was to
                    demonstrate what “the knot” and logical memory
                    have in common, now our
                    task is to demonstrate the difference that exists
                    between them.From
                    our works it follows that the sign changes the
                    interfunctional
                    relationships." (Vygotsky, 1933-34)

                http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/works/1934/problem-consciousness.htm
                    And now?


                    Thank you.

                    Achilles.

                        Date: Tue, 4 Jun 2013 18:31:23 -0600
                        Subject: Re: [xmca] Double Stimulation?
                        From: greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
                        <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
                        To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
                        <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>

                        Achilles,

                        Sounded interesting, but I'm not sure I
                        followed you completely. You
                say
                        that Strathern's quote seems like it has a
                        broader application that
                    "double
                        stimulation", but I could use some help with
                        the rest of your message.

                        If you have a few minutes, maybe you could try
                        rephrasing?

                        -greg


                        On Tue, Jun 4, 2013 at 4:11 PM, Achilles
                        Delari Junior <
                        achilles_delari@hotmail.com
                        <mailto:achilles_delari@hotmail.com>> wrote:

                            In my undertanding, this is very broader
                            and more powerful than
                double
                            stimulation... Double stimulation could be
                            overcoming with another
                    way for
                            think signs than "medium stimulus" - See
                            "The problem of
                    consciousness"
                            (1933-34), for instance. The more
                            important will be not the
                similarity
                            between a nude and a word, but their
                            difference, "before was
                    forgotten that
                            sign had a meaning" and "now" the meaning
                            must be take in account.
                    Double
                            stimulation, in my understanding, do not
                            resists to this new point
                    of view.
                            Achilles.

                                Date: Mon, 3 Jun 2013 06:19:04 -0600
                                From: greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
                                <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
                                To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
                                <mailto:xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>;
                                lchcmike@gmail.com
                                <mailto:lchcmike@gmail.com>;
                    antti.rajala@helsinki.fi
                    <mailto:antti.rajala@helsinki.fi>
                                CC:
                                Subject: [xmca] Double Stimulation?

                                I wonder if this quote by Marilyn
                                Strathern can be productively
                    connected
                                (not necessarily geneaologically, but
                                ideologically) to the
                    notion of
                                "double stimulation" (which I am just
                                now trying to figure out):
                                "Culture consists in the way people
                                draw analogies between
                different
                                domains of their worlds" (1992: 47).

                                -greg

                                --
                                Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
                                Visiting Assistant Professor
                                Department of Anthropology
                                883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
                                Brigham Young University
                                Provo, UT 84602
                                http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
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                        --
                        Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
                        Visiting Assistant Professor
                        Department of Anthropology
                        883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
                        Brigham Young University
                        Provo, UT 84602
                        http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
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                <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy/>
                Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
                http://marxists.academia.edu/AndyBlunden

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        Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
        <http://home.mira.net/%7Eandy/>
        Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
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