“What I Tell You Two Times Is True”

1. “Man is unique, not because he does science and not because he does art, but because science and art equally are expressions of his mind.” Jacob Bronowski “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” Four “Questionable” Principles in Search of Deeply Significant Learning Creative Leaps International John J. Cimino, Jr., President

2. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr. By deeply significant learning, we mean learning which actually changes our thinking, our attitudes, our sense of what is possible, even our sense of who we are and who we can be, if we choose. Open Letter to OCU Community Hence, our focus on these seven over-arching key words and phrases: imagination perception creativity interdisciplinary thinking knowledge integration leadership the arts

3. Disciplines as lenses • The value of multiple lenses • The particular value of the arts as one of your lenses for thinking, teaching and learning “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

4. The arts… “Onepurpose of art is to alter thequalityof our attentiveness -- to enhance, refresh and sharpen ourawareness.”JJC “The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been hidden by the answers.James Baldwin Artists capture our attention and awareness and move us to internal process, to perception at the level of imaginative experience which is thus credible, vital and evocative of possible futures. JJC “Aesthetic knowledge is an intuitive knowledge of the possible, rather and more than of the true, and aesthetic communication is not so much the account of that which has happened as the prompting of that which might happen or might be.”Gagliardi “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

5. Disciplines as lenses • The processes of “induction” and “transfer” • Induction in science and in the arts • Metaphors and inductive process • Metaphors as mini-lenses • Metaphors and Transfer • Transfer and learning “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

6. Disciplines and metaphors as lenses • A strategy of optimization and enrichment for triggering “depth” perception and learning • Designing into our courses & learning experiences a rich collection of conceptual lenses & “resonances” • via complementary disciplines and metaphors a “Resonance in Design” “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

7. Resonance in Design • What I Tell you Three Times Is True Our task is to help create multi-dimensional, meaningful and palpable “gestalts” …that, plus a love of learning and nothing less than the beginning of wisdom. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

8. Four “Questionable” Principles (or “Questionables”, as I often like to call them) • Transfer in all directions • Double description • Radiance • Optimism A Questionable: an idea which should be questioned and, having been questioned, may transform itself into a guiding principle with your own personal stamp upon it – or not. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

9. Transfer in all directionsQuestionable # 1 • Each thing that we learn, each learning experience that we have, ripples its effects through future and past learnings. • It is inevitable, ecological in scope, unknowable in any detail, uncontrollable, almost always surprising, essentially mysterious. • It is a process which must be trusted, not managed, catalyzed not controlled, and operates as within a complex dynamic system. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

10. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 • Direct transfer • Skills transfer and Habits of Excellence • Indirect transfer • Transfer learning in complex living systems through vast and subtle webs of possible connections • Emergence and contingency “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

11. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 • Indirect transfer • Constraining and enabling effects: optimizing the process • Strong on enrichment and openings to possible paths • Light on managed choices and extrinsic rewards systems • Strong on invitation, camaraderie and risk-free experimentation “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

12. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 • Indirect transfer • Connecting our personal inner worlds to the world scaffolding of archetypal verities • an “illustration of essence” • via Resonance in Design • Setting minds and hearts in wondrous transfer motion where “the inner work of art” is ours to perform “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

13. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 • Metaphor • A bridge for the transfer of attributes from one form of description to another • “my love is like a red, red rose” • A mapping of one idea upon another for comparison, clarification or elaboration • “come to think of it, my love is more like a nightingale, a summer’s day or a gazelle” “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

14. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 Metaphor as Strategy • Often only a combination of several metaphors will do the trick • to add dimension, life-like quality, emotional and imaginative appeal • In other words, we optimize the transfer of living-breathing bits of insight from one or more sources into one improvised gestalt “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

15. Transfer in all directions Questionable # 1 • Metaphor • The logic of metaphor as the logic of induction • Induction: from multiple observations to general principle • Induction: the light and the way of modernity in science (Bacon) • Setting the inductive process in motion • “You make two statements; what is true of both of them is the formal truth” (Bateson) • Creative juxtaposition • Metaphor as creative juxtaposition • Metaphor as “double description” • Double description and interdisciplinarity “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

16. Double description Questionable # 2 • This was Gregory Bateson’s name for interdisciplinary thinking • Double description and “binocular vision” • Joining two monocular views • The “bonus of insight” and the experience of “depth” • Double description and interdisciplinarity • The “bonus of insight” and the experience of “depth” • Double description and the arts • The “bonus of insight” and the experience of “depth” “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

17. Double description Questionable # 2 • It is the essence of metaphoric thinking • It is the driving force of the transfer principle • As a design principle, it takes the form of “creative juxtaposition” • It underlies the basic concept of “consilience” Consilience as a “jumping together” of disparate facts or ideas into a common structure of explanation: the consilience of induction. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

18. Transfer in all directions “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” “Man is unique, not because he does science and not because he does art, but because science and art equally are expressions of his mind.” Jacob Bronowski “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

19. Exploration by induction: What common element or explanatory principle underlies all the items below? “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

20. Exploration by induction: What common element or explanatory principle underlies all the items below? “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

21. Radiance Questionable # 3 • This means “alive in the idea personally discovered” (”Vico and the Science of Imagination”) • It underscores that teaching, leading and communicating are essentially “performative” and must be enacted as true exemplars, that is, fully authentic and fully present. • It means embodying the idea beneath the word, beneath the image, living the idea deeply known. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.

22. Optimism Questionable # 4 • This means that life is about hope, that positivity is essential to learning. • It means that the “radiant” affirmative dynamic which enlivens the arts can enliven each of us as makers and appreciators of art and as people who live artfully, passionately and well. • It means that optimism in leaders, teachers and artists is importantly self-enabling and also empowering to others. “What I Tell You Two Times Is True” John J. Cimino, Jr.