Archives for January 2025

I was on LinkedIn, and noted this list of influences in a profile: “complex systems, cybernetics, anthropology, sociology, neuroscience, (evolutionary) biology, information technology and human performance.” And, to me, that’s a redundancy. Why?

A while ago, I said “Departments of cognitive science tend to include psychologists, linguists, sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers, and, yes, neuroscientists. ” I missed artificial intelligence and computer science more generally. Really, it’s about everything that has to do with human thought, alone, or in aggregate. In a ‘post-cognitive’ era, we also recognize that thinking is not just in the head, but external. And it’s not just the formal reasoning, or lack thereof, but it’s personality (affect), and motivation (conation).

Cognitive science emerged as a way to bring different folks together who were thinking about thinking. Thus, that list above is, to me, all about cognitive science! And I get why folks might want to claim that they’re being integrative, but I’m saying “been there, done that”. Not me personally, to be clear, but rather that there’s a field doing precisely that. (Though I have pursued investigations across all of the above in my febrile pursuit of all things about applied cognitive science.)

Why should we care? Because we need to understand what’s been empirically shown about our thinking. If we want to develop solutions – individual, organizational, and societal –  to the pressing problems we face, we ought to do so in ways that are most aligned with how our brains work. To do otherwise is to invite inefficiencies, biases, and other maladaptive practices.

Part of being evidence-informed, in my mind, is doing things in ways that align with us. And there is lots of room for improvement. Which is why I love learning & development, these are the people who’ve got the most background, and opportunity, to work on these fronts. Yes, we need to liase with user experience, and organizational development, and more, but we are (or should be) the ones who know most about learning, which in many ways is the key to thinking (about thinking).

So, I’ve argued before that maybe we need a Chief Cognitive Officer (or equivalent). That’s not Human Resources, by the way (which seems to be a misnomer along the lines of Human Capital). Instead, it’s aligning work to be most effective across all the org elements. Maybe now more than ever before! At least, that’s where my thinking keeps ending up. Yours?

So, I’m writing, again. Not a book (at least not initially ;), but something. I’m not sure exactly how it’ll manifest, but it’s emerged. Rather than share what I’m writing (too early), I’m reflecting a bit on the process.

As usual, I’m writing in Word. I’d like to use other platforms (Pages? Scrivener? Vellum?), but there are a couple of extenuating circumstances. For one, I’ve been using Word since I wrote my PhD thesis on the Mac II I bought for the purpose. I think that was Word 2.0, circa late 80’s. In other words, I’ve been using Word a long time! Then, the most important thing besides ‘styles‘ (formatting, not learning) is the ability to outline. Word has industrial-strength outlining, and, to use an over-used and over-emphatic point, I live and die by outlines.

I outline my plan before I start writing, pretty much always. Not for blog posts like this, but for anything of any real length beyond such a post. Anything with intermediate headings is almost guaranteed to be outlined. I tend to prefer well-structured narratives (at least for non-fiction?). It likely will change, of course. When my very first book was written, it pretty much followed the structure. Ever since then…  My second book had me rearranging the structure as I typed. My most recent book got restructured after every time I shared it with my initial readers, until suddenly it gelled.

In this case, and not unlike most cases, I move things around as I go. This should be a section all its own. That is superfluous to need. This other goes better here than where I originally put it. And so on. I do take a pass through to reconcile any gaps or transitions, though I try to remedy those as I go.  The goal is to do a coherent treatment of whatever the topic is.

I throw resources in as I go. That is, if I find myself referring to a concept, I put a reminder in a References or Resources section at the end to grab a reference later. I have a separate (ever-growing) file of references for that purpose. Though I may not always include the reference in the document (currently I’m trying to keep the prose lean), but I want folks to have a resource at least.

I also jump around, a bit. Mostly I proceed from ‘go to whoa’, but occasionally I realize something I want to include, and put a note at the appropriate place. That sometimes ends up being prose, until I realize I need to go back to where I was ;). I hope that it leads to a coherent flow. Of course, as above, I do reread sections, and I try to give a final read before I pass on to whatever next step is coming. Typically, that means sending to someone to see if I’m on track or off the rails.

I also am pondering that I may retrofit with diagrams. Sometimes I’ve put them in as I go. At other times, I go back and fill them in. I do love me a good diagram, for the reasons Larkin & Simon articulated (Connie Malamed is doing a good job on visuals over at LinkedIn this month). Sometimes I edit the ones I have as I recognize improvements, sometimes I create new ones, sometimes I throw existing ones in. It’s when I think they’ll help, but I can think of several I probably should make.

The above holds true for pretty much all writing I do beyond these posts. This is for me, first, after all! Otherwise, I solicit feedback (which I don’t always get; I think folks trust me too much, at least for shorter things). I’m sure others work different. Still, these are my thoughts on writing, again. I welcome your reflections!