This is the final part of a three-part series about innovation. Previously we have discussed the role of innovation and how this can sometimes jar with our biological instincts. From this point we discussed how rituals could help transition individuals and groups through the risk and stress of moving from a familiar way of living well to a more uncertain aspiration of living better. We’ll look at innovation again in this article from the angle of connecting the past and the future.
Whitehead (1929) discussed how organisms form societies. A human being is a society of cells cooperating towards shared objects of care. An example would be a human being caring about its survival and the society of cells which make up a human being working together towards sustainable survival. This would be living well (Ibid).
If a group of cells formed a subsociety which began moving towards different objects of care, for example, the subgroups own expansion and survival at the expense of the survival of the whole society, then anti bodies would attempt to head off this rebellion. The anti-bodies would seek to maintain the order of the society. Anti-bodies would recognize the subgroup motives as threatening, and then act (Drawn from Doctor et al, 2022).
However, sometimes anti bodies can overact, and recognize the activities of a subgroup as threatening, when this subgroup of cells still cares about the same goals as the society. This would be an auto immune response. Let’s put this into the context of human beings at the sense making level, with a short detour to establish cognition as a universal primary.
Returning to Whitehead (1929), the observation was made that all organisms are cognitive, they feel the world around them. A rock for example, although seemingly inanimate, is still a society of particles which has agreed to work together to sustain the abstract form of a rock. It has a very low level of sophistication, and cares about very little beyond maintaining the societal order of a rock among its constituent particles.
The auto-immune system is a method of keeping societal order. At the collective level of human beings, we group together and work towards shared objects of care. When a subgroup introduces something new, we trigger an autoimmune response- is this subgroup helping or hindering the survival of the society?
A first parse of something new may focus on how novel it is. Whitehead (1929) identified two poles as organisms and their parts move from the past into the future. We have lived the past, experienced it, it is the physical pole. What to do next is something we imagine, the mental pole. The mental pole can tap into potential and introduce novelty. The past influences our future decisions, and so the physical pole influences the mental pole. If a direction about future direction is a sharp departure from experience, we may trigger a rapid immune response.
If our experiences have maintained living and living well, then a novel change could seem threatening. To change and not seem threatening, then it seems plausible that the future should clearly link to the past, or at least have a degree of coherence.
What does this mean for innovation? It means that innovation should augment past success and not run the risk of washing it away. Klein’s (2011) work on natural decision making brings this into sharp relief. Klein (ibid) observes that organizational innovation, especially technological innovation, places too much focus on being new and efficient. However, innovation can fail to augment what already works well, and consequently performance goes backward. The physical and mental poles have lost coherence.
Acknowledging that the change links to a continuous narrative helps people make sense of the change, a coherence of physical and mental poles. If people can make sense of the change, then it becomes realized that the change is working towards the same objects of care and not against it. This keeps the immune response healthy.
The key to this approach would seem to be being aware of what a society cares about. If it can be demonstrated that the innovation is helping achieve that goal, then the society achieves another organismic goal, reducing surprise.
Once an innovation has been introduced, it should start small to ensure it can be attended to. A subsociety with contrary objects of care can end the survival of the society by starting small, seemingly unthreatening, and fail to attract the attention of the immune response. The subsociety grows in strength and then overruns the society. By contrast but with equal outcome, a large widespread innovation with contrary objects of care, where past and future is not connected, can overrun a society rapidly.
With the above in mind, starting small, attending, and noticing the impact is significant, it is about tinkering and experimenting as safely as possible (Taleb, 2017). What is more significant, is linking the physical and mental poles. When the innovation makes sense, a society can aspire to live better collectively; Aspire towards a shared narrative, start small and attend to reduce surprise.
Reading
Klein, G (2011) Streetlights and Shadows. Bradford Books.
Doctor, T.; Witkowski, O.;Solomonova, E.; Duane, B.; Levin, M. (2022) Biology, Buddhism, and AI: Care as the Driver of Intelligence. Entropy 24, 710.
Whitehead, N. (1929) Process and Reality. Simon and Schuster
Taleb, N.N. (2017) Skin in the Game. Random House.
