1) The document discusses how to improve online political conversations through mapping topics of discussion. 2) Topic mapping involves representing important issues, perspectives, and their relationships as topics to help weave perspectives together and augment understanding of complex systems. 3) By recording conversations, mapping the topics and relationships discussed, and reflecting on them, it may be possible to conduct more civil online political discussions and continuously improve conversations over time.

1. Romancing Conversation
Topics
Jack Park and Marc-Antoine Parent
TopicQuests Foundation
Open Global Mind Workshop
29 October, 2020
© 2020, TopicQuests Foundation
PhotobyJohannesPlenioonUnsplash

2. Big Picture
• “Never doubt that a small
group of thoughtful,
committed, citizens can
change the world. Indeed, it
is the only thing that ever
has.” ― Margaret Mead
• Conversation mapping and topic
maps tools help weave
perspectives together
Photo by Ray Hennessy on Unsplash

3. Problem Space: Big Picture
• Signature Question
• How can we have civil conversations online about politics?
• Signature Issues
• Massive Complexity in our conversation topics
• Massive Complexity does not reduce well to simple
solutions
• Finding Solutions requires
• Increased creative exploration of options
• Increased Trust
Walt Kelly (1971) Image: Wikipedia

4. Problem Space
• Too much information (info glut)
• Missing information
• Proprietary and not available
• Not proprietary, but hasn't been brought
to addressable space
• Massive amounts of tacit knowledge
• Native intuition not captured
• Incomplete recording
• Trust
• Heterogeneity
• Language (vernacular, dialects, etc.)
• Different world views on same topic

5. Urgent Challenge
How we can improve our
perception of the complexity
we live within,
so we may improve our
interaction with the world?
― Nora Bateson
A game-changing
Perception ó Action response
is necessary within the decade.
How to Improve
Conversations?

6. Solution Space: Engelbartian Overview
• Human System
• complex, adaptive, anticipatory, as
individual and as society
• mother and user of Tool System,
animating it with intentionality
• Tool System
• hardware and software for
networked sensemaking and
presencing
• augments & de-augments Human
System capabilities
• Life System
• sustains Human System, both
physically and psychically
• is affected by Human System
amplified by Tool System
Image: Mark Szpakowski (2018)
http://www.topicquests.org/human-tool-and-eco-systems/

7. Human System: Limits of our Knowledge
• We can open a microbe to
study all the parts
• Opening the microbe kills it
• Why did opening a microbe
to count all the parts kill it?
• What is life?
• Did opening the microbe to
count its parts get us any closer
to an answer?
• Answers are bound to the
nature of Complex Systems
Img: Wikipedia

8. Life Systems: Relations Among the Parts
• Counting parts is a start
• But, everything is intertwingled
• Understanding the relationships
among those parts and between
them and their environment is
the next step
• Relations as complex,
interwoven fabrics
• Use tool systems to augment our
capabilities
Img: © Regents of University of California

9. Connecting Dots
As I’ve observed, “connecting the dots” means
putting pieces of puzzle together:
you get enriched by one or more relevant disciplines,
and what you learned from all other fields brings a
great possibility of making unique insights.
It helps you to see things from a different point.
—Kary Mullis, Nobel Laureate 1993
Photo by Ricardo Frantz on Unsplash

10. Tool Systems: Mapping
our Conversations
PhotobyBekirDönmezonUnsplash
• Purpose
• Augment Human Systems’ Perception of
Connections
• Improve Perception ó Action responses
• How
• Community Memory
• Indexing Subjects
• Tracking Relationships
• More Connected Dots

11. Tool Systems: How do we map our topics?
• MindMaps
• Simple
• Good place to start thinking about
situations
• ConceptMaps
• Adds labeled arcs (relations) to
MindMaps
• TopicMaps
• Turns important relations to topics
• Important relations:
• Have biographies
• Can be the subject of debate

12. Focus on Topic Map Structure
•Topics as Actors
•Topics as Role Players
•Topics as Relations
•Topics as Types
•Topics as Biographies
Relation
Biography
Actor
Type
Relation
Type
Actor
Type
Role Type Role Type
Relation ActorActor
Key point:
Every Relation – every
claim has a biography

13. Higher-order Benefits
of Topic Mapping
• Indexing subjects across topic maps
enables crossing heterogeneous
community boundaries
• Knowledge federation
• Provenance
• allows community memory
• enhances trust
• Connected dots unify information
• Reduces infoglut
• Connects missing information
Photo by Gabriel Garcia Marengo on Unsplash

14. Using this Engelbartian Ecosystem
Perception ó Action response
• Conduct civil conversations
• Record them
• Map them
• Reflect on them
• Rinse and Repeat
Photo by Sam Goodgame on Unsplash