8 ms·

Portable Ideas

88 points by llambda 14y ago

rmATinnovafy 14y ago
Good points. What does you mother think of this? I'd like to know her take on it, because she is an amazing example of someone who lives in the edge of the bubble. A black woman who became a programmer during the times when there were no women or blacks can put some insight into how to build portable ideas.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
te_platt 14y ago
I thought this article sounded familiar but it took me a while to place it. It's the parable of the sower, Matthew 13:3-8. 3 And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow; 4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up: 5 Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: 6 And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. 7 And some fell among athorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them: 8 But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.
- pilgrim689 14y ago
  I think this is the wrong analogy... The parable seems to say that if you spread your seeds across many areas, it's bound to grow somewhere. That would be a good analogy if the post was actually about spreading ideas in as many bubbles as possible and hoping one bubble picks it up. The post is actually about making 1 idea of high enough quality and insight such that it can be transferred from one bubble (yours) to the next by the "edges". So you'd have to find a parable that speaks of getting a good seed and planting it in your garden, in the hopes that the flower that grows from it spreads its seeds to your neighbors!
jayferd 14y ago
Portable green ideas sleep furiously.
abraxasz 14y ago
I will have to disagree. Or rather, I think that while some bubble are pretty closed, some are very permeable. I'll take Hacker News for example. Although some people complain about the fact that there are strong biases on HN, I actually think that it is not that bad, and there are plenty of topics on which the community is divided (on top of my mind: internet piracy is acceptable vs bad, windows is a good tool vs it sucks, google is evil vs it is awesome, linux will never be a good desktop environment vs it will, etc..). I think that there is a distinction between bubbles that are created around certain opinions (windows is bad + piracy is good + linux rocks) and bubbles that are organized around values (I disagree with you but I like debating with you + I like to learn about different subjects + etc..).
- adrianhoward 14y ago
  I like using the word "genre" instead of "bubble" as a metaphor for this sort of thing. Genre's are useful - they act as a nice shortcut in the bookshop if you're looking for a particular kind of book. But I never pop my head outside of the SF section I'm going to be missing out on a lot of good reading and some interesting outlooks on life.
stcredzero 14y ago
Fundamental ideas are portable ideas. Lisp didn't start out as a programming language. It was an abstract model of computation. As an ex-Symbolics employee friend of mine says, "Math never goes out of style." Eschew what's popular and what gets attention. Seek the fundamental instead. This is the difference between learning about Ruby because Rails is the current big thing versus knowing enough to be interested in Ruby because it embodies the objects+messages model and you find that beautiful. (And if you value the objects+messages model because it was a big thing in academia at some point, you are still missing the point!) Programming has many of the features of "pop-culture" because the rate of change in the field is faster than the rate of actual progress. Learn in-depth the actual progress. EDIT: Switched the positions of fundamental and portable, since fundamental => portable.
- _pius 14y ago
  Portable ideas are fundamental ideas. This is probably backwards.
  - stcredzero 14y ago
    True. Fundamental => Portable. But portability could be a function of something shallow but attractive.
- signalsignal 14y ago
  Everyone is some kind of fundamentalist, but people keep their ideas to themselves to keep an even keel because inexperience in expression tends towards bad outcomes. I have no scientific evidence for this, but this is my amateur reasoning in observing the personal growth in others.
  - stcredzero 14y ago
    Everyone is some kind of fundamentalist This is an awkward phrase, as the word "fundamentalist" carries anti-intellectual baggage. ...inexperience in expression tends towards bad outcomes. I have no scientific evidence for this... You now have one data point.
wes-exp 14y ago
How do you make an idea portable?
- raganwald 14y ago
  I honestly don’t know! Here are some of the things I’ve tried. First, I’ve tried writing parables. Some of these seem very portable, but they also often annoy the people in the bubble who already embrace the idea and want more practical insights or advice. Nevertheless, parables have a way of side-stepping the logical critic in people’s brains and appealing directly to their emotions. Sometimes that’s a big win. Second, I’ve tried to come up with sound bites. I’m not sure this is an effective example, but off the top of my head: “Discrimination doesn’t scale.” Sound bites are the refined sugar of ideas for good and for bad. Third, I’ve tried to write without demonizing the people I disagree with. I tried to portray “Ted” as well-meanininged but a little too caffeinated here: http://raganwald.posterous.com/bob-and-carol-and-ted-and-alice http://raganwald.posterous.com/bob-and-carol-and-ted-and-ali.... But I think I blew it here: http://raganwald.posterous.com/a-position-of-the-highest-moral-principle http://raganwald.posterous.com/a-position-of-the-highest-mor.... The truth is, I have no system or method for generating portable ideas, just some observations that many portable ideas have certain characteristics in common: They have emotional impact (tip 1), they are easy to remember (tip 2), and they avoid being divisive (point 3). YMMV.
  - stcredzero 14y ago
    parables have a way of side-stepping the logical critic in people’s brains and appealing directly to their emotions. Sometimes that’s a big win. Second, I’ve tried to come up with sound bites...Sound bites are the refined sugar of ideas for good and for bad. As you note, those are equally applicable to ideas with and without substance. The truth is, I have no system or method for generating portable ideas, just some observations that many portable ideas have certain characteristics in common: They have emotional impact (tip 1), they are easy to remember (tip 2), and they avoid being divisive (point 3). I'd posit that looking for ways to popularize substantive ideas will produce portable ones.
- dm1222e 14y ago
mattvanhorn 14y ago
Sounds to me like a cognitive escape velocity. An idea needs a certain amount just to get out of your head, and an even larger velocity to get out of the 'bubble.' People encountering the idea can either increase or decrease its velocity, like booster rockets. Now, I wonder if the escape velocity of a given bubble, or the current velocity of a given idea are measurable in any meaningful way, so that we could act to change them?
- pitchups 14y ago
  Love the concept of "cognitive escape velocity" - a perfect example of a portable idea that spans psychology, physics and social media!
digisth 14y ago
An unstated principle embedded in the post, sometimes made elsewhere (particularly in econ and political circles): change happens at the margins.
erikpukinskis 14y ago
"If you write an angry rant about sexism in the workplace, it may never leave the bubble. But a thoughtful piece may plant some ideas at the edge of the bubble that will escape" I've been on Hacker News a while, and have noticed across many posts that raganwald often writes well meaning, but sexist comments. He seems like a nice guy, and I've actually considered writing him a polite email about it. But I end up not doing it. For no other reason than it's really hard and time consuming. When you criticize someone, it's understandably met with resistance. And if you make any kind of rhetorical mistakes whatsoever, people will take the opportunity to discount your entire position. It's a minefield. And there's so much sexism in the world, there's not enough hours in the day to write "portable" responses to all of it. Writing an "angry" blog post is often as far as one can get. And so while I appreciate raganwald's point, that it's incredibly powerful when you can write a gentle, persuasive, portable argument.... I just don't think that's enough of a strategy for us, as a group. I think when someone calls you out on sexism, you have some responsibility to wade through the anger and rhetorical mistakes and try to understand what their beef is..
- raganwald 14y ago
  I’m always interested in and grateful for criticism. Feel free to make suggestions here if you think they will be instructive for others as well as for me. If you prefer to make them privately, I’m reg@braythwayt.com. Sincere thanks in advance...
gfodor 14y ago
This is an insightful post. I think a stellar example of what you get when you run with this concept and try to use it as a tool to influence others is seen in the right wing propaganda machine in the U.S. Often one has to sit back and wonder how reasonable, decent people can support horrible policies such as banning gay marriage, torture, and so on. At least part of the reason for this is because those in power who want to enact these policies have mastered the art of making them portable outside their own extremist spheres. They do this by "attaching" these ideas to more innocent, pure, and (generally) positive beliefs that are universally held by many conservatives, if not all Americans: love of country, love of God, the fear of harm to your children, belief in fairness, belief that hard work begets success, belief in the benefits of family and community, and so on. The magic that makes it possible for decent, loving, hard working people to support things like torture is by making the idea of torture "portable" into their worldview, by hanging it onto one or more of these core beliefs. If you don't support torture, you're not protecting your children. If you support gay marriage, you're laying the groundwork for families to unravel. It's all bullshit, of course, but these are the root things people are being convinced of: not that torture is good, or that gay marriage is evil (though it often morphs into that), but that these things are natural conclusions based upon beliefs you already have. It takes the work of an evil genius to figure out how to connect these two things together and make them portable towards groups of people who have otherwise innocent and positive beliefs, but we see it happening every day.
- raganwald 14y ago
  V. insightful: One way to make an idea portable is to attach it to another idea that is strongly held in another “bubble."
  - gfodor 14y ago
    Thanks. One thing I forgot to mention is that this becomes a self-perpetuating cycle by turning those holding the opposing viewpoint into enemies: if you're against torture, you are putting my children in harms way, if you are for gay marriage, you are destroying my family and community, etc.
jes5199 14y ago
as an alternative to "going viral", I know a company that's trying to "go bacterial". Bacteria reproduce much more slowly than viruses - and yet they still have a viable contagion curve, and are at least as ubiquitous in nature as viruses.
adrianhoward 14y ago
It's sometimes very hard to create "universally" portable ideas - the metaphor or story that's going to get everybody to understand and communicate an idea. You often need to bring people together a bit first so that all the groups can actually see the common ground - even if they've not reached it yet. For example - I have some fairly strong beliefs, based on the teams that I've worked with, on how design/UX and development fit together. I've learned from experience that I usually can't just jump to the "you need to play nice - look at all the advantages" pitch. Instead I have a bunch of arguments and points for developers, and a bunch of arguments and points for designers. The talk I giving at the mostly developer GOTO Copenhagen next week is going to be very different from the one I gave at UX Cambridge last year - because of the audience not the ideas. Once you nudge folk a little out of their comfort zone - then you can sell the larger changes that either side would have initially rejected. Keep looking for the portable ideas - they always help. But in the mean time I'd also pay a lot of attention to why different groups reject ideas, and use the knowledge you gain there to hone your presentation to that group. (BTW for folk who've not already come across it "Resistance as a resource" is a good read http://dhemery.com/articles/resistance_as_a_resource/ http://dhemery.com/articles/resistance_as_a_resource/ )

88 points by llambda 14y ago

Good points. What does you mother think of this? I'd like to know her take on it, because she is an amazing example of someone who lives in the edge of the bubble. A black woman who became a programmer during the times when there were no women or blacks can put some insight into how to build portable ideas.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

te_platt 14y ago

I thought this article sounded familiar but it took me a while to place it. It's the parable of the sower, Matthew 13:3-8. 3 And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow; 4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up: 5 Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: 6 And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. 7 And some fell among athorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them: 8 But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.

pilgrim689 14y ago
I think this is the wrong analogy... The parable seems to say that if you spread your seeds across many areas, it's bound to grow somewhere. That would be a good analogy if the post was actually about spreading ideas in as many bubbles as possible and hoping one bubble picks it up. The post is actually about making 1 idea of high enough quality and insight such that it can be transferred from one bubble (yours) to the next by the "edges". So you'd have to find a parable that speaks of getting a good seed and planting it in your garden, in the hopes that the flower that grows from it spreads its seeds to your neighbors!

jayferd 14y ago

Portable green ideas sleep furiously.

abraxasz 14y ago

I will have to disagree. Or rather, I think that while some bubble are pretty closed, some are very permeable. I'll take Hacker News for example. Although some people complain about the fact that there are strong biases on HN, I actually think that it is not that bad, and there are plenty of topics on which the community is divided (on top of my mind: internet piracy is acceptable vs bad, windows is a good tool vs it sucks, google is evil vs it is awesome, linux will never be a good desktop environment vs it will, etc..). I think that there is a distinction between bubbles that are created around certain opinions (windows is bad + piracy is good + linux rocks) and bubbles that are organized around values (I disagree with you but I like debating with you + I like to learn about different subjects + etc..).

adrianhoward 14y ago
I like using the word "genre" instead of "bubble" as a metaphor for this sort of thing. Genre's are useful - they act as a nice shortcut in the bookshop if you're looking for a particular kind of book. But I never pop my head outside of the SF section I'm going to be missing out on a lot of good reading and some interesting outlooks on life.

stcredzero 14y ago

Fundamental ideas are portable ideas. Lisp didn't start out as a programming language. It was an abstract model of computation. As an ex-Symbolics employee friend of mine says, "Math never goes out of style." Eschew what's popular and what gets attention. Seek the fundamental instead. This is the difference between learning about Ruby because Rails is the current big thing versus knowing enough to be interested in Ruby because it embodies the objects+messages model and you find that beautiful. (And if you value the objects+messages model because it was a big thing in academia at some point, you are still missing the point!) Programming has many of the features of "pop-culture" because the rate of change in the field is faster than the rate of actual progress. Learn in-depth the actual progress. EDIT: Switched the positions of fundamental and portable, since fundamental => portable.

_pius 14y ago
Portable ideas are fundamental ideas. This is probably backwards.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  True. Fundamental => Portable. But portability could be a function of something shallow but attractive.
signalsignal 14y ago
Everyone is some kind of fundamentalist, but people keep their ideas to themselves to keep an even keel because inexperience in expression tends towards bad outcomes. I have no scientific evidence for this, but this is my amateur reasoning in observing the personal growth in others.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  Everyone is some kind of fundamentalist This is an awkward phrase, as the word "fundamentalist" carries anti-intellectual baggage. ...inexperience in expression tends towards bad outcomes. I have no scientific evidence for this... You now have one data point.

wes-exp 14y ago

How do you make an idea portable?

raganwald 14y ago
I honestly don’t know! Here are some of the things I’ve tried. First, I’ve tried writing parables. Some of these seem very portable, but they also often annoy the people in the bubble who already embrace the idea and want more practical insights or advice. Nevertheless, parables have a way of side-stepping the logical critic in people’s brains and appealing directly to their emotions. Sometimes that’s a big win. Second, I’ve tried to come up with sound bites. I’m not sure this is an effective example, but off the top of my head: “Discrimination doesn’t scale.” Sound bites are the refined sugar of ideas for good and for bad. Third, I’ve tried to write without demonizing the people I disagree with. I tried to portray “Ted” as well-meanininged but a little too caffeinated here: http://raganwald.posterous.com/bob-and-carol-and-ted-and-alice http://raganwald.posterous.com/bob-and-carol-and-ted-and-ali.... But I think I blew it here: http://raganwald.posterous.com/a-position-of-the-highest-moral-principle http://raganwald.posterous.com/a-position-of-the-highest-mor.... The truth is, I have no system or method for generating portable ideas, just some observations that many portable ideas have certain characteristics in common: They have emotional impact (tip 1), they are easy to remember (tip 2), and they avoid being divisive (point 3). YMMV.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  parables have a way of side-stepping the logical critic in people’s brains and appealing directly to their emotions. Sometimes that’s a big win. Second, I’ve tried to come up with sound bites...Sound bites are the refined sugar of ideas for good and for bad. As you note, those are equally applicable to ideas with and without substance. The truth is, I have no system or method for generating portable ideas, just some observations that many portable ideas have certain characteristics in common: They have emotional impact (tip 1), they are easy to remember (tip 2), and they avoid being divisive (point 3). I'd posit that looking for ways to popularize substantive ideas will produce portable ones.
dm1222e 14y ago

mattvanhorn 14y ago

Sounds to me like a cognitive escape velocity. An idea needs a certain amount just to get out of your head, and an even larger velocity to get out of the 'bubble.' People encountering the idea can either increase or decrease its velocity, like booster rockets. Now, I wonder if the escape velocity of a given bubble, or the current velocity of a given idea are measurable in any meaningful way, so that we could act to change them?

pitchups 14y ago
Love the concept of "cognitive escape velocity" - a perfect example of a portable idea that spans psychology, physics and social media!

digisth 14y ago

An unstated principle embedded in the post, sometimes made elsewhere (particularly in econ and political circles): change happens at the margins.

erikpukinskis 14y ago

"If you write an angry rant about sexism in the workplace, it may never leave the bubble. But a thoughtful piece may plant some ideas at the edge of the bubble that will escape" I've been on Hacker News a while, and have noticed across many posts that raganwald often writes well meaning, but sexist comments. He seems like a nice guy, and I've actually considered writing him a polite email about it. But I end up not doing it. For no other reason than it's really hard and time consuming. When you criticize someone, it's understandably met with resistance. And if you make any kind of rhetorical mistakes whatsoever, people will take the opportunity to discount your entire position. It's a minefield. And there's so much sexism in the world, there's not enough hours in the day to write "portable" responses to all of it. Writing an "angry" blog post is often as far as one can get. And so while I appreciate raganwald's point, that it's incredibly powerful when you can write a gentle, persuasive, portable argument.... I just don't think that's enough of a strategy for us, as a group. I think when someone calls you out on sexism, you have some responsibility to wade through the anger and rhetorical mistakes and try to understand what their beef is..

raganwald 14y ago
I’m always interested in and grateful for criticism. Feel free to make suggestions here if you think they will be instructive for others as well as for me. If you prefer to make them privately, I’m reg@braythwayt.com. Sincere thanks in advance...

gfodor 14y ago

This is an insightful post. I think a stellar example of what you get when you run with this concept and try to use it as a tool to influence others is seen in the right wing propaganda machine in the U.S. Often one has to sit back and wonder how reasonable, decent people can support horrible policies such as banning gay marriage, torture, and so on. At least part of the reason for this is because those in power who want to enact these policies have mastered the art of making them portable outside their own extremist spheres. They do this by "attaching" these ideas to more innocent, pure, and (generally) positive beliefs that are universally held by many conservatives, if not all Americans: love of country, love of God, the fear of harm to your children, belief in fairness, belief that hard work begets success, belief in the benefits of family and community, and so on. The magic that makes it possible for decent, loving, hard working people to support things like torture is by making the idea of torture "portable" into their worldview, by hanging it onto one or more of these core beliefs. If you don't support torture, you're not protecting your children. If you support gay marriage, you're laying the groundwork for families to unravel. It's all bullshit, of course, but these are the root things people are being convinced of: not that torture is good, or that gay marriage is evil (though it often morphs into that), but that these things are natural conclusions based upon beliefs you already have. It takes the work of an evil genius to figure out how to connect these two things together and make them portable towards groups of people who have otherwise innocent and positive beliefs, but we see it happening every day.

raganwald 14y ago
V. insightful: One way to make an idea portable is to attach it to another idea that is strongly held in another “bubble."
- gfodor 14y ago
  Thanks. One thing I forgot to mention is that this becomes a self-perpetuating cycle by turning those holding the opposing viewpoint into enemies: if you're against torture, you are putting my children in harms way, if you are for gay marriage, you are destroying my family and community, etc.

jes5199 14y ago

as an alternative to "going viral", I know a company that's trying to "go bacterial". Bacteria reproduce much more slowly than viruses - and yet they still have a viable contagion curve, and are at least as ubiquitous in nature as viruses.

adrianhoward 14y ago

It's sometimes very hard to create "universally" portable ideas - the metaphor or story that's going to get everybody to understand and communicate an idea. You often need to bring people together a bit first so that all the groups can actually see the common ground - even if they've not reached it yet. For example - I have some fairly strong beliefs, based on the teams that I've worked with, on how design/UX and development fit together. I've learned from experience that I usually can't just jump to the "you need to play nice - look at all the advantages" pitch. Instead I have a bunch of arguments and points for developers, and a bunch of arguments and points for designers. The talk I giving at the mostly developer GOTO Copenhagen next week is going to be very different from the one I gave at UX Cambridge last year - because of the audience not the ideas. Once you nudge folk a little out of their comfort zone - then you can sell the larger changes that either side would have initially rejected. Keep looking for the portable ideas - they always help. But in the mean time I'd also pay a lot of attention to why different groups reject ideas, and use the knowledge you gain there to hone your presentation to that group. (BTW for folk who've not already come across it "Resistance as a resource" is a good read http://dhemery.com/articles/resistance_as_a_resource/ http://dhemery.com/articles/resistance_as_a_resource/ )