SENSE: A Field Guide to Science & Culture

'Violence Somewhere Else' (VSE) Theory

SENSE

A Field Guide to Science & Culture
Theory . Storytelling . Transformation

The New York Times has a modern obsession with Arizona -- it's such a weird place to them -- golf & retirement? Ha! Many articles are about illegal immigration and real estate booms, and now articles today about identity theft and Biosphere II.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/30/us/30identity.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/28/realestate/28nation.html

Years ago historical Arizona earned a violent reputation (Fort Apache; Tombstone), and later, Arizona developed a reputation for land fraud and as a desert home for mafioso. Much of that imagined reputation was fueled by ready telegraph connections and east coast newspaper reporters in search of stories about violence somewhere else. In their imaginations, New Yorker's need a place weirder that New York to make them feel better about themselves. Arizona's violence gives them smug pause to think they are better off. They understand geopolitical violence like 911 & WTC. They don't understand Arizona. Fiorello LaGuardia spent his early years in Arizona -- and then left -- and that still gives New Yorker's pause.

These days, articles about Arizona routinely appear in the New York Times. These daily stories often contain apochryphal elements, and by design or chance, editors produce a subliminal signal. When I travel and tell people I am from Arizona, they look at me like I have three eyes. They ask me about golf and violence, and almost in the same breath...

sense.editor@yahoo.com 

A Design & Model of Theory in One's Brain

SENSE

A Field Guide to Science & Culture
Theory . Storytelling . Transformation

http://www.graphpaper.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2006/05/whatiknow.jpg In this really great drawing, notice the overlaps and the exclusive or exclusionary areas. I think underneath this drawing there sits a cogent theory, and a model composed of independent and dependent, mediating and moderating variables. When I look at the current drawing, my reptilian brain jumps to the conclusion: ‘young male person drew this’ (there is an age and gender component to the drawing; I suspect that some women might draw it in a less phallic, more inclusive style). If this drawing were my drawing, if the ‘my website’ variable was mine, it would move or expand south and southeast (as I age, there is less I claim to know or control, and more I want to hear from others).

As an experiment, the variable ‘my web site’ could be replaced by a wide variety of other ‘my ___’ variables: my project, my report, my boss, my family, my job, my reputation, my car, my management style, my disease, my significant other, my cooking style, my attitude, my resume, my writing style, my mood, my stock market picks, my style of dressing, etc. It would be an interesting exercise to pick a ‘my ___’ variable of one’s own choosing, plunk it into the drawing, state the theory, list testable hypotheses, and redraw the model variables with relationship flows.

sense.editor@yahoo.com