Risk, Possibilities, Opacity and Creativity

Seed idea: Can we use the concept of opacity to describe both (a) uncertainty that poses risks and (b) unknowns we deliberately construct for creative latitude? With connections to phenomenology, project definition, and evolution into the adjacent possible.

Show Notes

Intro: 00:00
Going upstream along the path of concretizing an idea

Part 1: 02:38
Phenomenology, "bracketing"

Mentioned:

• Twitter thread on affordances and phenomenology
• The “ambient optic array” in JJ Gibson’s Ecological Approach to Visual Perception
• Wikipedia pages on Husserl and Epoché (bracketing)

 
Part 2: 10:23
Uncertainty, two kinds of opacity: risk and richness, creative constraints

Mentioned:

• The circuit breaker to manage uncertainty in Shape Up
• On "opacity" see any of Taleb's books, especially Antifragile

Part 3: 25:18
Ontology, res extensa and res potentia, the adjacent possible

Mentioned:

• Stuart Kauffman's Res Potentia and Res Extensa
• On the evolution of tech, see the epilogue of Kauffman's A World Beyond Physics

What is Synthetic A Priori?

Step into the messy phase of wrestling with ideas before they become conclusions. Ryan Singer draws connections between design, tech, science, and formal systems.