David Ing @daviding@qoto.org

Might we have an indicator that lives for Canadians are at a stress level lower than other countries? Either that, or spouses are just nicer to each other.

> Canadian marriages are oddly stable

> In 2020 – the most recent year for which data is available – Canada recorded fewer divorces than at any point since 1973. This is particularly impressive given that Canada has 16 million more people than we did in the early 1970s. The low divorce rate was driven in large part by COVID; couples forced into close proximity by public health lockdowns unexpectedly responded by learning to tolerate one another. But even before the pandemic, Canada was already boasting a crude divorce rate that was one of the lowest in the G7.

National Post: FIRST READING: Canada is a broken disaster (except in these areas).
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/first-reading-canada-is-a-broken-disaster-except-in-these-areas

Any country concerned about population decline could learn from Finland on policies encouraging infertile mothers, balancing personal and societal concerns.

> In Finland – where women first gained suffrage, where a woman is now Prime Minister – it is illegal to pay egg donors more than a basic €250 compensation for temporary discomfort (plus the basic daily allowance and kilometre allowance for transportation).

> Women in Finland donate for various reasons, but a scramble to pay bills is not one of them. Recipients do not pick their donor but are matched by doctors on basic biological criteria (donor height and her skin, eye and hair colour). At an average private clinic in Finland, one round of egg donation IVF treatment costs around €7,000, excluding medication.

> ... I became pregnant with a donor egg from a Finnish clinic. I have since left Finland to resume my university position in the United States

#HeidiMorrison | "I finally got pregnant in Finland - a country that hasn’t commodified infertility" | Dec. 12, 2022 | Globe & Mail (paywall) https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/first-person/article-i-finally-got-pregnant-in-finland-a-country-that-hasnt-commodified/

"An Extended Stay" | September 27, 2022 | UW Lacrosse at https://www.uwlax.edu/news/posts/an-extended-stay/

While institutions are incorporated to live beyond the lifetime of a single human being, perhaps fulfilling its mission can lead to a conclusion that the best course is to wind itself down. Courage at the #IveyFoundation , led by #BruceLourie

> One of Canada’s largest and oldest philanthropic organizations has decided to wind down and distribute its entire endowment – $100-million – to expedite efforts to align the economy with net-zero emission targets.

> The Ivey Foundation has determined that the need to transform industrial policies to meet climate goals is too acute to keep funding projects at its current rate, said Bruce Lourie, the foundation’s chief executive officer. The money will be dispersed to its slate of economic and environmental partner organizations over the next five years.

> Dr. Lourie said slashing carbon emissions by 40 per cent to 45 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 and getting to net zero by 2050, as per Ottawa’s international commitments, are only getting tougher to achieve. [....]

> From the foundation’s perspective, the two biggest risks facing the country are failing to adequately deal with climate change and missing related economic opportunities, such as electric vehicle and battery manufacturing and transforming the power grid, as other countries establish dominance in those areas. “So, in our philanthropic work, we’re really trying to integrate those two things – Canada’s competitiveness and prosperousness, together with the need to address our emissions,” Dr. Lourie said.

"Ivey Foundation will distribute $100-million endowment to causes aimed at accelerating progress on climate change" | Jeffrey Jones | Globe & Mail | 2021-11-29 https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-ivey-foundation-endowment-climate-change/

Reassured that qoto.org is on the Wayback Machine @internetarchive .

https://web.archive.org/web/20220000000000*/Qoto.org

Researching #Contextualism, online archive of "#RootMetaphor: The Live Thought of #StephenCPepper" from Paunch 1980 magazine is helpful. Philosopher of aesthetics a follower of #JohnDewey, contemporary of #KurtLewin, senior to #ThomasKuhn, #EricTrist

https://ingbrief.wordpress.com/2022/11/26/root-metaphor-the-live-thought-of-stephen-c-pepper-1980/ #SystemsThinking

#Autopoiesis, as coined by #HumbertoMaturana, is in the #Contextualist #RootMetaphor of #StephenCPepper, rather than the organismic root metaphor, say #HowardMancing and #JenniferMarstonWilliam #PurdueLibArts

https://ingbrief.wordpress.com/2022/11/23/autopoiesis-as-in-the-contextualist-root-metaphor-mancing-marston-william-2022/

#SystemsThinking

As much as #JudithRosen channels the work of her father, #RobertRosen, the long conversations on #AnticipatorySystems she used to have with him have led to #SystemsThinking ideas that are probably officially unpublished by him, and should be credited to Judith herself.

> I have come to view the consciously aware mind, as experienced by human beings, as a second Anticipatory System which has evolved within and emerged from the living physiology of the human soma. The reason I see the mind as a second Anticipatory System is because there is overwhelming evidence that the human mind has an encoded model for “Self” and for “Health (of Self)” which are independent of the somatic values, as well as its own optimality scale for evaluating sensory information.

> The models for “Self” carried by the mind and the body are independent of one another. This means that they may not match and when they do not, then dysfunction ensues. I consider Gender Dysphoria to be an example of exactly this situation.

"Robert Rosen’s Anticipatory Systems Theory: The Science of Life and Mind" | 2022 at https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7390/10/22/4172