Elizaveta Friesem
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    • Media is us >
      • Principles of communication
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        • A >
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          • Everybody is connected
          • Explain/excuse conflation
        • F >
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          • Forgetting about your purpose
          • Free will
        • G >
          • Good vs. Bad
        • H >
          • How much do we understand each other?
          • Human brain
          • Human nature
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          • Human thinking is nonlinear
          • Hurt people hurt people
          • Hypertext books
        • I >
          • I am an optimist
          • Ideas
          • "I'll never understand!"
          • Individual meanings vs. shared meanings
          • Inner compass
          • Interpretation
          • "It is what it is"
        • J
        • K >
          • Knowing your true purpose
          • Knowledge
        • L >
          • Language
          • List of completed pages
          • Literal vs. nonliteral communication
        • M >
          • Make Sense
          • May I meet this, too, with kindness
          • Meaning as importance
          • Mean and stupid
          • Meaning
          • Meaningless
          • Meaning wars
          • Meaning of life
          • Meaning communities
          • Meanings perceived by animals
          • Meaning-seeking vs. meaning-making
          • Media
          • (Mis)understanding each other's needs
          • My quest for meaning
        • N >
          • Norms
        • O >
          • Objectification
          • On being a scholar
          • On being a writer
          • On being right
        • P >
          • Paradox
          • Parenting
          • Privilege
          • Polarization
          • Postmodern worldview
          • Postmodern philosophy
          • Power
          • Power to see things in a certain way
          • Problem/solution binary
        • Q
        • R >
          • Reality
          • Rhizome in philosophy
        • S >
          • Science, religion and art
          • Self-awareness and empathy of higher order
          • Self-awareness
          • Self-empathy
          • Stories we tell
          • Society vs Individual
          • Subjectivity and objectivity
          • Suggested citation format
          • Synesthesia
        • T >
          • "The Death of the Author"
          • The importance of having a purpose
          • Truth
        • U >
          • Understanding ourselves
          • Us and them
        • V >
          • Verbal vs. nonverbal communication
          • Violence in the human nature
        • W >
          • What does it mean to "understand"?
          • What is a text?
          • What we can learn about ourselves from media
          • What is "natural"?
          • What's the point?
          • What will this project become?
          • Where do meanings come from?
          • Why am I trying to stay sane?
          • Why do people hurt each other?
          • Why is language so unhelpful?
          • Why do everyday objects make sense?
          • Why do misunderstandings happen?
        • X
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      • Power of meanings // Meanings of power
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Everybody Is Connected

PAGE IN PROGRESS
What you see here is a page of my hypertext book Me, Looking for Meaning. Initially empty, it will slowly be filled with thoughts, notes, and quotes. One day, I will use them to write a coherent entry, similar to these completed pages. See this post to better understand my creative process. Thank you for your interest and patience!

Big bang: we all grew out of the same kernel that had expanded into the universe

I often find myself thinking about people whose names I will never know, whose names did not enter the history books, but that have lived, loved, suffered and were happy and left their imprint on the world in ways nobody will ever know. These are the majority of people who have lived on the Planet Earth. Even their lives were not what’s called “remarkable”, they still mattered in no small way. (these are some thoughts that come to mind when see the Picture of pre-historic hand)

​Six degrees of separation

Global village

its not the same as « everybody knows each other » - the maximum size of natural social network is 150 individuals

​Mushroom picking - connecting to hunter-gathers of the past (mushroom picking with my grandfather)

Quote from Cezanne: "In my opinion, one does not substitute oneself for the past, one just adds a new link" (1904).

connected through trauma
​ » But traumatic experiences do leave traces, whether on a large scale (on our histories and cultures) or close to home, on our families, with dark secrets being imperceptibly passed down through generations. They also leave traces on our minds and emotions, on our capacity for joy and intimacy, and even on our biology and immune systems. Trauma affects not only those who are directly exposed to it, but also those around them. »
​(from The Body Keeps the Score, prologue), also add to Vicious Circle of Violence

transgenerational trauma

Everybody and everything is connected: we are made of the stardust. [write out the full text?]

Each individual exists on an extreme micro level of society, unable to fully comprehend the macro level , but these two levels are intimately interconnected-microlevel is shaped by macro level and vs versa

We think we know names of people who "made history", who influenced other, but that's not true. Influence is like ripples that are visible only in a localized area, then then seem to disappear, but they have left their mark, even if you do not know about them.
You know Hobbit, but you may not know Babbit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babbitt_(novel)
You know Rodin but you may not know Camille Claudel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camille_Claudel

Examples of ideas that were neutral or could be helpful but they influenced somebody who ended up hurting others: Nietzsche > Hitler

harari, Sapiens, chapter 9, local cultures have not always be interconnected the way they are now; development of the global culture
can we say that people were as good interconnected before the global culture came to be?

Can we say that people who lived before globalization started happening (see Harari about how it started) were also connected to everybody? They were not connected with their contemporaries if a person A lived in the Americas and person B lived in Europe. But there were other connections from the past. For example, to see how people were spreading throughout planet, where are they coming from? They are coming from the same area, where first Homo Sapiens appeared. They had common ancestors (check the idea that all people share one common ancestor, one individual). They way the common ancestors lived affected people who then spread on the planet. These people were separated for a while, but the way they were living their lives affected their descendents, who then did reconnect at some point. So while the six degrees of separation is more relevant for the modern time, people have always been connected in some ways and influencing each other.

Language is an example of how we are connected through time and space. Understanding etymology of words, how words we use now connected to words that our ancestors in many different countries used hundreds of years ago (Latin languages, Indo-European languages). Even before, what sounds they made that turned into words they started using for describing the world. Language is a tool that reflects how we see the world and to some extent shapes it. It reflects how our brain works (words = categories; symbolic meanings). It is a tool that is as useful as it is imperfect. And to think that this took has been first created by our ancestors from distant past, evolved through the use throughout millenia and centuries, and it still impacts us today.

Another example: wheel. We will never know who created it, but it has been impacting people thoughout centuries.

From Starts With Us newsletter (April 12, 2023):
​Before you say, “That’s the same as not being able to control anything!” — remember that how we act affects everything around us. While we can control only our own actions and behaviors, each action and behavior can have implications and effects far beyond the limits of our lives. Your children may imitate it, your family may be impacted by it, and your friends may learn from it — then it can ripple out to their children, their family, their friends, and so on. Every “big” event in our world is just the compounding of a million tiny events; a million small actions.

​Harari, chapter 11:
»
Zu Beginn des 21. Jahrhunderts zerfällt die Welt noch immer in rund zweihundert Staaten. Wobei keiner dieser Staaten wirklich unabhängig ist. Alle sind aufeinander angewiesen. Ihre Volkswirtschaften bilden ein einziges weltumspannendes Netz aus Handel und Finanzwesen, das wiederum von starken Geld-, Arbeits- und Kapitalströmen geprägt wird. » etc…


​About this project: Start page
Picture
  • About
  • Books
    • Media is us >
      • Principles of communication
      • Micro- and macropower
      • ACE model
      • Description of chapters
      • When conflicts get out of control
    • Hypertexts >
      • Me, looking for meaning >
        • A >
          • Anxiety
          • Am I strong or am I weak?
        • B >
          • Binaries
          • Both sides
          • Bureaucracy
        • C >
          • Can I give myself credit for being empathetic?
          • Choice
          • Circumstances
          • Cognitive biases
          • Common sense
          • Communication
          • Content and form of this book
          • Coronavirus and me
          • Culture
          • Cycle of violence
        • D >
          • Depression
          • Do children ask themselves about the purpose of life?
          • Doing the right thing
        • E >
          • Emotional pain
          • Empathy
          • Empathy as a matter of self-preservation
          • Everybody has their struggles
          • Everybody is connected
          • Explain/excuse conflation
        • F >
          • Feelings and emotions
          • Forgetting about your purpose
          • Free will
        • G >
          • Good vs. Bad
        • H >
          • How much do we understand each other?
          • Human brain
          • Human nature
          • Human needs
          • Human thinking
          • Human thinking is nonlinear
          • Hurt people hurt people
          • Hypertext books
        • I >
          • I am an optimist
          • Ideas
          • "I'll never understand!"
          • Individual meanings vs. shared meanings
          • Inner compass
          • Interpretation
          • "It is what it is"
        • J
        • K >
          • Knowing your true purpose
          • Knowledge
        • L >
          • Language
          • List of completed pages
          • Literal vs. nonliteral communication
        • M >
          • Make Sense
          • May I meet this, too, with kindness
          • Meaning as importance
          • Mean and stupid
          • Meaning
          • Meaningless
          • Meaning wars
          • Meaning of life
          • Meaning communities
          • Meanings perceived by animals
          • Meaning-seeking vs. meaning-making
          • Media
          • (Mis)understanding each other's needs
          • My quest for meaning
        • N >
          • Norms
        • O >
          • Objectification
          • On being a scholar
          • On being a writer
          • On being right
        • P >
          • Paradox
          • Parenting
          • Privilege
          • Polarization
          • Postmodern worldview
          • Postmodern philosophy
          • Power
          • Power to see things in a certain way
          • Problem/solution binary
        • Q
        • R >
          • Reality
          • Rhizome in philosophy
        • S >
          • Science, religion and art
          • Self-awareness and empathy of higher order
          • Self-awareness
          • Self-empathy
          • Stories we tell
          • Society vs Individual
          • Subjectivity and objectivity
          • Suggested citation format
          • Synesthesia
        • T >
          • "The Death of the Author"
          • The importance of having a purpose
          • Truth
        • U >
          • Understanding ourselves
          • Us and them
        • V >
          • Verbal vs. nonverbal communication
          • Violence in the human nature
        • W >
          • What does it mean to "understand"?
          • What is a text?
          • What we can learn about ourselves from media
          • What is "natural"?
          • What's the point?
          • What will this project become?
          • Where do meanings come from?
          • Why am I trying to stay sane?
          • Why do people hurt each other?
          • Why is language so unhelpful?
          • Why do everyday objects make sense?
          • Why do misunderstandings happen?
        • X
        • Y
        • Z
      • Power of meanings // Meanings of power
  • Editing
    • Me as your editor
    • How I will help you
    • Pricing
    • Privacy policy
  • Blog
  • Workshops
    • Five (easy) steps to become media literate
    • Surviving the polarization vortex
    • Understanding yourself
    • Not enough
  • Learn more
    • Bio
    • Talks and interviews
    • Essays
    • Poems >
      • Stranger
      • Lonely heart
      • Fairy tales
      • Dreams and nightmares
      • Puzzles
      • Moon
      • Seasons
      • Muse
      • Art
      • Sketches
      • Nonsense
    • Educational materials
  • Contact me