*** WARNING: High degree of concept-dropping in this entry. ***
"Conceptual competence” is a skill acquired when one embarks on a "transperspectival project," trying on multiple perspectives without collapsing into one. I would say that to be conceptually competent is to have the following capacities:
Have an embodied sense of the concept.
Have your own definition of the concept, aka a "based definition."
Have an understanding of how other people use the concept.
Have the ability to have fine-tuned delineations between similar concepts.
For whatever reason, I geek out about concepts, or what many call "mental models," a simplified conceptual representation of a complex aspect of reality. I like to collect mental models and have a bespoke system to familiarize myself with them. Playing with them has its benefits. It also has its failure modes, outlined in a session at Rebel Wisdom's "Becoming a Live Player" course:
The benefits:
Navigating reality. Having a toolbox of mental models helps you see reality from different perspectives, allowing you to navigate reality with more optionality.
Harmonizing minds. Sometimes a new mental model, introduced at the right moment, in the right way, with the right intent, can temporarily harmonize a mind. I have often experienced this with my interlocutors within my philosophy practice.
Memetic mediation. Having a greater sensitivity to how different groups use mental models allows you to engage in dialogue with diverse people, building bridges, often secret ones, in front of everyone. 🤫
Mental model sex. Also known as "idea sex" or "concept unfolding." This exercise is the ability to create new mental models from the interaction of existing ones. This benefit is the most useful because it offers greater agency when figuring out a personal challenge.
Sound smart. This one is listed with caution because it can backfire easily, making one seem pretentious and overcompensating for a person's intellectual insecurities or lack of life experiences. However, it can provide a quick "competency trigger" if used sparingly.
The failure modes:
Jargon salad. You sound incomprehensible to others if you do not have protocols to keep this in check. The “Liminal Web” is especially susceptible to this.
Lazy thinking. Intellectual laziness kicks in if the “method of elimination” or “rationalist taboo” is not applied—banning a phrase and describing the phenomena in simple language. Also, a concept creeps to include other phenomena when it should not; the words “shadow” and “trauma” are examples.
Disembodied thinking. The culture surrounding the people who overuse concepts is "disembodied," meaning the concepts are often not fully felt. This disembodiment does not have to be the case, as an "embodied model" practice can be developed.
is doing good work here.
I want to add one more benefit and failure mode to this list:
Additional benefit: construct awareness
Once one does enough transperspectival masturbation, a certain threshold gets passed, what Integral scholar Susanne Cook-Greuter calls construct awareness. The state of "cognitive defusion," the ability to look at concepts rather than only looking through them, becomes a permanent trait when someone becomes construct aware. Susan links this stage to the fool archetype.
‘Construct-Aware folks are the first who potentially realize the illusion of "knowing" and the futility of trying to make ever better maps of reality. Other names for the Construct-Aware stage are Magician, Alchemist, Fool, and Jester.’
- Susanne Cook-Greuter
You can tell when someone is not construct aware, as they have a certain degree of rigidness in the way they speak, with a greater attachment to needing to know and readiness to argue when their conceptual understandings are not used.
Additional failure mode: concept flexing
I read a lot of Substacks, and I am noticing a new phenomenon, which I'll call "concept flexing," people making up all sorts of concepts to get attention. I went through a phase where I was coining new concepts all the time and then showing them off. I look back at that phase with a certain cringe fondness. I do have a sympathetic understanding of my past cringiness. It is similar to when you first start going to the gym, gain some muscles, and are compelled to flex in the mirror after a good pump.
I chalk up all the concept flexing happening because people want to win in the attention economy. A new shiny concept = more eyeballs looking. This winning is especially true when the concept is "spiky," aka has some controversy or edge. It makes sense that my transpespectival masturbation entry has received more likes than all the other entries since I started journaling regularly again in June.
However, perhaps more people are slowly becoming construct aware and are going through their cringe concept flexing phase. While this could be the case, staying in this phase is a risk, arresting one’s development in conceptual competence.
***
While failure modes exist for conceptual competence, becoming skilled is a net positive. My intuition points me to one practice needed for my conceptual competence to improve: code-switching.
Code-switching is a concept from linguistics that refers to switching between languages. One website defines code-switching as “how a member of an underrepresented group (consciously or unconsciously) adjusts their language, syntax, grammatical structure, behavior, and appearance to fit into the dominant culture.”
Code-switching applies to the use of concepts. When entering jargon salad mode, you might have a small group that understands you, but it will seem like you are speaking a new language to others.
Conceptual competence has a spectrum; some people are more or less competent. The majority of people are around the middle range. This reality is not a bad thing. Considering conceptual competence as synonymous with intelligence or wisdom would be a huge mistake. Sure, concept-dropping may make one seem intelligent to some, and it does help one navigate reality if done with less foolishness. However, I have met many people who are extremely intelligent or have deep intuitive wisdom and do not have the strongest conceptual competence.
Code-switching is important for those who have an abstraction proclivity. I am good at code-switching amongst the various living philosophies in the noosphere, our collective consciousness, as described in my transpespectival masturbation piece. However, I have become rusty at code-switching with "regular people.”
I was once pretty good at it. Before The Stoa started, I was a corporate trainer for Dale Carnegie Training in Toronto.
I worked with hard-working and down-to-earth people, aka regular people. These people were not concerned with the “hyperobject” of the “meta-crisis” and midwifing a “wisdom commons.” They were concerned with paying the bills, not getting fired, being with their family, and winding down the day with their favorite TV show. I miss being surrounded by people like this.
I was also a good trainer, albeit one of the weirder ones on staff.
To become a Dale Carnegie trainer, you must undergo a rigorous year-long training program that socially stretches you. During this training, you become deeply intimate with the wisdom of Dale Carnegie, memorizing his “golden book,” which includes principles such as:
Show respect for the other person’s opinion. Never say, “You’re wrong.”
Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view.
Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires.
The cool thing about the Dale Carnegie course, essentially exposure therapy for office workers, is that their languaging is tight, with no unnecessary concepts. Their approach provided a great benefit for me. I spoke clearly, and artfully mentioned a fancy concept only during select moments to engender the “wow effect.”
While a trainer, I did philosophical stuff online, writing and podcasting, and hosted in-person Stoic-ish groups in Toronto. I found myself code-switching between the work domain and the philosophy domain. I became good at this code-switching and became a better communicator within each domain because of it.
While I am still technically a trainer, I stopped training since the COVID pandemic and have mainly focused on The Stoa and other philosophical activities. For the last 3.5 years, my contact with regular people has suffered, and I have been mainly associating with people who suffer from a similar abstraction proclivity as I do.
I have tried to self-impose heuristics to avoid escape velocity abstraction, such as the “write so my mother will understand” principle, but I keep relapsing (sorry, Mom). If wisdom is to become more common, one will have to speak commonly: with clarity, conciseness, and forthright authenticity.
I can do this. I just forgot how. I forgot how because I stopped practicing in environments that require such speech. I still want to be around my brothers and sisters who love a good jargon salad, but it's time to venture where regular people reside.
In a recent self-inquiry, I believe I have unfolded a concept that has encouraged me to return to teaching courses again, both in-person and online. In an upcoming entry, I’ll reveal this concept and continue experimenting with course-like experiences with paid subscribers.
Also, I may release my coveted mental model spreadsheet that I showed during the “Mental Model Play” class. I have never shown this spreadsheet to anyone before…
…and I probably shouldn’t. Releasing this bad boy into the noosphere wild without proper code-switching care might be an existential hazard. 😉