Collective wisdom is wisdom held and evoked by groups. Socratus is a bet that it's the next step in the wisdom traditions, and that design and technology can make it achievable. Socrates was a midwife; we're trying to build the maternity ward.
How the word moved
In August 2014 it was a heading in my Epistry essay, where I argued that systemic problems need a different epistemology. In April 2023 I wrote about how Socratus began in 2019 on exactly this bet. By October 2026 I was saying that wisdom needs arrangements through which it can act, which is a less romantic way of putting it.
In my words
"Planetary design and technology can make collective wisdom an achievable goal if midwifed by a self-avowedly Socratic community."
from Wystem: A System for Wicked Problems, Part 1, 8 Apr 2024
Related
- Inherited from Socrates - the midwife of wisdom.
- Related Infrastructure for Agency - what has to come after the wisdom is evoked.
- Related Wystem - a system for wisdom.
- Related Elephant - the wisdom of the whole elephant, as opposed to the blind men's parts.
Still open
What happens after the meeting ends? My 2026 writing keeps asking, and I don't have the answer yet.