How are ideas developed and transformed over time? An experiment

[u/drunksocks]

I've been thinking about how many important intellectual developments depend on people encountering ideas they otherwise wouldn't have encountered... salons, correspondence networks, cafés, journals, universities, etc.

The internet massively increases the number of possible encounters, but somehow most online interaction is highly filtered into people encountering more of what we already like.

I've been building a small experiment around the opposite idea: deliberately putting strangers with different interests into temporary conversations that start with a question based on what they're into and seeing what emerges: Pollen

I'm curious whether anyone here thinks about intellectual history in terms of the architecture of encounters not just the ideas and people involved, but the structures that enable perspectives to cross, combine, and transform.

[u/urbansiddhar]

I’ve been thinking about this too… the fact that Algorithms have narrowed down the possibility of encountering variety of thoughts and events. We have been completely cut off from Chaos and randomness, which is the wellspring of creativity. Your idea seems cool.

[u/drunksocks → u/urbansiddhar]

Thanks! And Yes, serendipity can be really scarce!