PROBLEM-SOLVING IN PHILOSOPHY: THE MIN BASADUR
FOUR-STAGE MODEL
Alistair Macrae’s presentation focused on Min Basadur's four-stage
problem-solving model, Northrop Frye's four mythoi, Frank
McConnell's four worlds and William Isaacs' four fields of
conversation.
Here is a summary:
Min Basadur’s four-stage problem-solving model
(Journal of Creative Behavior,1990):
Implementing
quadrant
Generating
quadrant
Optimizing
quadrant
Conceptualizing
quadrant
Northrop Frye’s four mythoi (Third Essay in Anatomy of
Criticism, 1957)
The mythos of
summer: romance
The mythos of
autumn: tragedy
The mythos of
spring: comedy
The mythos of
winter: irony and
satire
Frank McConnell’s four worlds (Storytelling and
Mythmaking, 1979)
The Romance
World: Knights
The World of
Melodrama:
Pawns/Detectives
The Epic World:
Founding Kings
The World of Satire:
Fools
William Isaacs' four fields of conversation (Dialogue and
the art of thinking together, 261, 1999)
Field I: Politeness
= McConnell’s early
summer
Field III: Inquiry
= McConnell’s
autumn and winter
Field II: Breakdown
= McConnell’s late
summer
Field IV: Flow
= McConnell’s
spring
Field III: Inquiry
= McConnell’s
autumn and winter
I argued that these four tables are congruent. For
example, Basadur's optimizing phase corresponds to
each of the following: Frye's spring mythos,
McConnell's spring world and Issacs' fourth field of
conversation.
Isaacs discusses David Kantor's claim that people who
participate in a discussion tend to assume roles. I
argued that the traits of of one of these roles (i.e., the
mover) are also the traits of McConnell's founding king
and that the traits of another of these roles
(i.e., the follower) are also the traits of McConnell's knight.
As well, I argued that Kantor's opposer is similar to
McConnell's detective and Kantor's bystander is
similar to McConnell's fool.
I argued that the task of preparing for a Harkness
discussion (i.e., studying the reading
package and looking for connections between texts) has
much in common with Basadur's generating stage. I
also argued that a Harkness discussion
(i.e., a Harkness discussion in which each participant has
read and reflected upon the topic-based reading package
prior to the actual discussion) tends to consist of
comments that Basadur associates with both
the conceptualizing and the optimizing stages.
I distributed a 30-item Harkness reading package.
Anyone interested in obtaining a copy of this reading
package and/or a complete version of the text of my 2011
OPTA presentation (Harkness discussions in the context
of Homer's Odyssey, Frye's The Educated Imagination
and Frye's Words with Power) is asked to email me:
fryeharkness@gmail.com