Narrative Self Café v11: CASH Values (How “Complex Adaptive System Hysteresis” Shapes Minds)

Sequel to Narrative Self Café (v10): Cruciform Antifragility

Act I — The Shape of the Room

1.1 The Stage

Lights up.

A seminar room. Whiteboard. Pitcher of water nobody touches.
The air has the faint electrical charge of ideas about to collide.

Bach stands.
Friston sits slightly behind him, hands folded, like a chess player who already knows the endgame.

1.2 Opening Statement (Bach)

BACH:
Thank you for coming.
I’d like to begin by reassuring the committee that nothing I’m about to say is original.

A pause.

Everything I’m about to say has already been said —
just not by the same person,
in the same sentence,
or with the consequences made explicit.

Arthur smiles. Hebb raises an eyebrow. Bourdieu does not.

1.3 Slide One — Three Systems Walk into a Bar

On the board appears a simple table.

• Weather
• Metal fatigue
• Human minds

BACH:
All three are complex.
Two remember their past.
Only one gets invited to dinner parties.

Light laughter.

The difference is not intelligence.
It is not representation.
It is not consciousness.

He writes two words:

Adaptation
Hysteresis

When a system adapts and remembers,
its future is no longer neutral.