The Goals, Principles, and Mission of the Minciu Sodas Virtual Laboratory

Mission

Minciu Sodas is our laboratory devoted to caring about thinking.
We are people who care about why, how, what, and whether we are thinking.
We respond to our concerns about thinking:

Why are we thinking? We clarify reasons for thinking.
How are we thinking? We provide tools for thinking.
What are we thinking? We develop structures for thinking.
Are we thinking? We promote formats for thinking.

We participate in the Minciu Sodas laboratory to address these common goals.
We support the Minciu Sodas laboratory by informing each other of our own related goals, and by sharing our resources to achieve these goals.

Objectives

Andrius Kulikauskas: As Director, I have looked over our work so far and developed a program of ten objectives for advancing our goals. I appreciate your help to better formulate our objectives, as well as to add any other objectives that you would like to work towards. Please write me at ms@ms.lt with any thoughts you have.

Greater Objectives: We support Caring

Our program includes four greater objectives that support caring. They expand on our four goals by considering the wider context that makes them profound. Our laboratory will pursue them only through material loss by ourselves and those who work with us. I invite and encourage you to work on these objectives within our laboratory.

We need to better clarify the four objectives below before we start working groups for them. I invite you to join our discussion groups and help develop these objectives and endeavors that would further them.

An Attitude for Submitting to God. We work to support anybody who wants to care about God. So perhaps we help them be more accountable for their lives, develop means that they may each heighten their own conscience and exercise action.
A Plan for Supporting God. We work to support anybody who wants to care about their relationship with God. So perhaps we foster their ability to hear God and listen to God.
A Language for Supporting Others. We work to support anybody who wants to care about their relationship with others. So perhaps we develop ways they might reach out to others, include and involve them, depend on them.
A World for Supporting Life. We work to support anybody who wants to care about others. So perhaps we help them understand others.

Lesser Objectives: We support Thinking

Our program also includes six lesser objectives that support thinking. Our laboratory strives to achieve these objectives through material gain for ourselves and others who work on them. Our director, Andrius Kulikauskas, is currently focusing on objectives that will place our research on a sound financial footing. He invites you to join the related working groups.

Flow of Experiences, ourownthoughts@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about their own thoughts. We have been working on the following endeavor: When you generate more thoughts than you can keep track of, you want to be able to stand back and reflect on them. You would like to use software to accumulate your notes and organize them into sequences, trees and webs. Unfortunately, your notes get trapped whenever products get discontinued. Minciu Sodas is developing an import/export standard so that you can work on your thoughts independently of any software format, and tools can compete and mature as you take up ever more challenging projects. Andrius Kulikauskas is leading our efforts. Sponsoring members are: TheBrain and MindJET. Active participants include: Ben Darnell, Nick Duffill, Saulius Maskeliunas, Raimundas Vaitkevicius, Joseph Goguen and Roy Roebuck. More information is at http://www.ms.lt/importexport.html
Confrontal of Issues, ourownactions@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about their own actions. A possible endeavor: You think about your actions because you're not sure what effect they might have on yourself and others. You want to be more sensitive to the effect you have, especially on the needs of others. Minciu Sodas can collect and study examples of the many different things we could be sensitive of. We can develop humor as a rigorous technique for revealing what we are insensitive of, and making ourselves more sensitive. Joe Damal is leading our efforts. Active participants include: Andrius Kulikauskas.
Harmony of Motivation, ourownstands@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about their own stands. We are considering the following endeavor: When you think about your stands and principles, you are invaluable, clarifying the essential. However, working for others, you can for the same reasons be annoying and troublesome. You do not fit well into a division of labor, and are looking to tap into various embedded life interests. You work productively when you enjoy your work. Our laboratory, Minciu Sodas, can develop a "declaration of unification of labor" that you might bring to a potential employer, anticipating a variety of drives that you will need to channel. You can agree on productive outlets, which Minciu Sodas can suggest and develop. Steve Raiff is leading our efforts. Active participants include: Andrius Kulikauskas. More information is at http://www.brainfarming.com/motivation/
Access to Creativity, otherthoughts@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about thoughts other than their own. You want to get out of a mental rut, find the thought you are missing, or clarify your own thoughts. Minciu Sodas can help you enter the intuition of another, map it to your own.
Agreement on Principles, otheractions@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about actions other than their own. A possible endeavor: You want to work together with others, but they all have their own personal ways of assessing themselves and others. Minciu Sodas can develop techniques that build bridges between different assessments, generate a shared language of principles, actions, experiences, and conclusions, open up channels to understand each other's issues and reasonings so you can work together as a team.
Intent for Discovery, otherstands@egroups.com, We work to support anybody who wants to think about stands other than their own. You want to know how your belief, on which you stand, relates to other stands. The investigations of the Minciu Sodas laboratory are designed to publicly explore the implications of your stand, find an unexpected stand that is relevant, and help you build relationships with those who take that stand. Minciu Sodas can develop this investigatory method so that you can apply it in your own virtual laboratory.

Through material gain Or through material loss?

Our laboratory is devoted to caring about thinking. If we are not comprehensive, then we risk distorting our goals. However, not every objective is appropriate for material gain. We are not comfortable pursuing some objectives unless we incur a material loss. There also exist objectives that are best pursued by promoting the opportunity for material gain. We make a clear distinction between those objectives we pursue through material gain, and those we pursue through material loss. Our laboratory provides a home for both kinds of objectives.

Notes on Endeavors that We are Pursuing

Working group	Endeavors
LovingGod	Love more than Think. Pray in Twos or Threes.
LovingOthers	Follow the Heart.
EmbracingOthers	Start a Heart-to-Heart Support Network.
EmbracingGod	Define What We Mean By Thinking. Make All Truth Available.
OurOwnThoughts	Create a Network of Tools for Thinking. Evoke the Savant.
OurOwnActions	Be Powered by Positive Emotions.
OurOwnStands	Make Work Fun!
OtherThoughts	Talk On and Off.
OtherActions	Combine Abstract and Concrete.
OtherStands	Design a Space for Minciu Sodas. Discover Structures that Help us Appreciate Thinking.

Discussion Channels

Newsletters | Discussion Groups | Working Groups | Subscribing and Unsubscribing

We use eGroups as our way of communicating as a group. We have structured our groups so that they work as discussion channels. Our intent is that you get the streams of information that are more relevant to your interests. We appreciate your comments! Please send them to our discussion groups or to our director Andrius Kulikauskas at ms@ms.lt.

Newsletters

Our newsletters inform current and prospective members of what our laboratory is accomplishing, and ways of
participating. They are weekly, irregular, and free!

caringaboutthinking@egroups.com Our newsletter in English. All are welcome to subscribe for free!

If you would like to reply to our newsletter, please send your letter to one of our discussion groups.

Our newsletters are in the public domain. You are welcome to translate them into other languages, and we would be glad to help make your translations available. Please write to us at ms@ms.lt

Discussion Groups

The Minciu Sodas laboratory is devoted to caring about thinking. Our discussion groups discuss what this means, and where we formulate our over all vision, structure, and strategy. We welcome non-members and show ways you can become a member for free by contributing examples of caring about thinking to the public domain.

minciu_sodas_en@egroups.com Discussion in English. View our archive. All are welcome to subscribe for free!
minciu_sodas_lt@egroups.com Discussion in Lithuanian. View our archive. All are welcome to subscribe for free!
minciu_sodas_es@egroups.com Discussion in Spanish. View our archive. All are welcome to subscribe for free!

Discussion groups also start as all-purpose channels for our members when we do not yet have a working group in that language for a particular objective. This makes it simpler for nonmembers to join our endeavors early on.

Working Groups

Minciu Sodas supports those who "care about thinking". To get things done we function as a laboratory, a lobby, a networking club, a service center.

We organize our work along ten objectives. Our plan is to have a working group for each objective, and help each working group develop an endeavor, bold and meaningful, which may typically take one or two years to accomplish.

All are welcome to read and share our letters on the web. Our correspondence is in the public domain whenever our letters do not indicate otherwise. Only members of our laboratory can join our working groups, to make for the most productive environment. Members may join as many working groups as they like at no charge!

To learn more about the working groups below, please read about the underlying objectives.

ourownthoughts@egroups.com Flow of Experiences. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!
ourownactions@egroups.com Confrontal of Issues. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!
ourownstands@egroups.com Harmony of Motivation. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!
otherthoughts@egroups.com Access to Creativity. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!
otheractions@egroups.com Agreement on Principles. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!
otherstands@egroups.com Intent for Discovery. View our archive. Members may subscribe for free!

We invite you to demonstrate you initiative and join the Minciu Sodas laboratory.

Subscribing and Unsubscribing

Suppose your egroup is: favorite@egroups.com

To Subscribe, send a blank message to: favorite-subscribe@egroups.com
To Post a message, send it to: favorite@egroups.com
To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to: favorite-unsubscribe@egroups.com
To Read messages on the Web: http://www.egroups.com/group/favorite/

On the web you can also change settings to get a daily digest or just read on the web.

When you subscribe to a working group, our laboratory will be alerted, and we will confirm that you are a member. Become a member of the Minciu Sodas laboratory!

If you have trouble with any of the above, our director Andrius Kulikauskas, ms@ms.lt, can help. It is easiest and quickest for us to subscribe and unsubscribe if you send emails as above.

Disclaimers

The goals and objectives of the Minciu Sodas laboratory are very bold. It is the responsibility of the Director of the Minciu Sodas laboratory to formulate our goals and objectives as meaningfully and comprehensively as needed for all of our current and prospective members to work together towards our mission of caring about thinking. Please do not assume that any particular member endorses any particular goal unless they are working towards that goal. When in doubt, please ask!

We provide our members the opportunity to state below any reservations they may have. The fact that they do not state any does not mean that they do not have any. It is also the policy of the Minciu Sodas laboratory to value goals and objectives that our system does not envisage because they reveal what we have overlooked, not appreciated, or been wrongheaded about.

Rules

As members of the Minciu Sodas laboratory, or as participants in our discussion groups, we expect each of us to help our research with our correspondence by following these two rules:

I agree that by writing a letter to or from the Minciu Sodas laboratory, or by sending a message to discussion groups organized by the Minciu Sodas laboratory, I am submitting the text of my letter or message into the public domain, unless within that letter or message I explicitly state otherwise (for example: Copyright 2000). In other words, everybody can assume that whenever my text does not state otherwise, nobody in the world needs my permission to copy, edit, and share all or part of my text.
In my letter or message, I let others know of any material that I include of which I am not the author, and make an effort to identify the author and the source of that material. Authorship is important regardless of whether the text is protected by copyright.

These rules are important so that together we can build up a wealth of facts which everybody may use for research. Our laboratory organizes such facts into a system of twelve projects. Our projects belong to the public domain, and all are welcome to use them.

We welcome suggestions regarding the above rules. Please send them to our director Andrius Kulikauskas at ms@ms.lt We invite you to join the Minciu Sodas laboratory, and we invite you to sign up for our discussion groups.

Principles

We welcome your suggestions in developing the mission and principles for the Minciu Sodas laboratory. Please send them to our director Andrius Kulikauskas at ms@ms.lt

Creating connections through work.

We want our wages to come from a service that truly helps other people. We think wealth consists of the quality and variety of connections made between people. We are working to help all people be connected through the ideas and initiative they contribute for the common good.

Meeting around theoretical challenges.

We want to provide and encourage leadership by pointing to theoretical challenges that we can meet around. We want to be independent and work for a wide variety of customers, both big and small. We want our business model to foster leadership and a balance of talents in all people.

Learning from practical situations.

We want rapid feedback so we work primarily for the private sector. We gear our services towards those that others do not provide. Through custom work for special needs we help show what may actually be general needs. We strive to test for ourselves the services that we provide.

Cherishing life outside of work.

We strive to work part time. We want to help with the chores of our society so that all people have time and energy for individual pursuits. We want the awareness that comes from being our own customers. We want to develop a business model that could work in a noncommercial setting as well.