Arguing outside of the story

[Greg]

@JohnDusenberry

Yes, but the overall inequity is indescribable

Ok. So why does that stop one from justifying a course of action? Choosing how to address the inequity is not itself a description of the inequity.

@JohnDusenberry

Is that what you meant by the inability to have both would still remain?

I mean that in the statement “I need to Pursue1 in order to X unless I should Pursue2 in order to Y”, I cannot have P1 and P2 at the same time. If I choose to stick with P1, or switch over to P2, I still would not be able to have both P1 and P2 at the same time. I can pick one side or the other, but the inability to have both would remain. Even if picking one side stops Pursuit from being an irritant, it still remains true that I cannot have both P1 and P2 at the same time.

Everything you’re saying about the dilemma continuing and processes never being “solved” is right. I just don’t see why that means one side of the source of conflict isn’t chosen. Every time a character does something in the story, it’s because a side of the conflict has been chosen.

In Shawshank Redemption, one of Red’s dilemmas is probably something like “I need to tell the parole board whatever they want to hear so they’ll grant me parole unless I need to do something else for whatever reason”. And we know which side he chose the first couple times he goes to a parole hearing.

One of Andy’s is probably “I need to tar the roof so I don’t get thrown off the roof unless I should talk to the guard in order to get him to give us some beer”. We know he chose to talk to the guard.

One of Woody’s (Toy Story) is probably “I should not move so humans don’t know I’m alive unless I need to scare Sid in order to stop him from mutilating more toys”. We know which side he chose.

[JohnDusenberry]

@Greg

So why does that stop one from justifying a course of action? Choosing how to address the inequity is not itself a description of the inequity.

If we’re talking about the same thing, I think what I mean is that the underlying subtextual inequities are not a 1:1 to the analogy of the Dramatic Circuit being a way to understand PRCO. From what I understand, it’s not that the Outcome is the “answer” or “solution” to the Potential. It’s that the Potential is one mental dilemma, which moves in a specific order to the next, which adds a feeling of resistance to the mind, which leads to the Current… which has its own dilemma, until finally the “Outcome” is that the mental focus shifts to the last element in that quad.

I could be conflating the idea, but I believe it works the same way that the problem quad works. The “Solution” is not an answer to the “Problem” … the mind has stopped processing the first motivation (Problem) and instead now processes a new motivation (Solution).

Throughout the story, the mind travels on a journey in a specific order, which in the end has meaning. It’s not problem-solving the individual mental processes along the way. They simply lead into each other in a specific order until they’ve explored everything… which when seen as a whole carries a certain meaning.

It’s like what we illustrated in the first season of Conflict Corner. By the time we brought the mind to the final few mental processes, everyone could just FEEL the meaning behind the journey. You can feel it even when you strip things of their context.

The reason it has meaning isn’t because the mind solved, or went with one side of the source of conflict. It’s because the mind saw the series of sources of conflict in that order, which ends up meaning something.

@Greg

One of Woody’s (Toy Story) is probably “I should not move so humans don’t know I’m alive unless I need to scare Sid in order to stop him from mutilating more toys”. We know which side he chose.

This is where I would suggest stripping away the context, because you’re putting the illustration into the source of conflict. These example don’t reveal a full source of conflict yet. You’re presenting the mind with a binary choice, not a conflict. A real conflict will not have a possible solution. That’s why it’s a dilemma. The context in these examples are all talking about the same thing, and as a result overlook the underlying source of conflict; conflating the illustration with the subtextual forces driving it.

To strip away the context in your example:
Woody: I shouldn’t do something so others don’t know something, unless I need to do that same something in order to stop something bad.

That’s a choice. That’s only talking about one context of “Doing”

A source of conflict would read more like:
I want to do something to keep others from knowing something, unless some new notion leads to a lack of knowledge about the situation.

So now you can see the source of conflict is: Is it a good idea to do something when I realize I don’t know the situation?

There’s no choice to be made with the sources of conflict. They’re mental dilemmas. They’re “feelings” … with one feeling leading to the next, sending the mind on a journey until finally all the feelings add up to a grand argument.

[MWollaeger]

Oh man, there’s so much to catch up on in Conflict Corner! My brain is melting just reading this thread.

[Greg]

I’m all on board with the stuff about dilemmas not being solved and leading to the next one and so on. But the point about stripping away the context is well taken but misses the point. The examples I gave were just placeholders for “properly stated subtext statements” so I wouldn’t have to put in the time or effort to come up with those proper statements. But the point is still there.

Since I feel like we’re both saying things that are accurate, here’s my attempt to better express what I’m saying in a way that let’s go of the “chooses one side over the other” language and incorporates what we are each saying.

If a bear is charging at me and my problem solving process says “here’s what getting chased by a bear looks like from four directions” in temporal order and stops short of giving me a course of action to take, then the process has been of no use.

If the process ends with a decision to play dead, maybe I can survive the brutal mauling im about to incur. If it ends in a decision to run, maybe I can outrun something else of interest to the bear.

In that sense, the problem solving process is about choosing a way to handle the dilemma. “You cannot have your cake and eat it too. Here’s why you should go ahead and eat the cake instead of having it.”

But Dramatica doesn’t look at the process as it unfolds. It looks at the process as having already unfolded, the choices already made. In the case of a bear coming at you, it looks at the choice to run (or to play dead or whatever) as already made and the outcome as already having played out. The order of events is a result of having already decided that the bear tripped and fell into a ravine and died as you ran away from it. The order of events occurs the way it does because the mind has already decided that.

So maybe in that context it would work better to say that each iteration of the dilemma builds toward a choice already made rather than saying the mind chooses one side. But that choice, whether seen as already built in or playing out in time, is part of the process we’re talking about. Everything in the story is geared toward proving that the decision to run is better than the decision to play dead. When you remove time and leave only structure, then no. No choice for one over the other is being made. But the choice of one over the other is being accounted for.

[JohnDusenberry]

@Greg

If a bear is charging at me and my problem solving process says “here’s what getting chased by a bear looks like from four directions” in temporal order and stops short of giving me a course of action to take, then the process has been of no use.

I’m finding it a bit hard to comment on this because Dramatica doesn’t deal with an inequity in any describable thing like a bear charging at you.

Do you mean to say that the four perspectives as a whole describes the “choice” made in the overall Narrative Argument/Premise? I think that’s what you mean by Dramatica looking at the process as having already unfolded–which yeah. I’m just not sure were the selection of a choice comes into play (other than Dramatica illustrating the mental process of either the MC or IC “choosing” to give up being motivated by the problem element, and latch on to a new motivation).

My concern with what was being said this thread was the suggestion that when looking at the individual sources of conflict, the mind chooses one side or the other. It certainly WANTS to choose one over the other, but it never does. Everything in the story is geared toward describing the Premise. The overall “choice” is being accounted for… the moving from Problem source of conflict to Solution source of conflict–but not the individual sources of conflict.

Perhaps I misunderstood, but I was trying to answer:

@glennbecker

at the end of the Signpost you’re exploring, you have to go with one of those two justifications

EDIT/ADDITION:

@Greg

Everything you’re saying about the dilemma continuing and processes never being “solved” is right. I just don’t see why that means one side of the source of conflict isn’t chosen. Every time a character does something in the story, it’s because a side of the conflict has been chosen.

The way I’ve come to understand this is that it is NOT that every time a character does something in the story it’s because a side of the conflict has been chosen. There are no characters, they’re not real. The Players are just stand-ins, metaphors to illustrate what the source of conflict feels like.

If a source of conflict for Progress is:
I want to make forward movement in order to be someone, but progress leads to the destruction of the present.

Then the author chooses to illustrate that angsty dilemma by saying, “You know what that feels like, Audience? It’s like as if there were a farm boy named Luke on a planet in the middle of nowhere called Tattooine. He’s dying to join his friends and fight the galactic empire. But his uncle says no, doesn’t want him repeating the past mistakes his father made. He needs him to be here and now. But he still wants to make progress and goes after it… which leads to the murder his uncle, illustrating the flip-side of making progress toward something. So now you can feel, Audience, the subjective mental strife surrounding a source of conflict of Progress.”

Nothing is chosen. No one character picks one side of the source of conflict. Luke STILL wants to progress toward being a freedom fighter, and Luke’s progress STILL destroys his present.

[Lakis]

@JohnDusenberry

But he still wants to make progress and goes after it

Isn’t this “choosing”?

To take an example you gave in another thread:

Understanding PRCO

For me, it helps to consider each element in terms of the mental dilemma is raises. The electric circuit analogy @mlucas mentioned is 100% right. But what happens if we talk about what’s going on with the battery? The mental processes each element brings to your mind… Subtext puts that fight in ESB at OS Signpost Being, with the overall Dramatic Circuit as Wisdom, Skill, Experience, Enlightenment. If we look broadly at the whole sequence when Luke arrives at Bespin until he falls, we see that W…

Okay, so a source of conflict is “Luke needs to be smart about facing Vader if he’s going to come out ahead, but he lacks the wisdom Yoda tried to impart while rushing into battle.”

The way we got here though is that Luke made a decision not to follow Yoda and Ben’s advice to complete his training. You could see that decision as a “best bad choice” – “If I don’t stay here and complete my training, I’ll be vulnerable, but if I do stay, my friends may be killed.” He makes the choice to go, which is part of what leads to Failure.

If Lawrence Kasdan were writing this using your approach would Luke’s decision be something that emerges in the storytelling once the unsolvable subtextual dilemma is articulated? Is there any more direct connection between what I’m talking about here (best bad choice) and PRCO (or maybe SRCA?).

[JohnDusenberry]

@Lakis

Isn’t this “choosing”?

It’s an illustration of the ongoing process of “Progress-ing” … which is still happening even when the other side is happening.

@Lakis

Okay, so a source of conflict is “Luke needs to be smart about facing Vader if he’s going to come out ahead, but he lacks the wisdom Yoda tried to impart while rushing into battle.”

Luke doesn’t make a choice to be smart, nor does he make a choice to lack wisdom. In fact, Luke doesn’t really make the choice to do anything. Looking over this example again, the source of conflict may be a touch incomplete. The underlying source of conflict there (when you strip away the context) should be more like:

I need to ignore wisdom in order to do something, but a lack of wisdom leads to bad situations.

The idea is that the mind is dealing with both sides of the inequity from start to finish. And really, to put a finer point on it. This “two sides” thing is just a means for us to better describe the source of conflict. Another way I often try to talk about it in Conflict Corner is to ask “so what’s the problem?”

“Should I ignore sage wisdom to do this if it leads to a bad situation?”
… and THAT’S really the mental dilemma. Perhaps an easier way to understand how there is no choice to be made. I can see how the mind would want to say “Yes” or “No” to this, but that’s not how it works. Instead, the mind moves on to the NEXT dilemma.

A whole story would feel like this… the mind travels between sources of conflict:
“Should I ignore sage wisdom to do this if it leads to a bad situation?”
“Should I fight to win if fighting leads to making enemies?”
and then the story “ends with”
“Can I feel hate to fuel my desires, if high emotions lead to dangerous predicaments?”

The mind is like… “reasoning” with itself. Thinking something out. There’s this dilemma, but then there’s this dilemma. And now that drove my mind to this OTHER dilemma.

[glennbecker]

I think the rub here is between how the mind works and how the story works.

In the mind, all of these inequities are ongoing. They are happening at the same time. They play out in an instant. There is no beginning and ending.

In the story or argument, we’re leveraging the mind, defining a scope around it with drivers and limits, and defining a path through these inequities in order to make a point about how you should or shouldn’t deal with these things in your own life. We’re taking something meaningless and assigning a meaning to it.

In the examples, I can answer in the affirmative which path Luke took. It doesn’t resolve the dilemma’s in the mind, but it shows a potential path you can take through these things that will be a positive, negative, or somewhere in between.

You’re coming up with these examples on the fly, and the context hasn’t been stripped away, so I don’t want to ding you on that. But just like a story doesn’t have meaning if the MC / IC both change. There doesn’t seems to be a meaning without having to take one path or other. At least to me.

I think both things can be true and not contradict each other. YMMV with what you find beneficial to your own writing.

[JohnDusenberry]

Dramatica sees the Mind and Story as one thing, the Storymind. It’s looks at mental processes in super slow motion, one little process after the next. The meaning doesn’t come from any choice that is made. Meaning comes from the structure and order of the processes from start to finish, seen as a whole.

I’m not sure how one can answer which path Luke took,

@JohnDusenberry

“Should I ignore sage wisdom to do this if it leads to a bad situation?”

… when there is no path to take. The problem I’m seeing is the conflation of the subtextual source of conflict with the story illustration that represents that source of conflict. What’s described there is supposed to be a way of saying “A mental conflict of Wisdom” … not a binary choice of which Wisdom the mind is going to choose. The context of that example IS stripped away. What sage wisdom? From who? What’s the bad situation? All questions which have the same answer: It’s irrelevant. The point is that the mind is in conflict over Wisdom-ing.

The StoryMind is not fully self-aware… it’s not standing outside of itself presented with choices saying “I have a problem, and which way should I go? Should I stick with this problem, or move to a solution?”

The “Story” part is the Encoding process, which is really just like it sounds. You’re encoding the underlying conflict. Representing those forces with characters, plot, dialogue, images, words. The sources of conflict are not presenting characters with a choice for which path to take. The sources of conflict describe the mind processing angsty mental feelings, or thoughts.

EDIT/ADDITION:
Another way to think of it is that the story structure is a literal map. Each source of conflict is a Point on the road, but there’s only one road. It’s not branching off this way or that way depending on something you choose at each point. You can appreciate a story at any level of detail. So that road might look like:

MC Past-------------MC Progress-------------MC Future-------------MC Present

And seeing those things in that order (along with the other 3 roads) means something.
Or you can zoom in, just like Google Maps, and see specifics along each section of the road. Getting a more detailed look at it all.

MC Past-----(variations)--------MC Progress------(variations)-------MC Future------(variations)-------MC Present ----(variations)----

[glennbecker]

@JohnDusenberry

What’s described there is supposed to be a way of saying “A mental conflict of Wisdom” … not a binary choice of which Wisdom the mind is going to choose.

I would suggest that by framing the underlying process as two incompatible truths you are both encoding the story point and creating a binary.

I think it’s pretty clear Luke chose to ignore wisdom even if it lead to a bad situation, but maybe I’m just not seeing it.

[JohnDusenberry]

@glennbecker

I think it’s pretty clear Luke chose to ignore wisdom even if it lead to a bad situation, but maybe I’m just not seeing it.

The thing is… Luke isn’t real. It might appear that Luke did something, but Luke was Mark Hamill and everything he did was filmed and edited together, printed on celluloid and shown to an audience.

What was actually happening is a form of telepathy, or manipulation to get you to recognize and feel the force behind Luke, which lived first in the minds of George Lucas, Lawrence Kasdan and Irvin Kershner as Wisdom-ing mental dilemma.

They put that into words and pictures (The StoryMind) which has the ability to maintain that mental dilemma, which when seen on screen… plants that in YOUR mind.

Luke was just the puppet. And so was Yoda (literally… double puppet).

[glennbecker]

Yes, I agree that Luke Skywalker is a construct created by George Lucas. This construct was used by Lawrence Kasdan for the purpose of exploring the personal conflict in a story.

I’m also agreeing that Uncle Larry, as I call him, used this construct (undoubtedly without awareness of it) to illustrate a personal conflict of Wisdom. I’m adding that Uncle Larry showed this construct was used to illustrate what happens taking a direction of ignoring wisdom as part of the argument they were making.

Then Mark Hamill acted this out so we could see how one approach to working through Wisdom leads to you getting your hand chopped off and finding out you’re half Space Nazi. Irvin Kirshner told him where to stand and yelled “Cut!” so he’d no when to stop talking. I’m skeptical of your claim that Yoda was a puppet, however, and would challenge you to provide evidence.

[JohnDusenberry]

@glennbecker

Then Mark Hamill acted this out so we could see how one approach to working through Wisdom leads to you getting your hand chopped off and finding out you’re half Space Nazi.

I think this is perhaps the best description of the lasting conflict at the end of ESB I’ve ever read.

And if you have a hard time believing Yoda is a puppet, just wait until I tell you his voice is actually Miss Piggy!

[Greg]

@JohnDusenberry

Dramatica doesn’t deal with an inequity in any describable thing like a bear charging at you.

If a bear charges at you, your mind is going to address that. Dramatica is a model of the mind. Therefore, Dramatica is a model of a process that addresses things like bears charging at you.

@JohnDusenberry

I want to make forward movement in order to be someone, but progress leads to the destruction of the present.

The choice here is whether to move toward being someone or keeping the present in tact. The mind explores this. An analogy for this is Luke keeping the present and not progressing and feeling stuck on a farm and then progressing while losing the present and and finding his home and family burned.

The argument isn’t that Luke chose one therefore the mind chose one. The argument is that the mind explores the dilemma—What does it feel like to protect the present at the expense of progress? What does making progress at the expense of the present feel like?—in such a way as to provide a judgment on which way best addresses the conflict. Without the eventual judgment that making Progress is a good or bad way to address conflict, the problem solving process would not be a problem solving process. It would merely be a conflict observation process.

@JohnDusenberry

The problem I’m seeing is the conflation of the subtextual source of conflict with the story illustration that represents that source of conflict

You’re really caught up in trying to use this as a defeater. But if you can replace all of the illustrations with a mental dilemma of your preference and have the point still stand-as it does in this thread-then this is not what you’re seeing.

If you still insist that the problem solving process stops short of deciding on a way to solve problems, so be it.

[mlucas]

@Lakis

Isn’t this “choosing”?

I think one thing that may be tripping people up is that, even though the storymind isn’t choosing one side of the dilemma over another as it moves through it, it’s still okay to show a character making a choice or seeming to favor one side. Definitely not required, but not disallowed either. The puppeteer is exploring that dilemma and the dilemma is still there after he moves past it – but the puppets can do whatever serves the story.

@JohnDusenberry

Luke was just the puppet. And so was Yoda (literally… double puppet).

Oh man. This thread is worth reading just for the double puppet comment.

@Greg

Without the eventual judgment that making Progress is a good or bad way to address conflict, the problem solving process would not be a problem solving process. It would merely be a conflict observation process.

Somehow I feel like both of you guys are right which makes me think you are talking about different things. I definitely agree that a story(form) makes judgments on the right way to solve problems in a given context… And Star Wars certainly argues that it’s good to embrace Trust when facing problems stemming from Test.

But at the level where there is a dilemma within a particular story point element, especially in the plot progression (signpost / PSR variation / scene PRCO), I don’t feel that the story is trying to make a judgment on those dilemmas.

[JohnDusenberry]

@mlucas

Somehow I feel like both of you guys are right which makes me think you are talking about different things.

What I’m talking about concerns all the individual sources of conflict the mind processes on its journey, and trying to illustrate that Dramatica is not a series of minor problems being solved along the way to somehow solve the overall indescribable inequity. Dramatica is not a model of the mind, it’s a model of the mind trying to solve an inequity.

You can definitely have the characters appear to make choices all you want. But that has nothing to do with the underlying subtextual sources of conflict that those actions of Luke “choosing” something ultimately represent. What the choices Luke makes don’t represent are a choosing of one side of a source of conflict over another.

EDIT/ADDITION:
If Luke chooses something in the storytelling, that does not represent choosing one side of Conceiving in order to Being, UNLESS Conceiving leads to Conceptualizing. If Luke makes a choice, that action merely represents/stands in as a way of illustrating the source of conflict as a whole … not choosing one side or the other.

[Lakis]

@JohnDusenberry

What I’m talking about concerns all the individual sources of conflict the mind processes on its journey, and trying to illustrate that Dramatica is not a series of minor problems being solved along the way to somehow solve the overall indescribable inequity.

So how do you connect all of these points so you have a plot, not just a bunch of isolated conflicts?
If nothing is “resolved” from one point to another, what distinquishes the Potential of a circuit from the Conflict or Outcome? What pushes the story from one point to the next?

The answer would seem to have to do with things like drivers and the distinct functions and relationships between the PRCO. Drivers are actions forcing decisions or vice versa – so that case, a decision is probably “resolving” a conflict, no? Also you have the story limit – if it’s an Optionlock, isn’t the process of going through the story one of working through various options to attempt to achieve the Goal?

Practically speaking, yes, stories are not “a series of minor problems being solved along the way” because usually the attempt to solve problems makes things worse until you reach the end of the story.

Not trying to beat a dead horse here, just trying to understand this in a practical, applicable way.

[kf27]

I have read your discussions, and this is a very interesting question.

@JohnDusenberry

Perhaps an easier way to understand how there is no choice to be made. I can see how the mind would want to say “Yes” or “No” to this, but that’s not how it works. Instead, the mind moves on to the NEXT dilemma.

This gave me an idea. It’s inspired by a similar exercise from Jeff Kitchen’s Writing a Great Movie: Key Tools for Successful Screenwriting. In this book he brainstorms a complete plot based on a dilemma. I think it would work with dramatica dilemmas on signpost level, variation level etc…
It’s maybe similar to the exercise, what glennbecker adviced in the first comment.

So example:

I have a dilemma:

Bob needs to buy a racecar, because he wants to start a new career as a car racer (-> justification A)
UNLESS
Bob wants to secure his savings, because he terrified about the possibility of poverty (-> justicication B)

The next step is the “deepening” the both side of the dilemma.
This is goes from Storytelling perspective. It’s also bit shilly, but I just do it, for the sake of the example.

So I’m brainstorming…

Why justification A is important to Bob?

• Bob always dreamed about being a superstar car racer
• A famous fortuneteller predicted that Bob will be the GREATEST car racer of the XXI. century
• Bob hates his job as a highschool teacher, and feels that if he doesn’t quit NOW, the rest of his life will be miserable
• Bob’s dying grandmother wished that Bob should pursue his dreams, and live his life happily

Why justification B is important to Bob?

• Bob’s father lost their family fortune because his game addiction. This was a traumatic experience to the the young Bob
• Because of this, Bob is very greedy (almost a modern Ebenezer Scrooge)
• Bob also worries about his younger brother reckless behavior. His brother personality is very similar to their father’s, and Bob always feared that his brother will also make great debts someday
• Bob wants to marry Alice, and he shoud save money for their new house

(**It’s also work if I ask: What can go wrong, if Bob goes with Justification A/Justification B?)

[kf27]

(Long comment, sorry…)

So the idea is to combine some of this statements to a mini-story with rising conflicts. Something like that:

In her death bed Bob’s grandmother wished that Bob should live a full life and pursue his dreams. Bob always wished to be a worldclass car racer, but now he thinks it is an unrealistic idea, and also too late for him to start a new carrier. It’s also a financially risky carrier, and Bob prefers to live his life safely.
After a particulary terrible day Bob realises that how much he hates his job as a highschool teacher. He feels, if he doesn’t quit now, the rest of his life will be miserable. The same day a wolrd famous fortuneteller predicts that Bob’s destiny to became the GREATEST car racer of the 21. century.
After this event, Bob is in battle with himself. He has enough savings to buy a race car, but the same time he hates irrational money spending. He wishes to buy the race car more than anything else, yet the same time he suffers from nightmares about being homeless. (Because what happened in the past with his father gambling debts etc.)
In the end Bob sticks with his decision, and buys the race car. Now he feels a surprising relief, and at night sleeps as peacfully as a baby.
However the next day, his younger brother, Tim, calls him on his phone. He made a shaddy business with the maffia, and now his life is in danger. Tim needs to pay a big amount of money to his “business-partners”, and he asks help from Bob. Bob just spent on all his savings, and now he needs to find a way to get a lot of money quickly…

I think, this exercise works, when we try to encode a dilemma on a storytelling level. In this way, there is a “tension” between the two side of justifications, and I think, it’s makes easier the encoding of the SRCA, PRCO, TKAD later.

(And sorry for my English mistakes. )

[glennbecker]

Your English is great!

The difference for my approach would be to list out every way you could get around the dilemma you’ve come up with:

• Why not get a second job?
• Couldn’t he pawn some of his stuff?
• What if he went to a bank and got a loan?
• Maybe he could find a sponsor?

Then, once you have that list, show why all of those can’t happen or make things worse.

After you’ve done that, you have a bunch of story beats and he’ll be boxed into spending his savings or giving up his dream.

Underneath all that storytelling, will be the “true inequity” which you’ve mapped out but haven’t explicitly stated.

Try to use that storytelling to draw a circle around the true inequity or move on to another illustration and save the drilling down for a second draft.