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Welcome to the Mind-Lab

a.k.a. LUCI – Laboratory of Urban Collective Intelligence

 

Welcome to the Mind-Lab – a space for experimentation on collective intelligence – a.k.a. ‘Laboratory of Collective Intelligence’ or Collaboratorium .  And welcome to Synergistics – the art and science of building synergy by collective intelligence, for sustainability, prosperity and resilience, in turbulent times – not only by evolution but co-evolution…  The source text is a ‘handbook for the 21st century’ – ‘Deeper City and the pathways from smart to wise’  (see some reviews).  

On this site you will find 4 main menus, as per overviews below –

  • Collaboratorium  – an experimental zone for learning & thinking on collective intelligence.
  • Themes – 4 main programs – ‘Smart-wise’ – ‘City-wise’ – ‘Eco-wise’ – ‘Foresight-wise’
  • Projects – current & recent projects which explore & test the collective intelligence potential
  • Toolkits – a set of practical methods, tools, examples and guidance:

Also you are invited to join the Mind-Lab community for updates & invitations

 

News & events

New year greetings with ‘Looponomix 2026’ …. Last year we sketched 4 over-arching ‘Doom-Loops’ of self-destruction – and now these look darker and more dangerous than ever… All the more urgent to find the seeds of ‘Life-Loops’ which can grow towards prosperity, justice & sustainability…  See updates – https://kumu.io/Joeravetz/loop-onomix-test#untitled-map (& background ) – comments welcome …

2026

  • Urban Geography Research Group: 28th January 2026, 1300: ‘Cities of Tomorrow: mapping a dynamic and dangerous future’ – seminar with Joe Ravetz – Details (shortly) https://ugrg.co.uk/
  • Foresight-CHAI (‘collective human-artificial intelligence’) Forum #3 – 26th Jan 1200:  now that AI provides endless content, we need to focus on the CHI – ‘collective human intelligence’. We review leading systems and develop a CHAI prototype.
  • Collective-net-zero-intelligence: 13th Feb 1400 (tbc). With the Manchester Climate Change Partnership, testing new tools for CHAI (‘collective human-artificial intelligence’): (international Foresight-CHAI program in Manchester – Kolkata – Beijing).  
  • Natural Flood Management India – Foresight-CHAI (‘collective human artificial intelligence’) – Jan 5-9th – for the project ‘Policy Mobility for Local Solutions and Community Resilience through Natural Flood Management’ (British Council funded):  details Collective flooding intelligence (includes workshop for the international Foresight-CHAI program, Manchester /  Kolkata / Beijing.   Public lectures follow in Kolkata:  13th Jan University of Calcutta: ‘13th Jan 1500 Presidency University: 14th Jan, Jadavpur University:details on  Collective flooding intelligence 

World Urban Forum in Baku, May 17-22 2026:  three events are planned:

  • City-verse CHAI (‘collective human-artificial intelligence’): ‘Academy’ training workshop focused on the smart-wise cities theme.
  • Global Urban Futures: ‘Urban Library’ event to kick off the international handbook project in interactive form.
  • Planetary peri-urban: ‘Networking’ launch of the ‘Peri-Urban-Rural Linkages’ compendium & global community (hybrid).

2025 (b) 

  • U4SSC (‘United for Smart Sustainable Cities’): 19th November 1400:  – https://u4ssc.itu.int/thematic-groups/ :  I will discuss Foresight-CHAI ideas &  work in progress

  • China-UK foresight 3.0 exchange program enters a second phase in Beijing, Nov7-14th: program as on Foresight-wise CASTED –CASTED http://en.casted.org.cn/ seminar.

  • Co-futuring with CHAI Forum #2 (Foresight 3.0 with ‘Collective Human Artificial Intelligence’) – 23rd October 1300.  …now that AI provides endless content – we need to focus on the CHI – ‘collective human intelligence’.
  • European Parliamentary Research Service – Policy Foresight Unit – seminar on Foresight 3.0 in strategic public policy – 24th October 0900.  (by invitation, contact joe.ravetz) 
  • PURL (peri-urban-rural-linkages) – keynote at the IFURL conference (hybrid) in Songyang county, Zhejiang Province, China:  4-5th November 2025 – details on Peri-wise program
  • Co-futuring with CHAI #1 – 24th July. Following the Foresight 3.0 workshop at Futures4europe  – demos and reviews of leading AI-enabled platforms.
  • Community Resilience through Natural Flood Management in UK / India – Sept 15th / October 9th workshops with the pathways toolkit. 
  • Systems thinking for African city governments: the synergistic approach – 22nd July – interactive workshop with the African-cities research consortium
  • Joe Ravetz’s journey of ideas is featured along with 40 other global thought leaders of the GTI network, in this unique collection – https://greattransition.org/gti-forum/memoirs-global-engagement  
  • As a modest contribution to Asia-Pacific futures – the Deeper City book is now available in Vietnamese at Thanh-pho-sau-hon …. (Chinese version is in discussion..)

 

Welcome to the book

The book is about the Symbio-polis – shorthand for the co-evolution, not only of material cities but the civilization which produces them – of which there are many deeper layers in the deeper city…. 

So the book aimed high – to visualize challenges and forward pathways, in text, system mapping, and visualizations – here are various materials –

 

A wider set of resources are shared with the visual thinking ‘sand-pit’ of Urban-3.0 –  further samples from  The Book:    the Mind Games and Political Games with visual storylines : background on the  Synergistics ideas & methods: deeper and wider insights and experiments in Visual Thinking.)

 

Welcome to the Collaboratorium

In this Collaboratorium / Mind-Lab  we aim to explore the frontiers and principles of ‘collective intelligence’, its methods and tools, and practical applications.  We aim to demonstrate the pathways forward, with analysis, examples, guidance, methods & tools.

Following a first phase of experimentation (2020-22), a forward plan is now forming with 4 main strands:

  1. Projects & case studies: experiments & applications, new & ongoing: some have open invitations to participate
  2. Community & dialogue: debates and symposia, ‘lab tours’, online comment;
  3. Research & publication: compile special issues and a multi-author ‘CI-Book’ (‘collective intelligence book of online knowledge’);
  4. Policy & practice: disseminate results, methods & tools, with ‘white papers’ & practical guides.

This is planned as a multi-year program, exploring a range of topics in 4 key themes and their intersections:

  • City-wise theme: ‘Peri-urban-wise’ & ‘MCR-wise’
  • Smart-wise theme: ‘CHAI-wise’ & ‘Local-wise’
  • Eco-wise theme : ‘Climate-wise’ & ‘Bio-wise’.
  • ‘Foresight 3.0’ is at the intersection of these clusters, with studies on collective intelligence, futures methods & applications: (also, ‘Pandemonics-3.0’ was a key focus 2020-22). 

 

Forward thinkers and interested co-authors are invited to join these workshops as they come up on the links. 

For comments or queries, contact joe.ravetz@manchester.ac.uk

 

Virtual hub

Through the pandemic, the Collaboratorium provided a unique 3D virtual hub / meeting place / coffee bar / water garden and lookout point – (designed by the Visioning Lab/ on a platform courtesy of Mozilla Hubs).

With an inspiring set of spaces, based on ‘earth / air / fire / water’ cosmology, this was perfect for virtual coffee /informal networking after intensive meetings…. We are now launching with FrameIO a next generation virtual space – details shortly…

 

Welcome to the projects

Here the synergistic methods are being developed and tested in a range of projects, large and small, from around the world. This is basically the inhouse Collaboratorium – the experimental zone of a ‘collective intelligence laboratory’.

New projects & initiatives

  • Foresight 3.0 Ukraine circular economy – working with UNIDO on the longer term prospects for Ukraine as a innovative and sustainable circular economy
  • International resilient cities  – China-UK project: exploring new methods of risk / resilience analysis, to look beyond the city limits at whole urban / peri-urban linkage systems.
  • Eco-wars-3.0 – This unique and very topical project explores the interactions of climate tipping points with human tipping points. Each side is hyper-complex, volatile & vulnerable – with the synergistic approach, we invite participants for co-production of a ‘collective climatic intelligence’ .
  • Ground zone / Liveable city toolkit:  The Ground Zone project is an Innovation Lab collaboration between the Manchester Urban Institute, and architects / designers Callison RTKL. 
  • Local-wise – (Urban participatory research & knowledge loops) – exploring new forms of urban knowledge in Living Lab context, and how they are co-produced between research, policy, business and civil society.  

Welcome to the toolkit

The Synergistic Toolkit is designed for working with complex inter-connected problems. It shows how to turn a ‘Nexus’ of contradictions, into a ‘Connexus’ of opportunities. It’s an evolving package of methods, tools, techniques, and templates.

The Toolkit helps to understand a complex present, and explore the pathways to opportunities in the future. It works generally with a 4 stage process – ‘Systems / scenarios / synergies / strategies’.

Each is the starting point for key questions…  these can be very complex – but also very simple… for example this series is used in many projects, with visual templates to support each question –

– what is our problem?? (who, what, why etc)

– what might change?? (in 5 / 10 / 20 years etc)

– what is our vision?? (in 5 / 10 / 20 years etc)

– how to achieve it ?? (who, what, how much etc)

 

Systems

First we explore the wider and deeper nature of the problem.
Find out more

Scenarios

Second we look at the forces of change and future uncertainty.
Find out more

Synergies

Third we look for visions and shared opportunities between all.
Find out more

Strategies

Finally we turn the visions into pathways for strategy and action.
Find out more

The University of Manchester