How do we measure the depth of human meaning-making across history, traditions, and intellectual paradigms? In this fascinating presentation, Brendan Graham Dempsey introduces the Cultural Complexity Index (CCI) initiative, a pioneering research project launched by the Institute of Applied Metatheory and Sky Meadow Institute that empirically maps how humans structure knowledge, solve problems, and make sense of their world.

Utilizing the Lectical Scale, a highly refined framework for measuring hierarchical complexity, the project analyzes sacred and significant texts from different historical periods. Its early findings suggest fascinating correlations between social complexity and the evolution of meaning-making, while also challenging some common assumptions about cognitive development in different historical eras.

What do we mean by “culture”? While integral theory typically enacts “culture” as representing our collective interiors (LL), the CCI investigates a broader dimension — the complexity of symbolic information processing as a whole. CCI’s use of the term aligns closely with Gregg Henriques’ description of “culture” as representing the human noosphere in general, the sphere of knowledge, symbolic representation, and individual sense-making, rather than the Lower-Left (LL) quadrant of Integral Theory, which focuses on relational, intersubjective, and cultural meaning-making. While the two are connected and often isomorphic with each other, they require distinct methodologies to be properly analyzed.

This is important because, as Brendan points out, he is not making claims about a given culture’s overall developmental center of gravity, but rather on the cognitive performance of certain individuals within a culture, as measured by the Lectical Scale.

Brendan’s presentation covers the theoretical foundations, core methodology, and preliminary results of the study — particularly its examination of texts from forager and archaic societies. In the ensuing discussion, participants explore crucial questions, such as:

• The origins of the CCI framework and how it measures individual cognitive complexity,
• How cognitive complexity relates to cultural evolution—but why they are not the same thing,
• The shift from mythic narratives to rational-scientific models—and how each stage builds upon the last,
• The hidden structures of symbolic meaning-making and how they shape everything from politics to personal identity,
• How the CCI helps dispel myths about cultural development, such as challenging the notion that early societies were incapable of producing later-stage artifacts or ideas, and clarifying the sequential-but-nonlinear nature of human evolution

For integral thinkers, the CCI aspires to provide both empirical validation and refinement of existing developmental models. While supporting key developmental insights, it also suggests nuanced updates to conventional correlations between social and cognitive complexity. Most importantly, the findings point toward practical applications — helping to frame new “stories of wholeness” that are adequate to the challenges of our time.

This research represents a significant step in bringing empirical rigor to cultural evolution theories while refining and deepening our understanding. By applying careful measurement and analysis, it enhances our understanding of both our developmental past and the challenges of constructing more complex and integrative meaning systems for the future.

The Institute of Applied Metatheory (IAM) is redefining how we address today’s most complex global challenges by leveraging integrative metatheories—comprehensive frameworks that unify knowledge across disciplines. In this insightful conversation, Robb Smith and Josh Leonard reflect on IAM’s groundbreaking work in 2024, from initiatives like the Metacrisis Mapping Project and the Cultural Complexity Index to innovative tools like Context AI, which revolutionize sense-making and meaning-making at the forefront of epistemology. Discover how leadership, collaboration, and storytelling play pivotal roles in driving transformational change, while exploring the ethical responsibilities that guide this impactful work.

Looking ahead to 2025, Robb and Josh outline an inspiring vision for IAM’s continued evolution. With a renewed focus on building a robust metatheory of change, fostering intergenerational collaboration, and advancing the integration of sense-making and meaning-making, IAM is crafting a new story of wholeness to address the crises of our time. Through this discussion, you’ll gain deeper insights into the transformative potential of integrative metatheories and practical ways to contribute to a more cohesive, resilient, and ethically grounded future.

The Sensemaking, Action, and Leadership Training (SALT) for Climate initiative tackles a crucial blindspot in today’s climate response: the lack of conscious, integrative sensemaking as a foundation for meaningful action. SALT for Climate brings together cutting-edge psychosocial research, skilled facilitation in human dynamics, and transformative Big Picture metatheories to help climate leaders address the psychological and systemic gaps in existing political, economic, and scientific paradigms.


Through specialized training and coaching, SALT enhances the emotional, social, and consciousness capacities of those leading climate efforts, bridging the divide between climate policies and public understanding—a gap that often stalls progress and drives polarization. This scalable approach complements the scientific and technical aspects of climate action, fostering greater public engagement and supporting more impactful, integrative climate leadership.

In this episode of IAM Insider, host Josh Leonard sits down with Gail Hochachka and Lisa Gibson, leaders of the SALT for Climate initiative, to explore their pioneering approach to climate action. They discuss the often-overlooked psychological and social dimensions of climate work, share insights from their work on collective sensemaking and leadership training, and explain why a focus on human dynamics may be the missing piece in our response to the climate crisis. Listen in to discover how SALT for Climate is helping us rethink what effective climate action looks like.

Dear friends,

As you may have seen, The Institute of Applied Metatheory recently chose to organize, fund and incubate a significant new Applied Metatheory Initiative called the Cultural Complexity Index, which we see as holding the potential to act as a high-leverage project for long-term social emancipation.

We were looking for proposals that identified deep, long-lasting levers for transformation, demonstrated a strong inherent drive for change, illuminated overlooked dimensions, made a distinctive impact, and had the potential to inspire widespread participation and collective action.

The CCI fit these criteria, and in the spirit of helping our broader community see, understand and learn from IAM efforts to coordinate social action across the emerging Teal movement, we are publishing today the introductory discussion we did with Brendan Graham Dempsey in consideration of the AMI.

We hope it gives you some idea about why we are so excited about supporting this exciting initiative, and I hope you enjoy.

Loving regards,
Robb

About the Cultural Complexity Index Initiative at the Institute of Applied Metatheory
The Cultural Complexity Index (CCI) targets the significant yet under-researched issue of human cultural complexification by offering quantifiable data to support theories and visibility of cultural evolution and civilizational analysis. This project addresses the need for sophisticated, integrative metatheoretical models to tackle today’s complex global challenges, aiming to move cultural complexification theories from speculative sociology to a robust social science. Utilizing the Computerized Lectical Assessment System (CLAS) to analyze hierarchical complexity in historical and contemporary texts, the CCI will produce reliable data to inform academic discourse, promote integrative thinking, and challenge the prevailing academic paradigms rooted in cultural relativism. The failure to consider the non-arbitrary relationships among cultural systems and their potential for coordinated integration has led to confusion around values and meaning in pluralistic societies. This well-intentioned relativism fuels nihilism, radical post-truth ideologies, social decoherence, and political tribalism. To address these issues and advance complex, integrative perspectives essential for tackling today’s complex problems, it is crucial to shift knowledge-generating paradigms toward a quantifiable understanding of cultural complexification. By generating multiple academic papers and a comprehensive book, the project aims to catalyze a paradigm shift in how cultural evolution is understood and valued, providing essential insights for addressing the complex problems of our time.

Dear friends,

The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump is a tragic and cowardly act of political violence that attempts to undermine the functioning of democracy at its heart, which is the peaceful transfer of power bestowed by the legitimacy of popular will.

Sadly, it is also the latest in a cascading sequence of predictable events as we continue to live through The Great Release, that large-scale breakdown in the United States’ power system that I first described in 2017, and since which has seen growing and acute political fractures in the US and around the world.

How did we get here?

Just hours before yesterday’s events, Josh Leonard and I discussed that exact question in great detail in “How America Got Here: A 50 Year Journey to Polarization” for IAM: The Institute of Applied Metatheory.

Based on a tweet thread I published a few months ago examining the wholesale transformation of American socioculture, we look at the deep structures—in the form of actual events, policies and decisions between 1970 and 2024—that radically shifted America from one form of system “regime” and associated equilibrium, that of relative national coherence in the early 1970s, into a new, radically- and qualitatively-different regime and equilibrium of extreme polarized decoherence of 2024.

Let me say this more directly: our current sociopolitical equilibrium is one of fracture, polarization and discord, so the very form and function of the system itself now is such that it will strongly resist moving away from producing more fracture, polarization and discord. Extreme events like January 6’s attempted insurrection, or the attempted assassination of a political leader, are both product and cause of the system naturally-generating the chaos it uses to reproduce itself.

The critical question is how did we generate a system whose equilibrium is extreme polarization? If we’re ever going to make choices that begin to shift our society toward the system reorganization that The Great Release predicts will be necessary, then we have to be able to see the mistakes, deformations, and integral violations that were committed on the way to getting here.

While I highly encourage you to watch our discussion to understand a fuller, more integral story of how we arrived here, I want to remind us that all division begins in the mind and can be ended by the heart.

Political differences are real, but they are nothing in the face of our infinite capacity for expanding our minds and hearts to accommodate new and different realities, lived realities our neighbors desperately want to show us, have us listen to, and have us affirm as real and valid. To reject this principle is to cauterize oneself from the full lifeworld, and what is a polarized society if not two groups who have retreated fully into their preferred barren demirealities?

But there’s another way. Cultivating an integral mind and heart is a path that takes us out of this hollow wasteland, and may indeed be the only one that can. We need integral leaders who can model the language, values, behavior and citizenship that the 21st century demands. Each of us can make that commitment, and renew it every day in the face of the widening gyre ahead.

Warm loving regards,
Robb Smith
Founder & CEO, Integral Life and the Institute of Applied Metatheory

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
02:05 Understanding the Socio-Cultural Shift
19:41 Economic Shifts
29:06 Media Fragmentation
37:28 Political Revolutions
40:57 The Role of Integral Leaders
41:27 The Repeal of Glass-Steagall and the Financial Crisis
44:11 China’s Entry into the World Trade Organization and Outsourcing
48:44 The Rise of Social Media and Identity-Fueled Tribalism
51:47 Donald Trump and the Erosion of Truth
57:52 The Importance of Integrative Leadership
01:04:06 Building a Healthier and More Resilient Society

Modern law enforcement faces complex and evolving challenges that demand innovative solutions. High-profile incidents, such as the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Eric Garner, have intensified public scrutiny, leading to significant swings in perception and policy. To navigate this turbulent environment, integrative frameworks offer the most promising path forward. By addressing deep-rooted issues and promoting sustainable change, these frameworks provide the necessary tools for transformative progress in policing.

In this wide-ranging roundtable discussion, the Institute of Applied Metatheory’s Josh Leonard hosts three leading experts in the field of integral policing to explore how applying big-picture, integrative frameworks could help address the complex challenges facing modern law enforcement.

The three panelists for this conversation are Chris Orrey, a retired police lieutenant from California, Gestur Palmason, a former police officer from Iceland, and Ryan Johansen, the current Chief of Police for San Bruno, California. Together, they explore the current landscape of policing from a big-picture perspective and demonstrate the potential for integral metatheory to drive transformative change in one of the most critical and challenging issue areas of our time.

The discussion delves into the powerful pendulum swings in public perception and policy that often follow high-profile incidents like the murder of George Floyd in 2020, and how an integral approach could help transcend these reactive cycles through a dialectical integration of opposing social pressures.

Key leverage points for transformation that emerge from the conversation include:

1. Training police leadership in the Integral Four Quadrants model as a powerful sense-making tool for navigating complexity,
2. Emphasizing officer wellness and resilience programs to support the healthy interior development of individual officers,
3. Rethinking police metrics and KPIs to more holistically assess the success and health of police departments across all four quadrants,
4. Fostering a culture of ongoing learning and development that empowers officers to adapt and grow with the increasing complexity of their roles.

While the path to a more integral future for policing is far from clear, the remarkable results and breakthroughs shared by Chief Johansen offer an inspiring glimpse of what’s possible when these big-picture integrative frameworks are put into practice with tact and vision.

The roundtable also reflects on the critical role of developmental leadership in shepherding this transformation. As more mature leaders begin to recognize the power and potential of integrative frameworks to help them better navigate the complexities of modern policing, we could be on the cusp of an exciting new wave of innovation and evolution in the field.

Join us for this thought-provoking and timely discussion as we explore how integrative metatheory could hold the key to ushering in a new era of policing — one that fosters greater trust, effectiveness, and resilience for officers and communities alike.

Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
7:18 The Current Context of Policing
11:14 Recruitment and Retention Issues
16:04 Integral Approaches to Officer Wellness
19:28 Navigating Polarities in Policing
25:21 Challenges in Police Reform
33:32 Innovations in Policing
38:01 Community Engagement and Education
43:00 Legislative Pressures on Policing
49:35 Identifying Leverage Points
1:02:26 Practical Applications of Integral Metatheory
1:12:30 Measuring Success
1:24:57 Integrating Green in Policing