Vienna, Austria; Danube University Krems; Krems, Austria; University of Surrey; Guildford, UK; London, England; Toronto, Ontario.
Austrian Airlines Toronto to Vienna. Just realised that I’m breaking my personal rule to fly across oceans on a carrier with a Canadian flag. Direct flight for short trip trumped brand preference. Fortunately, the Austrians aren’t known as an aggressive culture. I expect to nap, and wake up in Vienna. (OS 72, still boarding at Pearson International Airport YYZ) 20150702Danube University Krems. Small university campus just one street by two blocks up hill from small town. Attending pattern language conference, PURPLSOC is third within a year. Would have meet practically all Christopher Alexander scholars by now, may focus down in future events with some interested in collaborating. Shortest lead time ever, 8 hours on plane, 3 hours on train, 1 hour to find campus, barely time for lunch, check-in and shower before first speaker started at 2:30 pm. (Danube University Krems, Austria) 20150703Wellenspiel, Krems. Conference dinner by the Danube River in Austria. Weather has been warm, around 30 degrees C and sunny. Mountain altitude, air is clean. Some familiar faces from prior pattern language conferences. (Krems, Austria) 20150704Closing ceremony at PURPLSOC. Network of yarn symbolises colleagues meet over a few short days of intense interaction. Tangle is tossed in parachute to create a knotty mess. First learned this at PLoP 2014 in Illinois. (Danube University Krems, Austria) 20150705S7 platform, Praterstern. Morning commute to airport from Vienna city centre hotel on suburban line S7. Started journey a little earlier than originally planned, discovering that I would be sitting nearly 30 minutes, as trains don’t run more frequently. Austrian efficiency means trains run on time, so the best surprise is no surprise. Flights to London Heathrow will be connecting, lowering airfare and adding miles. (Praterstern, Vienna, Austria) 20150706Glass overhead walkways. From Frank Whittle at south to Alan Turing at north, buildings connected to encourage random interactions between researchers walking and thinking. Design of campus with buildings below 4 stores an antithesis of skyscraper thinking. Statue of Turing on plaza a little further north may be overearnest recognition, as he was never part of this university, and would only come home to Guildford on weekends while a teenager at boarding school. (University of Surrey, Stag Hill campus, Guildford, UK) 20150707
Stainless steel sculpture and fountain. William Pye (1969) “Narcissus”, with spray of water on west side of small lake in northeast Stag Hill campus. Terrain at university is scenic but hilly, signs posted that accessibility may lead to indirect routes. British summer morning is cool, wearing long pants in anticipation of afternoon rain. (University of Surrey, Guildford, UK) 20150708Main entrance to Guildford Cathedral. Angel musicians engraved in glass by John Hutton are inset into bronze doors. One glass panel was vandalised in 2009, and restored by a protégé of the original artist a year later. Guildford Cathedral was consecrated in 1961, one of three modern cathedrals of the Church of England, the others in Liverpool in 1978, the other in St. Albans in 1877. Cathedral is by the south end of the university, had afternoon stroll up and down hills as a break from sitting. (Guildford Cathedral, Surrey, UK) 20150709Bridge NGL 15/X49: Public footbridge beside Guildford Viaduct over River Wey rail crossing reflects British multifunction design, as pedestrians served as well as as trains. Narrow path on south side of New Guildford Line (NGL) starts from Woodbridge Road at the east, to Woodbridge Meadows on the west. Forest naturally shades the path. Route jogs closer to rail built at higher level, going around the Sea Cadets camp. Low stress walk to university in the morning, steps at west end not so welcoming for the cyclist hoisting his ride. (Guildford Viaduct over River Wey, UK) 20150710SIEYP panel: Post #ISIE2015 panel #SIEYP2015 Symposium on Industrial Ecology for Young Professionals looks forward on directions for research. Audience of over 100 graduate students and postdocs could shape the future of the field. Panel includes: Reid Lifset (Yale U.), Ming Xu (U. Michigan), Chris Davis (U. Groningen), Noa Meron (Tel Aviv U.), Weslynne Ashton (IIT), Megha Shenoy (independent, India), Chris Kennedy (U. of Toronto). Afternoon will have self-organizing groups for discussion. (Lecture Block, Stag Hill campus, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK) 20150711Millennium Bridge. St. Paul’s Cathedral across the River Thames, from the third floor cafe of the Tate Modern. Truncated reservation by B&B in Guildford opened opportunity for single Saturday night in London. Museum is one of the few cultural institutions open late. (Tate Modern, London, England) 20150711Saatchi Gallery front ramp: Grandfather watches French child enjoying kickboard, running in circles up the steps and gliding down again and again. Saatchi Gallery opens at 10 a.m. on Sunday, I arrived a few minutes early and sat on a bench next to Duke of York Square, by Sloane Square. After opening, a quick tour of the galleries was worth the trip, evening with the confusion of rerouting to the tube after the British 10K London Run shut down bus services on the streets. When I left the gallery 45 minutes later, the child was still running around in circles, and I noticed others also behaving well on skateboards around the shopping district. (Duke of York Square, London, England) 20150712
Richmond Adelaide Centre Courtyard. A perforated wall and partial shading aims to give a quiet outdoor respite in the shadows of downtown towers. Hidden behind a wall facing a busy westbound one-way street, pedestrians are more likely to find the spaces than drivers teaching by. (Richmond Adelaide Centre Courtyard, Toronto) 20150713
Douglas Austrom and Carolyn Ordowich shared some reflections developed jointly with Bert Painter (Vancouver, BC) on some draft humanistic principles, the three Tavistock perspectives, and a meta-methodology with Systems Thinking Ontario. Proponents of Socio-Technical Systems design refer back to the 1960s-1980s research of Fred Emery and Eric Trist of the Tavistock Institute. Calls to reinvent […]
Doug Schuler joined the monthly Systems Thinking Ontario meeting for a conversation about the potential for patterns and pattern languages to help address wicked problems on a large scale, via technology, loose coordination, and social commitments. Doug was exposed to the original A Pattern Language in the mid-1970s. It aimed to generate towns and buildings […]
Literacy has been proposed as an understanding of a small number of pervasive principles appropriate to making informed personal and societal decisions. Systems literacy includes an understanding of systems that influence you, and your influence on systems. Peter Tuddenham has been leading an initiative on Systems Literacy across a variety of systems organizations, particularly with […]
The Creative Systemic Research Platform (CSRP) Institute, led by Susu Nousala and Jelena Sucic, is distinctive in approaching systemic design from a bottom-up, longitudinal perspective. The co-presidents were able to join us in conversation at a Systems Thinking Ontario session, remotely from Finland and Switzerland, at a significant time disadvantage. Many approaches to systemic design […]
To appreciate how systemicists worldwide collaborate, Gary S. Metcalf joined Systems Thinking Ontario for a conversation. Gary served as president of the International Society for the Systems Sciences 2007-2008, and of the International Federation for Sysrtems Research 2010-2016. From 2003 to 2018, he was a graduate instructor in Organizational Systems and Research on the faculty […]
While the term “theory of change” is often used by funders expecting an outcome of systems change for their investment, is there really a theory there? The November 2020 Systems Thinking Ontario session was an opportunity for Peter H. Jones (OCADU) and Ryan J. A. Murphy (Memorial U. of Newfoundland) to extend talks that they […]
In conversation, @zeynep with @ezraklein reveal authentic #SystemsThinking in (i) appreciating that “science” is constructed by human collectives, (ii) the west orients towards individual outcomes rather than population levels; and (iii) there’s an over-emphasis on problems of the moment, and…Read more ›
In the question-answer period after the lecture, #TimIngold proposes art as a discipline of inquiry, rather than ethnography. This refers to his thinking On Human Correspondence. — begin paste — [75m26s question] I am curious to know what art, or…Read more ›
How might our society show value for the long term, over the short term? Could we think about taxation over time, asks @carlotaprzperez in an interview: 92% for 1 day; 80% within 1 month; 50%-60% tax for 1 year; zero tax for 10 years.Read more ›
For the @ArchFoundation, #TimIngold distinguishes outcome-oriented making from process-oriented growing, revisiting #MartinHeidegger “Building Dwelling Thinking”. Organisms are made; artefacts grow. The distinction seems obvious, until you stop to ask what assumptions it contains, about the inside and outside of things…Read more ›
In web conference, #HermanDaly says #EcologicalEconomics used to get attacked from the right, now it's from the left. Panel @revkin @jon_d_erickson @ktkish @sophiesanniti #TimCrowshaw #KatieHorner livestreamed #sustainwhat .Read more ›
Complementing the idea of a @longnow , @nfergus provokes the challenge of a #shortthen as the online social media platforms distract the larger perspectives on history.Read more ›
In his system of system concepts, Russell Ackoff made the distinction between reformation and transformation in many of his lectures. Here are two written sources. From Redesigining Society (2003) … Systemic Transformation A system is transformed, as contrasted with reformed, when its structure or functions are changed fundamentally. Such changes are discontinuous and qualitative, quantum […]
While Ackoff’s definitions of goals, objectives and ideals have been republished (and rewritten) multiple times, the 1972 definitions were derived from his original dissertation work. Accordingly, in addition to the human-readable definitions, some mathematical notation is introduced. — begin paste — OUTCOMES 2.30. End (an immediate intended outcome) of a subject A in a particular […]
The fifth way of knowing, as described by West Churchman, is a Singerian inquiring system. (This fifth way of knowing is more colloquially called Unbounded Systems Thinking in Mitroff and Linstone (1993)). The book On Purposeful Systems (Ackoff and Emery, 1972) was derived by Ackoff’s dissertation that was controversially coauthored with West Churchman. Purpose can […]
Understanding Process-Function Ecology by Ashwani Vasishth leads to luminaries in the systems sciences, including C. West Churchman, Eugene P. Odum and Timothy F.H. Allen.
As an irony, the 2020 book, The Innovation Delusion by #LeeVinsel @STS_News + #AndrewLRussell @RussellProf shouldn’t be seen as an innovation, but an encouragement to join @The_Maintainers where an ongoing thought network can continue. The subtitle “How Our Obsession with the New has Disrupted the Work That Matters Most” recognizes actual innovation, as distinct from […]
An online social network reproduces content partially based on algorithms, and partially based on the judgements made by human beings. Either may be viewed as positive or negative. > The trade-offs came into focus this month [November 2020], when Facebook engineers and data scientists posted the results of a series of experiments called “P(Bad for […]
