Toronto, Ontario; Pleasant Hill, California; Fairfield, California; Walnut Creek, California; Oakland, California; San Francisco, California
Palmerston casual dinner: Invitees list included many active in Canasian Artists Group circa mid-1980s, and friends of the Asian Canadian bookstore of Andrew Lee. Today’s generation doesn’t know the history of Toronto 30 years ago, and we debated whether they need to know. (Palmerston, Toronto, Ontario) 20160604
Robarts Library: Eleventh floor stacks, with triangular window bays protruding out facing Sussex Street. My alumnus card still gives me access to the stacks to old books, including one older than my attending university. Biked cross town, got caught in torrential downpour in the last five minutes, so entered the building dripping water. (Roberts Library 11th floor, University of Toronto, St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20160605Riverdale Park pedestrian bridge: View south on lower Don River, at rush hour with traffic northbound practically stopped. Rode bike west on Lake Shore Boulevard, then north. Carried bike up many flights of stairs to pedestrian bridge from West Riverdale Park to East. Just a short loop around our neighbourhood, but the headwind was strong on the outbound. (Riverdale Park pedestrian bridge over the Don River, Toronto, Ontario) 20160607Yonge Street at Yorkville Avenue: Facades of heritage 1870s-1890s Yonge Street buildings (John Oram, #836; Moses Staunton, #838-844; James Weir, #846-848A; Charles Frogley, #850) are being preserved as incorporated into a luxury 58-storey glass and steel tower at 1 Yorkville under construction. The storefronts are empty. In the lot behind, there’s a big pit with construction machines digging. Neighbourhood was quiet on a Saturday when festivals were drawing crowds elsewhere. (1 Yorkville Avenue at Yonge Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20160611Ryerson Student Learning Centre: Entered old building from Victoria Street Lane, not thinking of connection to new Yonge Street entrance. Library is open Sunday into evening, so Ryerson University students must not see summer as a special season. With eduroam, Internet access works the same as at home, so bicycling was just for exercise. (Ryerson Student Learning Centre, Yonge Street, Toronto) 20160612The Hearn: For Monday, @Luminato Festival is closed to the public. Rolled up on bike, attendant said to come back tomorrow at 5pm. The Hearn is a fair bike ride from Leslie Street and Lake Shore Boulevard, most people would choose the shuttle bus or pay the $15 onsite parking charge. (The Hearn, 440 Unwin Avenue, Portlands, Toronto, Ontario) 20160613Factory Studio: Chinoiserie play by @magicalmudge readers @R4Burning @Aranthor @pauliedat director @tara_beagan @fuGENTheatre @FactoryToronto partnered with @Shawtheatre. Story set in late 19th century, midwest America, about a mural to be created by a Chinese painter. For the WalkTheWalk National Festival of Asian Canadian Women, stage set with unwoven/weaving/comingtogether hanging knots of twine, manila rope, cotton rope and fibre piping. (Factory Studio, Adelaide Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20160614
OCADU: For Systems Thinking Ontario, Panagiotis Panagiotakopoulos @closetheloopgr starting with basics of Viable System Model, before describing application on a unified Sustainability Management System. Bimodal knowledge distribution in audience, from those who are new to VSM, to some who are experts. (Lambert Lounge, OCADU, McCaul Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20160615
The Hearn: Tenth annual Luminato Festival, sited this year at the former Hearn Generating Station that was decommissioned in 1993. The main hall used to house eight large turbines. Art has been placed on the ground floor, and on the walls of the top level, six flights of stairs up. On the west field is Pierre Huyghe (2012) Untilled (Liegener Frauenakt) Reclining Female Nude, where a bee colony has taken over the head of the figure. (Luminato, The Hearn, Unwin Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20160616
Michel de Broin (2013) One Thousand Speculations:
View of the installation in The Hearn from underneath on the southwest side, as part of Luminato 2015. Ball is composed of 24 aluminum structural sections and 1184 acylic mirrors. Area underneath the ball is cordoned off, for safety. Venue is a disused power generating plant, temporarily refurbished for a 10-day event. (The Hearn, Unwin Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20160616
Maple Leaf Lounge Transborder: Entourage of 6 bound for SFO, chilling over breakfast in the Maple Leaf Lounge. New check-in routes to U.S. gates. (Pearson Airport, Toronto, Ontario) 20160617Hyatt House Pleasant Hill: The last day of serious bachelorhood, amongst the male cousins available for matchmaking. (Hyatt House, Pleasant Hill, California) 20160617Jelly Belly Factory: Families queued in mid morning lineup for self guided factory tour of Jelly Belly production. We weren’t in the first 500 visitors who got the free two pounds of candy. We donned hairnets to view operations from overhead windows. (Jelly Belly Factory, Fairfield. California) 20160618The Gardens at Heather Farms: Wedding of Julie and Kevin, exchange of vows and rings, conducted by a non-religious officiant. Event was well-attended by a large family group, and many friends. Late afternoon ceremony had practically perfect weather conditions. Reception, dinner, and dancing into evening. (The Gardens at Heather Farms, Walnut Creek, California) 20160618Jack London Square: Bronze of White Fang wolf-dog hybrid, in front of Jack London’s Cabin. Interior of building is ultimate minimum for author. Oakland was a waypoint for family moving from Pleasant Hill through San Fran tourist stops, to Burlingame hotel overnight for early SFO flights tomorrow. DY and I are repositioned in an Alameda hotel for my meeting in Oakland tomorrow. Six of us arrived on Friday on the same plane, but are departing on five different routings on Monday. (Jack London Square, Oakland, California) 20160620United Club, SFO: Of the six of us leaving SFO today, I am on the latest flight direct. Dropped DY at West Oakland BART station at 9 a.m., she should have arrived in Vancouver before I depart to Toronto. The whole family is at ease through airports. (Club United, International Terminal, San Francisco International Airport. California) 20160620Fu Yao Supermarket Riverdale: Fresh jackfruit in season in Chinatown, they’ll sell you less than the whole. Biked over to replenish the pantry, since the family was away for four days. Shift to Pacific Time and back, late evenings with extended family, and then evening flight home means brainpower low due to to jet lag. (Fu Yao Supermarket Riverdale, Gerrard Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20160621Lower Don Trail: In progress Art Relay @PanAmPath A Love Letter to the Great Lakes under ramp from Don Valley Parkway southbound to Gardiner Expressway westbound. Official photo opportunity still two days away, at which point the artists should get more rest beyond the hammock. Signs for bicyclists to dismount or go slow through the site, ask that the work team be left alone so that they can make a crazy deadline. (Lower Don Trail, Toronto, Ontario) 20160622Manulife Centre: Cinema in Yorkville is on upper level of plaza between two modernist residential towers, built in the early 1970s. Building was new when I first came to university in Toronto, and a short walk off campus. Admission price for movie is lower on Tuesdays, and I caught X-Men Apocalypse on a normal sized screen with a handful in the audience. (Cineplex Odeon Varsity, Manulife Centre, Bloor Street West, Toronto) 20160628Nathan Phillips Square: Afterwork @TorontoJazzFest @GrayMatterSound Derek + Justin; @elibennettmusic @luisdenizsax Todd Pentney. @TOArtsFdn in 2015 honoured Justin Gray with Emerging Jazz Artist award. Temporary stage on northeast plaza, beside main stage tent, festival not using New Theatre Stage. Audience filled outdoor chairs mostly in sunlight, others listening from more shady spots outside the official fenced area. (Toronto Jazz Festival, Nathan Phillips Square, Toronto, Ontario) 20160629
Mill Street Beer Hall: H2 Harkness-Herriott @MillStBeerHall @TorontoJazzFest Sean Harness guitar @MikeH_trumpet Herriott as duo. No percussion or bass, yet so much music. Imaginative arrangements, no other musicians to hide behind. Early evening show, high stools in middle of beer hall facing west, so fans standing beyond the few seats with a prime view. (Mill Street Beer Hall, Distillery District, Toronto Jazz Festival, Ontario) 20160630
National Historic site, just south of busy Highway 401, Lock 1 is southernmost, and first of 44. Constructed 1908-1912, the boats can be raised 18 feet up from the level of the Bay of Quinte. Thicker concrete allowed for wagon valves chambers along side walls, rather than more expensive sluice gates. (Lock #1 Trent-Severn Waterway, […]
Away from city centre, deli has been a Montreal institution since 1946. Single order of smoked meat platter with rye bread and fries was sufficient for three diners. Broader menu included smoked whitefish chunks appetizer with salad, plus potato latkes with applesauce and sour cream. (Snowden Deli, Decarie Boulevard, Montreal, Quebec) 20250427
Possibly obsessive purchase, it's unclear how many bagels will be consumed in a few days, and how many into freezer. One dozen poppyseed, 6 sesame, 6 blueberry, 2 pumpernickel, plus assorted others. Resorted into plastic bags on the drive in traffic. (St. Viateur Bagel, St. Viateur Ouest, Montreal, Quebec) 20250427
Pilgramage for Montreal bagels (not Montreal-style) fresh from the oven. Samples on entry of avocado cream cheese, plus spicy avocado non-dairy, suggest a Quebec version of avocado toast. Plastic freezer bag offered in addition to paper bags. (St. Viateur Bagel, St. Viateur Ouest, Montreal, Quebec) 20250427
First stop on the way home was a specialty bakery. Consuming in the car, described the chocolate croissant as enjoyable and flaky, although he doesn't have previous experience withthe butter and wheat version. The bakery was discovered on a prior trip to the city. (Parc Sans Gluten, Avenue du Parc-La Fontaine Plateaux, Montréal, Quebec) 20250427
Post-theatre dessert with family, discussing Mean Girls The Musical. We had planned to hold up letters in the theatres as the cast was taking bows, but audience rose too quickly. Continued evening in hotel lobby until after midnight. (Yoyo, Rue Sainte-Catherine Est, Montreal, Quebec) 20250426
Place des Arts: Cast of Mean Girls The Musical taking bows on Saturday night performance. Owen Kent Ing stepping up from ensemble role to Kevin G this evening. He will have appeared in 150 shows by end of tour, having joined the company last year. (Place des Arts, Rue Sainte-Catherine, Montréal, Quebec) 20250426
Seven seats ready for Saturday night performance of touring company for Mean Girls, The Musical. Nephew in cast, in Montreal for 6 days, following Dallas, Texas, and before Boston, Massachusetts. We preferred visiting Quebec, rather than London Ontario in late May. (Place des Arts, Rue Sainte-Catherine, Montréal, Quebec) 20250426
Pre-theatre family dinner, including dim sum for cousins who don't get the option as often as we do. Second order of main dishes left much to take home. Short walk away from Places des Artes. (Restaurant Chinatown Kim Fung, Rue Sainte-Urbain, Montreal, Quebec) 20240426
luminum relief Frank Stella (1990) The Pitchpoling D-17, 2X. Inspired by Herman Melville (1851) Moby Dick novel, type of harpooning with a lance. Chaotic and explosive surface, negative spaces with silhouettes. (Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal, Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, Quebec) 20250426
Two years after submitting an academic manuscript and responding to double-blind reviews, “Rethinking work, with the pandemic disruption” has now been published in the International Journal of Organization Theory and Behavior (IJOTB) as earlycite. The article has a DOI (Document Object Identifier), and should be streamed with an official volume and issue number soon. The […]
The 128th meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario was convened in person. The classroom was filled with current students, alumni, our regular participants, and a few curious newcomers. Moderated by Zaid Khan, the conversation was sparked by Stephen Davies and myself (David Ing) on the evolving styles in learning systems thinking. Stephen has been leading SFIN-6011 […]
The “Understanding Systems” SFIN-6011 course is a requirement in the master’s program in Strategic Foresight and Innovation at OCADU. For winter 2025, the class is now led by Stephen Davies, breaking the incremental evolving of content since 2008. While still on faculty at OCADU, the original course designer Peter H. Jones is now a Distinguished […]
In the 1970s, five ways of knowing were established by C. West Churchman in The Design of Inquiring Systtems. In the 1990s, his student Ian Mitroff carried on the tradition and extended that work in The Unbounded Mind. Now in the 2020s, the technology of Generative AI opens up opportunties to query or request responses […]
For readers with an interest deeper than the 15-minute presentation given in August, the Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Socio-Technical Perspectives in Information Systems (STPIS 2024) have now been formally publishied. The invited paper on “Reifying Socio-Technical and Socio-Ecological Perspectives for Systems Changes: From rearranging objects to repacing rhythms” was reviewed by the […]
The 125th meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario coincided with the closing day for the RSD13-RSDX online program. As a regular systems convening group, we’ve had monthly meetings since January 2013. Zaid Khan moderated a discussion including me (David Ing), Tim Lloyd, Allenna Leonard, and Kelly Okamura. We recollected starting as a spinoff from Design with […]
Rhythm and pitch are primordial to language. Susan Rogers, after a career becoming Prince's recording engineer, turned to complete a PhD in psychology focused on music cognition and psychoacoustics.Read more ›
David L. Hawk (American management theorist, architect, and systems scientist) has been hosting a weekly television show broadcast on Bold Brave Tv from the New York area on Wednesdays 6pm ET, remotely from his home in Iowa. Live, callers can join…Read more ›
Following the first day lecture on Philosophy of Chinese Medicine 1 for the Global University for Sustainability, Keekok Lee continued on a second day on some topics: * Anatomy as structure; physiology as function (and process); * Process ontology, and thing ontology; * Qi ju as qi-in-concentrating mode, and qi san as qi-in-dissipsating mode; and […]
The philosophy of science underlying Classical Chinese Medicine, in this lecture by Keekok Lee, provides insights into ways in which systems change may be approached, in a process ontology in contrast to the thing ontology underlying Western BioMedicine. Read more ›
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 ›
In 2024, WordPress Studio was released, making installation on a local computer simpler. The instructions were modified from MacOS to Ubuntu Linux, by Daniel Kossmann, “How to install WordPress Studio in Ubuntu Linux” | Jun 15, 2024 at https://www.danielkossmann.com/how-to-install-wordpress-studio-ubuntu-linux/ I already had NVM installed, but in Terminal, with the result “command not found”. In the […]
The appreciation of change is different in Western philosophy than in classical Chinese philosophy. JeeLoo Lin published a concise contrast on differences. Let me parse the Introduction to the journal article, that is so clearly written. The Chinese theory of time is built into a language that is tenseless. The Yijing (Book of Changes) there […]
In trying to place the World Hypotheses work of Stephen C. Pepper (with multiple root metaphors), Nicholas Rescher provides a helpful positioning. — begin paste — Philosophical perspectivism maintains that substantive philosophical positions can be maintained only from a “perspective” of some sort. But what sort? Clearly different sorts of perspectives can be conceived of, […]
Finding proper words to express system(s) change(s) can be a challenge. One alternative could be diachrony. The Oxford English dictionary provides two definitions for diachronic, the first one most generally related to time. (The second is linguistic method) diachronic ADJECTIVE Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “diachronic (adj.), sense 1,” July 2023, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/3691792233. For completeness, prochronic relates “to […]
The selection of readings in the “Introduction” to Systems Thinking: Selected Readings, volume 2, Penguin (1981), edited by Fred E. Emery, reflects a turn from 1969 when a general systems theory was more fully entertained, towards an urgency towards changes in the world that were present in 1981. Systems thinking was again emphasized in contrast […]
