Toronto, Ontario
Centennial Park Conservatory: Carp in pool inside greenhouse enjoy a peaceful existence, while the winter temperature outside is colder than seasonal average. The flora and fauna are available 365 days per year to the citizens of the city. This venue is physically smaller than the location downtown, but the scent of flowers is noticed here. (Centennial Park Conservatory, Elmcrest Road, Etobicoke, Ontario) 20190101Atlantic Avenue: Bent guard rail is ugly, cars won’t pass. There’s a set of stairs for pedestrians eastbound down into the ravine, behind the backyards on houses on Hertle Avenue. This height differential is probably associated with the lost Ashbridges Creek, that became buried as the Midway Sewer circa 1913-1915. This residential street runs just 1-½ short blocks east of Greenwood Avenue before the big drop. (Atlantic Avenue, Greenwood-Coxwell neighbourhood, Toronto, Ontario) 20190105Dumpling House: Long overdue lunch to catch up on news of family and friends, both positive and negative. Discussed wellbeing, responsibilities, and current priorities on personal projects. Good variety of choices on the menu, a challenge sharing across vegan, keto and low-carb diets. (Dumpling House, Gerrard Street East, Toronto, Ontario) 20190107Systems Thinking Ontario: Wrapped up meeting @OCADsLab on chartering a #SystemsChanges program with multi-year horizons, as a change from previous #SystemsThinking Ontario meetings that were episodic. General agreement towards moving forward, lots of details to be worked out. (OCADU Strategic Innovation Lab, 205 Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20190114Rotman School: It’s always about the apps, more than better architecture or technology, says @JohnChen with @KelleherJc @PubPolicy_Munk @RotmanEvents on the success of turnaround at Sybase. Four part interview, on moving from Hong Kong to American universities, rise in Silicon Valley, coming into Blackberry, and the technology industry today. (Rotman School of Management, St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20190115Bahen Centre: Graduate seminar by Adrian K. Yee on The Rise of Nazi Mathematics 1893-1945. A guest at the Department of Mathematics, visiting cross-campus from the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology. Disclaimer on critical perspective of Germans espousing theories as superior to Jewish and French thought, well-documented by credible researchers. First indications with Felix Klein 1893 lecture at Northwestern University in USA, through to influence over journal Deutsche Mathematik that now may be in university libraries only in censored form. (Department of Mathematics, Bahen Centre, St. George Street, University of Toronto) 20190117Onsite Gallery: Panel @LisaDeanneSmith #DaveandJenn @hermeticferns @maryannecasasanta @rouzbeh92 #FelixKalmenson on Collaboration as Process @ONSITEatOCADU for winter How to Breathe Forever exhibition. Reflections on listening to each other and world in today’s Internet noise, working with material. Learning to slow down, getting away from production driven by commerce or grants. Symbiogenesis in shifting landsacpes of socio-political contexts. Allowing conscious attention, laughing at the irony of disruptions. (Onsite Gallery, OCADU, Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20190119Onsite Gallery: Polymer clay pieces @ONSITEatOCADU #DaveandJenn @hermeticferns (2017) The Wellspring, (2017) No Horizons, (2017) For Actaeon The Flower, (2017) The House Guest. Dimmed interior feels warm, in contrast to the severe cold temperature warning outside. (Onsite Gallery, OCADU, Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20190119World Sew Centre: Had zipper heads replaced while I watched, as my winter coat was opening up on walks during the severe cold temperature warning. Previously had brought in wife’s coat to buy an exact match for a broken zipper, and was advised by the clerk that the teeth were fine, so just the zipper heads would be a cheaper and immediate fix. Trust the judgement of the shopkeeper. (World Sew Centre, Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20190119Xpace Cultural Centre: In solo show @arezustudio (2019) Fortune Flavors the Bold @xpacecc, artist fills room with good luck symbols inspired by growing up with a mother who immigrated from Hong Kong. Second generation children typically lose their heritage language, so the appreciation of the distant culture comes only indirectly. Sign at the door welcomes visitors in, provided shoes are removed, which mirrors a custom in Chinese homes. (Xpace Cultural Centre, Lansdowne Avenue, Brockton Village, Toronto, Ontario) 20190126CSI 192: In era of big data, semantic web gives meaning @andrewiliadis @DecimalUOIT @UOITCDMS speaker series. From seminal work of #JohnSowa and #DougLenat, semantics solves many varieties of data described in heterogeneous ways, with controlled vocabularies of preferred tags. Schemas, graphs, ontologies now in the age of social media and search engines. (Centre for Social Innovation, Spadina Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20190128CSI 192: Despite campaigns to disconnect from Facebook, @karppi @DecimalUOIT @UOITCDMS speaker series says that most people are still online. Facebook is still the most popular social platform, and continues to grow in less developed countries. Community now framed in terms of engagement, continuing to encourage bonds that dissuade users from leaving. (Centre for Social Innovation, Spadina Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20190128Bissell Building: Vision by @smgrimes for prior @SemaphoreTO research cluster launched in 2012, amalgamating into @kmdi established 1996 @UofTInfoFaculty. Renewed energy for design-oriented research and research-oriented design with more public discussion on people’s issues with technology, including the marginalized. This generation of researchers share philosophical roots in critical theory. (Bissell Building, Faculty of Information, St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20190129
SystemsThinkingTO: New Year, New Direction, after two years with looser agenda, @DerailleurAgile seeking more defined path. Reviewing quantitative statistics for SystemssThinkingTO meetup over past year, didn’t give much insight. Facilitated attendees, building up responses first by individuals, then in pairs, and then fours. Responses mapped out with a dialogue map generated discussion towards converging a program for the rest of the year. (SystemsThinkingTO, LoyaltyOne, King Street East, Toronto, Ontario) 20190130
For those who haven’t read the 1965 Emery and Trist article, its seems as though my colleague Doug McDavid was foresighted enough to blog a summary in 2016! His words have always welcomed here, as Doug was a cofounder of this web site. At the time of writing, the target audience for this piece was […]
In the famous 1965 Emery and Trist article, the terms “causal texture” and “contextual environment” haven’t been entirely clear to me. With specific meanings in the systems thinking literature, looking up definitions in the dictionary generally isn’t helpful. Diving into the history of the uses of the words provides some insight. 1. Causal texture 2. […]
Towards appreciating “action learning”, the history of open systems thinking and pioneering work in organization science, the influence of Action Learning Group — in the Faculty of Environment Studies founded in 1968 at York University (Toronto) — deserves to be resurfaced. 1. Trist in Canada 2. Environmental studies, and contextualism in organizational-change 3. Action learning, […]
The news that Doug McDavid — my friend, colleague, and one of the original cofounders of the Coevolving Innovations web site in 2006 — had passed, first came through mutual IBM contacts. More details subsequently showed up on LinkedIn from Mike McClintock. Doug left us on May 9, while working at his desk, likely in […]
One of the challenges with the development of pattern languages is the cross-appropriation of approaches of techniques from one domain (i.e. built physical environments) into others (e.g. software development, social change). The distinction between pattern language and form language is made by Nikos Salingaros. Design in architecture and urbanism is guided by two distinct complementary […]
The 1995 article by Spinosa, Flores & Dreyfus on “Disclosing New Worlds” was assigned reading preceding the fourth of four lectures for the Systemic Design course in the Master’s program in Strategic Foresight and Innovation at OCAD University. In previous years, this topic was a detail practically undiscussed, as digging into social theory and the phenomenology […]
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 ›
Social ecology and environmental psychology described @dstokols @Social_Ecology , interviewed by @katiepatrick . References #WilliamsJames on attention. Book on Social Ecology in the Digital Age released in 2018.Read more ›
Concerns on #personaldata should be reframed as interpersonal, says @sheldrake , less the nodes and more the edge connections. “I want to take back control” superficial, @hartzog says control doesn’t scale. Agency is about negotiation in the world, more rhizomatic…Read more ›
Doing science should be wayfinding (pathfinding), says #TimIngold , gaining grounding in the art of paying attention, towards research as the pursuit of truth. Truth is more than objective facts, where science and art are embraced with materials, so that we can see the quality inside the natural world as it forms, rather than as […]
We should be more vigourous, says @MazzucatoM , in debating differences between value extraction and value creation, and between profits and rents. Lecture at Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford U., January 2019Read more ›
Proponents of #SystemsThinking often espouse holism to counter over-emphasis on reductionism. Reading some definitions from an encyclopedia positions one in the context of the other (François 2004).
Saying “it doesn’t matter” or “it matters” is a common expression in everyday English. For scholarly work, I want to “keep using that word“, while ensuring it means what I want it to mean. The Oxford English Dictionary (third edition, March 2001) has three entries for “matter”. The first two entries for a noun. The […]
It's been challenging to find sources that specifically define two-word phrases -- i.e. "systemic change", "systematic change", "systems change" -- as opposed to loosely inferring reductively from one-word definitions in recombination. MartinReynolds @OpenUniversity clarifies uses of the phrases, with a critical eye into motives for choosing a specific label, as well as associated risks and […]
The term "environmental" can be mixed up with "ecological", when the meanings are different. We can look at the encyclopedia definitions (François 2004), and then compare the two in terms of applied science (i.e. engineering with (#TimothyFHAllen @MarioGiampietro and #AmandaMLittle, 2003).
While many outside of the field of architecture like the #ChristopherAlexander #PatternLanguage approach, it's not so well accepted by his peers. A summary of criticisms by #MichaelJDawes and #MichaelJOstwald @UNSWBuiltEnv is helpful in appreciating when the use of pattern language might be appropriate or not appropriate.
Systems thinking should include not only thinking about the system, but also its environment. Using the term "field" as the system of interest plus its influences leaves a lot of the world uncovered. From the multiple definitions in the International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics , there is variety of ways of understanding "field".
