Toronto, Ontario
Water’s Edge Promenade: Walked south on Sugar Beach arriving just in time to see #JudyChicago start A Tribute To Toronto @TorontoBiennial performance. Barge with flashing light released purple smoke first, drifting east. After 5 minutes, the wind shifted north, forboding us to retreat back to a grassy knoll minutes before the crowd majority turned to follow. (Water’s Edge Promenade, East Bayfront, Toronto, Ontario) 20220604Yonge-Dundas Square: Facing southwest @YDSquare, four of 12+ screens @EdwardBurtynsky (2022) In the Wake of Progress @Luminato Festival with 360-degree immersion and booming sound. Plaza occupied by small groups of viewers looking upwards at images captured over 40 years. Second evening of two, arrived at dusk. (Yonge-Dundas Square, Toronto, Ontario) 20220612Congee Queen Agincourt: Weekday lunch becoming more normal, yet restaurant running below capacity. Comfort food with Cantonese fried noodles, grouper with tofu hotpot, bok choy. Day of meetings for community programs, lab tests. (Congee Queen Agincourt, Sheppard Avenue East, Scarborough, Ontario) 20220615Very Fair Seafood Cuisine: Reservation made for table of seven, for first family dim sum after years of takeout. No cart service, so ordered way too much food off the menu. Leftovers packed up for three destinations. (Very Fair Seafood Cuisine, Milliken Boulevard, Scarborough, Ontario) 20220618Pre-Fathers Day: Two sons still in town, so Saturday lunch uptown to meet with grandfather. Summer schedules are getting complicated, hard to find a day not already booked. Life is good, lots of changes on the domestic fronts. (Very Fair Seafood Cuisine, Millken Boulevard, Scarborough, Ontario) 20220618Little Italy: Street corner @TOLittleItaly trio @micheldequevedo hand drum, @ericstlaurent guitar @composer_jordan bass. Lyrics in Spanish appreciated by Mexicans and Venezuelans audience members, rhythms encouraged couples to dance. On break, Eric said this was only the second performance under Michel’s leadership, the non-Latin licks in guitar and bass give a freshe feeling. (College Street at Euclid Avenue, Little italy, Toronto, Ontario) 2020619Village of Yorkville Park: Tetrahedron @TorontoJazzFest @ernestocervini drums, @nirfelder guitar, @Richthealgoritm bass, @luisdenizsax alto. Performance delayed from CD release in March 2020, unfortunate timing at pandemic. Attentive audience under shade of trees in late afternoon, stage facing west. (Village of Yorkville Park, Cumberland Boulevard, Toronto, Ontario) 20200624House of Gourmet: Neighbourhood seafood dinner, casual occasion for introductions as our family network expands. Talked about summer travel plans, eastbound, westbound, overseas. Walked back to apartment for first look after many months of renovations, street life is now more active with the warm weather. (House of Gourmet, Dundas Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20220625Victoria University Quad: Trio @robocchipinti bass, @adreanf piano, #MarkKelso drums @torontojazzfest . Live music changeup in program, in respect of recent societal changes, to play Somewhere (West Side Story, Leonard Bernstein) followed by Is This America (Pat Metheny). Emotion in music sometimes doesn’t need words. (Victoria College Quadrangle, University of Toronto) 20220626Victoria University Quad: ES:MO duo @eshepherdmusic piano @Occhipintimusic guitar expanded for @torontojazzfest with @robocchipinti bass #NickFraser drums. Stories of the two travelling across Canada together borne out by long introduction to Riverman programmed live into loops with guitar, voice and keyboard bass. Performers are well-known in town, a large crowd was gathered on the lawn before they took the stage. (Victora College Quadrangle, University of Toronto) 20220626Village of Yorkville Park: From Montreal, #CODEQuartet @TorontoJazzFest @cjensenmusic sax, @lexfrenchmusic trumpet, #AdrianVedady bass, @jimdoxas drums. Behavior consistent with self-description as a collective, as each player called out the rhythm at the start of their composition. More openness and lightness in the chordless ensemble, without a guitar or keyboard to fill in space. (Village of Yorkville Park, Cumberland Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20220627Victoria University Quad: Singer-songwriter @sammyjacksonxo @torontojazzfest backed by @IanWrightMusic drums, @markgodfreybass . Wide stage with #TomFleming guitar, #ChrisPruden keys. Languid melodies and family back stories on a warm summer late afternoon. (Victoria College Quadrangle, Uniersity of Toronto) 20220628Village of Yorkville Park: Quintet @markgodfreybass @toronojazzfest with @IanWrightMusic drums, @mattworoshyl sax, #ChrisPruden keys, #KaeMurphy trumpet. Recognized by @TOArtsFdn as Emerging Jazz Artist of 2019, released album in Feburary 2020 just in time for pandemic shutdown. First live performance of the original group reformed for this day. (Village of Yorkville Park, Cumberland Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20220629Village of Yorkville Park: Bridges @jesseryansax @torontojazzfest with #DanielAnthony drums, #JulianAndersonBowes bass, #EwenFarncombe piano, @andrewmarzotto guitar, offstage @alexjazztrumpet. Emerging Jazz Artist @TOArtsFdn was Jesse in 2020, now Andrew in 2022 announced minutes before taking stage. Trinidadian heritage in compositions, updating into contemporary jazz with Caribbean and South American influences. (Village of Yorkville Park, Cumberland Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20220629
Market Street: Shaded patio table on pedestrian mall was the venue for the Systems Changes Learning Circle core members. First occasion for a face-to-face meeting, after over 2 years online due to pandemic. With rhythmic shifts having become central to our approach, we reminded ourselves that some emerging subgroups may similarly experience years of disordered thinking before reaching a convergence. (Market Street, St. Lawrence Market, Old Town, Toronto, Ontario) 20220630
Digging into philosophies underlying the systems sciences, pragmatism seems to have been a strong historical foundation for some research streams. In ongoing discussions, Gary Metcalf and I have been approaching pragmatism from two directions. Gary has been tracking from mid-1800s forward, listening to the audiobook The Metaphysical Club, with a history of figures living through […]
The ties between systems thinking and pragmatism are apparently strong, but the breadth in the philosophy of pragmatism can be confusing. Within the tradition, one of the threads is called nonrelativistic pragmatism, proposed by systems luminaries C. West Churchman with Russell L. Ackoff, descending from the work of philosopher Edgar A. Singer, Jr. A concise […]
A luminary in the systems movement, C. West Churchman, showed some respect for Chinese philosophy, with the I Ching (Yi Jing) in particular. Deborah Hammond was encouraged by West Churchman into joining and becoming a historian of the systems movement. In her 2003 book, Hammond wrote of her conversations with Churchman, back into his days […]
The 1969 publication of Systems Thinking: Selected Readings, edited by Fred E. Emery as a Penguin Modern Management paperback, can be regarded as a milestone. The articles date from the 1940s to the 1960s, when the first wave of systems thinking was on the rise. For the June session of Systems Thinking Ontario, we stepped […]
Within the Systems Thinking Ontario community, we were fortunate to have Nenad Rava step up to explain how the Sustainable Development Goals came to be, and relate them to systems change. This May session of Systems Thinking Ontario was a quick follow-on for the March edition on Ecological Limits to Development: Living with the SDGs. […]
The book Ecological Limits to Development: Living with the Sustainable Development Goals, published in 2002 by Routledge, was released as open access in 2023 by Taylor-Francis for readers who don’t have access to a university library. For the March edition of Systems Thinking Ontario, we were honoured to celebrate the release with editor-coauthors Kaitlin Kish […]
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 ›
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 ›
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 […]
In reviewing the original introduction for Systems Thinking: Selected Readings in the 1969 Penguin paperback, there’s a few threads that I only recognize, many years later. The tables of contents (disambiguating various editions) were previously listed as 1969, 1981 Emery, System Thinking: Selected Readings. — begin paste — Introduction In the selection of papers for this […]
In a recording of the debate between Michael Quinn Patton and Michael C. Jackson on “Systems Concepts in Evaluation”, Patton referenced four concepts published in the “Principles for effective use of systems thinking in evaluation” (2018) by the Systems in Evaluation Topical Interest Group (SETIG) of the American Evaluation Society. The four concepts are: (i) […]
How might the quality of an action research initiative be evaluated? — begin paste — We have linked our five validity criteria (outcome, process, democratic, catalytic, and dialogic) to the goals of action research. Most traditions of action research agree on the following goals: (a) the generation of new knowledge, (b) the achievement of action-oriented […]
After 90 minutes on phone and online chat with WesternUnion, the existence of the canton of Ticino in Switzerland is denied, so I can’t send money from Canada. TicinoTurismo should be unhappy. The IT developers at Western Union should be dissatisfied that customer support agents aren’t sending them legitimate bug reports I initially tried the […]
