Toronto; Riverside Beats & Eats StreetFest; Waterloo, Ontario; Toronto Jazz Festival; Luminato Festival
Orient Express kiddie ride. Dragon head could be the most menacing part on carnival ride that is being set up for weekend in west end park. Garish display from street for roller coaster that may only get to 10 feet off the ground means teenagers unlikely to get thrills from steep rises and drops. (Christie Pits Park, Blood Street West, Toronto) 20150604Bicycle-powered music. Music by @Mirian_Kay and @petitsnouveaux amplified by cyclist on @TuneYourRide for @RiversideBIA Beats & Eats StreetFest. Sunny Saturday afternoon, relaxed pedestrians discovering short intersections off Queen Street East. (Munro Street, Toronto) 20150606Pedal your own smoothie. Almond milk + fruit @OmaChiropractic, blender 20 seconds on bike @RiversideBIA Fest. @CycleToronto kiosk next over if wheels go astray. Seat was a little high for short riders, so parents had to ride for kids. (Munro Street, Toronto) 20150606Glen Road bridge. Tranquil view south over Rosedale Valley to tunnel by Sherbourne TTC station east exit, tunnel under Bloor Street above, then Howard Street and the towers of St. Jamestown. Despite having been around Toronto for 40 years, still discovering nooks off the beaten path while bicycling around town. (Glen Road bridge, Toronto, Ontario) 20150608U Waterloo convocation. Picked up gown, found name in program, waiting in the bleachers for ceremonies in about an hour. Brothers and grandfather came to see Adam receive diploma for Masters degree in Applied Science in Systems Design Engineering. (University of Waterloo) 20150613@TorontoJazzFestival opener. Tara Davidson sax, @DanielRFortin bass, @ErnestoCervini drums @TorontoLibrary North York concourse for early evening set. Band has known each other more than a decade. Played a lot of new original songs, yet to be recorded, including “31 Days”, which is how long it took Tara to write it last year. (North York Central Library) 20150615Grooveyard @torontojazzfest. Toddlers @shopsdonmills dance with happy feet as jazz musicians play pop and R&B repertoire. Slight personnel substitution due to double booking with other events around town? Maybe the kids will appreciate more sessions jazz when they get a little older. Grooveyard gets the audience to sing along, while their other personas would not have words. (Shoppes at Don Mills) 20150618Choral jazz @BurdockTo: Isis Giraldo Voces project @torontojazzfest, unexpected a capella harmonies in a warm set with an excellent sound system. Performers from Montreal have a different sense of musicality, great that they can share this on tour. Opening for Emma Frank. (Burdock Music Hall, Toronto) 20150618Dreampop jazz @BurdockTO: Emma Frank @torontojazzfest stretches the genre with contemporary vocal phrasing and pacing. Isis Geraldo on keyboard, Simon Millerd on trumpet. Drums and string bass follow the Montreal style of musicality, pushing the rhythm forward. (Burdock Music Hall, Toronto) 20150618Fleet of PanAm @TO2015 cars: Two weeks before the games start, a lot in Toronto Portlands is where the new cars with PanAm stickers are parked. Staging area is near the West Donlands Athletes Village, remarkably close to downtown Toronto. The contribution of General Motors as a transportation sponsor is significant. (Cherry Street at Commissioners Road, Toronto) 20150620Looped cello @Luminato: @cris_derksen with electronics and live drummer on the Festival Garden Stage, as part of National Aboriginal Day. Pattern played into machine, layers built up, and then soloing on top. Audience sprawled out on astroturf enjoying the weather. (Pecaut Square, Luminato Festival, Toronto) 20150621Hoop dancing @Luminato: Nimkii Osawamick performing with @cris_derksen on the Festival Garden Stage. Wrapped up in multiple hoops with looped cello and drummer on National Aboriginal Day. (David Pecaut Square, Luminato Festival, Toronto) 20150621
Beyond city-building as urban planning is the idea of a Music City. This sees development of cultural life across a wide variety of arts, alongside economic benefits brought to the region. At the 119th meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario in March 2024, socio-cultural designer Adam Hogan and musician-designer Ziyan Hossain joined moderator Zaid Khan in conversation. […]
Having reached year 6 of an espoused 10-year journey, the Systems Changes Learning Circle is (again) convening monthly Dialogues on Social Innovation at the Centre for Social Innovation in Toronto. Starting up in 2019, the Circle was convening regularly in the Climate Ventures space at 192 Spadina Avenue. The pandemic interrupted in-person meetings, and the […]
EQ Lab runs Dialogic Drinks, “the kind of philosophical discussion you have in a coffee shop or bar”, twice per week. Wtih this group interested loosely in questions on leadership, I was invited to host an online session on March 12 (evening in Hong Kong and Singapore, really early in Toronto) and on March 14-15 […]
At the 118th meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario in February 2024, behavioral scientist Cameron D. Norman and design strategist Tara Campbell were invitied for a conversation guided by Zaid Khan. The panelists are both alumni of the Strategic Foresight and Innovation program at OCADU. Some time ago, they had conducted a research project on evaluation […]
An article on “sciencing and philosophizing”, coauthored by Gary S. Metcalf and myself, has been published in the Journal of the International Society for the Systems Sciences, following the ISSS 2023 Kruger Park conference in South Africa, last July. There’s a version cacned on the Coevolving Commons. This article started in a series of conversations […]
For the January 2024 Systems Thinking Ontario session, educational game designer Scott DeJong and innovation designer Geoff Evamy Hill joined a conversation moderated by Zaid Khan. Mutual interests in the new field of educational design and games were at the core of the discussion. This was an opportunity for systems thinkers to expand their knowledge on […]
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 ›
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 ›
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 […]
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 […]
