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
For five immersive days, a team of six researchers had the opporunity to collaborate on ideas on rhythmic shifts (mostly based on Systems Changes Learning) and anticipatory systems (in the legacy of Robert Rosen). The 2024 Banathy Conversation was organized by the Creative Systemic Research Platform Institute, facilitated by Susu Nousala, Gary S. Metcalf, and […]
Systems Processes Theory has been under development for many decades, led by Len Troncale, a past president of the International Society for the Ssytems Sciences. Many have found getting a grip on the science to be a demanding task, both in scope and in depth. Over many decades, Lynn Rasmussen was a collaborator, refining and […]
The Socio-Technical Systems (STS) perspective, dating back to the studies of Eric L. Trist and Fred E. Emery, was on the reading list of organizational behaviour classes in my undergraduate and master’s degree programs. It wasn’t until 15 years later, when I got involved with the systems sciences and David L. Hawk, that the Socio-Ecological […]
Civic Tech can be described as projects using technology “for the public good“. Civic Tech may be related to, but different from Gov Tech. For the May 2024 Systems Thinking Onrtario, we had two knowledgeable guests in conversation. Dorothy Eng, executive director of Code for Canada since 2021, related her professional journey from engineering to […]
On my May trip through the UK, I accepted an offer to lead an Expert-Led Session at the University of Hull. I had previously been a Research Fellow of the Centre for Systems Studies, but haven’t travelled to the Hull for some years. As we worked out the arrangements, I found out that the seminar […]
I’ve been checking on the breadth of some personal research on systems thinkers. (The list is incomplete, and may orient more towards systems scientists). Searching on Scopus gives an h-Index that counts scholarly references (with a boost, for the first person on the list who received a Nobel prize in chemistry). The list below is […]
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 ›
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 […]
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 […]
