ᛕᎥᕼᗷᗴᖇᑎᗴ丅Ꭵᑕᔕ @Kihbernetics@qoto.org

Systems thinkers use a number of different terms for the three basic concepts in the "system's triad" so that we have a "real system" as opposed to the "conceptual system" which is sometimes also called the "mental model" which is again different from the (real) descriptive or simulation model. In #Kihbernetics we make the distinction between #Machine, #System and #Model unambiguous following the rules specified in the works of #WRAshby and #HRMaturana

Ashby warns us against our first impulse to point at the pendulum and say 'the system is that thing there' because this has a fundamental disadvantage in that "every material object contains no less than an infinity of variables" from which "different observers (with different aims) may reasonably make an infinity of different selections."

Therefore, there must first be given an #observer, and a #system is then defined as "any set of variables selected by that observer from those available on the real ‘machine‘".

#HRMaturana defines a #system, as "a #configuration of #relations that an #observer abstracts in the flow of #interactions and #transformations of a #collection of #elements distinguished in the observers daily living" that is "spontaneously or artificially #conserved" in its #dynamic within some "#domain of concern" of the observer.

So, in Kihbernetics, the triad looks like this:

@Inquiry

Yes, a "classic" indeed. The word was coined and used for the first time in 1864 in a racist hoax to discredit Lincoln.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miscegenation_hoax

He could have used other words like mix, combine, merge, amalgamate, ... instead of such an obscure one.

Reading this recent (2022) article from Fritjof Capra:
The organization of the living:
Maturana’s key insights
included in the latest Constructivist Foundations volume 18(1): 005–011

https://constructivist.info/18/1/005

and I am continually bewildered by the fact that no one in the #Constructivist field figured out yet that #Autopoiesis, although necessary, is not the sufficient condition for #Life.

All #LivingSystems are in fact #DynamicalSystems with memory made of #Material, #Energy, and #Information structures participating continually in both auto- and allopoietic processes.

In fact, the recursive, #Autopoietic processes of learning and growth depend only on (are "structurally coupled" with) the linear #Allopoietic work processes dealing with all the things (resources, waste) in the system's environment and producing the externally observable #behavior of the living (dynamical) system.

The (Newtonian) #Physics or #ClassicalMechanics of #ChangeManagement according to the #kihbernetic worldview:

The #Force required to put the change in motion is proportional to its #Mass or how large the change is; because the bigger the change the more #Friction it creates. The #Gravity, or how immediate the necessity to change is, will also increase the friction of the #ResistanceToChange.

However, once the change is put in motion, the #Acceleration produced by the mass's #Inertia will start "pulling" the change by itself and only minimal force will need to be applied to #Control that the change is moving in the right direction and/or with the right speed of change.

Another reason (among many) why I became disenchanted with #Cybernetics and had to “invent” #Kihbernetics.

Warren Sturgis McCulloch, the co-inventor of the first computational model of a #Neuron that was the precursor for #AI and #DeepNeuralNetworks, uses a racial slur to incorrectly suggest that Cybernetics is somehow the result of the “interbreeding” between the Natural and the Artificial in the preface he wrote for Gordon Pask’s book:

https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/3965798-an-approach-to-cybernetics

“The paradox Kant had linked to teleology (or to internal purposive forms or natural purposes) is related to the fact that a purposive system has to move or develop towards a purpose before that purpose is present, apparently even before a purpose can be conceived of. A genuine purposive system does not only possess a representation of the purpose towards which it is moving, but it also has to construct that representation itself.”

#cybernetics #teleology #purpose #purposivesystems #constructivism

Gertrudis Vijver - New Perspectives on Cybernetics - Self-Organization, Autonomy and Connectionism

https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-94-015-8062-5

#Determinism and #FreeWill

<According to the Santiago theory, the behavior of a living organism is determined. However, rather than being determined by outside forces, it is determined by the organism’s own structure – a structure formed by a succession of autonomous
structural changes. Thus, the behavior of the living organism is both “determined” and “free.”>

Fritjof Capra - The Organization of the Living: Maturana’s Key Insights

https://constructivist.info/18/1/005.capra.pdf

"The #authority relation of the #hierarchy is often popularly expressed by referring to #DNA as the "#MasterMolecule" of life, but here again we must emphasize that there is no intrinsic chemical property of DNA that allows it to hold this office. It is the integrated collection of "ordinary" molecules we call the cell that endows DNA with this authority. We should not expect that a more detailed study of DNA, enzymes, and hormones would reveal other than ordinary molecules anymore than we would expect that a detailed study of presidents would reveal other than ordinary men."

#HHPattee
"#HierarchyTheory: The challenge of complex systems" - Published back in 1973, but many people still struggle to understand it.

It affects everything, from the #OriginofLife to #Democracy, #Control, #FreeWill ...
This matter is so fundamental that it should be taught in schools as part of a standard high school curriculum, along with physics, chemistry, and biology.

https://www.academia.edu/863851/Hierarchy_theory_The_challenge_of_complex_systems

The real problem is #humans, not #AI.

"People are often irrational and behave in ways that contradict their values, and values can change over individual lifetimes and generations. After all, it’s not clear whose values we should have machines try to learn."

https://www.quantamagazine.org/what-does-it-mean-to-align-ai-with-human-values-20221213

#Anticipation IS #Computation.

The #Model used by a computing #System to anticipate the #State of affairs in its #Environment depends heavily upon the #Knowledge state of the anticipatory system.

Knowledge is the #Integral result of the system's #History of all previous computations. The same system will anticipate different outcomes depending on its current knowledge state

An anticipatory system does not need to be a #purposeful system.

#Purpose and Anticipation are only necessary for #Control.

There is no anticipation in #Evolution.

Apart from that, a very interesting article:

https://www.academia.edu/5729941/Anticipation_and_dynamics_Rosens_anticipation_in_the_perspective_of_time?email_work_card=view-paper

@mjambon

I search for the URL:

Back in the days (early 2000s) I tried to "sell" to a well-known aerospace company this "three-legged stool" approach of stable continuous organizational #changemanagement, where #sixsigma stands just as one of the many different tools one can choose from in dealing with the different #products of the organization, along with tools and methods more appropriate to deal with the other two aspects of the organization #people and #process.
As one could have expected, those "black belts" on the other side of the table didn't like it 😀.
They went with a strategy where a version of six sigma was used as the "foundation" for all process improvement efforts and everything else was subordinated to it.

"Silicon Valley’s culture of “move fast and break things” meant business leaders were less concerned with reliability and more focused on game-changing discoveries."

Why it always has to be "Either-Or"? What happened with "And"?

#ChangeManagement #sixsigma
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/whatever-happened-to-six-sigma

@Harishjosev

I think the lack of #variety is not always be a bad thing. It means things are done in a #consistent and #reliable manner. When you are #competent in something it becomes a simple nearly #trivial activity, a #routine done unconsciously freeing your consciousness for thinking about other more #complex things .

#Diversity is very useful when the system faces #unknown situations and must switch from normal #exploitation activities of acquiring resources for sustainable living to the #exploration of new "pastures" which consume those resources in the short term but may benefit in the long term.

How the system approaches a situation depends very much on how much #knowledge it has about the situation it is in and where this places it on the "#complexity plane".😀

I've drawn the picture below as a reaction to the current inclination of prominent #ChangeManagement the(r)orists frowning at "military" style #CommandAndControl or #C2 organizational methods while promoting #FlatOrganizations without #MiddleManagement and with no need for #Planning (everything will change anyway), as a far better, more #Agile way of dealing with #Complexity.

This may be true if the organization is operating and struggling to survive on the left side of this "complexity plane", but if it wants to mature and "get somewhere in life" it better starts aiming for the other side by collecting, documenting and using "lessons learned", planning for and working towards wherever it wants to be in the future.

@ceoln

Please do. I guarantee you won't be disappointed. Pattee has more than 100 papers freely available on the Academia site and each one of them is a gem.

He is the only author I know with whom I have difficulty finding anything in their thinking that needs to be corrected or argued about.

A momentous recent paper from the most consequential thinker on the matter of the #originoflife, #information, and #biosemiotics has only 124 views and I must be responsible for at least a dozen.

#HowardHPattee

"Folding is entirely a lawful physical process, leaving neither freedom nor necessity for interpretation. Similarly, the initial converse action-to-symbol conversion of sensory inputs also leaves no freedom for interpretation until after the action-to-symbol conversion"

https://www.academia.edu/66621846/Symbol_Grounding_Precedes_Interpretation_Commentary_to_the_target_article_by_Terrence_Deacon_2021

"#Causal #analysis goes one step further than standard #statistical analysis; its aim is to infer not only beliefs or probabilities under #static conditions but also the #dynamics of beliefs under changing conditions, for example, changes induced by treatments or external interventions."

"There is nothing in the joint distribution of symptoms and diseases to tell us that curing the former would or would not cure the latter."

J. Pearl - Causal inference in statistics

Statistics Surveys Vol. 3 (2009)
p. 99

https://ftp.cs.ucla.edu/pub/stat_ser/r350.pdf

"#Correlation does not imply causation, but #causation implies a specific pattern of correlations, and that must count for something."

"Testing a #hypothesis is actually not so much about trying to confirm it, but about trying to falsify it."

http://www.the100.ci/2022/11/18/causal-inference-hypothesis-testing-all-at-once/