David Ing @daviding@qoto.org

Rereading the introduction to the 1969 _Systems Thinking: Selected Readings_ Penguin paperbook surfaces some choices by the editor #FredEEmery that I hadn't previously appreciated.

https://ingbrief.wordpress.com/2023/05/03/introduction-systems-thinking-selected-readings-edited-by-f-e-emery-1969/

#SystemsThinking #LivingSystems #opensystems

The "doable dozen" is a phrase that #BjornLomborg picked up from #JordanPeterson on the April 3 interview. The list is now more complete at Halftime for the Sustainable Development Goals microsite at https://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/halftime

> The 12 best policies to scale up, that our experts have identified, cover a wide range of areas: tuberculosis, education, maternal and newborn health, agricultural research and development, malaria, e-procurement, nutrition, land tenure security, chronic diseases, trade, child immunization and skilled migration.

> The benefit of these 12 best policies can really only be described as momentous. It will save 4.2 million lives each year and generate $1.1 trillion in additional economic benefits each and every year for the developing world.

A series of articles by #BjornLomborg with leading media outlets has been lined up. This article in Forbes sets a direction.

> But in 2015, when the world replaced the #MDGs [#MillenniumDevelopmentGoals], things went wrong. World leaders could again have chosen to focus on a few, crucial targets. They could even have kept the same targets, since they are so important to the world’s most vulnerable people. We could have focused on pinpointing where the needs are deepest and the opportunities are greatest.

> Instead, the #UnitedNations and world leaders came up with a hodge-podge, absurdly long list of 169 targets for the world to achieve from 2015-2030: the #SustainableDevelopmentGoals.

https://archive.is/LiShI

A new book by #BjornLomborg is coming out, #BestThingsFirst. I listened to the 2-hour interview by #JordanPeterson released on April 3 (as usual, while on my bike and driving). The timing seems related to the upcoming #UnitedNations meeting in October, where we are at the midpoint of the #SustainableDevelopmentGoals #SDGs, and failing.

Here's a text summary of the interview. The list of 12 proposed initiatives isn't given as straightforward, but the idea that we might succeed on some things rather than failing on everything is likely to be appealing to many.

https://podcastdisclosed.com/12-ways-the-planet-could-truly-be-saved-bjorn-lomborg-jordan-b-peterson-podcast-345/

Greater appreciation of #SystemsThinking contextual-dyadic thinking of #KeekokLee, with
anatomy as structure / physiology as function (and process);
process ontology / thing ontology;
qi ju as qi-in-concentrating mode / qi san as qi-in-dissipating mode

https://daviding.wordpress.com/2023/04/24/2021-06-17-keekok-lee-philosophy-of-chinese-medicine-2/

On individual versus collective advancement, via @timoreilly :

> I remember once I was working on our property in Sebastopol where I used to live, and I had this landscape architect who came in to help us.

> And she said, “Everybody always wants to put their nice new thing where it’s already beautiful.” She said, “No, you want to put your nice new thing in the worst part of your property, so you will make it better.” And I thought that was really good advice.

"Building a Better Future: A Conversation with Tim O’Reilly" | May 5, 2021 at https://codeforamerica.org/news/building-a-better-future-a-conversation-with-tim-oreilly/

Greater depth into the #SystemsChanges Learning foundations may be gained from the work on the philosophy of science underlying #ClassicalChineseMedicine, by #KeekokLee. Highlights from this 2021 lecture are digested for easier indexing. For those not immersed in pinyin (Romanized Chinese spelling), the text may or may not be less confusing than the verbal presentation.

https://daviding.wordpress.com/2023/04/19/2021-06-16-keekok-lee-philosophy-of-chinese-medicine-1/

#SystemsThinking #SystemsSciences #PhilosophyOfScience

Web video of open access book launch #Ecological Limits to Development: Living with the #SDGs #KaitlinKish #StephenQuilley #SophiaSanniti @KatyGwiazdon

https://coevolving.com/blogs/index.php/archive/ecological-limits-to-development-living-with-the-sdgs-st-on-2023-03-13/

#SystemsThinking Ontario, #Sustainability #Development Goals

Instead of #SustainableDevelopmentGoals, #KaitlinKish #StephenQulley say #EcologicalLivelihoodGoals.

"informal processes of exchange, familial care, place-bound community, mutual aid, and reciprocation –​which we designate as _Livelihood_"

Open access book for March 13 https://wiki.st-on.org/2023-03-13

#SystemsThinking #EcologicalEconomics

From the debate between Michael Quinn Patton and Michael C. Jackson OBE on "Systems Concepts in Evaluation" on 2023-02-27, I've digested into text the few minutes with the largest contention.

https://ingbrief.wordpress.com/2023/03/10/concerns-with-the-way-systems-thinking-is-used-in-evaluation-michael-c-jackson-obe-2023-02-27/

#SystemsThinking #evaluation

Peer-reviewed article on #SystemsChanges Learning 2019-2022 published in special issue of J. #Systemics #Cybernetics & #Informatics, on "#Sustainable, Smart and #SystemicDesign #PostAnthropocene" edited by #MarieDavidova #SusuNousala #ThomasJMarlowe

https://coevolving.com/blogs/index.php/archive/systems-changes-learning-recasting-reifying-jsci/

#SystemsThinking

Truthiness was coined by Stephen Colbert in 2005, and became legitimated as an entry in a dictionary by 2010.

> ... _truth_ just wasn’t “dumb enough.” “I wanted a silly word that would feel wrong in your mouth,” he said.

> What he was driving at wasn’t _truth_ anyway, but a mere approximation of it — something _truthish_ or _truthy_, unburdened by the factual. And so, in a flash of inspiration, _truthiness_, was born. [....]

> Five years later, _truthiness_ has proved to be no _bushlips_. It has even entered the latest edition of the New Oxford American Dictionary, published earlier this year, with Colbert explicitly credited in the etymology.

"Truthiness" | Ben Zimmer | The New York Times Magazine | October 13, 2010, cached at https://archive.is/lkEMX , original at https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/magazine/17FOB-onlanguage-t.html

Generative AI, such as ChatGPT, may be better viewed as putting together hypotheses, where testing either leads to corroboration or truthiness.

> The glitch seems to be a linear consequence of the fact that so-called Large-Language Models are about predicting what _sounds right_, based on its huge data sets. As a commenter put it in an already-months-old post about the fake citations problem: “It’s a language model, and not a knowledge model.”

> In other words, this is an application for _sounding like an expert_, not for _being an expert_ — which is just so, so emblematic of our whole moment, right? Instead of an engine of reliable knowledge, Silicon Valley has unleashed something that gives everyone the power to fake it like Elizabeth Holmes.

"We Asked ChatGPT About Art Theory. It Led Us Down a Rabbit Hole So Perplexing We Had to Ask Hal Foster for a Reality Check" | Ben Davis | March 2, 2023 at https://news-artnet-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/news.artnet.com/art-world/chatgpt-art-theory-hal-foster-2263711/amp-page

Generative AI is more about language tricks than knowledge (as human beings knowing).

> ... instead what we should conclude is that tasks—like writing essays—that we humans could do, but we didn’t think computers could do, are actually in some sense computationally easier than we thought.

> In other words, the reason a neural net can be successful in writing an essay is because writing an essay turns out to be a “computationally shallower” problem than we thought. And in a sense this takes us closer to “having a theory” of how we humans manage to do things like writing essays, or in general deal with language.

"What Is ChatGPT Doing … and Why Does It Work?: It’s Just Adding One Word at a Time" | Stephen Wolfram | February 14, 2023 at https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2023/02/what-is-chatgpt-doing-and-why-does-it-work/

For those who thought I spoke too quickly at the ISSS 2022 plenary talk, the article on "Appreciating Systems Changes via Multiparadigm Inquiry" in the Proceedings of the 66th Annual Meeting has been formally released.

https://coevolving.com/blogs/index.php/archive/appreciating-systems-changes-isss-proceedings/

Rethinking #SystemsThinking

Many of the luminaries of the systems sciences spent a year at the #CASBS (e.g. Kenneth Boulding wrote _The Image_ in a burst of inspiration, with his participation). In the current day, the CASBS continues to encourage inquiries worth following.

> Capitalist democracy needs rethinking and renewal. Our current political economic framework is fixated on GDP, individual achievement, and short-term profit, all the while heightening barriers to widespread prosperity. Faced with mounting climate crises and systemic discrimination, we must reimagine ways to ensure ethical flourishing for all. In response, the Winter 2023 issue of Dædalus focuses on “Creating a New Moral Political Economy,” and addresses these long-standing problems and how to combat the resultant unequal footing across the polity, marketplace, and workplace. In eleven main essays and twenty-two responses, the authors raise questions about how to create supportive social movements that prioritize collective, equitable, and respectful responsibility for care of the earth and its people.

https://www.amacad.org/daedalus/creating-new-moral-political-economy

#SystemsThinking

Web video recording of relaxed conversation on Sensemaking and Theory-Building led by #GarySMetcalf for #SystemsThinking Ontario.

https://coevolving.com/blogs/index.php/archive/sensemaking-theory-building-gary-s-metcalf-st-on-2023-02-13/

In #SystemsThinking associated with scientific pluralism, the treatments of world theories as (i) analytic or synthetic have generally received more attention than (ii) dispersive or integrative.

https://coevolving.com/blogs/index.php/archive/world-theories-as-analytic-deductive-dispersive-integrative/

#SocioTechnical #SocioEcological #SystemsTheory