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Stafford Beer 1926 – 2002
If, as will become the dominant theme of this blog, the Purpose of a System is What it Does ( POSIWID) what does it mean to mankind that so many of our systems appear broken to even unseasoned observers?
Stafford Beer of course had a lot to say on this subject in his many works but one example that often haunts me comes from his work of prose Chronicles of Wizard Prang.
“In a hundred years or so, everyone now alive in the whole earth will be dead – is this not so? … It would therefore be possible for the human race to run its affairs quite differently, in a wise and benevolent fashion, in a relatively short time… The purpose of education,” said Wizard Prang, “is to make sure this doesn’t happen.”
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Tags: cybernetics, design, freedom, POSIWID, software, systems
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Guests look on from the terrace of Operations Support Building II as space shuttle Endeavour launches on the shuttle program's last planned night launch. Endeavour launched from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39A to begin the STS-130 mission early Monday, Feb. 8, 2010. Mission STS-130 will deliver a third connecting module, the Italian-built Tranquility node and a seven-windowed cupola, which will be used as a control room for robotics, to the International Space Station. Image Credit: NASA/Paul E. Alers
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