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R.U.R.: Rossum’s Universal Robots by Karel Čapek
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
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Your first time here?
Welcome, I'm glad you've dropped in.... David Soul (aka Bricoleur)
Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella Meadows
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
the subtitle says it all; this is an excellent introduction to the field of systems thinking.
Meadows clearly introduces all of the concepts critical to the foundation of learning in this area including: systems concepts of stocks, flows, feedback, time delays, resilience, bounded rationality, and system boundaries. More importantly she includes countless real world examples, ranging from the level of the personal to the level of global social institutions, that bring the richness of the field and applications of systems thinking to life.
Tags: Books, CEP, systems thinking
11
Mar
A combination that works
13
Apr
An Imperceptible Step
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“The privacy and dignity of our citizens [are] being whittled away by sometimes imperceptible steps. Taken individually, each step may be of little consequence. But when viewed as a whole, there begins to emerge a society quite unlike any we have seen — a society in which government may intrude into the secret regions of a [person’s] life.” – Justice William O. Douglas
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“IF YOU WANT TO CREATE A CHANGE, you must challenge not only the models of Unreality, but the paradigms that underwrite them.” — Stafford Beer
“General system theory, therefore, is a general science of wholeness” — Ludwig von Bertalannfy
Level II
Beer, Stafford, Brain of the Firm, Allen Lane, 1972
Level III
Klir, George J., An Approach to General Systems Theory, Van Nostrand, 1969
Level V
Bertalannfy, Ludwig von, General Systems Theory, George Braziller, N.Y., 1968
Tags: change, complexity, cybernetics, model, models, science, Stafford Beer, Systems, Systems theory
I have not read any of Stafford Beer’s entries in the Select Bibliography included in The Heart of Enterprise, so cannot make any recommendations on the entries included here at the time this item is added to the series… it will be updated as I move forward with construction of my own “learning machine”
Level II
Varela, Francise J., A Calculus for Self-Reference, Int. J. General Systems 1975, Vol 2. pp5-24, Gordon and Breach
Level III
Spencer-Brown, G., Laws of Form, Allen & Unwin, 1969
Tags: cybernetics, Stafford Beer
“We are searching for some kind of harmony between two intangibles: a form which we have not yet designed and a context which we cannot properly describe.” — Christopher Alexander
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Level IV
Weyl, Hermann, Symmetry, Princeton U.P., 1952
Level V
Jones, J. Christopher, Design Methods, Wiley, 1970
Alexander, Christopher, Notes on the Synthesis of Form, Harvard U.P., 1966
Level V
Design Methods – J. Christopher Jones
Tags: Christopher Alexander, cybernetics, design, reflections, synthesis, Systems
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The Prince — Machiavelli
“The main foundations of every state, new states as well as ancient or composite ones, are good laws and good arms you cannot have good laws without good arms, and where there are good arms, good laws inevitably follow.” — Niccolo Machiavelli
Level IV
Vickers, Geoffrey, Freedom in a Rocking Boat, Allen Lane, The Penguin Press, 1970
Schon, Donald A., Beyond the Stable State, Random House, N.Y., 1971
Level V
Tags: civilization, commerce, culture, cybernetics, ethics, governance, government, jane jacobs, morals, philosophy, politics, reflections, The Prince
I have not read any of Stafford Beer’s entries in the Select Bibliography included in The Heart of Enterprise, so cannot make any recommendations on the entries included here at the time this item is added to the series… it will be updated as I move forward with construction of my own “learning machine”
Level III
Ackoff, R.L. and Emery, F.E., On Purposeful Systems, Aldin-Atherton, NY, 1966
Miller, J.G. Living Systems, McGraw-Hill, 1978
Level IV
Whyte, Lancelot Law, Internal Factors in Evolution, Tavistock Publications, 1965
Tags: cybernetics, Stafford Beer
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Level II
Ashby, W. Ross, An Induction to Cybernetics, Chapman and Hall, 1956
Maturana, Humberto, and Varela, Francisco, Autopoeitic Systems
Powers, William T., Behaviour: The Control of Perception, Aldine, Chicago, 1973
Level III
Sommerhoff, G., Analystical Biology, OUP, 1950
Level IV
Rashevsky, Nicholas, Mathematical Principles in Biology, Charles C Thomas, Illinois, 1961
Waddington, C.H., The Strategy of the Genes, Allen & Unwin, 1957
Level V
Margalef, Ramon, Perspectives in Ecological Theory, University of Chicago, 1968
Tags: autopoiesis, cybernetics, humberto maturana, science, Stafford Beer, Systems theory, w.ross ashby
NASA image of the day
Curiosity at 'Cumberland'NASA's Mars rover Curiosity used its front left Hazard-Avoidance Camera for this image of the rover's arm over the drilling target "Cumberland" during the 275th Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (May 15, 2013). The rover team plans to use Curiosity's drill to collect a powdered sample from the interior of the rock for analysis by laboratory instruments inside the rover. This is the mission's second rock-drilling target. The rover drove from its position beside the first drilling target, "John Klein," to its position beside Cumberland with drives of 121 inches (308 centimeters) on Sol 273 (May 13) and 26.6 inches (67.5 centimeters) on Sol 275. Curiosity's total odometry on Mars is now 2,385 feet (727 meters). Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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