October 28, 2008
September 23, 2008
“Designing Freedom” lessons from Cybernetics relevant today
Designing Freedom by Stafford Beer
My review
rating: 4 of 5 stars
I finally got my own copy of this book (which I’ve been looking for it since about 1990)…
I’d forgotten just how great it is.
I’ve been angered lately about the number of absolute falsehoods spread by ALL sides in both current election campaigns (USA and Canada) – sometimes on purpose, often because they simply “don’t get it.” This book covers some of the reason this is endemic in our societies and at least gives me some hope that someday the leaders of our systems of governance will discover the route to stabilizing our systems. But for now I shake my head in fear and anguish.
Case in point – the current financial market failure and massive bail-out scheme of the Bush administration. As constructed it simply cannot be successful. The system being proposed simply is not viable – if for no other reason it lacks the requisite variety necessary for control(indeed one only has to note how many changes had to be made even before it got from the exec branch to the legislative branch because it was too ‘simple’ to possibly do more good than harm).
In this book (originally a series of radio lectures on the CBC network in 1973) Beer explores many items – even a quick read gives ample reasons justifying my fears as our control systems increasingly are inadequate for the task at hand.
This is an excellent introduction to the works of Stafford Beer… a start here guide to cybernetics – the science of effective organization. Read it to understand the real issues that face our institutions and society at large. Google Preview
September 22, 2008
Lessons Forgot
40+ years ago the cyberneticist Stafford Beer forecast that computerization would be a disaster if this “new” prescription of Shirky’s was not followed [Clay Shirky (shirky.com) It’s Not Information Overload. It’s Filter Failure delivered at the Web 2.0 Expo last week].
In a later radio broadcast summarizing some of his concepts (CBC Radio 1973; later published as “Designing Freedom” Anansi) Beer summarized the need this way:
“Now I am saying that we don’t really use them [computer, teleprocessing, and the techniques of effective organization], whereas everyone can assuredly say: ‘Oh yes we do.’ The trouble is that we are using them on the wrong side of the variety equation. We use them without regard to the proliferation of variety within the system, thereby effectively increasing it, and not, as they should be used, to amplify regulative variety. As a result, we do not even like the wretched things.”
It was just yesterday I drove to Vancouver to pick up a copy of “Designing Freedom” (I’d been looking for it since 80’s when I first read several of Beer’s works) and then today I saw Shirky’s post; synchronicity ! Shirky only has a small part of it though, and the lessons of cybernetics go much further than a simple analysis of filter needs.
As it happens, I’ve been (re) Reading my Beer recently:
(First “Heart of Enterprise“; next “Platform for Change“; and I’m currently in the middle of “Designing Freedom” and now will probably go back to read “Brain of the Firm” and his Operations Management classic “Decision and Control” for good measure).
I first read some of Beer’s works in the early to mid 80’s and constantly go back to it – its amazing to me how many of the most current ” great understandings” of current day prognosticators that I reflect on are actually things that I’ve crossed the path of decades ago – things that were introduced to me by this great intellect. Unfortunately, Beer’s lessons mostly go unnoticed by those in charge of our governance systems, and even when someone trips upon reality they usually pick themselves up, dust themselves off and go there way in blissful ignorance. I’ve been going back through these tomes simply because I’ve recognized how many falsehoods are being spewed by both sides of both elections that are currently underway (ie. the USA Presidential run and the Canadian general election). One example?
Well, I can flatly state (without any fear that the future will prove my prognostication wrong):
the current financial bailout being negotiated in Washington WILL BE A FAILURE regardless of which candidate wins the presidency
Simply put, the executive branch proposal ignores cybernetic truths and thus is doomed to failure before the “signature” ink is even put to page. And the world will suffer for it.
July 28, 2008
Testing Zemanta
I’ve just downloaded Zemanta – and will be giving its first work out in this post. >>>
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 open 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.”
<<< This was all to brief a workout but it looks like a valuable tool- it assists finding relevant links to cross reference in a blog post ….. and as a jog to my own memory of where to go back to others it doesn’t find.
I’ll be using it more over the next several posts to give it a real trial – this and the iPhone for “jiffy short posts” just might lead me back into blogging.
July 22, 2008
The best of times
Carl Pope has an interesting piece
If you look far enough into the future you can devalue the worth of not just the human race but of everything (at least by using NPV techniques) to such an extent that the value of humanity, civilization and the environment today is nothing at all… it appears that this could be the basis of behind thinking of some well known politcal advisors…. As we must live in the best of times, lets devalue the worth of everything in the future to zip by acting in such a way as to make it happen exactly that way…with the future worse than now it truly can be said “we do live in the best of times” QED
The Purpose of a System is What it Does….read Pope’s work and then consider if the purpose of the admin is indeed to discount the future value of anything (that might cause temporary local pain) to such an extent that no action is taken until its too late for change.
February 11, 2006
Squidoo: Second Order Cybernetics
In effect, those involved in second order cybernetics have turned the principles of cybernetics upon the field of cybernetics itself. In order to qualify as second-order cybernetics, the observer of a system must be described and explained — the explanation can not be based purely on the system observed as if the observer did not exist.
Squidoo: General Systems Theory
Von Bertalanffy
General Systems Theory is closely related to Cybernetics… this lens concentrates on the former but also examines the relationship and where the two fields overlap and can be used to give better insight into the workings of complex and emerging systems.
Squidoo: Educational Cybernetics
It is normally approached through the form of “action research” and should be considered as part of the sphere of Second Order Cybernetics as studying education systems is of course the studying of people systems and the process of studying systems we are in causes the systems and us to change.
Squidoo: VSM
This lens is dedicated to exploring the work of Stafford Beer and the development of his Viable Systems Model (VSM).It is especially concerned with the applicaton of cybernetics to the field of organizational design, management and control. Squidoo: Cybernetics
Cybernetics, and the related domain of systems science , is the study all forms of “organized complexity”, that is how different components can be assembled in a way that is neither random nor repetitive so as to form a “system”.
Pursued to its logical conclusion, this is a study about how a system of components can arranged in such a way as to fulfill a certain purpose. In this sense, Cybernetics is the study of viable system organization
Cybernetics 