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The Purpose Of A System Is What It Does
The purpose of a system is what it does (POSIWID) is a heuristic in systems thinking coined by the British management consultant Stafford Beer, who stated that there is "no point in claiming that the purpose of a system is to do what it constantly fails to do". It is widely used by systems theorists, and is generally invoked to counter the notion that the purpose of a system can be read from the intentions of those who design, operate or promote it. When a system's side effects or unintended consequences reveal that its behaviour is poorly understood, then the POSIWID perspective can balance political understandings of system behaviour with a more straightforwardly descriptive view. Origins Beer coined POSIWID in his books and used it many times in public addresses. Speaking to the University of Valladolid in October 2001, he said: Uses From a cybernetic perspective, complex systems are not controllable by simple notions of management, and interventions in a system can best be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heuristic
A heuristic or heuristic technique (''problem solving'', '' mental shortcut'', ''rule of thumb'') is any approach to problem solving that employs a pragmatic method that is not fully optimized, perfected, or rationalized, but is nevertheless "good enough" as an approximation or attribute substitution. Where finding an optimal solution is impossible or impractical, heuristic methods can be used to speed up the process of finding a satisfactory solution. Heuristics can be mental shortcuts that ease the cognitive load of making a decision. Context Gigerenzer & Gaissmaier (2011) state that sub-sets of ''strategy'' include heuristics, regression analysis, and Bayesian inference. Heuristics are strategies based on rules to generate optimal decisions, like the anchoring effect and utility maximization problem. These strategies depend on using readily accessible, though loosely applicable, information to control problem solving in human beings, machines and abstract i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cybernetics
Cybernetics is the transdisciplinary study of circular causal processes such as feedback and recursion, where the effects of a system's actions (its outputs) return as inputs to that system, influencing subsequent action. It is concerned with general principles that are relevant across multiple contexts, including in engineering, ecological, economic, biological, cognitive and social systems and also in practical activities such as designing, learning, and managing. Cybernetics' transdisciplinary character has meant that it intersects with a number of other fields, leading to it having both wide influence and diverse interpretations. The field is named after an example of circular causal feedback—that of steering a ship (the ancient Greek κυβερνήτης (''kybernḗtēs'') refers to the person who steers a ship). In steering a ship, the position of the rudder is adjusted in continual response to the effect it is observed as having, forming a feedback loop throu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Systems Thinking
Systems thinking is a way of making sense of the complexity of the world by looking at it in terms of wholes and relationships rather than by splitting it down into its parts.Anderson, Virginia, & Johnson, Lauren (1997). ''Systems Thinking Basics: From Concepts to Causal Loops''. Waltham, Mass: Pegasus Comm., Inc. It has been used as a way of exploring and developing effective action in complex contexts, enabling systems change.Sarah York, Rea Lavi, Yehudit Judy Dori, and MaryKay OrgilApplications of Systems Thinking in STEM Education''J. Chem. Educ.'' 2019, 96, 12, 2742–2751 Publication Date:May 14, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00261 Systems thinking draws on and contributes to systems theory and the system sciences.Systemic Thinking 10Russell L Ackoff From Mechanistic to Systemic thinking also awal street journa(2016) Systems Thinking Speech by Dr. Russell Ackoff1:10:57 History Ptolemaic system versus the Copernican system The term ''system'' is polysem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heuristics
A heuristic or heuristic technique (''problem solving'', '' mental shortcut'', ''rule of thumb'') is any approach to problem solving that employs a pragmatic method that is not fully optimized, perfected, or rationalized, but is nevertheless "good enough" as an approximation or attribute substitution. Where finding an optimal solution is impossible or impractical, heuristic methods can be used to speed up the process of finding a satisfactory solution. Heuristics can be mental shortcuts that ease the cognitive load of making a decision. Context Gigerenzer & Gaissmaier (2011) state that sub-sets of ''strategy'' include heuristics, regression analysis, and Bayesian inference. Heuristics are strategies based on rules to generate optimal decisions, like the anchoring effect and utility maximization problem. These strategies depend on using readily accessible, though loosely applicable, information to control problem solving in human beings, machines and abstrac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Systemantics
''General Systemantics'' (retitled to ''Systemantics'' in its second edition and ''The Systems Bible'' in its third) is a systems engineering treatise by John Gall in which he offers practical principles of systems design based on experience and anecdotes. It is offered from the perspective of how ''not'' to design systems, based on system engineering failures. The primary precept of the treatise is that large complex systems are extremely difficult to design correctly despite best intentions, so care must be taken to design smaller, less-complex systems and to do so with incremental functionality based on close and continual touch with user needs and measures of effectiveness. History The book was initially self-published after Gall received rejection letters from 30 publishers. After several reviews in academic journals, it was picked up by Quadrangle–The New York Times Book Company, who published it in 1977. A condensed version was also published in ''The New York Times'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wiktionary
Wiktionary (, ; , ; rhyming with "dictionary") is a multilingual, web-based project to create a free content dictionary of terms (including words, phrases, proverbs, linguistic reconstructions, etc.) in all natural languages and in a number of artificial languages. These entries may contain definitions, images for illustration, pronunciations, etymologies, inflections, usage examples, quotations, related terms, and translations of terms into other languages, among other features. It is collaboratively edited via a wiki. Its name is a portmanteau of the words ''wiki'' and ''dictionary''. It is available in languages and in Simple English. Like its sister project Wikipedia, Wiktionary is run by the Wikimedia Foundation, and is written collaboratively by volunteers, dubbed "Wiktionarians". Its wiki software, MediaWiki, allows almost anyone with access to the website to create and edit entries. Because Wiktionary is not limited by print space considerations, most of Wiktiona ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Proof Of The Pudding Is In The Eating
{{Short pages monitor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Duck Test
The duck test is a frequently cited colloquial example of abductive reasoning. Its usual expression is: The test implies that a person can identify an unknown subject by observing that subject's habitual characteristics. It is sometimes used to counter abstraction, abstract arguments that something might not be what it appears to be. Notable uses Indiana poet James Whitcomb Riley (1849–1916) may have coined the phrase when he wrote: A common variation of the wording of the phrase may have originated much later with Emil Mazey, secretary-treasurer of the United Auto Workers, at a labor meeting in 1946 accusing a person of being a communist: The term was later popularized in the United States by Richard Cunningham Patterson Jr., Ambassadors from the United States, United States ambassador to Guatemala in 1950 during the Cold War, who used the phrase when he accused Guatemala's Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán government of being Communist. Patterson explained his reasoning as fol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Management
Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a Government agency, government bodies through business administration, Nonprofit studies, nonprofit management, or the political science sub-field of public administration respectively. It is the process of managing the resources of businesses, governments, and other organizations. Larger organizations generally have three Hierarchy, hierarchical levels of managers, organized in a pyramid structure: * Senior management roles include the board of directors and a chief executive officer (CEO) or a President (corporate title), president of an organization. They set the strategic goals and policy of the organization and make decisions on how the overall organization will operate. Senior managers are generally executive-level professionals who provide direction to middle management. Compare governance. * Middle management roles include branch managers, regional managers, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Complex Systems
A complex system is a system composed of many components that may interact with one another. Examples of complex systems are Earth's global climate, organisms, the human brain, infrastructure such as power grid, transportation or communication systems, complex software and electronic systems, social and economic organizations (like cities), an ecosystem, a living cell, and, ultimately, for some authors, the entire universe. The behavior of a complex system is intrinsically difficult to model due to the dependencies, competitions, relationships, and other types of interactions between their parts or between a given system and its environment. Systems that are " complex" have distinct properties that arise from these relationships, such as nonlinearity, emergence, spontaneous order, adaptation, and feedback loops, among others. Because such systems appear in a wide variety of fields, the commonalities among them have become the topic of their independent area of research. In ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Moral Judgement
Morality () is the categorization of intentions, Decision-making, decisions and Social actions, actions into those that are ''proper'', or ''right'', and those that are ''improper'', or ''wrong''. Morality can be a body of standards or principles derived from a code of conduct from a particular philosophy, religion or culture, or it can derive from a standard that is Universal morality, understood to be universal. Morality may also be specifically synonymous with "goodness", "appropriateness" or "rightness". Moral philosophy includes meta-ethics, which studies abstract issues such as moral ontology and moral epistemology, and normative ethics, which studies more concrete systems of moral decision-making such as deontological ethics and consequentialism. An example of normative Ethics, ethical philosophy is the Golden Rule, which states: "One should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself." Immorality is the active opposition to morality (i.e., opposition to that w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Systems Thinking
Systems thinking is a way of making sense of the complexity of the world by looking at it in terms of wholes and relationships rather than by splitting it down into its parts.Anderson, Virginia, & Johnson, Lauren (1997). ''Systems Thinking Basics: From Concepts to Causal Loops''. Waltham, Mass: Pegasus Comm., Inc. It has been used as a way of exploring and developing effective action in complex contexts, enabling systems change.Sarah York, Rea Lavi, Yehudit Judy Dori, and MaryKay OrgilApplications of Systems Thinking in STEM Education''J. Chem. Educ.'' 2019, 96, 12, 2742–2751 Publication Date:May 14, 2019 https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.9b00261 Systems thinking draws on and contributes to systems theory and the system sciences.Systemic Thinking 10Russell L Ackoff From Mechanistic to Systemic thinking also awal street journa(2016) Systems Thinking Speech by Dr. Russell Ackoff1:10:57 History Ptolemaic system versus the Copernican system The term ''system'' is polysem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
