Ventana software support forum

irt: billh@lsid.hp.com (Bill Harris), Sat, May 4, 1996 4:23 AM EST

Bill makes a good comment:

The next step seems to be to do more models and find out what works and
what doesnt. Some of that is somewhat obvious, but some begs for feedback
from others.

Suggestions?

Did anybody even consider the possibility that I wouldnt have one? (You can
tell Ive been up far too long).

I rather figured thats why were here on this list -- to provide assistance
when asked and feedback when desired. I am personally, and consider most
others also to be, quite willing to look at and consider approaches to most
anything. I have a whole bunch of models I want to build, and if I could quit
putzing with my web pages long enought I might just get to some of them. And
when I do I would most definitely like some feedback as to where they make
sense and where Ive missed the mark.

Gene Bellinger
CrbnBlu@aol.com

=46rom Gene: >>The whole crux of the situation is "perceived meaningfulness!=
"

=46rom Ed: >(B) Try to get the audience to listen to a discussion on
generic thinking
>so they will consider using the tool for a related, but somewhat different
>task in the future.

Gene and Ed have struck something. In myth criticism as in SD, archetypes
rule. Some of you may know of Joseph Campbell (Hero With a Thousand Faces,
Power of Myth, etc) and his notion that the world communities tell ONE
story. When we help young readers-so disconnected and disenchanted with
the modern crash of information-to be a part of the ONE story, to hear
humanitys conversation, we WILL change their life.

Gregory Bateson touches on this as well, albeit from a different
perspective. Can we TEACH young people to see, read, model, recreate,
feel, calculate "the pattern that connects"?

What good are facts? If they fit nothing, if I see them as disjointed, I
will forget them. Worse, I will hate them. In the publishing business,
templates save time and actually help people imagine and create. Generic
structures, literary archetypes, and page templates are much the same
thing-a pattern, a way of understanding and ordering ideas, stories,
images. How is writing a novel like building a house? How is =BC like a
human life? Maybe these are not, strictly speaking, SD questions, but they
do get young people to think beyond a test date and what must be known by
then.

Maybe a reason for SDs low profile is whats happening here: quiet typing
in offices and homes around the globe. Maybe when SD is a TV show, or a
movie, or replaces grammar instruction, or Bert and Ernie do a
stock-and-flow diagram on how Cookie Monsters appetite fluctuates-maybe
then, SD will be household thinking. Crass? Is there a nursery rhyme or
tune that tells a systems story?




Timothy Joy
CC-STADUS: Cross-Curricular Systems Thinking and Dynamics Using STELLA
La Salle College Preparatory
11999 S.E. Fuller Road (503)659-4155
Milwaukie, OR 97222 (503)659-2535 (fax)
tjoy@pps.k12.or.us

"I must Create a System or be enslavd by another Mans.
I will not reason and Compare; my business is to Create."
-William Blake,=20

Re Bill Harris question about how to deepen ones learning about SD
when you cant come back to school.

Bill has the right idea already: read the literature! Most important,
as George Richardson has said, recreate the classic models of the field
on your own computer and for yourself. This means entering them in to
the computer yourself, from scratch, NOT getting the model on disk. The
latter way ensures the model remains a black box; the former forces you
to look at and ponder every equation - and when you do, ask why did
they do it this way? what might be better?. The time spent will pay
huge dividends later. Finally, find someone to work with and bounce
your ideas off.

SD is not a spectator sport. You learn by doing. And best of all, its
fun, too.

John Sterman
jsterman@mit.edu

irt: dave_patterson@MENTORG.COM (Dave Patterson), Mon, May 6, 1996 1:38 PM
EST

In an off the list communication Dave indicated that it might make more sense
to refer to this University concept in a fashion other than something that
looked like US Net for obvious reason. I think some of my history crept into
thsi because it abbreviates to USN, in which I served for a number of years.

Daves comment was that maybe Systems University Net (SU Net) would be more
appropriate, and I agree with him. And, when I first read it I missed a most
marvelous connection. This abbreviates to SUN, which could be indicative of a
bright star in the future of the worlds collective understanding. And yes, I
know there is already a SUN Microsystems.

more thoughts?

Gene Bellinger
CrbnBlu@aol.com
http://www.radix.net/~crbnblu/