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Historical Quotes

Posted: Mon Feb 14, 2000 11:17 am
by "Jaideep Mukherjee"
> Chief Seattle. Unfortunately the "speech" was written decades after the
> chiefs death by a script writer in Hollywood. Apparently, the script
> writer wrote what he thought Seattles sentiments were. There are,
> however, some really interesting insights in this particular data!

Thanks Bruce for pointing this out. The gist of the quotation, whether
attributable to the Chief or not, still conveys the point I was trying to
make.

To respond to some posts in reply to my post, and just to clarify once
again, I do understand the difference between excessive data massaging
(hence wasting everyones time and money) and hi-level analysis. My point in
the post was simply that sticking to high-level analysis *only* can lead to
missing important insights that can only come from data (hence my examples
from physics). It can be easy to hide behind simplistic upper-level
analysis, and not look at details, even when warranted (hence my mention of
chaos theory).

On fancy GUIs - my feeling is rightly conveyed by Sun Microsystems CEO,
Scott McNealys, policy - no powerpoint presentations in his company!!! Full
quote and details on "Quorchives" on my web site. PLEASE dont shatter my
illusions on this one;_>

I guess it really depends - case by case. I had also made the point that
visionaries, VERY high-level analysts are very important - that was the very
point of giving the quotation, a statement of very high-level "systems
thinking" - with a high-quality data reference I might add - my teabox :-))

Anyway, I think there is always this creative tension between high-level and
detail analysis. Good modeling, and data fidelity at *any* level, linear or
nonlinear modeling, can lead to good insights. A section of SDers are biased
only toward high-level analysis - which is great if you can successfully
pull it off - but I think it limits the SD potential. Some also think that
SD is the only way to model - that I think is limiting too.

Cheers & thanks to all for who replied -

Jaideep
jaideep@optimlator.com
http://www.optimlator.com/

Historical Quotes

Posted: Mon Feb 14, 2000 12:32 pm
by Bruce Hannon
Chief Seattle did have an authentically recorded speech at about this time
and it is the equal of the faked one. You can find it in Indian Oratory:
famous speeches by noted Indian chieftains, Vanderwerth, W. C.,: Norman,
University of Oklahoma Press, 1971. I find the authentic version far more
persuasive.


Bruce Hannon, Jubilee Professor
Liberal Arts and Sciences
Geog/NCSA
220 Davenport Hall, MC 150
University of Illinois
Urbana, IL 61801
reply to: b-hannon@uiuc.edu
Vita: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~j-domier/people/hannon.html
Example Models: http://agec89.agecon.uiuc.edu/GMS/
Modeling Books: http://www.springer-ny.com/biology/moddysys/
21->27 July 2000 Five day Modeling Workshop:
http://web.aces.uiuc.edu/aim/model/
217 333-0348 office
217 244 1785 fax

Historical Quotes

Posted: Fri Apr 14, 2000 9:28 am
by Bruce Campbell
Jaideep Mukherjee wrote:
<snip>
> My peppermint teabox here has a quotation: "We do not weave the web of life,
> We are merely a strand in it, Whatever we do to the web, We do to
> ourselves." - Chief Seattle, 1854
<snip>

This is now a bit off topic, but is another good example of why we
should question data. The above quote comes from a lengthy speech by
Chief Seattle. Unfortunately the "speech" was written decades after the
chiefs death by a script writer in Hollywood. Apparently, the script
writer wrote what he thought Seattles sentiments were. There are,
however, some really interesting insights in this particular data!

Sorry if Ive shattered anybodys illusions.

Bruce Campbell

--
Bruce Campbell
Joint Research Centre for Advanced Systems Engineering
Macquarie University 2109
Australia

E-mail: Bruce.Campbell@mq.edu.au
Ph: +61 2 9850 9107
Fax: +61 2 9850 9102