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It's useful to note that system's thinking is such an outdated model of looking at the world. Basically modeling the world as a fancy mechanism, with mechanisti
by philtechguy 6y ago
It's useful to note that system's thinking is such an outdated model of looking at the world. Basically modeling the world as a fancy mechanism, with mechanistic explanations about every aspects of the world. Very reductionist about organisms, nature, societies, etc.
- xg15 6y agoWhy is it outdated? Do you have any souces for that? What do you propose instead?
- animal_spirits 6y agoI think its a good start to learn about chaotic systems instead. For most systems, minute parameter changes can have dramatic effects on the predictability of the system https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_njf8jwEGRo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_njf8jwEGRo
- philtechguy 6y agoWell, one of the reasons is that a lot of systems theory was basically trying to apply notions, concepts and mathematical analysis from physics, firm management, and game theory to contexts where they just didn't apply: ideal rationality of agents, information flow diagrams, and even notions like equilibria. The notion of equilibrium in ecosystems, for example, came from the physics of gases in vacuum chambers, neither organisms or populations of organisms exhibit such tendencies. There are many more examples of why mechanistic explanations simply don't work for many phenomena in the philosophy of science. Weiner, Simon, and others were just trying to use the maths they knew to solve some bigger more complex problems and in the process ended up stretching the metaphor of the system a bit too far.