Hi there,

Disclaimer: im just a humble coder, with no special knowledge in system theory. I am not even sure if i am at the right place for my question. so please be patient with me :) If there is more appropriate place on reddit to ask this question i would be thankful for any hints.

There is an effect i can sometimes observe in systems of all kind; People trying to measure the perfomance of a system to compare it to similar systems. So people are trying to pull out single numbers of the system that in someway describe its perfomance. Example: Frames per Second of a gaming computer, transactions per second of a databse, GDP of a country, unemployment rate of a region and so on.

This works more or less from case to case. But that is another story.

But most of the time it is possible to change the system in certain ways to improve these numbers but without improving the systems initial purpose. And often it is cheaper to just optimize these numbers compared to optimizing the systems purpose execution. So the system architects/builders/maintainers will often just do that; Optimize their system to look better but not to perform better. There are tons of real world examples for this behaviour:

• Improving hardware drivers for graphic cards to look good in benchmarks but with not real word use case impact
• The politican accepting precarious working and living condition for the citizens in exchange for a lesser unemployment rate
• and so on

So in short: Benchmarks can lead to wrong optimization.

Is there a technical term/word for this effect/concept? Is there any literature about this problem? I could not find any...

Scientific reality is textual

http://gamahucherpress.yellowgum.com/wp-content/uploads/Scientific-reality-is-textual.pdf

or

https://www.scribd.com/document/572639157/Scientific-Reality-is-Textual

(In english, french or german)

Is there any theory about monitoring the efficacy of organizations, like if government agencies actually do what they’re supposed to?

Is there a subreddit for “organizational theory”?

Thank you

On her book, Donella Meadows writes the following:

"Counterintuitive - that's Forrester's word to describe complex systems. Leverage points frequently are not intuitive. (...) And I know from bitter experience that, because they are so counterintuitive, when I do discover a system's leverage points, hardly anyone will believe me"

I find this fascinating and I'm thinking about writing an article/blog post entitled "Paradoxes as leverage points". Anyone interested in systems thinking would like to co-write with me?

I would like to write about concrete examples in history in which counterintuitive leverage points have been used to intervene and change (improve) a system. I find this a fascinating topic to be honest.

If you could point me to interesting resources for me to read / learn more I would also be very much appreciated :)

Hello, I have to write a paper roughly about state interventionism in economy and the crucial source on which we are to base our paper is one where the words:

structural change

Are being used really often without an explanation of what is meant by the authors. Because the books uses elements of systems theory in other parts and, as far as I know, structural change is based upon ideas from systems theory, may I ask for directions on how to find out what it means or what it means generally? Im just at a total loss.

Hello my friends!

I have a kind of theorical/technical question. I have seen many commentators of Shannon's work - including Weaver - writing that noise can sometimes be beneficial to the efficiency of the transmission of the message. This is somehow related to the equation of equivocation. But I have not seen anyone enter in greater details about how this is the case.

Can anyone tell me how does noise, in Shannon's model, sometimes help the transmission of the message? In theory, it is the reduction of noise that would do that trick.

What can I read about this?

Thank you so much!

I'm announcing my new newsletter: Systemantics!

The Systemantics newsletter views technology, politics, science, and culture through a systems lens. Systems are all around us. Some are nature-made like the Solar System, while others are human-made: the World Wide Web.

My focus will be on the following questions. What characterizes robust systems? Why do some systems succeed and are so simple to use while others fail? How do we build upon and extend existing systems in a way that doesn’t compromise their integrity?
Engineers aren’t the only ones who build and design systems. Everyone creates systems. Your morning and bedtime routines are systems. Businesses and organizations are systems. Legal contracts are akin to APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) in software that connect and extend two or more systems. My hope is that there is something we can all learn from the various ways different disciplines create systems.

I'll be doing a case study on a past systems failure twice a month. Every Sunday, you can also expect a list of articles, books, podcasts, and more I’ve consumed throughout the week to study systems thinking further. I’m excited to take you along on this journey with me.

Thanks for joining.

https://systemantics.substack.com/p/cherish-your-bugs?r=1m1h0&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Can someone point me to some good Python resources for modelling systems theory

A little ambiguous, so don't judge me too harshly.

Hello! I'm looking for a source of information about this diagram, I don't know much, so a starting point would be very useful for me, until I reach the requirements for this subject. I would start by asking you if you know any source of information for something at least similar, it may seem familiar to you in some way. Maybe I will reach to do something about this subject.

https://preview.redd.it/qy6357ibhl381.png?width=1045&format=png&auto=webp&s=1acdb43440cde390af8e6bf462ecddcfd386686e

Can anyone point me towards a systems thinking alternative to the economic models of supply and demand? This seems like an area fertile with potential for systems thinking to derive a more convincing explanation than conventional economics has managed so far

Anyone else find the OG 6 Star Wars films to embody systems theory themes? While Lucas is well documented as accrediting Joseph Campbell's Monomyth archetypes while developing the story I feel like there is more. Organismic vs mechanistic, steady state as a lack of balance leading to bifurcation, there's more but I'm curious to hear any feedback.

Dear systems thinkers, I am testing a technology that I created. It is IIB: a blind, humor-based, algorithmically assisted network for intellectual inclusion and neurodiversity for bottom-up emergence of vision-driven collaborations. Could you, please, help me to learn how to make it better? More things to be deployed this week, so treat it as a work in progress. Thank you very much for your wise help. The ting to test: https://intellectualandimmaterialbank.com/ Where you can leave your feedback: https://forms.gle/YtQZdEkz82XKCLC47 Thank you. Your advice will be of huge value.

I just stumbled upon this subreddit, and now I'm interested in the big brain stuff you guys are saying. Please explain it to me.

Also, my favorite book on the subject of systems theory was “systems theory and scientific philosophy“ by John Bryant.

The author has apparently been pushing up daisies since 2008. I don’t know where to find another copy of the book, and my umbrella cockatoo ate my personal copy. (The sting- or rather bite- was that much more as the copy was signed by the author).

Hello!

I have to solve a problem: the irreversible adjustment of the dc motor speed. I don't have much to do with such things but I have to try to solve it. I have to integrate some equations (1), (2), (3) for the integration step h = 0.001 and h = 0.005, and the integration interval will be [0,1]. Anyway, I'm not interested in solving the whole problem, just to be able to present something from it, I have nothing to prove for such problems.

If you have any idea how to solve it, or a link, I don't know if WolframAlpha can help me.

https://preview.redd.it/m8vagh2q3sp61.png?width=885&format=png&auto=webp&s=089771bed1984be9f377cc438db8673261742c2e

Hi,I just wanted to say,I have found this youtube channel.https://www.youtube.com/c/ComplexityLearningLab/playlists ,they also have a website and community.

Anyone interested in learning about systems theory,or anyone who wishes to connect with like minded people,and perhaps even start projects together,should check them out.

I personally feel very grateful to have found this community,I hope to contribute to their work and collaborate with them in the future.

A robust system should not have too much or little connectivity. Is there any way to objectively determine/measure if a given system has a good, too low, or too high amount of connectivity?

Hi, I recently became interested in complex system via cybernetics and reading about Norbert wiener. In undergrad I studied environmental science and biology so definitely see overlap in those fields and complex system. Currently I’m a software engineer doing mostly front end work so nothing to do with AI. I’m actually quiet curious about digital archives and science history BUT also complex systems and systems theory. I’m just wondering what kind of fields people, who pursue studies in this subject, work in?