REPLY European 'Global System Dynamics Project' (SD7170)

[SDMAIL Ralf Lippold]

Posted by  Ralf Lippold <ralf_lippold at web.de>

Hello Valerie,

you are giving a good point about the culture and non-translation (of major
works) of SD work - to be true the same in Germany.

Another point that I hear often from people (either academics or business):
"This stuff is really old and it hasn't worked out, has it?. Isn't there
anything new on that?".

That is mostly end of the story and off to the next theory they go.

At 6:59 Uhr -0400 11.07.2008, SDMAIL Jim Thompson wrote:
> ...
> Perhaps we should ask why those who choose to not join "our
> community" exclude themselves.

and vice versa ;-)

This reminds me very much of Peter Senge telling an interesting story that
connects -at least in my head- pretty much with what we are experiencing
right now. The talk can be found at:

http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/307

In short here the story: while being at Stanford as an undergraduate Paul
Ehrlich's book "The Population Bomb" just had come out and one of Peter's
roommates happened to work with Paul Ehrlich (a biologist). So Peter who was
doing systems engineering at that time asked his roommate, "Gee, biologists
are running around like they invented systems theory. Don' t you ever talk
to
the engineers?". His roommate's answer was, "No."

This short story makes me wonder that we are stuck in a very similar muddy
and foggy path with system dynamics.

Looking across the boundaries of the own field is never easy and it is
pretty
uncertain what could evolve from a connection with other fields (as the one
being active part in the European Commission funded project that Kim has
unserved and shared with us all. Thanks Kim :-)).

The least plausible and most improbable solutions very often take the
largest
leverage points for the improvement of the whole system within.

So let's take the shaky first steps outside our regular system dynamics
boundaries and let's cross the gulfs of the unknown (strongly reminds me of
the 3rd SoL Global Forum in Oman past April, where the motto was "Bridging
the Gulf - Learning across organizations, sectors, and cultures"
http://www.solonline.org/repository/download/Bridging%20the%20Gulf%20Brochure12-4.pdf?item_id=14793147

Posted by  Ralf Lippold <ralf_lippold at web.de>
posting date  Fri, 11 Jul 2008 14:09:32 +0200