12,420 research outputs found
HOW CAN PD PROCESS MODELLING BE MADE MORE USEFUL? AN EXPLORATION OF FACTORS WHICH INFLUENCE MODELLING UTILITY
In what sense is PD process modelling useful? and how can the utility of modelling be improved?
In this paper, we approach these questions through an analysis of PD process modelling âutilityâ â which in broad terms we consider to be the degree to which a model-based approach or modelling intervention benefits practice. We view the utility of modelling as a composite characteristic which depends both on the properties of models and on the way they are applied. The paper draws upon
established principles of cybernetic systems in an attempt to explain the role played by process modelling in operating and improving PD processes. We use this framework to identify eight key factors which influence the utility of modelling in the context of use. Further, we indicate how these
factors can be interpreted to identify opportunities to improve modelling utility.International Design Conference - DESIGN 201
Recommended from our members
Management cybernetics: Computer simulation models of operational management organizations
This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Cybernetics is the science of effective organization, i.e. the science that describes the general principles of growth, learning and adaptation in complex, dynamical systems.
Stafford Beer regards his viable system model as a design for effective formal organization. He also declares that since his model is explicitly based upon the principles of cybernetics, it facilitates consideration of what is and is not possible within formal organizations and provides guidance in creating efficient structures. The purpose of this research is to demonstrate and test Stafford Beer's ideas on the viable system model via the simulation of certain business activities. A methodology for getting access to the cybernetic body of knowledge is given as well as examples of cybernetic laws relevant to managerial and business practice. An important part of the work is devoted to the explanation and discussion of Stafford Beer's viable system model, and the importance it represents as a cybernetic method for the design of organizational structures. Simulation models incorporating the major activities of a business firm are represented and used as case studies to investigate how basic industrial organizations based on Beer's viable system model work under operational conditions
Practopoiesis: Or how life fosters a mind
The mind is a biological phenomenon. Thus, biological principles of
organization should also be the principles underlying mental operations.
Practopoiesis states that the key for achieving intelligence through adaptation
is an arrangement in which mechanisms laying a lower level of organization, by
their operations and interaction with the environment, enable creation of
mechanisms lying at a higher level of organization. When such an organizational
advance of a system occurs, it is called a traverse. A case of traverse is when
plasticity mechanisms (at a lower level of organization), by their operations,
create a neural network anatomy (at a higher level of organization). Another
case is the actual production of behavior by that network, whereby the
mechanisms of neuronal activity operate to create motor actions. Practopoietic
theory explains why the adaptability of a system increases with each increase
in the number of traverses. With a larger number of traverses, a system can be
relatively small and yet, produce a higher degree of adaptive/intelligent
behavior than a system with a lower number of traverses. The present analyses
indicate that the two well-known traverses-neural plasticity and neural
activity-are not sufficient to explain human mental capabilities. At least one
additional traverse is needed, which is named anapoiesis for its contribution
in reconstructing knowledge e.g., from long-term memory into working memory.
The conclusions bear implications for brain theory, the mind-body explanatory
gap, and developments of artificial intelligence technologies.Comment: Revised version in response to reviewer comment
Structuring institutions to exploit learning technologies: A cybernetic model
The adoption of learning technologies has not fulfilled expectation in any sector of education. Arguably, it is the structure of educational institutions which is the main obstacle. Schools, colleges and universities were designed to allow the delivery of education by the few to the many at a time when the key technology was the printed page, and many of the organizational instruments that facilitated this are still with us today: timetables, classrooms, syllabuses and so on. These permit a particular style of education to take place, but result in a system where the complexity of learning needs is ignored New technologies can provide new organizational devices that recognize this complexity. These require careful design and imply a significant restructuring of institutional organization. This paper addresses how the tools provided by management cybernetics, in particular Stafford Beer's Viable System Model, allow the analysis of structural mechanisms and how they impact on organizational complexity. It describes how these tools can be used to redesign educational organizations, including identifying key points where technologies can be used to create structures that permit a more flexible exploitation of the opportunities offered by learning technologies. The current JTAP project Toolkit for the Management of Learning is offered as an example of a set of software tools that emerge from such a cybernetic analysis
Governance for sustainability: learning from VSM practice
Purpose â While there is some agreement on the usefulness of systems and complexity approaches to tackle the sustainability challenges facing the organisations and governments in the twenty-first century, less is clear regarding the way such approaches can inspire new ways of governance for sustainability. The purpose of this paper is to progress ongoing research using the Viable System Model (VSM) as a meta-language to facilitate long-term sustainability in business, communities and societies, using the âMethodology to support self-transformationâ, by focusing on ways of learning about governance for sustainability. Design/methodology/approach â It summarises core self-governance challenges for long-term sustainability, and the organisational capabilities required to face them, at the âFramework for Assessing Sustainable Governanceâ. This tool is then used to analyse capabilities for governance for sustainability at three real situations where the mentioned Methodology inspired bottom up processes of self-organisation. It analyses the transformations decided from each organisation, in terms of capabilities for sustainable governance, using the suggested Framework. Findings â Core technical lessons learned from using the framework are discussed, include the usefulness of using a unified language and tool when studying governance for sustainability in differing types and scales of case study organisations. Research limitations/implications â As with other exploratory research, it reckons the convenience for further development and testing of the proposed tools to improve their reliability and robustness. Practical implications â A final conclusion suggests that the suggested tools offer a useful heuristic path to learn about governance for sustainability, from a VSM perspective; the learning from each organisational self-transformation regarding governance for sustainability is insightful for policy and strategy design and evaluation; in particular the possibility of comparing situations from different scales and types of organisations. Originality/value â There is very little coherence in the governance literature and the field of governance for sustainability is an emerging field. This piece of exploratory research is valuable as it presents an effective tool to learn about governance for sustainability, based in the âMethodology for Self-Transformationâ; and offers reflexions on applications of the methodology and the tool, that contribute to clarify the meaning of governance for sustainability in practice, in organisations from different scales and types
Beyond Dualisms in Methodology: An Integrative Design Research Medium "MAPS" and some Reflections
Design research is an academic issue and increasingly an essential success factor for industrial, organizational and social innovation. The fierce rejection of 1st generation design methods in the early 1970s resulted in the postmodernist attitude of "no methods", and subsequently, after more than a decade, in the strong adoption of scientific methods, or "the" scientific method, for design research. The current situation regarding methodology is characterized by unproductive dualisms such as scientific methods vs. designerly methods, normative methods vs. descriptive methods, research vs. design. The potential of the early (1st generation) methods is neglected and the practical usefulness of design research is impeded. The suggestion for 2nd generation methods as discussed by Rittel and others has hardly been taken up in design. The development of a methodological tool / medium for research through design â MAPS â (which is the central part of the paper) presents the cause and catalyst for some reflections about the usability / desirability / usefulness of methodical support for the design (research) process.
Keywords:
Integrative Design Research Medium, Research Through Design, MAPS, Methodology</p
Webscience, 'social machines' and principles for redesigning theories of agency: a prolegomenon
This paper argues that the advent of the WWW and the principles now developing for the move âsocial machinesâ has posed serious challenges to traditional social theory. In particular, it is argued that the concept of social machines and the forms of distributed agency they imply amplify âdeep flawsâ in the underlying principles of current agency theories that make empirical work using such frameworks âundecidableâ. The occasioning of social machines and the WWW here are examined for the ways in which the traditional models of agency, involving reflexivity/skill dynamics, can be dismantled and new principles for re-designed agency theory posed. One key problem and three re-design principles are identified
The cybernetic Bayesian brain: from interoceptive inference to sensorimotor contingencies
Is there a single principle by which neural operations can account for perception, cognition, action, and even consciousness? A strong candidate is now taking shape in the form of âpredictive processingâ. On this theory, brains engage in predictive inference on the causes of sensory inputs by continuous minimization of prediction errors or informational âfree energyâ. Predictive processing can account, supposedly, not only for perception, but also for action and for the essential contribution of the body and environment in structuring sensorimotor interactions. In this paper I draw together some recent developments within predictive processing that involve predictive modelling of internal physiological states (interoceptive inference), and integration with âenactiveâ and âembodiedâ approaches to cognitive science (predictive perception of sensorimotor contingencies). The upshot is a development of predictive processing that originates, not in Helmholtzian perception-as-inference, but rather in 20th-century cybernetic principles that emphasized homeostasis and predictive control. This way of thinking leads to (i) a new view of emotion as active interoceptive inference; (ii) a common predictive framework linking experiences of body ownership, emotion, and exteroceptive perception; (iii) distinct interpretations of active inference as involving disruptive and disambiguatoryânot just confirmatoryâactions to test perceptual hypotheses; (iv) a neurocognitive operationalization of the âmastery of sensorimotor contingenciesâ (where sensorimotor contingencies reflect the rules governing sensory changes produced by various actions); and (v) an account of the sense of subjective reality of perceptual contents (âperceptual presenceâ) in terms of the extent to which predictive models encode potential sensorimotor relations (this being âcounterfactual richnessâ). This is rich and varied territory, and surveying its landmarks emphasizes the need for experimental tests of its key contributions
- âŠ