Humainologie creative dialogue team practice Wednesday October 28 Zoom link and book synopsis
- Arthur Clark
- Oct 27, 2020
- 7 min read
“Never do anything that isn’t play.” - Marshall Rosenberg
“Anyone who thinks play is nothing but play and dead earnest nothing but dead earnest hasn’t understood either one.” - Dietrich Dӧrner
My synopsis of the book by Dietrich Dӧrner is appended below. Please keep in mind as always that my synopsis can only provide a glimpse of the book itself, and I choose books that I think will be well worth reading. Here once more is the Zoom link for team practice tomorrow, to be hosted by Shinobu.
Topic: Humainologie Dialogue Session October 28 Time: Oct 28, 2020 06:30 PM Mountain Time (US and Canada) Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81199236099?pwd=Vjk4V1lCVk44WU1ndHhoY3dUTHBKdz09 Meeting ID: 811 9923 6099 Passcode: 12345
If you are reading this tonight, Tuesday, that’s wonderful, but will you be at team practice tomorrow? This song is about that complex question
and here’s a good one contributed by Donna
and if you decide YES! I’ll be there, here’s the dance video from Alan that I plan to use tomorrow to get ready
Having read the book, The Logic of Failure: Recognizing and Avoiding Error in Complex Situations, I thought more creatively about my complex current situation and decided to take a break for several weeks from doing book synopses, in order to focus on a series of goals that I had been postponing. I plan to start the synopses again in January. In the meantime, I’ll send a poem each week, either one I have written myself (I’ve embarked on a Poetry Quest) or one by another poet. If a few of you would like to each contribute one book synopsis some time next year, that would add variety to spice up our team practice sessions in 2021. I very much look forward to starting our screenplay for Tom Hanks at team practice tomorrow. This week I had planned to send a “short and cheerful guide” to solving problems but will hold off on that for now so that I don’t put too much on your plate!
Voluptuous octopus and bon appètit,
Arthur
Book: The Logic of Failure: Recognizing and Avoiding Error in Complex Situations (Dietrich Dӧrner, original German edition 1989; English translation 1996)
Recurrent famine stalks the land. The problem is “solved” by drilling deeper wells to access groundwater. The population gradually increases because of more reliable and abundant crops. Then the deep wells that were drilled to solve the problem deplete the groundwater to the point that the crops again begin to fail. Yet the population continues to grow. The famine returns with a vengeance, and the situation arising from your well-intentioned solution is worse than the problem you had tried to solve. We know the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but it’s also paved with failure to understand the complexity of real-world problems and the variety of consequences – beyond the initial positive effects – that a particular solution is likely to have.
Using computer simulation of complex situations, the author studies how people respond to the related challenges. The players show patterns of behavior you would expect in real life. For example, they might become overly focused on their pet solution to a problem, without monitoring carefully whether it is really working after some initial success. “Here, as in the real world, we found that our decision makers [often] acted without prior analysis of the situation; [or] failed to anticipate side effects and long-term repercussions; [or] assumed that the absence of immediately obvious negative effects meant that correct measures had been taken; [or] let overinvolvement in ‘projects’ blind them to emerging needs and changes in the situation; [or] were prone to cynical reactions.”
It doesn’t have to be that way. There were good (more successful) players (decision-makers), and they had patterns of behavior such as the following: They asked why? - type questions more often than what? – type questions. Their decisions included consideration of related aspects of the system. In other words, they thought in ways that were more complex, when compared to the bad (less successful) players. Overall, they asked more questions than the bad players, especially as the sessions continued. For example, in one of the simulations, the bad players would ask most of their questions in the first four sessions, whereas the good players would continue to ask many questions throughout the total of eight sessions. Another characteristic of the good players was that they had much less tendency to be distracted by what the author calls “ad hocism.” If some relatively trivial issue arises, the good players would not lose their focus on what was important, whereas the bad players would often shift attention to the trivial option if it sounded interesting.
The good players would often reflect critically on their own behavior and think about how they needed to modify it. Moreover, when the bad players encountered especially stubborn problems, they “were frequently inclined to shift responsibility or blame onto someone else’s shoulder.” Such behavior is understandable, explains the author, but “If, the moment something goes wrong, we no longer hold ourselves responsible but push the blame onto others, we guarantee that we remain ignorant of the real reasons for poor decisions, namely, inadequate plans and failure to anticipate the consequences.”
The patterns of behavior, particularly among the unsuccessful players, were diverse. One player’s lack of success might be related to his tendency to be distracted too easily as the situation unfolded, whereas another player’s failure might be chiefly caused by an inability to analyze the situation in sufficient detail at the outset. The good players seemed to have a greater tolerance of uncertainty, and a tendency to be patient as well as vigilant. They observed and thought carefully before their actions. Notice how similar this is to the creative architects as compared to the less creative architects, as described in the book by John Cleese, Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide.
Having provided examples of what he studies in the first chapter, the author turns his attention in Chapter 2 (“Demands”) to a more detailed description of “complexity” and how to approach it successfully. Complexity does not convert easily into a mathematical formula, although efforts have been made to do exactly that. For one thing, complexity is subjective. Driving a car is a complex activity for a beginner, but much simpler for an experienced driver. The face of someone you have met is quite “complex” in its lines, contours, and colors, yet you can recognize that person instantly. Unlike the game of chess, the complexity of real-life situations and of the computer simulations used in the author’s studies does not wait for the player to make a move. The situation is constantly changing; it is dynamic. Furthermore, unlike the chessboard, that dynamic complexity always includes important things that the player cannot see. The situation is not transparent. Another part of the complexity is the ignorance and the mistaken hypotheses in the mind of the player. We tend to make false assumptions and are often not even aware that we are making an assumption at all. Our mind creates a “reality model” that inevitably differs from the reality itself. The map is not the territory.
Nonetheless, a good map (a conceptual model of the complex situation) is essential for the player’s purposes. In the section of Chapter 2 entitled “Steps in Planning and Action,” the author writes: “Defining goals is the first step in dealing with a complex problem, for it is not immediately obvious in every situation what it is we really want to achieve.” Perhaps your purpose is to improve “quality of life.” But what exactly does that mean? If it’s “quality of life” in a suburb, for example, does that mean better transportation, better schools, better shopping, less noise from traffic, better interactions among residents, or what?
There are five “Steps in the organization of complex action,” of which the first step (“Formulation of goals”) is followed by development of a model and gathering essential information (step 2); and then asking what is likely to happen in the future, based on knowledge of what has happened in the past (step 3). Then it is time for the fourth step: planning actions, making decisions, and implementing the plan of action. The fifth step is to review the initial and evolving effects of the actions taken, and revise the strategy based on that feedback. This may lead to an awareness that the original definition of goals itself needs revision. Each step in the schematic Figure 11 is connected to each of the other steps because “actual planning processes can involve frequent leaps back and forth between steps.” The familiar way of doing things and experimenting with new ways of doing things both have value. We should make informed choices about whether to follow the familiar path, to experiment with a new approach, or to use some hybrid of the two.
The butterfly effects of your action today may be good or bad. In the real world, you will often be unable to learn the consequences, which may happen years later. Therefore, Dӧrner emphasizes computer simulation as a way of learning how to handle complex situations. You can fast-forward the consequences of your decision, and thus see what might happen years hence if you make that particular choice. In effect, this accelerates the acquisition of wisdom. You can raise your awareness of such things as the necessity to state your goals clearly; the value of developing a conceptual model of the system you are dealing with; the potential value but also the potential dangers of following your habitual patterns of behavior; and the importance of changing your priorities when the situation calls for it. And you can acquire this wisdom faster than you would if you rely only on your real-world experience. Dӧrner concludes with an emphasis on make-believe. “Is that a frivolous idea? Playing games in dead earnest? Anyone who thinks play is nothing but play and dead earnest nothing but dead earnest hasn’t understood either one.”
The complex situation you are facing might be old age or finding a job or just getting through each day with a disability. This book may be helpful to you in making the decisions you must make as you face those challenges on the road ahead.
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