this this was my Nokia 8250 and at the
time in my early who I must have been
around 18 this was the bee’s knees this
was where mobile phones were at you know
you could play snake on it you could
send text messages which we knew at the
time and it was small it fit in that
little pocket in your jeans and do not
underestimate the coolness of the blue
screen at the time
now of course fast-forward 18 years
things have changed and we now have my
phone actually is sorry is much larger
ironically perhaps the phone is bigger
than it was back then and unfortunately
waistline is a bit too but also so is my
understanding of how technology shapes
us how it shapes our behaviors and so I
recently I had the pleasure of long
service leave and I thanked my English
forebears for this privilege and I took
my time to travel in Europe I spent
about four months traveling in Europe I
took only a little turtle shell backpack
so I only had carry-on backpack but I
also managed to take a couple of banks
an insurance agency a guy called Gerald
who was my translator an internet
browser a GPS navigation system and of
course an internet browser if I didn’t
mention that and of course this was my
iPhone now when I was in Iceland the
land of things that explode a bit like
doctor Thomas’s presentation and things
that smell and all the rest of it I
decided to go to brew or fuss brew
fosters a waterfall and it’s probably a
little hard to see here but this is the
dot marking where I am this is the
carpark where I started and that’s maybe
Thrall kilometers or there abouts and it
all started great it was this wonderful
path it’s pretty it’s Iceland you know
there’s a lot to look at and then it
just became this sopping muddy mess and
I was literally up to my knees in mud
I’m losing my shoe it sort of sucks off
I was clinging at times to little bits
of grass and roots and things to
actually stop myself sliding off into
the icy raging river right next to me so
needless to say when I got there I took
a nice blue dock because I wanted to
remember the fact that I’d actually made
it but I didn’t want to go back and so I
had to do some map to ground how to use
some of my army training and it’s again
hard to see but there’s a lot of not
there’s not actually any
through here but they were gravel pars
and some houses and sorts of odd things
like that and so my thought was no
worries
I got this and this is the point I’m
getting it I managed to get out I walk
you know walk myself out I actually did
a big loop around through here and dad
along the road but the key point is here
yes the technology has changed the
technology can do lots of things that it
couldn’t do previously but what’s also
changed is us the way I approached the
situation the way I thought about the
situation my response to the situation
was all mediated by the technology but
it was me myself that had actually
changed my thinking and this is the
point technology shapes us I had the
pleasure recently of listening to a CBC
Massey lecture by Neil Turok who’s a
cosmologists and distinguished physicist
theoretical physicist in in Canada and
he spoke about many topics broadly the
history of physics and one of the things
he touched on was the quantum nature of
reality and it’s all very confusing so
if you know nothing about quantum
physics which is like me don’t worry
because no one does it’s really
complicated stuff even Einstein was
famously critical of it you know down
how non-intuitive it was so what we one
of the things he spoke about was quantum
computers now at the moment we have a
lot of change in society yes there’s
social media there’s things coming
through blockchains are starting to make
an impact and quantum computers exist
and they are getting better at the
moment google has managed to get around
72 qubits in an entangled state and the
reason this matters is that digital data
is a 0 1 but a qubit has 1 bit as a
quantum bit is able to consider
information in far more powerful ways if
a quantum computer was to reach 300
cubits
it would be able to consider every
single atom in the entire visible
universe simultaneously and you consider
the computational power that that would
engender and you match it with something
like artificial intelligence and where
things are going to change so yes the
technology will continue to change but
one of the things that Neil Turok talks
about is of course the systems that
govern the world so quantum mechanics he
argues is a way of understanding the
world but he used a cosmologist he talks
about the universe you know and so we
have nebula we have the solar system we
have the moon dictating the the tides
which of course messes with my often and
run on the beach because of how hard the
sand is it’s either too soft it’s too
hard whereas you know so systems impact
on us and of course this goes all the
way down to micro systems to the level
of quantum physics and Planck’s theories
and and these kinds of things so what we
end up is a scenario where we have lots
of systems operating at multiple levels
we have technology technological change
and more and more dramatic technological
change coming and the question is sort
of what on earth are we to make of all
of this and the answer is 42 but only if
you’ve read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to
the galaxy for most people though the
answer is this idea of the good life
people just want to live the life that
they see is the good life and there are
many different conceptions of it I
particularly like this one this is from
Aristotle’s Nicomachean ethics and his
basic up at proposition is human
flourishing now he goes on to unpack it
in various ways but the idea is central
to the good life is that people and
human potential flourish and so the
question I have for you or what I’m here
to discuss is how we can take this
understanding of complex systems and how
we can focus in on the human potential
and the development of human beings most
change is systemic particularly in
organizations there’s a new objective
they come in this is what we’re doing is
time there’s management there’s
resources and it’s a push push push push
push scenario designed to achieve an
outcome and more or less bludgeons
people into conformity this is an odd
dated way of thinking there is still
place for systemic thinking what I’m
here to discuss with you there was
systemic thinking now this is
consideration of how a part exists
within a whole so in the same way that
you exist now on the planet Earth and
it’s rotating the Sun and you have a
system inside you that’s processing your
dinner from earlier you know the systems
everywhere what we want to consider has
how systemic thinking
can help to model and change and create
what we call emergent phenomena this
scenario here is probably difficult to
see it’s yellow black and red and what
happens is it’s a net logo model
it’s an agent-based modeling piece of
software and what it models is how
individuals interact with other
individuals and how these build
compounding effects and lead to what are
called emergent phenomena so what we
really want then is systemic thinking
using this kind of agent-based modeling
kind of mindset designed to achieve the
emergent phenomena that we want and not
achieve the emergent phenomena that we
do not want you only need to look as far
as social media to look at some
positives but also some emergent
phenomena that are very negative and so
what are young people to do there’s all
this change coming it’s all very complex
it’s all very there’s all these systems
going on they’re interacting and there’s
all these things happening that we can’t
control and the answer starts with a hot
shower so the first thing you need to do
is take a hot shower now my apartment is
freezing it’s honestly it’s an iceberg I
don’t know why it’s to do with the way
the air flows around it so every morning
I wake up and I want to get a hot shower
so it’s a race out of a shower you turn
the hot water on and ah it’s too hot so
of course you turn the hot water down
but then oh it’s cold now it’s too cold
me and turn it back up again and then
you’re in and out of the shower and
eventually you get it right and what
this is is a feedback loop and this is
the power of systemic thinking is it
allows you to identify leverage points
where you can move from a desired state
or throw you it from a current state to
a desired state the diagram on the
screen encapsulate s– the basic
principle it’s a cyclical loop it
doesn’t look once it continues to loop
and reinforce a particular type of
behavior or a particular outcome that
you’re trying to achieve now in and of
itself a single loop like that isn’t
particularly interesting what’s much
more interesting is how one system
interacts with other systems and this is
how we lead to this idea of emergent
phenomena and you can be designed for
you can manage complexity and difficulty
by designing for it this particular
design have gone too far
here on student learning and the idea is
these blue loops that run all the way
through are all reinforcing loops
they’re designed to reinforce ultimately
the center node which is student
learning and there are some balancing
loops which create delays and create
some problems and so this is the toolkit
that you have moving forward to deal
with complexity to deal with the change
that is coming in our society this is
thomas edison and contrary to some
people’s beliefs he did not invent the
incandescent light bulb no what he did
as my previous speaker discussed was
innovate because innovation is not
ideation it’s not creation of newness
newness is good we want ideas but
innovation the hard work of getting
things implemented in ways that value
and build on human potential and develop
humans towards eudaimonia this is what
we want so the next time that you come
across a light bulb or somebody else’s
light bulb or you recognize that the
system in which you operate usually an
organization needs to respond to other
ecological changes around it I want you
to think systemically I want you to
identify the leverage points to build in
the feedback system loops that will
ultimately develop human potential and lead to human flourishing
time in my early who I must have been
around 18 this was the bee’s knees this
was where mobile phones were at you know
you could play snake on it you could
send text messages which we knew at the
time and it was small it fit in that
little pocket in your jeans and do not
underestimate the coolness of the blue
screen at the time
now of course fast-forward 18 years
things have changed and we now have my
phone actually is sorry is much larger
ironically perhaps the phone is bigger
than it was back then and unfortunately
waistline is a bit too but also so is my
understanding of how technology shapes
us how it shapes our behaviors and so I
recently I had the pleasure of long
service leave and I thanked my English
forebears for this privilege and I took
my time to travel in Europe I spent
about four months traveling in Europe I
took only a little turtle shell backpack
so I only had carry-on backpack but I
also managed to take a couple of banks
an insurance agency a guy called Gerald
who was my translator an internet
browser a GPS navigation system and of
course an internet browser if I didn’t
mention that and of course this was my
iPhone now when I was in Iceland the
land of things that explode a bit like
doctor Thomas’s presentation and things
that smell and all the rest of it I
decided to go to brew or fuss brew
fosters a waterfall and it’s probably a
little hard to see here but this is the
dot marking where I am this is the
carpark where I started and that’s maybe
Thrall kilometers or there abouts and it
all started great it was this wonderful
path it’s pretty it’s Iceland you know
there’s a lot to look at and then it
just became this sopping muddy mess and
I was literally up to my knees in mud
I’m losing my shoe it sort of sucks off
I was clinging at times to little bits
of grass and roots and things to
actually stop myself sliding off into
the icy raging river right next to me so
needless to say when I got there I took
a nice blue dock because I wanted to
remember the fact that I’d actually made
it but I didn’t want to go back and so I
had to do some map to ground how to use
some of my army training and it’s again
hard to see but there’s a lot of not
there’s not actually any
through here but they were gravel pars
and some houses and sorts of odd things
like that and so my thought was no
worries
I got this and this is the point I’m
getting it I managed to get out I walk
you know walk myself out I actually did
a big loop around through here and dad
along the road but the key point is here
yes the technology has changed the
technology can do lots of things that it
couldn’t do previously but what’s also
changed is us the way I approached the
situation the way I thought about the
situation my response to the situation
was all mediated by the technology but
it was me myself that had actually
changed my thinking and this is the
point technology shapes us I had the
pleasure recently of listening to a CBC
Massey lecture by Neil Turok who’s a
cosmologists and distinguished physicist
theoretical physicist in in Canada and
he spoke about many topics broadly the
history of physics and one of the things
he touched on was the quantum nature of
reality and it’s all very confusing so
if you know nothing about quantum
physics which is like me don’t worry
because no one does it’s really
complicated stuff even Einstein was
famously critical of it you know down
how non-intuitive it was so what we one
of the things he spoke about was quantum
computers now at the moment we have a
lot of change in society yes there’s
social media there’s things coming
through blockchains are starting to make
an impact and quantum computers exist
and they are getting better at the
moment google has managed to get around
72 qubits in an entangled state and the
reason this matters is that digital data
is a 0 1 but a qubit has 1 bit as a
quantum bit is able to consider
information in far more powerful ways if
a quantum computer was to reach 300
cubits
it would be able to consider every
single atom in the entire visible
universe simultaneously and you consider
the computational power that that would
engender and you match it with something
like artificial intelligence and where
things are going to change so yes the
technology will continue to change but
one of the things that Neil Turok talks
about is of course the systems that
govern the world so quantum mechanics he
argues is a way of understanding the
world but he used a cosmologist he talks
about the universe you know and so we
have nebula we have the solar system we
have the moon dictating the the tides
which of course messes with my often and
run on the beach because of how hard the
sand is it’s either too soft it’s too
hard whereas you know so systems impact
on us and of course this goes all the
way down to micro systems to the level
of quantum physics and Planck’s theories
and and these kinds of things so what we
end up is a scenario where we have lots
of systems operating at multiple levels
we have technology technological change
and more and more dramatic technological
change coming and the question is sort
of what on earth are we to make of all
of this and the answer is 42 but only if
you’ve read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to
the galaxy for most people though the
answer is this idea of the good life
people just want to live the life that
they see is the good life and there are
many different conceptions of it I
particularly like this one this is from
Aristotle’s Nicomachean ethics and his
basic up at proposition is human
flourishing now he goes on to unpack it
in various ways but the idea is central
to the good life is that people and
human potential flourish and so the
question I have for you or what I’m here
to discuss is how we can take this
understanding of complex systems and how
we can focus in on the human potential
and the development of human beings most
change is systemic particularly in
organizations there’s a new objective
they come in this is what we’re doing is
time there’s management there’s
resources and it’s a push push push push
push scenario designed to achieve an
outcome and more or less bludgeons
people into conformity this is an odd
dated way of thinking there is still
place for systemic thinking what I’m
here to discuss with you there was
systemic thinking now this is
consideration of how a part exists
within a whole so in the same way that
you exist now on the planet Earth and
it’s rotating the Sun and you have a
system inside you that’s processing your
dinner from earlier you know the systems
everywhere what we want to consider has
how systemic thinking
can help to model and change and create
what we call emergent phenomena this
scenario here is probably difficult to
see it’s yellow black and red and what
happens is it’s a net logo model
it’s an agent-based modeling piece of
software and what it models is how
individuals interact with other
individuals and how these build
compounding effects and lead to what are
called emergent phenomena so what we
really want then is systemic thinking
using this kind of agent-based modeling
kind of mindset designed to achieve the
emergent phenomena that we want and not
achieve the emergent phenomena that we
do not want you only need to look as far
as social media to look at some
positives but also some emergent
phenomena that are very negative and so
what are young people to do there’s all
this change coming it’s all very complex
it’s all very there’s all these systems
going on they’re interacting and there’s
all these things happening that we can’t
control and the answer starts with a hot
shower so the first thing you need to do
is take a hot shower now my apartment is
freezing it’s honestly it’s an iceberg I
don’t know why it’s to do with the way
the air flows around it so every morning
I wake up and I want to get a hot shower
so it’s a race out of a shower you turn
the hot water on and ah it’s too hot so
of course you turn the hot water down
but then oh it’s cold now it’s too cold
me and turn it back up again and then
you’re in and out of the shower and
eventually you get it right and what
this is is a feedback loop and this is
the power of systemic thinking is it
allows you to identify leverage points
where you can move from a desired state
or throw you it from a current state to
a desired state the diagram on the
screen encapsulate s– the basic
principle it’s a cyclical loop it
doesn’t look once it continues to loop
and reinforce a particular type of
behavior or a particular outcome that
you’re trying to achieve now in and of
itself a single loop like that isn’t
particularly interesting what’s much
more interesting is how one system
interacts with other systems and this is
how we lead to this idea of emergent
phenomena and you can be designed for
you can manage complexity and difficulty
by designing for it this particular
design have gone too far
here on student learning and the idea is
these blue loops that run all the way
through are all reinforcing loops
they’re designed to reinforce ultimately
the center node which is student
learning and there are some balancing
loops which create delays and create
some problems and so this is the toolkit
that you have moving forward to deal
with complexity to deal with the change
that is coming in our society this is
thomas edison and contrary to some
people’s beliefs he did not invent the
incandescent light bulb no what he did
as my previous speaker discussed was
innovate because innovation is not
ideation it’s not creation of newness
newness is good we want ideas but
innovation the hard work of getting
things implemented in ways that value
and build on human potential and develop
humans towards eudaimonia this is what
we want so the next time that you come
across a light bulb or somebody else’s
light bulb or you recognize that the
system in which you operate usually an
organization needs to respond to other
ecological changes around it I want you
to think systemically I want you to
identify the leverage points to build in
the feedback system loops that will
ultimately develop human potential and lead to human flourishing
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