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I was asked recently by Ray Ison (ISSS President 2014-2015) to provide a bibliography of my work on systems literacy. One piece of work came to mind that I think needs to be resurfaced. I was challenged in 2018 by James Martin, then the Chair of the INCOSE Systems Science Working Group to develop a grand vision. To do that we organized a survey of ISSS and INCOSE. 113 people responded. I created a blog post on the results in February 2019. After 4 years I think it is worth a re look https://vimeo.com/317104695

The SGSR was the name of this society before it was renamed the International Society for the Systems Sciences. Dr. James Grier Miller was at the beginning of the SGSR. He recounts factors that were influencing colleagues to form the SGSR. One factor stands out for me and it was the reaction of scientists who had been involved in creating atomic and hydrogen nuclear bombs who wanted science to serve mankind, not destroy it.

 

Dr. Miller recounts these conversations in his first lecture introducing Living Systems Theory. at the 11 minute mark he calls these scientists   "a very interesting group. They included, Enrico Fermi and Harold Urey, both of whom had been involved in the development of the plutonium bomb". And at minute 14 and 25 seconds he goes on "Certainly a feeling of of deep responsibility for being the father of the plutonium bomb and for the work he was doing at that time, on the development of the hydrogen bomb. I don't think, as far as I could tell from talking to him and his, some of his friends and, on one occasion to his wife and reading what his wife has written about him, and he ever talked much to people, generally to physicists about this inner sense of guilt that he had."  

 

Sense of guilt Miller implies is one of the factors that brought scientists together to form the SGSR.

 

Today Russia and Ukraine are at war and the prospect of a nuclear accident or nuclear war event is present I think reflection on one of the founding purposes of the now ISSS was to understand how humans get to this situation and how to prevent it. Some 68 years on we still have a lot to learn.

 

Watch the video here on Vimeo and read the transcript here 

Over the three years of my time as President-elect, President and Past-President of ISSS I have worked with William (Bill) Smith to develop and use his approach "Understanding Lightness, Darkness and Color (LDC),as a Systems Language" to understanding systems in relation to ISSS as an organization and also to the development of Systems Literacy. Read more about Bill and his life's work at http://www.odii.com   

 

With respect to ISSS in 2020 Bill invited ISSS members to complete a color selection activity as a way to gather information about individual preferences.  He has combined  the individual results to produce a group picture as well as a male and female portraits. All three come with recommendations for how ISSS can make better use its purpose power relationships and achieve balance between male and female.

 

The results are posted here 

 

Media1 from ISSS on Vimeo.