Although a few of my previous posts have hinted at this subject I think that now that I have got the initial burst of activity on the blog out of the way it is time to make a clearer statement of where my thoughts are coming from and, therefore, put some context on to the content of the blog.<\/p>\n
Of course, in keeping with the overall theme of the blog I should stress that this is work in progress and “feeding my ignorance” remains the main aim – trying to identify the context for this is important, but it does not mean that the context is fixed.\u00a0 As my learning increases, so the context may shift.<\/p>\n
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Note that although this entry is published it is not – and never can be – complete.\u00a0 Therefore (in keeping with my worldview itself) I reserve the right to update and change it!!\u00a0\u00a0 Understanding such self-referential things is part of the way I believe we need to view things.<\/em><\/p>\n Simply put, I believe that we all create for ourselves an internal representation of “the way the real world is<\/em><\/strong>” in order for us to make sense of and interact with that real world.\u00a0 For me, that internal representation\u00a0stresses the inter-relatedness of things and, particularly, the way those relationships change over time.<\/p>\n There – that’s done it. \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n Well OK perhaps it does need a bit more……<\/p>\n Firstly, it might have been better to entitle the post\u00a0mein weltanschauungen<\/strong>\u00a0simply because although my worldview could be considered complete and a single whole, it is more understandable to look at it as a number of (not necessarily consistent) mental models that interact to allow me to make sense of things.<\/p>\n There are two concepts that, I guess, dominate any description of my worldview and they are\u00a0systems<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0models<\/strong>.\u00a0 It is probably no coincidence that these are both terms that have a multitude of meanings.\u00a0 Neither word is really sufficient to capture what is properly meant and therefore it becomes even more necessary that I try to explain the way in which I use them.<\/p>\n Systems<\/strong>\u00a0exist in order to achieve some purpose.\u00a0 Many people get a bit hung up about the word system; many people have trouble understanding the nuances of meaning that I apply to the word.\u00a0 Within the last few weeks I have taken part in a discussion about whether the ‘concept’ of system is actually needed.\u00a0 I have to say that whilst I can accept that the word might get in the way very often, I find it difficult to imagine life without the concept that I currently label “a system”.<\/p>\n I do think that systems are imaginary.\u00a0 That is to say that they only exist because someone labels them as a system.<\/p>\n The idea of imaginary systems also can cause some people a problem – they point at something and say “that isn’t imaginary” and they are right, however it doesn’t matter how real the physical bits are the notion that it is\u00a0a system is a product of someone’s imagination and that is always going to be predicated on their mental models.<\/p>\n So, systems are imaginary in “my world” – they are also fleeting in the sense that they do not exist forever – in some case they exist for quite a long time, but in others they come into existence for just a few moments.\u00a0 In addition, they are forever changing and what comprises a system will (in most cases) be constantly in a state of flux – including what is inside and what is outside the system boundary.<\/p>\n Here we meet another of my ideas that some people find difficult.\u00a0 There is a need to draw a boundary round the system – that I do not disagree with – but where my thinking differs is that for me the boundary is fluid not fixed.\u00a0 The ‘system of interest’ will expand and contract depending on many factors as it moves through its own particular life cycle.\u00a0 For many people drawing the boundary means something very rigid and everything is either inside or outside the system.\u00a0 In contrast, I am comfortable with the notion that things “swap sides” through time.<\/p>\n Enough on systems for the moment.<\/p>\n Models<\/strong>\u00a0are abstractions created to represent parts of ‘reality’ in a format that we can understand.\u00a0 Necessarily every model is less than perfect – if it was a perfect representation then it would\u00a0be<\/strong>\u00a0the reality and therefore superfluous.\u00a0 We all create and use models all the time – when was the last time you looked at a map – that is one of the many every day models that we create and use.<\/p>\n Much of the time we are unaware that we are using a model, but it is my belief that all of our interaction with the world around us is based on the way in which we have modelled that world inside our heads\u00a0– what I (and many others) call our mental models.\u00a0 These house all our preconceived ideas, all our biases, all our prejudices and preferences and they drive our behaviour.<\/p>\n We each have a tendency to project our models on to the behaviours of others – often with the result that we find it very difficult to understand those behaviours.\u00a0 If we work on the basis that everyone sees the world the same way as we do, then of course we will be disoriented by behaviours that contradict that model.<\/p>\n For some people “a model” is a computer simulation – that’s it – for others, of course, a model is a pretty girl on a catwalk – for yet others it is a number of bits of plastic that need to be glued together and painted to represent some famous aircraft\/ship\/car\/whatever.\u00a0 It is no surprise that the combination of the concept of systems and the concept of models – both of which have a myriad of meanings – results in considerable care being needed when explaining my worldview.<\/p>\n For me, I view the world through a set of mental models that determine how I will react and those mental models see the world in a systemic way.\u00a0 I prefer the concept of multiple mental models because to me it makes more sense to have a number of individually coherent models that can contradict one another than having one model that is in itself inconsistent. (I guess that is itself one of my mental models\u00a0\ud83d\ude00\u00a0)<\/p>\n I think that I act in a way that is consistent with all of these models at all times – sometimes I will come across situations that are not covered by my suite of models – then I need to expand them or create a new one specific to the situation.\u00a0 At other times I come across a situation where my models are contradictory – again, this results in change\/expansion to the models in order to remove the contradiction.\u00a0 How all contradictions are removed however.\u00a0 There are some ways in which I view the world that can be seen to be incompatible if I were ever to attempt to justify them.<\/p>\n So with that basis we can start to examine some aspects of my worldview – bearing in mind at all times that it is predicated on a very basic mental model that although I will defend my view of the world I am also aware that it is certainly incomplete and wrong – as all models are.\u00a0 I also go along (to a certain extent) with Mark Twain when he says:<\/p>\n It ain\u2019t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. I qualified that with “to a certain extent” because\u00a0I am also fond of suggesting that they thing that causes most projects to fail or plans to go awry is\u00a0something that you didn’t think of before the event.\u00a0 That is sort of\u00a0covered in the Mark Twain quote because if you\u00a0avoid thinking that you “know for sure” that you have ‘thought of everything’ and instead consider it a certainty that you have forgotten ‘something’ then you can\u00a0make contingency plans for that ‘something’ even if you have no idea what it actually\u00a0is.<\/p>\n The fact that everyone views the world in different ways is – for me – an inescapable and palpably obvious fact.\u00a0 Where, I think, this causes the most difficulty is when we are blind to the (equally obvious to me) fact that \u00a0these differences do not make one right and the other wrong – instead they are ‘just’ differences.\u00a0 The judgement of what is right and what is wrong in this sense may even be unable to be made since the nature of much of our mental models is that they are not necessarily objective.<\/p>\n The rejection of an\u00a0either\/or<\/strong>\u00a0stance in favour of a\u00a0both\/and<\/strong>\u00a0one is part of my way of dealing with the world.\u00a0 This means that I am tolerant of other views even if I do not agree with them, but it most cetainly does not mean that I believe that there is never a right and wrong position.\u00a0 It would be easy to equate my tolerance with an ‘anything goes’ attitude – that is certainly not the case and I will (at times vigorously) defend my own point of view.\u00a0 Is there anything that is always right or anything that is always wrong?\u00a0 Well I guess it depends on how specific you make the ‘anything’ – even the greatest evils and the most beneficient acts have a (perhaps very small) doubt about whether they were right or wrong and often we must ask the question “who are we to judge”.<\/p>\n Equally, there are some things which are, quite literally, impossible to call – where two (or more) interpretations of the situations can be quite different but still correct (or wrong – although this doesn’t really count as there are an infinite number of wrong interpretations).<\/p>\n Our mental models therefore incorporate and express all of our biases and prejudices and they are the result of a huge array of factors including all of our experiences to date through our lives.\u00a0 Of course the fact that we are now exposed to so much more information about the world than used to be the case means that we have both the opportunity to better refine these models and the risk of greatly misinterpreting the signs.<\/p>\n There are huge areas of subject matter about which I know nothing (or next to nothing – so little that I would not begin to understand it) and – of course, there are even bigger areas that I don’t even know that I know nothing about. \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n That is not a problem for me – I am comfortable with the fact that no matter how hard I try there is too much in this world for me to know everything.<\/p>\n I do see, virtually every day, many, many instances of people who are unwilling to let go of their own mental models.\u00a0 In some cases, let me stress, this can be a good thing.\u00a0 However, very often (and it has to be said this is becoming ever more prevalent by news presenters when they do ‘interviews’) there is no attempt at dialogue to explore the limitations of knowledge, instead there is a berating of one party by the other, with both being ultra-defensive.<\/p>\n There is a paradox here as well – when I see\/hear someone propounding a point of view or an idea or whatever that doesn’t fit with my own mental model I often think “why can’t they go and learn a bit more’.\u00a0 Why can’t I?\u00a0 Who would benefit most?\u00a0 Are they ‘lacking’ some extra knowledge that I have?\u00a0 Or have I got some ‘incorrect’ knowledge that they have not been exposed to?\u00a0 My mental model makes me think that it might just possibly be me that is wrong.\u00a0 Why should I be the most knowledgeable?<\/p>\n It is said “in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king”.\u00a0 Unfortunately I think that too often we mistake a little knowledge for true wisdom.\u00a0 The greatly increased availability of ‘stuff’ through the medium of the www results in just about everyone having a misplaced sense of ‘knowing’ things about which, in reality, they have no more than a nodding acquaintance!!\u00a0 Watching news bulletins quickly shows that “the man in the street” has a valid (!!!) opinion on absolutely every subject.\u00a0 The reality is often far from that….<\/p>\n If asked to rate my knowledge about some subject on a scale from none to ‘guru’ I don’t ever give myself “top marks”.\u00a0 I have learned that there is always more to learn.\u00a0 It seems to me (and don’t forget this is itself filtered through my mental models) that too manypeople are rating themselves too highly on the knowledge scale.<\/p>\n So, according to my weltanschauung one area where we are failing is in putting too much credence on what we know and therefore paying too little attention to what we don’t know.\u00a0 A second failing is that we tend to fail to take into account change.<\/p>\n It is a well proven that the vast majority of car drivers consider themselves to be “better than average” drivers.\u00a0\u00a0 Now, I know you can prove just about anything with statistics, but this is one which patently must be wrong.\u00a0 However, we all fail in these sort of self-judgement tests and I must be careful whenever I suggest that I am in any way special.<\/p>\n It does seem to me though that there are ‘abilities’ and ‘skills’ that I have that are not shared with the majority of the population.\u00a0 This is not elitist in any way, because it is a statement that can be made about anyone.\u00a0 So, when\u00a0I say things like “unlike most people…” I feel that this is a not unreasonable statement to make about just about anything – it doesn’t make me better – only different.<\/p>\n The fact that I take a very systemic view of the world is one way in which I am (I think) very much in the minority.\u00a0 Is a systemic view the ‘right’ view?\u00a0 I don’t know, but, given that it is what works for me I would have to answer that I believe that it is a better way of understanding the world.\u00a0 I talked about systems earlier – what exactly do I think distiguishes a ‘systemic view’.<\/p>\n Primarily the distinguishing features are a concentration on the interactions and a very strong emphasis on the fact that things do not stand still – change happens – and that change not only changes the world, but it changes me (and my mental models) as well.<\/p>\n There is no doubt that the way I act and react in the world today is very different to the way I did as a teenager or as a child.\u00a0 There are things that I thought or did then that I would not consider thinking or doing now – and vice versa of course.\u00a0 Sometimes change has come suddenly and there is a specific trigger that “changed my mind” – in other cases it is difficult to point to the moment in time when the mind changing happened, but it is clear that comparison between ‘then’ and ‘now’ exhibits significant differences.<\/p>\n I think that for many people cause and effect are inextricably closely coupled – I, on the other hand, most certainly see cause and effect as separated in time and space.\u00a0 Often, indeed, it is only through reflection that the causes can be determined – and even then you must be careful not to use ‘post-hoc’ vision to create a false interpretation.<\/p>\n Another aspect of my systemic viewpoint is that the interaction between competing and cooperating systems is important.\u00a0 I adopt different roles at different times – as does just about everyone else – I am a parent; I am an employee; I am a teacher; I am a musician; I am an athlete; and so on.\u00a0 Apart from these being different roles they exist wihin different ‘worlds’ – my family world; my work world; my church world; and so on.<\/p>\n The worlds (and the roles) can and do overlap to a certain extent but fundamentally they are linked only by whatever\u00a0I<\/strong>\u00a0am.\u00a0 To a certain extent my persona is different in each of these worlds, but they are all\u00a0me<\/strong>\u00a0– inextricably linked – and even though there are aspects of me that do not surface in each of the worlds – and I suspect some aspects that are private to my internal world – the complex relationships between them are driving my behaviour and how others perceive me.<\/p>\n My worldview must therefore assume that the same is true for others and that those parts of them I connect with within the worlds that I inhabit are only part of their own complex characters – I must never assume that I know everything about them.<\/p>\n This has been a long discourse, but I think a necessary one, since it allows me to discuss rather more isolated facets with the advantage of having given this context.\u00a0 In keeping with my worldview, you should not assume that this covers everything!\u00a0 It does, however, lay out the ground rules for interpreting other aspects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Although a few of my previous posts have hinted at this subject I think that now that I have got the initial burst of activity on the blog out of the way it is time to make a clearer statement of where my thoughts are coming from and, therefore, put some context on to the … Continue reading “Mein 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\n<\/em>It\u2019s what you know for sure that just ain\u2019t so.<\/em><\/p>\n