ec&mos.ppt 001 presentation file name: mgtedf.ppt based on ec&mos.ppt version 5 march 2007
TRANSCRIPT
EC&MOS.ppt 001
Presentation
File Name:
MGTEDF.ppt
Based on EC&MOS.ppt
Version 5 March 2007
One Area of Public Policy:Education.
Is there a problem?
EC&MOS.ppt 010
EC&MOS.ppt 115
Do Schools Nurture High-Level Talents?
Is what they do do valuable?
EC&MOS.ppt 116
Some overall assessments
of the quality of the service.
EC&MOS.ppt 117
In the course of repeated studies in Sweden, Andersson found that, in round figures:
One third liked school.One third found it just about tolerable.But one third found it an intolerable and destructive experience.
In a study conducted by the Northern Ireland Council for Educational Research, 98% of a random sample of secondary school pupils said that they felt that they had been failures at school.
EC&MOS.ppt 118
In the US, after one of the largest studies tracking pupils through their education and beyond, 30-year-olds were interviewed about the connection between their education and their subsequent lives. The interviewers asked open-ended questions and the interviews were tape-recorded, and a printed version produced.
Reading them, one gets an overwhelming impression of people floundering around in the job market until they find a niche which suits them.
Most said that the educational system had failed to help them think about and develop their talents.
They developed the competencies they needed on the job.
EC&MOS.ppt 119
To examine the connection between the educational system and people’s subsequent lives and careers, the investigators gave batches of the interview transcripts to a range of well-established researchers and asked them what conclusions they drew.
A remarkable number said that the only conclusion one could draw was that the schools should be closed. But this was not sociologically realistic. And all that could be done was ask how the schools could be made happier, more developmental, places.
EC&MOS.ppt 120
In a series of studies we conducted several times, over many years, and in several countries, we asked secondary school pupils to rate, separately, how important they considered to be each of the subjects they were studying and how interesting they found each.
More than HALF rated more than HALF of their subjects BOTH Boring and Useless.
What is more, they did not change their minds as they grew up, left school, and got jobs.
In contrast, work was much better than being at school.
After being at work for more than 5 years more than 80% liked their jobs, liked their employers, and found their jobs interesting.
83% said they had been better able to develop their talents at work compared with school.
EC&MOS.ppt 122
• Most of what happens in most schools does not deserve the name "academic" or "intellectual“ because it involves little analysis, judgment, critical thinking, or reconciliation of different points of view.
• Most of the work is boring, routine, and repetitive.
EC&MOS.ppt 124
In Elementary Schools even the competency-oriented components the teaching of reading, writing, and counting are badly done because teachers do not know:
▪ Students motives.▪ How to diagnose problems.▪ How to invent remedial strategies. (All of which is
why most children are actually taught to read by their parents.)
Johnston and Bachman and Raven found that: ▪ Many primary school classrooms are soul destroying
environments. ▪ A significant number have teachers who are
destructive of pupils’ characters and personalities.There is little attempt to vary teaching methods and
content so as to engage the motives, and foster some of the talents, of all of the pupils for at least some of the time.
EC&MOS.ppt 008
Knowledge Based Education is Largely a Waste of Time
Formal Knowledge has a half-life of a year. So what has been taught is forgotten by the time when it is needed.
It is out-of-date when it is taught.And does not relate to the problems which will be met.
A knowledge-based curriculum fails to come to terms with the “information explosion” ... it is impossible to teach more than a tiny fraction of both what is known and up-to-date information.
./cont.
EC&MOS.ppt 009
What people need is a unique combination of up-to-date specialist knowledge. Not general out-of-date knowledge.
Even when it is relevant to jobs, what has been learned has no impact after two years: After that people rely on knowledge gained on the job.
Few enter jobs in their area of specialty. Many university graduates end up as shelf-fillers, maids, clerks, or working in call centres.
But, as is shown dramatically in the next slide LEVEL of education relative to others IS important.
EC&MOS.ppt 010
Relative Social Status of Persons Completing Secondary School but then Terminating their
Education
Son's Status (%)
Father's Status Higher Same Lower
1.Professional and high administration - 28 72
3.Inspectional, supervisory, etc. 18 25 57
5.Skilled manual, routine non-manual 52 36 12
7. Unskilled 94 6 -
EC&MOS.ppt 125
Education confers little added value.
Students differ greatly from each other.
Some arrive with abilities, competencies, and motivational predispositions which will help them to do well in school and later life.
But most teachers do not help these or other students to develop – or even recognize – these qualities.
Yet they are not immutable.
Most adults can think of one teacher who did help them to develop.
And they blossom dramatically when they get to work.
EC&MOS.ppt 012
As if all this were not enough
1) in study after study, exam qualifications at any level at which education may terminate have no predictive validity whatsoever to job performance.
2) staying on at school if one does not already have the characteristics of those who typically stay on does one very little good.
EC&MOS.ppt 014
In Conclusion
Most of what schools spend so much time teaching and assessing is a waste of
time.
• What we have is a norm-referenced system that does little more than legitimise the rationing privilege and, through qualification inflation, keep numerous people occupied.
EC&MOS.ppt 126
ACHIEVEMENT OF WIDER GOALS
Chart 1
Importance of Objectives: Adolescent Pupils
Percentage of pupils rating each objective “very important”
82
79
78
76
76
73
72
71
67
66
55
51
44
38
37
36
32
29
28
22
9
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
1. Initiative to introduce change
2. Independence
3. Outside Speakers: Careers, other topics
4. Apply knowledge to new problems
5. Characters / personalities
6. Careers information
8. External examinations
9. Express self articulately
13. Able to study independently
15. Masters of destinies
23. Consideration of others
27. Right and wrong
36. New subjects: Philosophy, sociology etc
38. Wide range of cultures / philosophies
39. Interest in non-examined subjects
41. Sense of duty to community
42. Parenthood: Home-craft
43. At home w ith figures / numbers
45. Non-examined aspects of subjects
49. Rules: (clothes / hairsstyles in school)
50: Rules out of school behaviour
EC&MOS.ppt 010
EC&MOS.ppt 010
How nurture “confidence and initiative to introduce change?
Competence to build up own understanding.
Like “culture of enterprise” a group characteristic requiring diversity.
Exams: not top priority but gets attention: sociological function.
Latent and Manifest goals
Teachers’ job: intervene outside the system.
Understand social forces.
Unless they do these things they cannot do their job effectively.
New definition of teacher competence … appraisal. (cf item 1)
EC&MOS.ppt 010
The word educate comes from educere which means to draw out .
To draw out diverse talents.
EC&MOS.ppt 134
More than half the pupils we interviewed said more should be
done to achieve 90% of the objectives we asked them about.
EC&MOS.ppt 030
Chart 2
Importance of Objectives: Teachers
Percentage of teachers saying each objective “very important” for “more academic students”
93
92
92
90
89
89
88
82
82
82
78
76
71
68
68
67
58
44
39
35
19
16
13
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
1. Characters / personalities
2. Independence
3. Able to study independently
4. Sense of duty to community
5. Express self articulately
6. Opinions of own
7. Consideration for others
8. Clarify life-goals
9. Express self clearly in writing
10. Right and wrong
14. Careers information
16. Apply knowledge to new problems
21. Initiative to introduce change
23. External examinations
24. Non-examined aspects of subjects
25. Form hypotheses, seek evidence, reason
28. Masters of destinies
32. At home with figures / numbers
34. Wide range of cultures / philosophies
36. Parenthood: homecraft
37. New subjects: philosophy, sociology etc
38. Sceptical
39. Have a good time
EC&MOS.ppt 032
Chart 4
Teachers’ Ratings of Success with which Objectives are Attained
Percentage of teachers saying Education “very successful” or “moderately successful”in achieving each objective with “more academic” students
83
61
53
53
52
50
49
48
42
41
35
33
32
30
24
21
16
11
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
1. External examinations
2. Right and wrong
3. At home with figure / numbers
4. Thorough religious education
5. Express self clearly in writing
6. Get on with other people
7. Characters / personalities
8. Opinions of own
13. Careers information
15. Able to study independently
21. Apply knowldege to new problems
23. Non-examined aspects of subjects
26. Initiative to introduce changes
29. Form hypotheses, seek evidence, reason
31. Masters of destinies
33. Interest in non-examined subjects
38. Parenthood: homecraft
39. New subjects: philosophy, sociology etc
EC&MOS.ppt 127
Most teachers - even those who think the wider goals
are important (and many do not) - say they do little to achieve them.
EC&MOS.ppt 010
Chart 3
Objectives which teachers say they try to achieve with more academic students
Percentage saying they “try very hard” to do this in their own lessons
76
63
61
60
59
59
57
53
53
39
34
31
27
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
1. Exams
2. Considerate
3. Make sure enjoy lessons
4. Opinions of own
5. Sense of duty to community
6. Read and study on own
7. Right and wrong
10. Independence
11. Character and personality
16. Facts and techniques to new problems
22. Clarify life goals
23. Confidence and initiative
25. Inform about jobs and careers
EC&MOS.ppt 129
Classroom Observation studies confirm teaches’ statement
self-assessments: Little is done.
EC&MOS.ppt 131
Teachers are, in any case, not in a
position to implement educational
programmes to achieve these
goals since they do not know their
pupils' values, and systematically
underestimate their serious-
mindedness.
EC&MOS.ppt 132
EC&MOS.ppt 132B
EC&MOS.ppt 133
Outcome Assessments
EC&MOS.ppt 135
Percentage of Pupils Saying That Their Teachers Helped Them “A Lot”
Studying For:
O Grades Highers
With examinations 25 40
With personal problems 6 4
To be independent 9 8
With things useful in a job 9 6
To get on with people 7 7
To have confidence 13 11
EC&MOS.ppt 136
Percentage of Adults Saying That Their Own Education had Been “Useful”
HSES LSES
To help them get a job 58 18
To do their job well 50 18
To run their homes well 13 9
To help them use their leisure
18 5
To help the develop useful skills
13 10
EC&MOS.ppt 137
The role models teachers present are inappropriate and lacking in diversity.
Most teachers self-images are of down-trodden, ineffectual, people who are unable to get control over the constraints on their own lives.
EC&MOS.ppt 138
Our work in primary schools showed
that there was a lot of variance in
teachers’ objectives and demonstrated
considerable isomorphism between
teachers’ objectives, the classroom
processes they implemented, and
their actual effects on pupils' priorities
and feelings of competence.
EC&MOS.ppt 139
CONCLUSION
Some two thirds of the money spent on "Education" is wasted so far as the development of human resources is concerned.
Thoughtful people are right to be concerned: the problem is that the most widely recommended solution - prescription of content and testing - is misguided.
Pupils are RIGHT to be turned off, de-motivated, and to protest.
EC&MOS.ppt 140
But, Actually,The Situation is Worse
Than That
EC&MOS.ppt 141
…. because most schools actually have negative effects.
… Not only from the point of view of damaging personal development but also because they actively contribute to a sociological process which is contributing to the extinction of our species.
We can begin to appreciate this by RECALLING that
schools NOT ONLY DO NOT DO the things they are expected to do
they also promote a disproportionate number of the wrong people into influential positions.
Is this an accident produced by the absence of the understandings, tools, and arrangements that have already been summarised?
OR IS IT (at least in part) A RESULT OF SOME DEEPER PROCESS?
EC&MOS.ppt 143
What Do Schools Do?
EC&MOS.ppt 145
1. CREATE endless useless “WORK” for:
– Pupils and students– Teachers and lecturers– Advisors– Inspectors– Administrators– Examiners– Counsellors– Educational Researchers– Accountants– Tax Inspectors– Politicians
Our largest single industry.
EC&MOS.ppt 146
2. LEGITIMISE THE RATIONING OF PRIVELEGE
They do this by creating the illusion that economic differentials are legitimate:
a) The “best” people (as determined by single-factor models of “ability” [acting as surrogates for a preoccupation with personal advancement]) get to the top.
b) If the poor are poor it is their own fault: they lack “ability” and “motivation”.
c) It renders most talents invisible and fails to develop them, thereby obscuring the fact that many people contribute in essential, but very different, ways to their organisations and society.
EC&MOS.ppt 147
3. CONTRIBUTE TO THE CREATION AND PERPETUATION OF A DIVIDED SOCIETY
which, in turn, has the effect of inducing people to do all sorts of things they do not want to do(in order to avoid to fate meted out to those who don’t join in) and, as a result, to the perpetuation of a destructive society.
They do this by (a) teaching things through the “informal curriculum” and (b) directly. (See next slides).
EC&MOS.ppt 148
3. a The “informal (or latent) curriculum”
Pupils WITHIN SCHOOLS learn to:
Work without question at the boring and useless tasks of which school education is so largely composed (thereby “learning to labour” in Willis’s sense);Seek to secure their own competitive advantage rather than that of the wider group.
Concentrate on ingratiating themselves with their superiors in order to secure personal advantage. The most effective learn to work out for themselves what pleases their superiors (teachers) and then concentrate on doing just that. (Bernstein; Tomlinson & Tenhouten. Also implied by students’ rejection of Schon and Argyris’s attempts to revamp management education at MIT.)/contd
EC&MOS.ppt 149
3a. The Informal Curriculum (contd)Pupils WITHIN SCHOOLS learn to:
• Be “cornflakes package people” - i.e. all hype and no substance - to present themselves as what they are not; to make claims they cannot honour - and especially to present themselves as contributing to others and society whist in fact promoting themselves. (“Learning to labour” in a sense that Willis did not notice).
• Accept the right of others to decide what they will do, decide which abilities “count”, unilaterally assess them in terms of these abilities, assign their position, and determine their access to benefits, and their access to developmental experiences.
• Practice, recite, and echo (instead of challenge) the myths of the system (thus both (i) reinforcing the system and (ii) developing in pupils the habit of echoing rubbish).
EC&MOS.ppt 150
3 b i. BESIDES TEACHING THESE THINGS, SCHOOLS ALSO CONTRIBUTE DIRECTLY TO SOCIAL DIVISION by promoting
a) People who know how to make convincing claims that they cannot live up to but in such a way as to avoid detection.
b) Those who are most concerned to advance themselves and least interested in the well-being of their fellows or in achieving the manifest goals of their organisations (but who know how to present themselves as being the opposite).
(See Bernstein and Tomlinson & Tenhouten for studies in schools. Among adults, Hogan found that 50% of American managers drive their organisations into the ground for the sake of personal gain, often deliberately destroying and discrediting the competence and credibility of their colleagues in order to do so. Day & Klein, Hope, and Raven & Dolphin, studying public service managers, came to similar conclusions. Hogan and Raven & Dolphin found that many destroyed the developmental potential of their organisations in order to make them “efficient” and advance themselves.)/cont
EC&MOS.ppt 151
3 b i (contd) SCHOOLS CONTRIBUTE DIRECTLY TO SOCIAL DIVISION by promoting
c) Those who are least inclined to think about wider social issues and do something about them. (It in fact squeezes such people out: We found that the most upwardly mobile were the least concerned to act for the good of their communities.)
d) Those who intone the right words and echo the prejudices of their superiors and fellows.
e) “Court Jesters” (Chomsky) who discuss issues in a way that suggests that they are known and being tackled, thereby taking the wind out of the sails of anyone who might try to arrange for something really to be done about them.
/contd
EC&MOS.ppt 152
3 b ii. SCHOOLS CONTRIBUTE DIRECTLY TO SOCIAL DIVISION by demoting
• Those who work independently, think for themselves, question the received wisdom, and, especially, challenge authority. (Tomlinson & Tenouten).
• Those who are able to get control over their own lives and set about directly tackling problems for their own and other people’s benefit. (Dore, McClelland, Nuttgens, Schon: MIT’s prize students did not want to be competent managers).
EC&MOS.ppt 153
This Network of
Interlocking
Processes Has Many
Direct and Indirect
Effects
EC&MOS.ppt 154
1. A divided society induces many people, against their will, to:
a) Participate in the manufacture and marketing of junk foods, junk toys, junk insurance, junk health care products, junk education, junk research.
b) Be willing to engage in 100 unethical acts every day: to drive cars, eat bananas, wear clothes sporting fashionable brand names produced in sweatshops, treat others in demeaning ways, pay taxes to support a war machine, etc.
In order to avoid the demeaning and degrading treatment heaped on those who are deemed to lack the necessary abilities.
EC&MOS.ppt 155
2. It contributes to the illusion that, if the poor are poor, it is due to their own incompetence and indolence.
This helps to divert attention from the fact that those who are least able to perform the roles expected of them are, not the poor, but the leaders and managers of our society.
This oversight in turn reinforces the tendency to lay the blame for the ills of society at the door of the poor and the powerless (instead of at the door of the leaders and managers of society.
EC&MOS.ppt 156
MORE SPECIFICALLY,
THIS PROCESS SHIFTS BLAME FOR
THE STATE OF EDUCATION
FROM SOCIETY’S LEADERS AND MANAGERS
TO POWERLESS TEACHERS.
EC&MOS.ppt 157
It looks as if the current worldwide moves to “devolve” control of education to groups of parents who are to hold teachers accountable for achieving centrally determined goals is an attempt to shift the blame for the faults of the educational system from the system’s leaders and managers to teachers - who have neither the power, the resources, the competencies, or the time that is needed, let alone work in the context of a network of expectations which would allow them to respond to the diversity of parents and pupils’ needs and values or within the kinds of structures that would be needed to initiate the necessary developments.
The whole enterprise of “curriculum development”, “testing”, and meeting the demands (especially the paperwork demands) of the “national curriculum” diverts attention from the issues and creates busy work - just like the “market mechanism”.
EC&MOS.ppt 158
There is one more generalisation we can draw out of this discussion - a generalisation which may help us to find a way forward.
This is that the most pervasive and least remarked feature of modern society is that we live in an Orwellian (or “Alice in the Looking Glass”) world in which nothing is what it seems to be - and is usually its opposite.
EC&MOS.ppt 159
Some examplesEducation is not about developing the talents of children but, as a minimum statement, about legitimising the rationing of privilege and, probably more seriously, there to perform the more basic sociological functions we have discussed.
Cornflakes and other goods are not what they claim to be: only the image.
The Marketplace is not about efficiency, but about creating the maximum number of useless jobs - witness insurance - which are differentiated in such a way as to induce participation.
Democracy is a façade for management by the TNCs.
“Loans” of money are entirely fraudulent. The money “lent” did not previously exist and has not been withdrawn from any other possibly productive process.
“Defence” systems offer no defence at all but are recipes for certain death.The “efficiency of centralised production” is a myth. /cont.
EC&MOS.ppt 160
IN SHORT: SOCIETY IS HELD TOGETHER BY MYTHS WHICH ARE EVERY BIT AS IMPORTANT AS THOSE THAT ARE SO OBVIOUS IN “PRIMITIVE” SOCIETIES.
If we are to find a way forward it will be necessary to make such myths explicit and examine their functions.
We cannot expect to make much progress if we take things at their face value.
EC&MOS.ppt 161
SO NOW WE MAY BRING TOGETHER
WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED ABOUT
WHY THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
NEGLECTS ITS MANIFEST (BUT
CORRECT) GOALS AND ATTEMPT
TO DISCERN A WAY FORWARD
EC&MOS.ppt 162
Why Main Goals Neglected1. Do not know how to achieve.2. Will not come to terms with social functions of education -
incompatible with self- image.3. No means of assessing – so can not:
(i) See progress .(ii) Monitor own effectiveness.(iii) Get credit in certification process.(iv) Get credit in accountability and evaluation.
4. Value-Laden:One group or other opposes. Incompatible in same class.
Need to individualise in relation to pupil's values so pupils can practice components of competence, but teachers don’t know pupils' values and do not respect "working class" values.
Assessments value-laden.Can only observe if classroom elicits.Observers’ perceptions influenced by his/her values and
competencies: Lack ability to manage independent, thoughtful, people.Need to influence values - fear of brainwashing.
Handle by choice. But prevented by lack of respect and worries about perpetuating status quo. Compare private schools.
\cont.
EC&MOS.ppt 163
Why Main Goals Neglected (Cont.)
5. Transformational. Can't specify outcome in advance.
6. Requires sensitive monitoring and facilitation of growth. Conflicts with “teaching as telling” and satisfactions wanted from job: centre of attention, source of information.
7. No tools to help teachers administer individualised, CBE programmes. Too much to expect.
8. Variety and choice in conflict with equality: Worries about reinforcing social divisions.
9. Conflict with beliefs about behaviour to be expected of public servant. Requires teachers to attend to pupils’ needs and invent ways of meeting them. Requires teachers and pupils to be doing things they do not know how to do and the outcomes of which they cannot specify in advance. Public servants not expected to be innovators and adventurers: expected to do bidding of elected representatives. Criteria and tools of accountability. Creation and management of innovative climates in schools/public service.
Won't call for research because do not think it can help them with such problems.
EC&MOS.ppt 172
Figure 1: Feedback loops driving down quality of education
EC&MOS.ppt 174
Looking at the diagram as a whole, what we now see is:
1.That what happens is not determined by the wishes of parents, teachers, or ministers of education but, both directly and indirectly, by the sociological functions the system performs by society. One needs to take these sociological forces seriously and ask how they can be harnessed.
2.That one effect of these sociological forces is to create inappropriate beliefs – and these reinforce existing inappropriate beliefs about society and how it is to be managed. On the one hand, the educational system teaches these beliefs. On the other, what can be done to improve it is very much constrained by them.
3.That what happens is determined by a system, or network, of forces. \cont.
EC&MOS.ppt 175
Looking at the Diagram as a whole we see: (Cont.)
• That, as a result, any attempt to change any one part without considering the system as a whole will be negated by the rest of the system.
• That pervasive, systems-oriented, change is required. But that change, although system-wide, cannot be centrally mandated because there are too many new things to be done. What is needed is pervasive experimentation and learning.
• How 2, 4, and 5, both individually and collectively, both (a) drive attempts to reform the system ever more narrowly around the top triangle and (b) divert attention from the necessary developments that are listed in the bottom part of the diagram.
\cont.
EC&MOS.ppt 176
Looking at the diagram as a whole we see that: (Cont.)
7. The causes of the symptoms (and thus the appropriate places to start reform) are far removed from those symptoms.
8. The most important developments have to do with
(a) finding ways of harnessing those sociological forces (i.e. it is a classic academic task calling for fundamental developments in theory) and
(b) generating new beliefs about how public policy is to be managed.
The most important developments are therefore anything but obvious. “Common sense” alone will not work.
EC&MOS.ppt 177
The diagram again underlines the need for pervasive innovation in
every nook and cranny of the system.
The changes that are needed cannot be even envisaged by a small group
of people.
They cannot be centrally decreed.
EC&MOS.ppt 178
What Kanter terms “Parallel Organisation” activity is required.
This has two main components:
1. Time for all concerned (teachers, system managers, pupils) to experiment with:
Ways of catering for different types of pupil.
Ways of nurturing different competencies.
Ways of giving pupils credit for different outcomes.
Interfaces with parents and employers.
Ways of giving teachers and managers credit for having contributed in very different ways to the system.
Ways of ensuring that all act on information in an innovative way in the long-term public interest.
2. Recognition of the need for a wide variety of different types of contribution (fund raiser, publicist, prototype maker, and so on) to any one of these efforts.
EC&MOS.ppt 179
This conclusion is precisely the opposite of that which lies behind current government policy and widely held beliefs about how public management – and hierarchical management more generally – should work.
Again, particular attention should be drawn to the need for pervasive experimentation designed to influence and help us to understand the systems processes which determine what happens.
We do not need system-wide, centrally decreed, change.
EC&MOS.ppt 180
Note the way in which myths that it is “unreasonable” to challenge sustain the system.
One cannot in a sound byte or in any normal contribution to a political meeting say anything because anything one needs to say only makes sense in the context of a network of understandings which are not shared.
Without this background anything one says is, at best, incomprehensible – and more often just absurd.
The system itself thus discredits anyone who has anything serious to say about how it is to be changed.
EC&MOS.ppt 181
Note the need for change in the way in which we think about the role of public servants:
It is their job to: Create variety. Arrange for the short and long-term, personal and social
consequences of each to be monitored in a comprehensive way (expand each).
To create a climate of innovation and systems learning and action.
If we are going to get them to do the things we need to change: Their job descriptions. The organisational arrangements in which they work, and
the procedures used to find out whether they are behaving in appropriate ways.
The necessary developments in all these areas are centrally dependent on contributions from psychologists.
EC&MOS.ppt 182
Note also that, if we are to harness the sociological forces which we can now see to be so important we are critically dependent on developments in psychology.
Reiterate the need for experimentation which is designed to illuminate – i.e. help us to understand the operation of – the hidden sociological system itself.
Hence note the need to change the way we think about the nature of experiments. They are means of throwing light on a larger hidden reality. They are not means of sharply discriminating between theories. It is the insights gained in the course of a study that are most important; not the “hypotheses tested”.
EC&MOS.ppt 183
Numerous, comprehensively evaluated experiments based on different perspectives, assumptions, or theories are required. Most importantly, these experiments need to be monitored for what they have to tell us about the operation of hidden systems processes.
Note then the links to parallel organisation activity
BUT ALSO NOTE THE NEED FOR FUNDAMENTAL RESEARCH
ADVENTUROUS, PROBLEM DRIVEN fundamental research.
EC&MOS.ppt 185
SOCIO-CYBERNETICS
EC&MOS.ppt 187
AUTOPOIETIC
EC&MOS.ppt 189
Imminent Disasters
Collapse of Biosphere(Due to CO2, CFCs, destruction of rain forests)
Collapse of Food Base(Due to destruction of soils, seas, atmosphere)
Collapse of World Order(Due to treatment of Third World)
Collapse of Financial System(Due to the fact that prices no longer mean anything, usurous lending of non-money, inequity in incomes, and irresponsibility
of bankers)
Collapse of everything(Due to nuclear winter)
EC&MOS.ppt 190
Bill Rees and others concerned with “ecological footprints” have shown that:
For everyone in the world to live as we live, it would be necessary to have five
back-up planets engaged in nothing but agriculture to both provide the direct agricultural products that would be needed and rectify the continuous
destruction we wreak on the soils, the seas, and the atmosphere.
EC&MOS.ppt 191
Virtually all graphs of the consumption of resources, the destruction of life, and the destruction of the soils, the seas, and the atmosphere, show exponential increases, mostly growing much faster than the “population explosion”.