Thinking about the VSM and the Person

[Mark Johnson]

If you don't know it, this article by Allena Leonard is useful...
http://www.allennaleonard.com/PersVSM.html

[Alex Hough]

Allenna Leaonard's article has made for interesting and repeated reading for a VSM apprentice like myself. I would be interested to read other members stories. Below is my first attempt of writing about VSM and my personal experience. In doing so I hope to learn something and would welcome comments. I always find it difficult to decide when to start a story, but since I have just cooked myself some lunch, I will start with cooking.

Cooking has shifted from a S1 to a S2 for me; I used to be a chef and eared my living from cooking; I wrote restaurant reviews and a cooking column; I used to be an art student and wrote to about cooking in the context of art as part of my work; all were S1 activities to me. Now cooking is in my S2, for functional and recreational reasons. But it is also part of my identity, S5, in the here and now. In S5 cooking is of a creative act and a time for daily reflection informed by various realms of knowledge. I do look out into the environment (S4) for new ingredients and methods of food preparation, largely in Chinese cooking.

It is now important to get back to my S1 otherwise I will be spending too much time writing here, which would be affecting my personal VSM. Am I getting VSM and the person? Any comments welcome.

[Mark Johnson]

Thanks Alex,

It's interesting how we can talk between ourselves like this and know what we mean (and it's useful). If we can nail it down a bit and make it accessible to people outside the community, then I think there's something important to say...

Mark

[Alex Hough]

Clarity sought.
The output of the distiller at the automatic gave "technology as amplifier": what does this mean and what relevance is to VSM and the person?

[Mark Johnson]

I think at the simplest level, we can say technology amplifies human action - obviously muscular action (pulley, car), but also our capacity to organise ourselves and others.

It may not be quite that simple: more deeply, there's stuff to look at in Marx on work, labour and surplus (see also Arendt "the Human Condition"), and also Heidegger's view of human action as basically reordering/organising a 'standing reserve', where technology reveals new standing reserves (with a JCB, an empty field becomes a potential building site). Beyond the VSM, it's worth looking at the biological cybernetics of Maturana for more clarity. But I think amplification is a good starting point.

[Alex Hough]

Yesterday I went to the Furturesonc [1]conference on social networking. I was trying to think of people's activities in social networks in a VSM way. I think I remember reading in on of Stafford Beer's books something like this: "The problem with computers is that people think that they are using them as attenuators of variety is that they are actually amplifying."
My observation at the conference yesterday was that the urge to order, tag and classify data in the social networking context, seemingly amplifies personal variety. It does, but it has an impact on the requisite variety. Too much time is spent organising a trivial part of the envirnmnet. To achieve requisite variety attenuating variety would be a better strategy, and amplifying personal variety in another way.
Have I got this right?
[1] http://www.futuresonic.com/08/ideas/

[Mark Johnson]

Tagging, ordering and classifying gives us more 'stuff to do' - so apparently an increase in variety. On the other side, the activities of online action are mediated through common interfaces, with power to attenuate variety through synergising practices, making connections between things, etc. Furthermore, online action is social action, and the efficacy of it reaches beyond the person to the social environment. To not engage with it may be more threatening than to increase personal variety.

In the final analysis, I don't see this as a net increase or decrease in personal 'stuff to do', but reorganising activities such that the variety of personal action is amplified through technological empowerment: much of what those technologies actually do is attenuation (RSS for example).

[Alex Hough]

"The problem with computers is that people think that they are using them as attenuators of variety is that they are actually amplifying." - I think that this is because it is fun to use new toys and we all like to use the same ones so that we appear to have things in common.

The social networking tools are channels. In the VSM, as I understand it, the channel would have a capacity for variety, it would be an attenuator or an amplifier and there would be transponders. I am thinking how I can map the VSM onto a Social Media, and measure it as a channel.

I would like to think about how to manage these channels for my personal VSM and incorporate them into the tool I am designing for the VSM and the person.

I would be interested in what tools people use in their personal VSM and why.

[Mark Johnson]

My advice would be don't map it onto the media, map it onto the person. The VSM of the person needs to be able to explain your first paragraph.

I'm not sure about channels: there's the whole thorny problem about information. Bateson's definition of information is about right IMO: "a difference that makes a difference". In other words, you can't take the observer out of the equation.

With regards to tools, have a look at PLEX, which was a project I was involved with (http://www.reload.ac.uk/plex), and Flock (http://www.flock.com), which is not dissimilar, but more 'polished' (and I use it all the time)

[Steve Hales]

I don't think we can talk of "computers". For me different types of software do different things: Email can be a major variety increasing tool depending on how a business doesn't manage it. On the other hand, databases, when searched, are variety attenuators in that they can ensure that only appropriate information is retrieved - if well designed. Websites are marvellous amplifiers. etc.. It all depends on what the software is for. I think the key point is that software provides marvellous tools that can be used to ensure requisite variety whether in attenuation or amplification. However, they are frequently not planned properly resulting in "information overload" or work turning into "dealing with emails". Worth a deeper think.

[Patrick]

Hi Chaps
been a while getting to this - sorry!
I think this is an area well worth exploring more. Thanks for the link to Allena's paper Mark - I hadn't seen that before.
Just to pick up on it, if you run VSM as a "diagnostic" initially, you can see its use in picking up all sorts of stuff, people who have S2 problems and book themselves to be doing two things at once (they come across as disorganised), people who have S1 activities that are contradictory and S2 is overloaded (they come across as inconsistent, or liars). There are people with S3 problems, do I really allocate my time effectively to maximise my synergy? Nope. Other S3 issues - failure to deliver.
People with 3* issues (including another set of people who tell porkies). Lots of people (me included) have immense problems with balancing their 3-4 homeostat. As a mate of mine said "there are two types of people - ones who only start things they know they can finish and those who start lots of things and may finish a few of them.
Then there's the whole aspect of identity and looking at that in terms of structural coupling. What are the relationships you have with the world that involve structural coupling, so either they can change you or you can change that bit of the world. So Mark's cooking is one of those, something you did that changed who you are and how you operate. Even though you may not still be a chef, its still a part of your identity isn't it?
As far as social media goes, I can see a connection to all of those and more...

[Mark Johnson]

Hi Patrick,

I agree with your presentation of this. I think this is useful and needs some serious work. One of the barriers to getting this stuff 'out there' is the psychologists who think they've got this territory mapped. What would you say to them?

[Alex Hough]

Hello,

OK. So my system 4 how has some more info: there are psychologists out there and Mark thinks that they think that they have the territory mapped.

For the construction of my personal map, these maps you be useful. Could either of you direct me towards them?

I am interested how creativity might feature in a personal VSM.