J D R de Raadt

• Melbourne Centre for Community Development - www.melbournecdd.com

El tema de este libro es el pensamiento. De Raadt presenta una forma de pensar que combina la erudición humanista cristiana de Erasmo, la filosofía social y las bellas artes de la República Holandesa del siglo XVII, y los avances más recientes en teoría modal, ciencia de sistemas y sociocibernética. Su objetivo es enseñar a sus alumnos a pensar de...

The theme of this book is thought. The author presents a way of thinking that combines the Christian humanist scholarship of Erasmus, the social philosophy and fine arts of the 17th century Dutch Republic, and the more recent advances in modal theory, systems science and sociocybernetics. His endeavour is to teach his students to think in a humane...

This book is divided in two parts. The first part is a historiological study of the decline of the family during the modern era. It explores the epistemological origins of this decline brought about by two opposite forces, instrumental rationality and subjectivism. The second part explores the parallels between the biblical view of the family and s...

Recientemente presenté una conferencia plenaria en el 14o Congreso Brasilero de Sistemas (2018). La conferencia se titulaba “El razonamiento cibernético y la ética de la vida y el trabajo”. Argumenté que el hombre moderno no usa el cerebro en la forma en que está diseñado para ser utilizado. Los animales lo usan de la manera correcta y es por eso q...

I recently delivered an address to the 2018 Systems Science congress in Brazil. The address was entitled “Cybernetic Reasoning and the Ethics of Living and Work”. I argued that modern man does not use the brain the way it is designed it to be used. Animals use it the right way and that is why they are so incredibly intelligent despite their brain b...

In this book, de Raadt examines concepts of informatics – such as dis-information, noise and uncertainty generated by global interconnectivity – that explain the destabilising effect of information technology on society. These concepts are derived from cybernetics and are pedagogically presented to provide students an understanding of the social an...

The 1970s mark a historical point of the rise of neo-liberalism and of the gradual crumbling of socialism as a force to oppose it. Since then, neo-liberalism has become the mainstream creed that permeates every institution in our global world in addition to, and of especial interest to us, the university and the formation of its students. Given its...

This book is an edited collection of papers – written by the authors over a period of twenty years – that describes the transition from a system approach to thinking to educational programmes focused on community development. Multi-modal systems thinking integrates the humanities to inspire people to live fully, socially and ethically. The book cov...

This is a book for people, Christians and non-Christians alike, who are disgruntled with the incongruities of of post-modernity and who are willing to engage in some serious thinking to un-derstand what is happening to us and what should be done about it. The author argues that, despite our material achieve-ments, modern man has regressed to mediev...

Starting from the crisis in our communities—research has indicated it to be widely spread—the author explores the scientific tradition preceding the rise of modernism in order to draw out a more humane way of thinking that may help our contemporary societies. He discerns between two types of Renaissance humanism, one characterised by its cleverness...

Though it is claimed that Melbourne is one of the most liveable cities in the world, a systemic examination, based not on mechanistic and utilitarian foundations but on a humanist, systemic science reveals that a variety of modalities of its social fabric are threatened and will drive the city to eventual collapse. As usual, the worst impacted are...

The introduction of information technology in society during the last 30 years has brought mixed results. There is evidence that the benefits to society may not outweigh the detrimental effects that have followed this technology. This is partly because its inclusion in the affairs of humanity has been guided by a mechanical and utilitarian world vi...

Contemporary approaches to ethics are centred upon utilitarian and formal ethics. Yet, these are not capable of counteracting the moral crisis in our society. We must move beyond self-interest or merely doing what is specified in codes, to Samaritan ethics, which means attending to the needs of our neighbour even when he is unable to repay us. This...

This paper supports the inclusion of Christianity in the European constitution. It does this by analysing the role that an ethical vision plays in sustaining a community and the impact on other critical factors such as ethics, work, management, social structure and education that ensues when vision is undermined. It examines in particular the contr...

This paper introduces an evaluation method for community projects based on the multimodal systems approach. The method differs from the common mechanistic approach to evaluation in four ways. Firstly, it uses the long-term life (viability) of a community as the ultimate criteria of evaluation. Secondly, it is normative; that is, it focuses on the r...

This article is based on my presidential address to the Swedish Operational Research Society 1996 Conference. It starts with a statement affirming the critical need to incorporate virtues and norms in the management and operation of our institutions. With the help of multimodal systems thinking and Stafford Beer's Viable Systems Model, it builds a...

Without Abstract

The object of this inquiry is threefold. Firstly, it reviews the historical process through which science has become depersonalised and secularised. Secondly, it investigates the normative consequences of this. Thirdly, it proposes a way to integrate thought as part of our person and as part of our experience of God and the universe.

This is an examination of the role that systems scientists ought to play in the present historical situation. After reviewing the basic elements of multi‐modal systems thinking, it applies these in an analysis of the process of decadence in civilisation. It concludes that the systems thinker in a decadent civilisation must go beyond teaching and ad...

Examines two types of cybernetic filters which can be incorporated in a management information system (MIS). The design of these filters is dependent on the type of uncertainties which an organization experiences in its environment and also on the response time of the organization to environmental disturbances. The response time is in turn determin...

The viability of a social system is dependent upon its ability to generate information and learn. This requires an appropriate arrangement of its information systems, incorporating two types of recursions and reflecting two methods of learning. The first method generates information; the second one invokes it from a higher organisational level. Not...

Our world is becoming increasingly interdependent; events in one part of the globe combine with events in other parts to strike a host of social systems. As a result of this combination of distant events, systems find that the time interval between one disturbance and the next is significantly shortened. On the other hand, interdependence among soc...

This article examines the process of information transmission in adaptive, viable organizational systems. Beer's viable system model is used to explain a system's information requirement at each time of the adaptation process, the source of this information and the effect of information transmission on a system's cohesion. Four hypotheses are state...

This is an appraisal of the impact that the mechanization of knowledge has had upon modern society, and a search for the driving force behind this mechanization. The investigation starts by examining the multimodal structure of social systems, giving special consideration to the discrete modal orders that are found in a civilized and humane society...

Many social systems in the past and in the present have evinced a lack of humanity. This may be attributed, at least in part, to the reductionistic ideas that have underpinned social design. These ideas have failed to see the multi-modal character of human life, and as such, ignore the things that matter the most to mankind, such as love, faith and...

A cybernetic model is proposed to explain the generation of disinformation in formation systems and its impact on the viability of an organization. Viability is defined in terms of organizational equilibrium and stability. First, a measure of information is selected. Second, the organization's use of information to attain equilibrium when disturbed...

Every system (whether it be a self-directed missile, a predator, a man, or an organization) needs a model with sufficient information to accomplish its purpose and be viable. The quantity of required information is determined by the uncertainty and the complexity of the environment in which the system operates and the level of success which is nece...

This study examines Ashby's law of requisite variety: its theoretical origin and its relevance to organization and management. This leads to a statement of hypotheses which are tested empirically. The empirical work includes the operationalization of variety and entropy and the collection of data in an insurance organization. The data are statistic...

Ashby's homeostat model and Ashby's law of requisite variety are applied to an organizational situation involving insurance agents. It is argued that Ashby's model may explain the skewness found in the output distribution of work. An empirical study using sales figures of insurance agents is included.

This is a study of ethics from a systemic point of view. It starts by stating the foundation of ethics in God and postulating that the essence of ethics is love and self-denial. The study then turns to examine the relationship between ethics, faith, justice and sentiment. This is followed by the operational aspect of love and its expressions in a v...