Systems Quotes | Quote Catalog

We think we are creating the system, but the system is also creating us. We build the system, we live in its midst, and we are changed.

— Ellen Ullman, Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents

Technology Simulacrum Projections of Self Systems

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We think we are creating the system for our own purposes. We believe we are making it in our own image. We call the microprocessor the “brain”; we say the machine has “memory.” But the computer is not really like us. It is a projection of a very slim part of ourselves: that portion devoted to logic, order, rule, and clarity. It is as if we took the game of chess and declared it the highest order of human existence.

— Ellen Ullman, Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents

Technology Simulacrum Projections of Self Systems

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Posts are heterogeneous in form (video, images, audio, text) and consists of semi-structured data (e.g. a textual post has a title and a body, but the actual textual content is un-structured). Luckily enough, our users do a great job at summarizing the content of their posts with tags. As the distribution below shows, more than 50% of the posts are published with at least one tag.

— Tumblr Engineering, Categorizing Posts on Tumblr

Engineering Systems Categorization Tagging NLP

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That's the difference between governments and individuals. Governments don't care, individuals do.

— Mark Twain, A Tramp Abroad

Government Care Compassion sympathy Understanding connectivity humanity Systems institutions Inequality Injustice

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Monarchies, aristocracies, and religions are all based upon that large defect in your race—the individual's distrust of his neighbor, and his desire, for safety's or comfort's sake, to stand well in his neighbor's eye. These institutions will always remain, and always flourish, and always oppress you, affront you, and degrade you, because you will always be and remain slaves of minorities. There was never a country where the majority of the people were in their secret hearts loyal to any of these institutions.

— Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger

monarchies Systems the system Religion Minorities slaves minority neighbor Hate bigotry institutions country America Oppression heart Loyalty Philosophy

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The time lags imposed by stocks allow room to maneuver, to experiment, and to revise policies that aren't working.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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A stock takes time to change, because flow takes time to flow.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer Time

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The elements, the parts of systems we are most likely to notice, are often (not always) least important in defining the unique characteristics of the system—unless changing an element also results in changing relationships or purpose.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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A system generally goes on being itself, changing only slowly if at all, even with complete substitutions of its elements—as long as its interconnections and purposes remain intact.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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Changing [a system's] elements usually has the least effect on the system.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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...one of the most frustrating aspects of systems is that the purposes of subunits may add up to an overall behavior that no one wants.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer Truths

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If a frog turns right and catches a fly, and then turns left and catches a fly, and then turns around backward and catches a fly, the purpose of the frog has to do not with turning left or right or backward but with catching flies. If a government proclaims its interest in protecting the environment by allocates little money or effort toward that goal, environmental protection is not, in fact, the government's purpose. Purposes are deduced from behavior, not from rhetoric or stated goals.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Facts Insights Rhetoric Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer Truths

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Many interconnections in systems operate through the flow of information.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Systems theory Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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Do the parts together produce an effect that is different from the effect of each part on its own?

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Good questions Systems

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You think that because you understand 'one' that you must therefore understand 'two' because one and one make two. But you forget that you must also understand 'and.'

— Sufi teaching story, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Insights Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer Wow

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A system is an interconnected set of elements that is coherently organized in a way that achieves something.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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You can be doing something that has always worked and suddenly discover, to your great disappointment, that your action no longer works.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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The system, to a large extent, causes it's own behavior. An outside event may unleash that behavior, but the same outside event applied to a different system is likely to produce a different result.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Self-similarity Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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A system is a set of things—people, cells, molecules, or whatever—interconnected in such a way that they produce their own pattern of behavior over time. The system may be buffeted, constricted, triggered, or driven by outside forces. But the system's response to these forces is characteristic of itself, and that response is seldom simple in the real world.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Systems Thinking in Systems: A Primer

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We think we are creating the system, but the system is also creating us. We build the system, we live in its midst, and we are changed.

— Ellen Ullman, Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents

— Ellen Ullman, Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents

— Tumblr Engineering, Categorizing Posts on Tumblr

That's the difference between governments and individuals. Governments don't care, individuals do.

— Mark Twain, A Tramp Abroad

— Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger

The time lags imposed by stocks allow room to maneuver, to experiment, and to revise policies that aren't working.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

A stock takes time to change, because flow takes time to flow.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

The elements, the parts of systems we are most likely to notice, are often (not always) least important in defining the unique characteristics of the system—unless changing an element also results in changing relationships or purpose.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

A system generally goes on being itself, changing only slowly if at all, even with complete substitutions of its elements—as long as its interconnections and purposes remain intact.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Changing [a system's] elements usually has the least effect on the system.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

...one of the most frustrating aspects of systems is that the purposes of subunits may add up to an overall behavior that no one wants.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Many interconnections in systems operate through the flow of information.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

Do the parts together produce an effect that is different from the effect of each part on its own?

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

You think that because you understand 'one' that you must therefore understand 'two' because one and one make two. But you forget that you must also understand 'and.'

— Sufi teaching story, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

A system is an interconnected set of elements that is coherently organized in a way that achieves something.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

You can be doing something that has always worked and suddenly discover, to your great disappointment, that your action no longer works.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

The system, to a large extent, causes it's own behavior. An outside event may unleash that behavior, but the same outside event applied to a different system is likely to produce a different result.

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer

— Donella H. Meadows, Thinking in Systems: A Primer