AmateurRadio.com

What is the most important aspect of life?  Having fun! (Of course!).

Perhaps it is unusual to wax philosophical in an amateur radio forum, but I am going out on a limb to share a perspective that hopefully is refreshingly new and full of life:  Systems thinking — an amateur radio approach.

What I’m sharing herein, I find very intense, invigorating, challenging, and motivational! The more I think about amateur radio with this perspective–the Systems Thinking perspective–the more fun I’m able to define, and then accomplish.

In my opinion, this approach to life is REVOLUTIONARY! Why isn’t this knowledge distributed far and wide?  Why aren’t these precepts taught in the schools for young children, so that they can be equipped for a life full of accomplished purpose?  Perhaps it is due to the deceptive simplicity of approaching life with the perspective of Systems Thinking.

SYSTEMS THINKING AND AMATEUR RADIO

Amateur Radio as a Service – a System, not a Collection

What is Systems Thinking?

In a very simplistic sense, a system is any group of parts that make up one complex whole.  Each part cannot function as the whole, and each part interacts with other parts, such that this behavior affects that end result which is expressed by the whole.

Think about a motorcycle.  Let’s play with that thought: I disassemble my motorbike in your living room.  Once the bike completely taken apart and the parts are scattered all over your living room floor, can any one of those parts support my riding it out to the countryside, and back again?  No.  Only the bike can act, when it is made whole again, as a motorbike.  But, even if the individual parts, doing their part well, try to be the bike all by themselves, but fail, in the end realize that the parts are very important.  Each part has a place and a job.  Each part belongs.

By now, as you think about this, you probably realize that there is a difference between collections, and systems, of course.  A bag of rocks is not a system.  A motorcycle is a system.  A bag of motorbike parts is not a motorbike.  The assembly of the motorbike parts does make a motorcycle.

What does this have to do with amateur radio?

The amateur radio service (hobby) is a system, not a collection.  There are many parts–and one of the most important component of the amateur radio system is you and me.  We interact with each other, exchanging knowledge, reports, friendships; we each function, lending our functioning the the autonomous self, the amateur radio service.

It takes more than one of us to make up the amateur radio service.  It would take at least two amateur radio operators, at the most extreme emaciated existence as a public service. It is obvious that one ham, all by herself, does not make the amateur radio service.  No one of us is the amateur radio service, by ourselves.  We need each other in order to have a ham radio community–the amateur radio service.  Ourselves, our radios, antennas, computers, knowledge, schedules, and so on, are all parts of the big system with which we participate in our community.

Let that sink in.

Ponder the long-term repercussions of this revelation:  We need each other, and we need our resources (time, skills, knowledge, radios, etc.).

How do we shape our System?  What will elevate our System so that it is effective?  And, so we begin to do this, SYSTEMS THINKING.

Please read, and ponder these thoughts, as you read through this article:

https://thesystemsthinker.com/a-lifetime-of-systems-thinking/

Additionally, you should check out this video–it is  great!

Bonus (not necessary but still VERY good deeper dive):

In my estimation, Dr. Russell Ackoff is amazingly wise, and inspiring!

SYSTEMS THINKING

At the moment, I am studying and trying to implement system thinking.  It is the topic I am mostly studying right now.

The following is an introduction to Systems Thinking:

https://thesystemsthinker.com/

Download this useful paper that helps you understand system thinking:

http://nw7us.us/systems-thinking/Introduction-to-Systems-Thinking-IMS013Epk.pdf

I would very much like to hear your thoughts on all of this.  Seriously.  Take your time.  But, let’s start wading through this pool of refreshing water…

Happy New Year!

Tomas Hood
NW7US

Addendum:  I do not necessary agree with every perspective, conclusion, or point made by Dr. Russell Ackoff.  Never-the-less, the overarching idea of systems thinking seems valid, and is worth considering.

“Radio Hams” do more than play with their machines. They are also invaluable in relaying vital information during times of tragedy and disaster.

Here is a mildly entertaining look at radio hams, those amateurs sending and receiving coded messages during the late thirties when films first dealt with the subject of “radio hams.” In this case, the ham operators manage to be helpful during situations of stress, using their abilities with code to help someone in distress and to seek aid for pilots flying a missing plane.

The humorous ending has the family gathered around the radio listening to someone speaking Chinese while the narrator tells us how impressed the family was to be hearing someone across the world on their radio set.

This little vintage film, a rather more serious film than many of Pete Smith’s other presentations, takes a look at how ham radios can become priceless aids during emergencies. The two stories shown, one dealing with sickness, the other with a missing plane, are bookended by a humorous look at a typical three-generation family’s fascination with their ham radio.

Of course, amateur radio, or “ham radio”, is alive and doing very well, in our modern times. Using satellites, moon-bounce communications, repeater networks, as well as shortwave, mediumwave, and longwave telecommunications technology, amateur radio continues to provide emergency services in times of need, from hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, and even during such times as the infamous 9/11 atrocity. But, amateur radio also breeds invention and experimentation, always at the cutting edge of science. It is a hobby worth investigating, having room for a wide-range of interests. Preppers, science lovers, experimenters, and those with a passion to meet people from all over the world by way of radio waves, all together make up the radio hobby of amateur radio.

Clayton Moore, later famous as the Lone Ranger, appears uncredited as a ship radio operator.

Directed by Felix E. Feist

Writing Credits Buddy Adler (screenplay) (as E. Maurice Adler)

Cast (in alphabetical order)

Barbara Bedford – Mrs. Crane (uncredited)
Eleanor Counts – Miss Mulligan, Jimmy’s Sister (uncredited)
Jack Daley – Pa Mulligan (uncredited)
Robert Homans – Lighthouse Keeper (uncredited)
Clayton Moore – Ship Radio Operator (uncredited)
Alonzo Price – Clyde DeVinna (uncredited)
Jason Robards Sr. – Pilot in Distress (uncredited)
Pete Smith – Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Harry Strang – Man in Montage (uncredited)
Phillip Terry – Co-Pilot (uncredited)
Dorothy Vaughan – Ma Mulligan (uncredited)

Produced by Pete Smith – producer (uncredited)
Music by David Snell (uncredited)
Cinematography by Robert Pittack
Film Editing by Philip W. Anderson (as Philip Anderson)
Music Department Jack Virgil – orchestrator (uncredited)
Other crew Douglas Smith – technical advisor

According to https://archive.org/details/wwIIarchive this film is in the Public Domain.
Creative Commons copyright.