Culture, Communication, Complexity.

Tag: control systems

Subscription

Post author By G
Post date Feb 5, 2026
No Comments on Subscription

In a world that has deeply and intractably commercialised the concept and experience of individuality, the very last thing actually required of us is to be different. We are sorted and we voluntarily self-sort into labels and categories, compressing ourselves into neat, data-ready boxes that serve as containers for self-managed subscription into vast machines of […]

Philosophy

Atlas, Debugged

Post author By G
Post date Jan 30, 2026
No Comments on Atlas, Debugged

I no longer believe the world can be healed by better arguments, smarter policies, cleaner data, or more sophisticated machines. These things mostly just turn the volume up on whatever is already broken. The deeper condition is non-closure: the simple fact that complex systems do not stabilise by resolving tension, but by holding it in […]

cybernetics language Philosophy

Living Inside Language

We learn to navigate the world by drawing lines through it. Self and other. Mind and world. Human and machine. These distinctions help us function, the way handrails help us walk down unfamiliar stairs. They stabilise action and expectation. But they are not where reality begins. They are not built into the fabric of existence. […]

Tags abstraction, abstraction drift, adaptability, administrative rationality, algorithmic decision making, ambiguity tolerance, artificial intelligence limits, automation and society, bureaucratic systems, categorisation, cognitive science, communication systems, complexity science, consciousness studies, control systems, cultural systems, cybernetics, data driven systems, decision infrastructures, distributed intelligence, efficiency logic, embodied cognition, emergence, epistemic humility, Epistemology, ethical technology, everyday philosophy, extended mind, feedback loops, formalisation, generative systems, governance systems, human centred systems, human cognition, human experience, humane design, information theory, institutional design, instrumental rationality, intelligence as field, interface thinking, language and reality, language technologies, loss of context, machine learning critique, managerial logic, meaning making, metrics and meaning, modern rationalism, Ontology, organisational behaviour, perception and reality, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, popular philosophy, power and knowledge, predictive systems, procedural reasoning, provisional knowledge, public understanding of complexity, resilience, responsibility and agency, rule based systems, science communication, sensemaking, social complexity, social systems, standardisation, symbolic systems, system optimisation, systems theory, systems thinking, technocracy, technological mediation, translation across domains, uncertainty

cybernetics

Productive Misanthropy

Service delivery systems must model the environments they act within. This is unavoidable. Eligibility rules, risk categories, performance metrics, and compliance frameworks are all abstractions that allow action under constraint. The model is not the world. It is an interface that reduces complexity to something administrable. Over time, however, the interface acquires weight. The abstraction […]

Tags accountability regimes, activation policy, ADM oversight, administrative burden, administrative error, administrative exhaustion, administrative violence, adverse outcomes reproduction, algorithmic governance, appeals system, APS governance, ashby law, audit and assurance, audit culture, audit logs, australian public administration, automated decision making, backlog dynamics, benefits navigation, bureaucratic drift, campbell law, carceral throughput, care coordination failure, case load pressure, case processing, centrelink processes, churn management, commonwealth integrity, comparative public policy, complex adaptive systems, complexity informed governance, compliance complexity, compliance theatre, consultancy dependence, control systems, cost shifting, cybernetics in policy, debt recovery algorithms, digital by default services, digital identity, dignity in service delivery, disability services, documentation requirements, downstream harm, eligibility criteria, entropy displacement, epistemic closure, explainability, feedback loops, frontline discretion, general systems theory, goodhart law, governance-failure, government accountability australia, health system navigation, high dimensional systems, human centred design, identity verification burden, incentive design, income averaging, inequality reproduction, information asymmetry, institutional complexity, institutional self maintenance, integrated services, jobseeker compliance, justice system churn, knowledge hierarchies, KPI gaming, legibility politics, marginalisation dynamics, metric fixation, model provisionality, model reality mismatch, mutual obligation, mygov access, NDIS administration, non take up, operational efficiency traps, organisational learning, organisational legitimacy, payment suspension, performance reporting, performance targets, policy compliance burden, policy framework inertia, policy humility, policy implementation gap, policy modelling, poverty administration, procedural churn, procedural denial, procedural friction, procedural justice, procedural opacity, procurement incentives, productive misanthropy, provisional metrics, public accountability, public sector ethics, public sector reform, public value, queue management, rationing by process, recidivism cycle, recipient experience, regulation lived experience, regulatory systems, representational assumptions, requisite variety, review tribunals, risk management culture, risk scoring, ritualised validation, robodebt, robodebt royal commission, sanctions regime, sensemaking organisations, service delivery systems, service design, service recipient entropy, services australia, services australia call centre, social determinants of health, social protection systems, social welfare policy, state simplification, statistical governance, street level bureaucracy, system stability versus success, systems dynamics, systems thinking, target culture, transparency, trauma informed services, triage systems, trust in institutions, unemployment services, welfare administration, welfare conditionality, workforce australia

cybernetics

Meaning: Uncertainty Disco

Post author By G
Post date Jan 2, 2026
No Comments on Meaning: Uncertainty Disco

Meaning does not exist in words, ideas, or intentions taken in isolation. It arises from a relational system in which elements acquire significance only through their differences from one another over time. Words are defined by other words; references defer to further references; interpretation always lags expression. That lag is not an accident or a […]

Tags adaptation, ambiguity, Artificial Intelligence, authoritarianism, automation, climate systems, coercive power, communication systems, complex governance, complex systems, control systems, cybernetic governance, cybernetics, disinformation, ecological collapse, entropy analogy, environmental crisis, Epistemology, fascism, feedback loops, field theory, geopolitics, global instability, Global Systems, governance-failure, information ecosystems, information entropy, knowledge systems, language philosophy, manifold semantics, meaning, meaninglessness, misinformation, planetary boundaries, planetary governance, platform governance, policy failure, political systems, post-truth politics, power dynamics, relational meaning, resilience, semiotics, shock absorption, socio-technical systems, systemic resilience, systemic risk, systemic-fragility, systems collapse, systems theory, technological systems, uncertainty