[SystemSafety] The Leveson Indictment

[Les Chambers]

Nancy

RE: < I think it is time for me to get off this list. There is too little
useful and correct information about system safety. Please remove me.>

 

It is true that posts on this list sometimes venture into serendipitous
territory. But this is the very nature of discourse between creatives. You
wander into the seemingly irrelevant and all of a sudden something highly
relevant emerges.  August Kekulé had a day-dream of a snake seizing its own
tail (this is a common symbol in many ancient cultures known as the
Ouroboros or Endless knot) and went on to discover the ring shape of the
benzene molecule. Postit notes came out of a 3M focus group suggesting that
3M should make a glue that wasn't sticky. 

I share the experience of many designers, in that many creative insights
come at you from left field when you are not thinking about design. 

 

It is also common for people with ideas to be written off as irrelevant.
They are routinely demonised as an eccentric and quirky - even dangerous.
Case study: David Harel, who reports there were suggestions that state
charts were unsafe (this was 20 years ago - you deserve the right of reply).

 

You are entitled to your opinion but I think it's a little harsh. From time
to time this list has been invaluable to me (example: the formal methods
discussion). 

 

Cheers

Les

 

Harel paper:
http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~harel/papers/Statecharts.History.pdf

 

-------------------------------------------------
Les Chambers
Director
Chambers & Associates Pty Ltd
 <http://www.chambers.com.au> www.chambers.com.au

Blog:  <http://www.systemsengineeringblog.com/>
www.systemsengineeringblog.com

Twitter:  <http://www.twitter.com/chambersles> @ChambersLes
M: 0412 648 992
Intl M: +61 412 648 992
Ph: +61 7 3870 4199
Fax: +61 7 3870 4220
 <mailto:les at chambers.com.au> les at chambers.com.au
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