 Systems thinking, in its most general sense, is a way of seeing the world. Before anything, it places great emphasis on the question of how do we see the world, that is to say our subjective interpretation of events. Human beings are not infinitely knowing creatures. We have a limited set of sensory and cognitive capabilities with which to interpret events. This limitation manifests itself in the fact that our attention is always limited. Our reasoning is often biased, and we're continuously using many assumptions to take shortcuts and rapidly draw conclusions. From the systems thinking perspective, it is seen as paramount to gain an awareness to what these limitations and bias within our reasoning and models are. The heart of systems thinking is a recognition of this subjectivity, that is the recognition that how the world appears to us is not merely in some objective form, but in fact our conceptual systems structures, defines and interprets every piece of information and endeavor that we undertake, whether in science, management, engineering or everyday life. Indeed it is precisely because of this systems thinking would hold that any serious endeavor needs first to understand the structure and makeup of the paradigm that is being used. This is in contrast to our more analytical approach, which holds that the world is largely objective, it simply exists and we just need to go and discover how it works. Here little reference is made to the assumptions and overall paradigm used to understand the world. The main emphasis is simply on building models, with which to understand some objective reality. Systems thinking would put forward the idea that the subjective dimension of how we interpret events is just as important as objective inquiry, that if we do not understand our subjective processes of reasoning, we have no real way of knowing if they're truly valid or invalid, whether what we know is based upon a coherent and sound set of assumptions or is it in fact based upon a weak or misleading set of assumptions. Systems thinking then puts a much stronger emphasis on self-awareness, where awareness is the ability to know directly, to perceive, to feel or to be conscious of events, objects, thoughts, emotions or sensory patterns. Awareness of one's way of seeing the world and the process through which we reason is seen as a prerequisite to effective cognitive capabilities. In this sense, we can understand systems thinking as a form of meta-language, in that one of its explicit aims is to help individuals to understand their processes of reasoning and how our actions and the world they create lead directly from how we reason and see the world. David Baum, the famous 20th century physicist, talked about this as such. The reason that we don't see our problems is that the means by which we try to solve them are the source. That may seem strange to someone that has first heard it, because our whole culture prides itself on thought as its highest achievement, and the achievements of thought I am not trying to say are negligible. There are very great achievements in technology and various other ways in culture, but there's another side to it. One of the obvious things wrong with it is fragmentation. Thought is breaking things up into bits which should not be broken up. We can see this going on, we see the world is broken up into nations, yet the world is one, and you can see with the nation we have the boundary of the nation. We have established the boundary of a nation, now that is invented by thought. If you go to the edge of the nation, there's nothing there particularly. This quote illustrates well how our very thinking creates the world around us, and ultimately how it creates the problems that we encounter. Before anything, it is in understanding these processes of reasoning and the paradigm that constitute our way of seeing things that we have the greatest chance to make a difference to gain a deeper understanding of the world around us, and a greater capacity to act effectively within it. Cognition is a very demanding exercise, and thus it makes sense for us to use preconceptions and assumptions to limit the demand on this energy-expensive exercise. These tools of preconception and assumption-based reasoning are an important form of abstraction, but we need to be able to use them instead of them using us. To be an effective thinker is to understand the dynamics of the conceptual system that we're using, and this gives one the capacity to use it in a professional manner to generate knowledge, instead of it using us as we simply react to our preconceptions. Our tacit assumption is that we are in control of our thought processes and how we see the world. The Enlightenment gave us the conception of the rational individual, the idea that humans are endowed with the capacity of abstract thought, that modern humans are rational and calculating, that we use our intellectual capabilities to act in a purposeful way. However, over the past 30 years or so, as this idea of the rational individual has come under scrutiny within economics and the social sciences, it's proven limited in scope. Humans are capable of abstract reasoning, but this is typically not what people do. For most people, it is not particularly enjoyable, and often an over-demanding exercise. More often instead, we use all sorts of automatic inference processes based upon assumptions, so as not to have to reason. In this process, we are not active agents of our own thought, but instead are guided by assumptions. To be an effective thinker, one needs to hold an awareness to our set of assumptions, beliefs, and understand the paradigm that we're using. One needs to be aware of the assumptions that one is using, and be able to adjust them when needed. To use concepts and processes of reasoning like a professional uses her tools, and not letting those tools use us, which is often the case. David Baum again puts this well when he says quote, There is this feeling when we're thinking about something, it does nothing except inform you of the way things are, and then you choose to do something. That is the way people are talking, but the way you think determines the way you're going to do it, and then you don't notice, a result comes back, but you don't see it as a result of what you've done, even less you see it as a result of how you're thinking. Unless the thinking changes, it won't be correct. Unless we see the source of it, it will never change. We need some kind of awareness of what thought is doing, let's put it that way, that seems clear, but which we don't have generally speaking. Systems thinking recognizes that it is, before anything, how we think that creates the world we live in. Thus systems thinking is primarily concerned with the metacognitive skills that are required to understand, appraise, and use thinking effectively and constructively. So this is where we start with the systems thinking journey. It is to say, how do I see the world? What is my set of assumptions, beliefs and values? And then to go out into the world and notice how the way that you see the world affects how you act in the world. The way in which your world view influences and decides what you're going to pay attention to and also decides what you're not going to pay attention to, thus shaping our perception all day every day.