Systems

One way to understand the various patterns and processes in our world is to think of them as "systems" (e.g., the criminal justice system, neural systems, economic systems, etc.). There's lot of talk about these systems ("blame the system"; "you can't beat the system") and efforts to change them, but not a lot of understanding about how systems actually work. We will bridge this knowledge gap by learning about what all systems have in common, how they respond to change and why it is difficult to change them in predictable ways.