Comments on: STEPS Book Launch: Science and Innovation for Development http://rs.resalliance.org/2010/01/26/steps-book-launch-science-and-innovation-for-development/ coping with ecological surprise in a human dominated world Wed, 08 Sep 2010 17:24:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Mike Warner http://rs.resalliance.org/2010/01/26/steps-book-launch-science-and-innovation-for-development/comment-page-1/#comment-222708 Mike Warner Sat, 30 Jan 2010 06:47:34 +0000 http://rs.resalliance.org/?p=2311#comment-222708 This really is an excellent book, reviewing, as it does both Western and traditional/indigenous knowledge, and also including a section on resilience. One point... ... it was actually authored by Jeff Waage of the London International Development Centre: http://www.lidc.org.uk/ ... which is a consortium of London University Colleges (School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, School of Oriental and African Studies and others) who's mandate is to adopt a problem centred, inter-disciplinary approach to development. On that note... ... although I'm a big fan of both the Resilience Alliance and Steps Centre, and am very interested in complexity/systems theory, in the interests of balance, I should point out that quite a lot of LIFE SAVING innovations in development have, actually, come out of a reductionist/cartesian model of science! I have a Swedish mother and am currently based in Stockholm but, sometimes, reading the RA posts one can't help but wonder whether the Swedes have it in for Descartes (who, I hear died of pneumonia up here in Sweden, cos Queen Christina made him get up early in the morning in the middle of winter to teach her about science :-) ) On a more serious note... ... clearly some kindof BALANCE between reductionist science and holistic/systemic/complexity science is what is needed in relation to real world problems in the developing world. So I'd, personally, like to see more books like this which adopt a BALANCED ideological/rhetoric free stance looking at the best things coming out of both models of science. Mike This really is an excellent book, reviewing, as it does both Western and traditional/indigenous knowledge, and also including a section on resilience. One point…

… it was actually authored by Jeff Waage of the London International Development Centre:

http://www.lidc.org.uk/

… which is a consortium of London University Colleges (School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, School of Oriental and African Studies and others) who’s mandate is to adopt a problem centred, inter-disciplinary approach to development. On that note…

… although I’m a big fan of both the Resilience Alliance and Steps Centre, and am very interested in complexity/systems theory, in the interests of balance, I should point out that quite a lot of LIFE SAVING innovations in development have, actually, come out of a reductionist/cartesian model of science!

I have a Swedish mother and am currently based in Stockholm but, sometimes, reading the RA posts one can’t help but wonder whether the Swedes have it in for Descartes (who, I hear died of pneumonia up here in Sweden, cos Queen Christina made him get up early in the morning in the middle of winter to teach her about science :-) ) On a more serious note…

… clearly some kindof BALANCE between reductionist science and holistic/systemic/complexity science is what is needed in relation to real world problems in the developing world. So I’d, personally, like to see more books like this which adopt a BALANCED ideological/rhetoric free stance looking at the best things coming out of both models of science.

Mike

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