6.5 Appreciating some implications for practice I think for most people, the National Health Service would be experienced as a complex situation. If so this would be a good example of perceived complexity. Remember though, if you engaged with it as if it were a difficulty you would not describe the situation as one of perceived complexity. I could not call it a complex system unless I had tried to make sense of it using systems thinking and found, or formulated, a system of interest within it. This means I would have to have a stake in the
6.2 Natural frequency of free oscillations Most of us have a fairly accurate understanding of what is meant by resonance – it's what causes a bell to continue to make a sound long after it has been struck. Yet this is just one example of resonance, a phenomenon that occurs in nature in a surprisingly large number of places. It is all to do with the reversible transfer of energy from one form to another in a system. The common feature associated with mechanical systems that are able to store energy by oscillating is that they h
4.5.1 Mathematical models Computers in the last few decades have, in many cases, made mathematical modelling a lot easier. Models that used to require hours of manual cranking through long equations can now be created on a screen using specialist software. Processes can be recreated – modelled – in the time it takes to press a few buttons. For example, when designing a pipe network to carry a gas or fluid, such as in the village water supply problem, you might wish to know how the flow would be distributed w
Conclusion This free course provided an introduction to studying Engineering. It took you through a series of exercises designed to develop your approach to study and learning at a distance, and helped to improve your confidence as an independent learner.
4.10 High girders and the train Divers found the high girders lying on their sides in the shallow water of the river bed a short distance away (Figure 22), within which the almost intact remains of the train itself was found. No bodies were recovered because they had all been washed away by the river or tide. Although bodies were recovered
4.8 Photographs showing the detail: standing pier 28 The final part of the survey deals with the two standing piers connected to the lower girders left after the high girders section fell during the disaster. The whole of pier 28 is shown in Figure 34, and two close-ups of the columns are shown in Figures Author(s):
3.1 Protein diversity Of course, our bodies can't just be made up of squidgy bubbles of phospholipid, or we would collapse in a heap on the floor! Stiffer frameworks, both inside and outside the cells, also exist and help to define shape and add strength. These frameworks are formed largely from structural proteins, a class of polymeric materials that form fibres and filaments to provide mechanical support for cells and tissues. Structural proteins are made inside cells but are often then moved into the spa
6 Part 2: 2 Immersing yourself in complexity The first three activities in Figure 4 are to plan a strategy, then to immerse yourself in an example of complexity, and then represent that complexity through drawing a rich picture. I've selected a rich picture as the focus of this task because it is a means of bringing you into a
19 Part 3: 3 Sustaining and disruptive innovation You can experience this free course as it was originally designed on OpenLearn, the home of free learning from The Open University: Author(s): 9 Part 2: Invention You can experience this free course as it was originally designed on OpenLearn, the home of free learning from The Open University: Author(s): 5.1 Introduction to key concepts Before I go any further I will establish the meaning of some of the key concepts that you will encounter throughout this unit. The key concepts elaborated in this unit are: inventor invention design product champion entrepreneur improver innovation dominant design robust design lean design radical i References References 8.7 The festival of Durga Puja in Calcutta Although Hindus are not required to attend temples on set days in the week, the Hindu year is punctuated by days dictated by the lunar calendar during which puja (worship) should be offered to a particular deity or deities. Hindu festivals often combine the marking of the changing of the seasons and the 2.3 The significance of Volksgemeinschaft in Nazi ideology Hitler made no reference to Kristallnacht in his speeches at the time of the event. Less than three months later, however, on 30 January 1939, he gave a two-hour address to the Reichstag. The speech focused principally on the international situation but contained the ‘prophecy’ that a new war would bring about ‘the destruction Vernichtung of the Jewish race in Europe’. The ‘prophecy’ was singled out in newsreel coverage of the speech, yet neither the official References Keep on learning   There are more than 800 courses on OpenLearn for you to Learning outcomes After studying this course, you should be able to: assess the specific problems concerning the health of a community describe how medical knowledge was a resource for, and was shaped by, broader cultural perceptions of the body. 2.3.2 Love Please now read ‘Dogs and Wolves’. This poem is amazing in its forceful, simple-seeming expression of an extraordinarily complex combination of thought and emotion. The ‘dogs and wolves’ are the speaker's ‘unwritten poems’. Why ‘unwritten’? One infers that other matters take priority over love poems. But – ‘unwr 1.6 Further reading For an advanced general introduction to the philosophy of language, see Blackburn 1984. Lycan 1996 is pitched at a more accessible level. Pinker 1994 is an informal but informative discussion of the hypothesis that much of our linguistic ability is innate, an important topic that has had to be left out of this course.
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