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Remembering John Warfield* Julie Thompson Klein Remembering John Warfield 2 Remembering John Warfield* Julie Thompson Klein, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, USA, Email: [email protected] doi: 10.22545/2010/00011 will always remember the day John Warfield of Arts in mathematics and a Bachelor of Science declared, \Im taking you to the war room." in electrical engineering and in 1949 a Master of IThe \war room" was the famed interdisciplinary Science in electrical engineering. In 1952, he earned think tank on the George Mason University campus a Ph.D in electrical communications from Purdue where John and his colleagues engaged in integrative University. design and problem solving. The excitement of their During the course of his career, John held many work and other projects is conveyed in the wonderful important positions. He was elected president of the 1 photo of John, shown in Figure 1 Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society of the Insti- tute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and president of the International Society for the Systems Sciences. He was an editor of Systems Re- 1 Who is John Warfield? search and of the IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics. He was also president of Inte- John Nelson Warfield was born and grew up in Mis- grative Sciences and the AJAR Publishing Company. souri. When he died, he held the title of University Beyond these academic posts, he had ten years of Professor Emeritus and Laureate at George Mason industrial experience and was the author of two U.S. University. Warfield began advanced studies at the patents on electronic equipment. It comes as no University of Missouri but, like many of his gener- surprise, then, that John was honored in his lifetime. ation, found his life interrupted by World War II. He received the Joseph G. Wohl Award for Career After basic training in the U.S. Army Infantry, he was Achievement at the 2006 annual meeting of the IEEE placed in an electrical engineering program. When Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society. The high- the war was over, he returned to the Columbia cam- est award conferred by the Society, it acknowledged pus in Missouri, where in 1948 he received a Bachelor his contributions to systems engineering concepts, 1TheATLAS Publication thanks Special Collections and methodology, design, education and management. Archives and at George Mason University Libraries, for ac- In 2007 he also received INCOSE Pioneer Award cess to the photo with Dr. Warfield (upper right) and a col- and the IEEE Third Millennium Medal. league working on an early computer in the 1950s. George Mason University <http://vault217.gmu.edu/?p=1302> John was not a boastful man, so not one to tout and original source The Pennsylvania State Engineering such accomplishments or being called, as he was, Review, Summer 1954. \the father of systems science." These qualities were *TheATLAS Publication thanks The Association for Inte- evident to everyone who met him at annual meet- grative Studies, for permission to reprint and adapt for this ings of the Association for Integrative Studies (AIS), special issue remarks previously published in \Remember- ing John Warfield,” AIS Newsletter, 32, 2 (March 2010): a professional organization dedicated to advancing 7-8. interdisciplinary education. He was a kind and easy- Transdisciplinary Journal of Engineering & Science Vol. 1, pp. 2-4, (December, 2010) ISSN: 1949-0569 online Julie Thompson Klein Remembering John Warfield 3 Prior to his passing, John was chosen to be ed- itor of the new Transdisciplinary Journal of Engi- neering & Science, a project of the ATLAS orga- nization. The journal will now be dedicated to honoring him by recognizing responsibilties for a culture of peace and transdisciplinary knowledge. He was also paid tribute in vault 217, the online newsletter of the Special Collections & Archives at the George Mason University Libraries. The tribute highlights selected portions of 100 archival boxes of professional materials he donated in 2000. Accessible online, the John N. Warfield Digital Collection includes his papers as well as oral his- tory interviews, videos of class lectures, and filmed sessions of his Interactive Management process (http://digilib.gmu.edu:8080/xmlui/handle/1920 /3059). Figure 1: John is Working with a Colleague. The second edition of Johns book A Science of Generic Design, published by Iowa State University Press in 1994, is ample testimony to his accom- going person who enjoyed a good debate, but also plishments. It represents his thinking on managing chatting informally with anyone during meals and complexity through systems design. Sitting next breaks at AIS conferences. John attended many to my treasured copy of A Science of Generic De- conferences and was an early proponent of the link sign is another collection of writings that tap the between complexity and interdisciplinarity. In 1997, astonishing range of his mind, including essays on at Appalachian State University, he spoke on \Seven topics he presented at AIS conferences. In one of Milestones in the History of Thought." At the 1996 my personal favorites, \Reading for Bureaucrats," gathering at Eastern Michigan University, he con- he offers an annotated digest of important readings sidered implications of five schools of thought for culled from over thirty years of studying complexity. integrative inquiry in his presentation on \Interdisci- Other works pull together his own essays on com- plinary Domains and Complexity." At the Arizona plexity, and he lays out a plan for The Great Uni- State University-West conference in 1995, he partic- versity in The Wandweaver Solution. Characteristic ipated in a panel on \Demands of Complexity on of John, The Wandweaver Solution is a systematic Integrative Communications." At the 1993 meet- proposal complete with research background, chal- ing hosted by Wayne State University, he defined lenges, vision, programs, schedule and benefits. It \Criteria for Structural Thinking" that would help was supported by a multi-year research support from promote incorporation of structural thinking into the Ford Motor Company (http://www2.gmu.edu/ interdisciplinary teaching and research. In 1990, at depts/t-iasis/wandwaver/wandw.htm). St. Anselms in New Hampshire, his topic was \On In his last paper, published in this special issue, Language Components of Integrative Studies." He John Warfield exhibited another vital quality that proposed four terms for use in integrative sciences{ defined his life. He never stopped working to achieve platform theory, domain theory, subsumption, and the kind of change he knew is needed. His plan for supersumption. In 1988, at the University of Texas{ Horizons College acknowledges the importance of Arlington meeting, he explored how liberal arts could a liberal education and attendant values of critical revitalize science. In his presentation on \Universal thinking, analysis, and problem solving. Yet, he ex- Priors to Science," he examined the roles of human horted, a liberal education and the current structure beings, language, reasoning through relationships, of institutionalized learning are not enough to realize and archival representation. In 1987, at Pennsyl- a science of synthesis and systems design grounded vania State University, he spoke on \Knowledge in the cognitive domain of complexity. The sweep Integration and the Systems Community." of his intellect and experience is readily apparent in Transdisciplinary Journal of Engineering & Science Vol. 1, pp. 2-4, (December, 2010) ISSN: 1949-0569 online Julie Thompson Klein Remembering John Warfield 4 his vision, reaching from Aristotle, William Shake- College (edited, 2002), the monograph Mapping Interdis- speare, Alexander Pope to Ford Motor Company, the ciplinary Studies (1999), and Humanities, Culture, and U.S. Defense Department, and the country of Ghana. Interdisciplinarity: The Changing American Academy Only a genuine \landscape of systems learning," he (2005). She is also author of the forthcoming book Creat- admonished, will be capable of the level of problema- ing Interdisciplinary Campus Cultures, Associate Editor tization and comprehensive portrayal, appropriate of the forthcoming Oxford Handbook on Interdisciplinar- responses, and implementation and management of ity, and author of numerous book chapters and journal responsible programs that is required. articles. In this regard, John reminded me of another im- portant figure who was one of the architects of the seminal 1972 book, Interdisciplinarity: Problems of Copyright © 2010 by the author. This is an open access Problems of Teaching and Research in Universities{ article distributed under the Creative Commons Leo Apostel. Even with their distinctively different Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ intellectual backgrounds{ one a philosopher and the by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and other a systems engineer and their different cultural reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. styles{forged in American and European traditions{ they were both committed to bridging the discourses of interdisciplinarity and systems thinking. They also shared a tendency to stand still physically while talking, but their minds were also moving. And, they shared a rhetorical style, always interrogating un- derlying assumptions while formulating conceptual tools for interdisciplinarity and laying out an opera- tional approach. When I met Leo, he talked about another visionary in the 1972 book{Erich Jantsch. Unfortunately,
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