Teleological Systems Development and Ateleological Systems Development

Teleology is "the explanation of phenomena by the purpose they serve rather than by postulated causes" says the Oxford Dictionary . On Wikiquote :

Teleology is the study of the purpose or design of natural occurrences. A teleology is any philosophical account that holds that final causes exist in nature, meaning that, analogous to purposes found in human actions, nature inherently tends toward definite ends. Teleologies may be formulated as natural, human, or in terms of a deity. Telic accounts tend toward a goal or definite end, and may thus be interpreted as opposing mechanistic accounts.

Russell L. Ackoff

, in Redesigning the Future (1974) wrote:

Because the Systems Age is teleologically oriented, it is preoccupied with systems that are goal-seeking or purposeful, that is, systems that can display choice of either means or ends, or both. It is interested in purely mechanical systems only.

We should agree that a teleological approach to systems development seems not to provide the answers we so desperately need, what is the alternative? It may seem as if we have destroyed all basis for meaningful behaviour. [p. 25]

It may be useful to try to contrast ateleological behaviour with teleological behaviour, before attempting to outline the alternative. A sense of the difference between teleological and ateleological systems development can be gleaned from the “attributes” of the processes as expressed in Table I.

Table I. Teleological and ateleological development

Attributes of the design process	Development philosophies
Attributes of the design process	Teleological development	Ateleological development
Ultimate purpose	Goal/purpose	Wholeness/harmony
Intermediate goals	Effectiveness/efficiency	Equilibrium/homeostasis
Design focus	Ends/result	Means/process
Designers	Explicit designer	Member/part
Design scope	Part	Whole
Design process	Creative problem solving	Local adaptation, reflection and learning
Design problems	Complexity and conflict	Time
Design management	Centralized	Decentralized
Design control	Direct intervention in line with a master plan	Indirect via rules and regulators

Do examples of ateleological systems development exist? Yes, there are various examples in different fields of social interaction and development that can be distinguished in this manner.

It must again be noted, before discussing these examples, that the distinction as made above is a specific way of using a language and that there is no claim here that this is the only way of distinguishing these two spheres of thinking. This is, nonetheless, a start in the articulation of what are two fundamentally different ways of viewing the world in general and systems development in particular.

A teleological approach is common in the design of built environments. The pattern language approach by Christopher Alexander is seen as an exception.

Architecture and ateleological design

It must, however, be said that the mainstream thinking and philosophy in architecture and urban design are rationalistic and teleological. The exception to this rule is the thinking as embodied in the work of Alexander (1979).

Alexander describes a design process that seeks to design buildings and cities that are alive, beautiful, and whole – those qualities that make people to want to dwell in them. To try to do justice to his theory is beyond the scope of this paper. Some of the important concepts will, however, be outlined. His theory is rich and subtle, and can best be understood by reading his work, especially The Timeless Way of Building. [p. 26-27]

Alexander’s first, and very important principle, is that the design process must be self-generative: “It is a process which brings order out of nothing but ourselves; it cannot be attained, but it will happen of its own accord, if we will only let it”. The design process is not controlled by a “designer” – in this case the architect. The process must be in the hands of the people. It enables them to “design” that, which is meaningful for them. The adaptation between the people and the buildings is profound. [....]

According to Alexander, the second important principle is that the development process should be piecemeal. There should be no big jumps. Each increment must contribute to the whole. It must make it more whole and more alive. This piecemeal process is implemented by a pattern language. It is a “language” because it provides a set of dynamically evolving patterns that are used to express – in physical space (buildings, cities) – the human events of the people using the language.

What is a pattern? Patterns are fundamental geometric structures or relationships that, if applied, will generate wholeness. Patterns are expressed in terms of a rule “which establishes a relationship between a context, a system of forces which arise in that context, and a configuration which allows these forces to resolve themselves in that context”. Patterns are, however, not a fixed set of rigid relationships, but are “a field – not fixed, but a bundle of relationships, capable of being different every time that it occurs, yet deep enough to bestow life whenever it occurs”. [p. 27]

Why consider an ateleological approach? There are perils associated by putting goals first and learning second.

Learning and learning systems

Systems which must adapt in a meaningful and holistic way must be able to learn. Teleological systems have a limited capacity to learn. This limited capacity is brought about by two factors. First, as systems become increasingly teleological, their set of alternative actions become progressively less. In these systems the only acceptable actions are the actions that make the systems behaviour converge towards the selected goal. This limited set of legitimate actions limits the system’s ability to experiment, as behaviour that does not directly contribute to the converging behaviour is inefficient and ineffective. The lack of ability to experiment causes the system to lose its capability to expand its scope of actions – which limits its capability to learn. Teleological behaviour therefore occurs to a greater or lesser degree at the expense of learning.

Furthermore, to learn, the system must be able to appropriate the tacit information that is part of its continual interaction with its environment, for it is through appropriation that new understanding is constituted.

The system must become part of a hermeneutic circle. The system must therefore be able to continually interpret and understand itself in terms of the whole. This implies that the system (as part) must understand its actions or behaviour in terms of its meaningfulness in relation to the whole. To lose this coherence would imply the loss of identity and the wisdom of the whole. Such continual reinterpretation would be seen as inefficient and ineffective forms of teleological behaviour.
The system must remain open to the possibilities of new understanding. Remaining open to new understanding is to be distracted from, or lose sight of, the goals or objectives that are essential for teleological behaviour. [p. 24]

From a systems theory perspective Bateson (1980), using the work of Ashby (1957), showed that a system cannot learn (and thus evolve) unless it is stochastic. Bateson defines stochastic systems as systems that incorporate at least two processes. First, the system must have a random process – a process that can generate diversity. Second, the systems must have a built-in comparator that selects certain events, states, or alternatives based on some type of criteria. The determination of the criteria is critical as inappropriate criteria could force the system into short-term teleological behaviour. In the process of evolution the comparator is “natural selection”. Stochastic systems are, however, divergent. Divergent systems’ behaviour cannot be predicted, and not being predictable means they cannot be “controlled”.

It should be clear, from the above, that learning and control are negatively related. Returning to the process of development it can be concluded that:

The teleological design process (as a convergent process) is very predictable and thus controllable. The process does not, however, have the ability to evolve as it is not able to learn.

To create an evolving development process a “stochastic” ability is needed. An ateleological design process, therefore, is the only way to create a dynamic and learning process between the designers, the users and the information system.[....]