Jeff Long

Berkeley, CA United States

Retired Systems Scientist

I've been exploring the hypothesis that many problems arise from the way they are represented. This class of 'representational effects' arises primarily because of the limitations of our cognitive toolset, specifically our notational systems. There is much historical evidence for our ability to overcome such limitations by use of improved representational (primarily notational) tools. As two examples, we could not represent a symphony without modern staff musical notation, nor dynamic systems without the calculus. I've therefore been attempting to create a new area of study called "notational engineering".