Breaking the Four Pieces Limit – Defence

The Four Pieces Limit describes the limit on our conscious mind – that is, we can’t keep more than four things in play at once. In a skirmish or a battle, it can be a very serious limit, preventing us from seeing opportunities or dangers.

There are many other areas where the Four Pieces Limit is a severe limitation – economics, for example, where a simplistic theory seems to work well for a while, until some other factor becomes dominant, and then it sounds more like “thoughts and prayers” than science.

It is a common problem at the limits of human endeavour. So what can be done about it?

Active Structure is the name of a technology that allows the building of large and complex analytic structures, which start off undirected. The structures are created using statements in English. English, as is any natural language, is a powerful way of describing the most complex problems we can think about. But the English language is a complex problem in itself, far too complex and interwoven to be fully understood consciously under a Four Pieces Limit. We long ago accepted this limit, and understand we can only work on facets of it, with the machine handling all the interconnections.

Different aspects of the technology become important at different points in the cycle.

The Specification or Plan

A specification is a large and complex document, constructed from the input of many specialists, who don’t necessarily understand the contributions from other specialists. Active Structure can help here by linking everything together, by showing the underlying meaning, and combing the document for errors and inconsistencies.

Detailed Processes

The processes relevant to a particular role. The role needs some familiarity with the roles around it, some information on the mechanisms and networks that support it, and a (possibly simplified ) view of the overarching task described by the specification.

Decision Point

There is a decision point with two paths – be arrogant and think we can know it all, or be humble, accept that we have a Four Pieces Limit, and use tools that can carry a heavier cognitive load and ease the collaborative burden, while we work on facets of the problem. The analogy of a truck is strong – it is just that we are a little more sensitive about using a machine to share cognitive loads than we are about a truck carrying physical loads. 

But what about ....?? This is a strong reason for communicating with it in English - we can describe complex concepts in ways that both we and it can understand.

Active Structure©