Growth and Fitness
through Innovation
How to
augment the returns
from your stake
© Klaus G. Saul
Any new opportunity or variation produces uncertainty. If the uncertainty is removed by hazard then nothing is achieved. If, however, it is removed by meaningful decisions or meaningful information then there is progress which makes sense.
For living entities any decision or information is meaningful which helps escaping from threatening death, decay, penury or the scarcity of vital resources.
For human stakeholders any decision or information is meaningful which helps overcoming the limitations restricting the quality of personal life.
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Life and the
safeguard against death and decay mean something important for all living entities. The
longing to escape from threatening penuries and shortcomings drives them to compete for
the scarce vital resources. It is this meaningful struggle for life which induces the
species on Earth to differentiate and to improve their ability to survive by an adaptive
evolution [EXHIBIT 8].
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Strangely
enough, we see from [EXHIBIT 10] that even Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1892) was not
absolutely clear about the causes underlying his observations. It took, indeed, the
British Nobel prize winner, philosopher and scientist Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) to
really understand the progressive evolution on the surface of our planet Earth [EXHIBIT 11].
Russell introduced man - himself an outcome of the evolution - into an enforcing position
with respect to the progressive change {Russell, B. (1927)}. He thus integrated human
activities into a proceeding perspective. Indeed, modern man controls about 10% of
all the bio-mass produced on Earth {Markl, H. (1998)}.
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The
extraordinary impact of man was made possible due to the enormous storage capacity of his
brain. Today there exist 10 million tons of that brain distributed over 6 billion heads.
To the extent as this brain be coherently interconnected it represents an enormous
“critical mass” to advance culture, the power of analytical thinking and the
differentiation of knowledge. These elements altogether result in a maximum content
of rationally confirmed human insight {Simon, H.A. (1993)} [EXHIBIT-12].
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The human brain
can store individual experience. It enables man to verify his knowledge repetitively with
renewed experience and to transform personal discoveries into consensus knowledge or
universal insight with an ever increasing assurance.
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While the
Darwinian systems are bound to escape from the threat of decay by the "trial &
error" variational mechanism humans can develop fitness by disruptively pursuing
meaningful conjectures that cannot be refuted.
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Russel saw man
proceeding by acting meaningfully. Man can pursue personal intentions as long as he
respects the rules of nature that provides him with his vital resources. By watching these
rules, he gains access to further dimensions that outreach beyond the limits of his actual
situation.
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Man can forecast
the next sunrise which supplies him with strength-donating energy. Man can develop
visions, hypotheses or projections on his own behalf. Moreover he can check the prospects
of his projects on the basis of facts long before it comes to action.
2-8
In a certain
sense, man is capable of escaping from the actual limitations of his existence by pursuing a more
attractive future. The prospect of a more qualified self-realisation rewards him
with self-esteem, confidence and courage.
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We all know
people who find their self-esteem as researchers by bringing themselves into the deepening
of knowledge or into the expansion of human insight. Others achieve self-realisation by
investing into their skills, cpabilities or resources as entrepreneurs providing
better products, goods, value, performance or access to higher levels of human existence. Still
others feel rewarded as “rulers or emperors" in the fight for lasting power or as
adventurers, conquerors and seekers after treasures that neither putrefaction, rust nor
moths can destroy.
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All that
outlasting meaning has been summed up by Ludwig and Saul {Ludwig, K.P. (1998)} as stakeholder-prospectives
[Exhibit 13]. The stakeholder-prospectives accomplish personal activities with
everlasting meaning. This meaning embraces the entire human existence independently of
the actual situation of the personal life.
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By disruptively
departing from the actual situation and by joining in a self-sustained growth of
humankind, the individual can proceed far beyond the limitations of his natural
existence.
LITERATURE
Dr. Klaus G. SAUL; Leiter Fachausschuss S1.3
INNOVATIONSMANAGEMENT
DEUTSCHE GESELLSCHAFT FÜR LUFT- UND RAUMFAHRT - LILIENTHAL- OBERT e.V. (DGLR) 53175 Bonn