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Ian McClelland

@ianmcclelland.bsky.social
31 followers 98 following 12 posts

Strategic innovation for a complex world @ adaptivepractice.co | Writing @ adjacentpossibilities.co

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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
When #technology makes life too easy we lose the tacit knowledge that keeps us capable, connected, and resilient. My latest post on Substack discusses three hidden dangers of optimising everything for friction-free delivery.
adjacentpossibilities.co
The costs of friction-free tech
What do we risk losing when we take a shortcut?
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Always loved the letters in @vizcomic.bsky.social #evidence #policy
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Complexity Science Hub @csh.ac.at · 21/09/2026
Last week, we had an amazing first edition of the CSH 𝗪𝗘𝗱𝗻𝗲𝘀𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝗦𝗔𝗟𝗢𝗡! Faculty member 𝗟𝗷𝘂𝗯𝗶𝗰𝗮 𝗡𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗹𝗸𝗼𝘀𝗸𝗮 spoke about #AI 's impact on the labor market. How is it different from previous technological disruptions? She started with 𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗵𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗲𝘅𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗲𝘀: 🧪🧵 #FutureOfWork #econsky
Ljubica Nedelkoska speaks into a microphone, standing in front of a screen, in an ornately decorated room with painted wall panels.Ljubica Nedelkoska speaks and gestures on a stage while an audience listens in a grand room with arched windows and chandeliers - the Salon of the Complexity Science Hub.Ljubica Nedelkoska speaks into a microphone on a stage, standing beside an orange chair, in front of a screen showing a historical photo of a horse-drawn harvester labeled 'Case Harvester (around 1912).Ljubica Nedelkoska speaks into a microphone while seated on an orange chair next to moderator Aashima Dogra-Freitag on a stage.
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Adrian Currie @adrian-currie.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Methods in the Philosophy of Science: A User's Guide, edited by the inestimable @phieveigl.bsky.social (and me!), has 27 chapters from super-cool philosophers of science explaining how they do their thing, and is now open access! Our baby is free! #philsci direct.mit.edu/books/oa-edi...
direct.mit.edu
Methods in the Philosophy of Science: A User's Guide
A guidebook to methods and methodology, encouraging deeper engagement across the philosophy of science and beyond.The last twenty years have seen multiple
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Inspired by @villagereach.bsky.social, my latest short essay on Substack outlines why R&D innovation frequently results in "pilotitis", and how context-sensitive innovation offers an alternative approach www.adjacentpossibilities.co/p/how-contex...
adjacentpossibilities.co
How context-sensitive innovation avoids the trap of pilotitis
Why R&D innovation fails in complex environments, and what VillageReach can teach us about an alternative approach
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
In the run up to Christmas, turkeys have never been fatter and are truly living their best lives. Why are they so angry? newsletter.humanprogress.org/p/americas-p...
newsletter.humanprogress.org
America’s Progress and Pessimism Paradox
Why do our country’s best days feel like our worst?
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gquaggiotto.bsky.social @gquaggiotto.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Searching together: Human–AI complementarities in innovation search. With a section on serendipity "The advancement of AI, including hallucination, when leveraged intentionally or exploratively, can lead to unexpected and serendipitous discoveries" www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
In the run up to Christmas, turkeys have never been fatter and are truly living their best lives. Why are they so angry? newsletter.humanprogress.org/p/americas-p...
newsletter.humanprogress.org
America’s Progress and Pessimism Paradox
Why do our country’s best days feel like our worst?
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Some notes on #creativity. We may yet keep our creative edge over #ai: www.adjacentpossibilities.co/p/creativity...
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
There is no great mystery to #creativity. Whether you're an artist, a designer, or a scientist, creative output relies on the same mechanics: engage widely with people and culture, capture and play with ideas, and make time for idleness. This week's post: www.adjacentpossibilities.co/p/creativity...
adjacentpossibilities.co
Creativity is just connecting things
To unlock creative potential, engage widely with people and culture, capture and play around with ideas, and always make time for idleness.
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gquaggiotto.bsky.social @gquaggiotto.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Treating peer review as public infrastructure could help unlock much more philanthropic capital www.macroscience.org/p/america-al...
macroscience.org
America Already Built the World's Largest Science-Vetting Machine
We barely use it.
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
There is no great mystery to #creativity. Whether you're an artist, a designer, or a scientist, creative output relies on the same mechanics: engage widely with people and culture, capture and play with ideas, and make time for idleness. This week's post: www.adjacentpossibilities.co/p/creativity...
adjacentpossibilities.co
Creativity is just connecting things
To unlock creative potential, engage widely with people and culture, capture and play around with ideas, and always make time for idleness.
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James Plunkett @jamestplunkett.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
🔥 New today 🔥 The first publication from The Marshall Plan for Civic Life 👇 Today @kinship.works and @demos-uk.bsky.social have published a Discussion Paper to open a conversation about how to fund a decade of civic renewal. marshall-plan.netlify.app (1/n)
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Did first shift at #Felix North London warehouse this morning. Mad to see how much food potentially goes to waste, and what goes into supplying food banks and other community organisations around London. Check out their good work : felix.org
felix.org
Homepage
We are Felix. We rescue great food and get it to people who need it. We're about fuller plates, fuller communities, and fuller lives.
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Jason Hickel @jasonhickel.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
I'm excited to announce this new piece we have in Nature Sustainability, on the question of post-growth and China. To me, this is the important point: post-growth *must* take account of world-system dynamics and should facilitate, not compromise, Southern liberation. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
On the relevance of post-growth in China - Nature Sustainability
Post-growth debates largely ignore China, despite its key position in the world economy, leaving a gap in sustainability discourse. This Perspective examines China’s role in a post-growth transition, ...
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Hurvin Anderson’s “Audition” (1999), based on photographs taken by his brother of Wyndley Swimming Pool in Birmingham. Anderson superimposed multiple views until “the whole pictorial field became full of possibilities.” Wonderful #art exhibition at @tate.bsky.social : www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tat...
A painting of a municipal swimming complex contained by glass walls and concrete pillars.
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Another Green @anothergreen.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
Elinor Ostrom the first woman to win a Nobel in #economics was born today 7th August 1933, she worked on commons ownership, deep democracy and tackling #climatechange. We should respect her rules for radicals! www.plutobooks.com/product/elin...
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
About time tech companies were made to pay for the environmental and social damage they externalise, all while making massive profits, aggressively avoiding tax, and leaving a very strained public purse to pick up the bill www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
bbc.co.uk
Meta told to pay another $567m in New Mexico child safety lawsuit
The ruling is in addition to $375m in fines Meta was already ordered to pay in the case, for a total of $942m.
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gquaggiotto.bsky.social @gquaggiotto.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
To save expertise, we need to resist technocracy. In the case of int'l orgs, this requires that we demythologise their origins, that we acknowledge they have never been independent from politics, and that we refrain from technocratic wishful thinking aeon.co/essays/are-w...
aeon.co
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
I’ve started a Substack exploring cultural evolution, tech shifts, and complex systems. The first essay looks at the origins of hip hop through the lens of theoretical biology and Stuart Kauffman’s theory of the "adjacent possible" www.adjacentpossibilities.co/p/homo-tinke...
adjacentpossibilities.co
Homo tinkerus and the origins of hip hop
What DJ Kool Herc and Grandmaster Flash can teach us about cultural innovation and the step-by-step nature of radical change.
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Ashwini Ashokkumar @ashwinia.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
New paper in @nature.com with @lukebeehewitt.bsky.social, @isaiasghezae.bsky.social, & @robbwiller.bsky.social: Can LLMs predict results of social science experiments? Across 70 experiments, we find a strong correspondence (r=.85) between predicted and observed effects. doi.org/10.1038/s415... 🧵
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gquaggiotto.bsky.social @gquaggiotto.bsky.social · 07/06/2025
[Amen] "Funders who care about justice should enable communities to lead their own research projects" ssir.org/articles/ent...
ssir.org
Let Communities Lead Research (SSIR)
Funders who care about justice should enable communities to lead their own research projects. | Open access to this article made possible by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
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Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 07/05/2025
Opinion from the FT's Editorial Board: 'The US and European countries that tout Israel as an ally that shares their values have issued barely a word of condemnation. They should be ashamed of their silence, and stop enabling Netanyahu to act with impunity.' www.ft.com/content/f5fd...
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Ian McClelland @ianmcclelland.bsky.social · 08/05/2025
Macmillan would surely be well-suited to a flat management structure, learning from Buurtzorg in the Netherlands. I'm amazed their model hasn't caught on more. Lack of imagination? Vested interests? www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
theguardian.com
‘It makes no sense’: Macmillan hiring for senior roles after axing 26% of staff
Exclusive: Charity posts several senior corporate roles, months after saying it faced ‘tough financial climate’
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