The opposite of objectivity is not subjectivity, but ETHICS.
Heinz has been a leading exponent of the argument that
the role of the observer is always crucial. He makes a
distinction between the cybernetics of a system being
observed by some external "objective" observer (first
order cybernetics) and the cybernetics of observing
systems (second order cybernetics, or cybernetics of
cybernetics).
Heinz would, I think, approve of the following translation
for this conversation: leaving the individual out leads to
systems thinking for observed systems, putting the
individual in gives us systems thinking for observing
systems.
One way this distinction seems to play out within the
system dynamics field is in 1) the attempt to model
reality vs 2) the attempt to model someone's mental
models.
-- Barry Clemson Center for Organizational Systems Engineering Old Dominion University bclemson@aol.com