If I read John Warfield correctly, "wicked problems" is a label some
people apply to situations and circumstances they perceive as inherently
intractable. However, these same situations and circumstances might well
be viewed differently by other people, and these other people might reach
very different judgments. Indeed, what one person views as a "wicked
problem" might be viewed as a "tame problem" by someone else. Yet a third
person might even view the same situation as not particularly problematic.
Problems, then, like beauty, exist in the eye of the beholder. So do
Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny. My earlier assertion
stands: I don't believe in "wicked problems" and I believe Professor
Warfield's conclusion that Nelson's list of 10 characteristics of wicked
problems are more or less empty supports my position.
Professor Warfield's reference to Alexander Pope's poem, "An Essay on
Criticism," did set me in search of learning -- and I think I learned
something.
My latest edition of Bartlett's Quotations carries this snippet of the
poem by Pope that Warfield cited:
"Tis with our judgments as our watches, none
Go just alike, yet each believes his own."
Given that Pope's poem was published in 1711, his observation clearly
predates the discussion we are having now.
That same edition of Bartlett's also provides an interesting
cross-reference to a Sir John Suckling, who wrote in 1638:
"But as when an authentic watch is shown,
Each man winds up and rectifies his own,
So in our very judgments."
I suspect we haven't heard the last of "wicked problems" -- unless and
until someone comes up with an authentic watch against which we can wind
up and rectify our own.
-- Fred Nickols nickols@aol.com