Hume and Kant on Free

Hume and Kant on Free Will Essay Abstract This paper is an attempt to show how Kant’s ideas concerning practical and transcendental freedom of the will was a significant correction to the parallel theories of Hume. It starts out by clarifying Hume’s critique of free will, especially as it appears in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. It draws the conclusion that Hume’s philosophy is espousing skepticism, and that Kant’s effort is to overcome this skepticism and restore trust in reason. The philosophy of Kant is outlined in order to make the last point. It is generally agreed that Kant supplied the definitive stamp to philosophy that ushered in the modern age. Hume, though enormously influential in his time, and a favorite in the French salons of philosophy, fell into disrepute in the Victorian era, and only since has become a subject of restored interest. Yet Hume is the philosopher cited by Kant as having stirred him from his â€Å"dogmatic slumbers’. He had espoused a philosophy of empirical skepticism, so thorough and devastating in its scope that it became impossible for Kant to remain in his settled certainties of Newtonian science. It was the spur that carried him on to compose the Critique of Pure Reason (1781), where reason is restored, and man is once more vindicated as a rational being. Just because he refuted and answered Hume’s skepticism does not imply that the latter philosophy is nullified. We must keep this in mind, that Hume’s skepticism is completely valid as far as sense experience is concerned, and Kant does not refute any part of this philosophy. What he does is posit a further dimension to human understanding, specifically, the synthetic a priori faculty of the mind, the existence of which Hume did not suspect. Only after this addition is the primacy of reason restored. So we cannot say that Kant has destroyed Hume’s philosophy, rather he has added to it. Central to Hume’s skepticism is his critique of â€Å"cause and effect†, which is spelled out to its most profound depths in chapter VII of the An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748). The preliminary task is to outline the copy principle. The premise to this is that all knowledge begins from sense experience. Among such we are able to distinguish between primary and secondary sensations. The primary sensations are extension, motion, inertia etc, which are indeed the concepts that physics tackles. Color, taste, smell etc are said to be secondary sensations, composed or derived from the primary ones. The copy principle says that the primary sensations, though not delivering complete information from the material object – which is more poignantly described as â€Å"the object in itself – nevertheless is a faithful copy of it. This is why primary sensations are distinct and forceful presences in our mind. Secondary sensations are in turn copies of the original copy, and due to this derivative nature they lose distinctness to us. We will examine the copy principle of Hume in a moment. For the time being we accept it as such and consider the consequences. For Hume’s purposes, it has allowed him to refer to objects and their motions with confidence, and not to be held back by the validity of these concepts. For without the principle we don’t know as yet that objects are objects, and motion is motion, and we would have had to deal with a chaos of sense experience, and nothing meaningful to refer to it against (1993, p. 12). So now, with the copy principle of Hume as foundation, we proceed to talk about objects in motion. Next, we observe interdependence between objects, carried out in space and time. We â€Å"know† that motion in one object is â€Å"cause† to motion in another. A billiard ball in motion strikes another, and after impact the second acquires a velocity too, and the faculty of our understanding tells us, without the least inkling of doubt, that the impact imparted by the first ball is the cause of the second ball gaining motion. This understanding is so refined that we can, with a little help from Newton’s mechanics, predict the exact trajectory of the second ball by analyzing the trajectory of the first. We know it, but how do we know it? This is the crucial question for Hume. For if we do not have the answer we are left with skepticism. After impact with the first ball the second could have taken any one of an infinite number of trajectories. But it takes only one, and indeed we expect it to take only that one. A physicist may come along and try to convince us that it could not have taken any other trajectory because the laws of motion stipulates that, with the initial conditions given, the path it takes is the only possible one. But this is not an answer to the observer of the billiard ball, because he doesn’t care what the laws of physics are. If nature had followed another mathematical law then another outcome would have been just as valid. The observer could then have framed his conundrum differently: Of the infinite possible mathematical laws why just that one? There is nothing in the inner logic of the situation that dictates that the first ball should produce exactly the prescribed trajectory in the second. Hume said this about the experimental set-up, that we may try an experiment ten times, and may arrive at the exact same result ten times. But this does not prove that the specific outcome is inevitable. Not even if we confirmed the outcome a million times, because we would still only have a statistical probability and not a proof. Hume’s conclusion is that there is no rational link between cause and effect. Yet we expect effect to follow cause, immediately and irrevocably. If this is so then, explains Hume, it is a feeling transmitted to us by custom. What exactly he means by custom is left vague. He could not have meant anything other than â€Å"observing over and over again†, even though this fails to take into account new experience. He himself supplies a famous counterexample in the Enquiry. Some one who has experienced all the shades of blue, except for a tiny strip of the spectrum, is expected to report a gap when looking at the full spectrum of blue. But the fact is that he does not observe a gap at all, and recognizes at once the full spectrum of blue, even though he is experiencing a particular shade on blue for the first time. The recognition was instantaneous, and the eye did require â€Å"accustoming† beforehand. This readily disposes the theory of â€Å"custom†. Hume, however, continues to insist that our convictions regarding cause and effect can have no other source than custom. That the inference to custom is a vague one is made clear when he comes to consider free will. The very act of consciousness, he says, testifies to the existence of free will. But coming to reflect on how it is possible that we are able to willingly set our limbs into motion, and to move and external object thereby, it appears nothing less than miraculous. The mystery in nothing less than how one immaterial body imparts momentum to another: For first: Is there any principle in all nature more mysterious than the union of soul with body; by which a supposed spiritual substance acquires such an influence over a material one, that the most refined thought is able to actuate the grossest matter? (Hume, 1993, p. 43) The upshot is that we cannot explain free will, just as surely as we cannot explain cause and effect. ‘Custom’ was hesitantly introduced to explain cause and effect, and the same comes to the rescue of free will. As constant observers of nature we come to expect an effect to always follow a cause, and the same analysis ought to be applied to the orbit of human will. In all times and in all places humans have shown a constancy in their day to day affairs, which points to a constancy in human nature. The speculation concerning the scope of free will is overdone by the philosophers, maintains Hume. The exercise of free will, when looked at through the vista of human history, does not display divergence as much as it displays constancy. Hume broaches on the distinction between freedom and necessity to make this point clear. Inanimate objects convey to us most clearly the quality of freedom. We may describe an inanimate object as indifferent to the rest of the material universe, and in that sense free. But this freedom also entails necessity. The object is subject to the necessary laws of causation, and indeed is bound entirely by them. This is the relationship that binds cause and effect to inanimate objects, and is a relationship that is composed of both freedom and necessity. Hume transposes the same analysis to the relationship between human beings and free will. The will is indeed free, but being so implies that it conforms to human nature. He proposes the following definition: By liberty, then, we can only mean a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will; this is, if we choose to remain at rest, we may; if we choose to move, we also may. (1993, p. 63) The notion of free will advanced here bears a crucial difference to the popular one, and begs to be spelt out. What Hume describes as free will is not a choice between course ‘A’ and ‘B’. Rather the choice is between ‘A’ and ‘not A’, the latter implying stagnation, not an alternative course. This is the entire extent of our free will. We choose either to move forward, or else to stand still. This is what Hume would describe as freedom to act. Free will, however, is in complete accordance with human nature, and therefore follows the laws of necessity, just as everything else in contingent reality. Free will urges us to act â€Å"freely†. With freedom to act we may respond to this urge, or we may desist. In the final analysis our understanding of free will hinges on custom, in the same way as does our understanding of cause and effect. The past is guide to the future in the probabilistic sense. Beyond probabilities we have no understanding of either, contends Hume. In order to enforce this skepticism he proceeds to dismantle the Cartesian theories that pretended to explain mind and matter interaction, especially the theory of occasionalism advanced by Father Nicholas Malebranche. In this theory God is made both motivator and executor of every act or incident that seems to be â€Å"cause†, while the circumstances which we call a cause are only occasions for God to act in such a manner. Hume complained that this not only made God a slave to his own creation, but it also eradicated free will, making everything â€Å"full of God† (1993, p. 47). By disposing summarily the Cartesian explanations of cause and effect Hume makes his skepticism complete. Kant overcomes this skepticism by revising the premise of Hume. The correction is made most forcefully in the opening to the Critique: Although all our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it arises entirely from experience.   For it is quite possible that our empirical knowledge is a compound of that which we receive through impressions and that which our own faculty of knowing (incited by impressions) supplies from itself†¦ (1999, p. 1) To be fair to Hume, he does consider this possibility, and ponders whether there is a blueprint in the mind where all ‘causes’ and all ‘effects’ can be referred back. (1993, p. 44). But he dismisses this idea when he realizes that a static blueprint can never account for the dynamic reality. However, the faculty that Kant is suggesting is not static, rather dynamic and creative, and here lies the crucial difference. In the technical terms of Kant it is the synthetic a priori faculty of the mind. This is distinguished from the analytic a priori faculty, such as logic. The rules of logic are extant in the mind (a priori), but form a self-consistent system (analytical), and therefore do not depend on sense experience. On the first instance it seems impossible that the mind can have a faculty that is synthetic a priori, where synthetic implies that it is creative. It entails that order is created out of the chaos of sense experience, and order that was not there before. But Kant also provides proof that the mind is capable of synthesis. Mathematical propositions are synthetic a priori, he contended. The proposition â€Å"3 + 5 = 8† may sound like self-consistent logic, but it is not really so. â€Å"8† is a completely new concept, and is not contained in either â€Å"3†, â€Å"5† or â€Å"+†. If we know that â€Å"3 + 5 = 8†, it is due to a synthetic a priori faculty in the mind. As Kant relates in the Prolegomena, when he realized that mathematical propositions are indeed synthetic a priori, it led him to ponder on what other such concepts the mind uses to facilitate understanding, and it appeared to him, in due course, that â€Å"cause and effect† was a concept of understanding that derives from the same faculty. He does not at all concern himself with material reality as a â€Å"thing in itself†, that which the materialist philosophers were after in order to provide a foundation to Newtonian science. Like Hume he maintains throughout that an absolute material reality is beyond knowledge, and to speculate on its existence was futile. We only need to consider what we perceive and what we do. He also shows that Hume falters at exactly those points where he cannot dismiss material existence in itself. The copy principle is slavish to a material object in itself. The object does not deliver copies to our mind; rather the mind provides the concepts of space in which we are able to conjure up material objects from sensory data. Both â€Å"space† and â€Å"time† are pure concepts of the mind, contends Kant, and like â€Å"cause and effect† are the tools by which we come to understand contingent reality (Prolegomena, 2005, p. 26). As soon as it is made out that we are the responsible architects of our own reality, and are not passive bystanders to an absolute material reality beyond our control, we suddenly discover ourselves as moral beings. Therefore the subsequent direction of Kant’s philosophy, after the metaphysics of understanding has been established, is towards a metaphysics of morals. And so emerges the crucial distinction that Kant makes between practical and transcendental freedom. To say that we have practical freedom implies we are able to understand the world, and by doing so we direct the will accordingly. We will do so of course for practical purposes – survival, utility, convenience, happiness etc. this would seem to cover the entire orbit of freedom. But Kant went on to demonstrate, in his Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals (1785), that such freedom is not actually freedom at all, and indeed is a binding. Thus far Kant is in concord with Hume. Now, the metaphysics of understanding, as spelt out in the Critique, is not the entire picture. The synthetic a priori faculty of the mind fashions understanding out of sensory experience. But such understanding does not lead to truth. As pure concepts of understanding space and time are both necessarily infinite. But because they emanate from the finite mind they are also finite. So in their very make-up space and time lead to contradictions. The same end must necessarily meet anything that takes place within space and time. So that matter is both infinitely divisible and also made up of concrete building blocks. As another example, we have free will, but at the same time everything is caused, so we don’t have free will. Such examples are put forward by Kant as pairs of â€Å"antinomies†. According to our understanding both consequences are valid, and yet they mutually contradict each other. All practical reasoning necessarily leads to pairs of antinomies. This must be so, because we reason by means of subject and predicate, where the subject is the cause of the predicate. But this subject is in turn predicate to another subject, and so on in an infinite chain of causation. If there was an ultimate subject at the beginning of this chain, we could have claimed to have discovered the final cause, and thereby have at hand a pronouncement of truth. But in contingent reality there is no such final cause. So whenever we try to make pronouncements of truth we must face contradiction. We cannot say that practical reason is false for this reason. Life is ruled by contingencies, and practical reason is to explain the contingent, or to facilitate such understanding. Absolute truth lies beyond all contingencies, and this is ruled by â€Å"pure† reason, explains Kant. It is not within the grasp of the human mind, yet it is the underpinning of the mind, and is the source of all innate faculties. The same analysis applies to practical freedom, which is but the corollary to practical reason. With practical freedom we choose our course according to practical reason, i.e. we are motivated by self-serving motives – happiness, honor, respectability, and so on. But in doing so we bind ourselves to those endless chains of contingencies, so that we are not really free. We chase material acquisition in order to be happy, and yet it always eludes us. The definition of freedom is to escape all contingencies, and yet by the application of practical reason we are mired more and more into contingent reality. Therefore we are not free. This is indeed a contradiction, one which Hume does not pay heed to. The very act of consciousness tells us that we are free, that out will is free. If practical reason does not embody this freedom, then surely pure reason must do so. By the same token, we are in possession of a transcendental freedom, which is a path that overcomes all contingencies, and is dictated by pure reason. Kant describes this path as the moral one. We recognize and follow this path from a sense of duty. To clarify what it is, duty is done for its own sake. There is no material motive whatsoever attached to it. Not for any particular good, it is done for the universal good. It is a categorical imperative, meaning that the very make-up of our being, or pure reason, dictates that we follow it. As an aid to identifying one’s duty Kant devised the following wording for the categorical imperative: â€Å"I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law† (Moral Law, 2005, p. 74). Kant is described as overcoming Hume’s skepticism. But it is questionable whether the latter is a skeptic at all. According to a contemporary, Hume’s philosophical paradoxes are delivered with a confidence that belies skepticism: â€Å"Never has there been a Pyrrhonian more dogmatic† (qtd. in Mossner, 1936, p. 129). A more recent reassessment of Hume is carried out by the German Neo-Kantian philosopher Ernst Cassirer, who opines, â€Å"Hume’s doctrine is not to be understood as an end, but as a new beginning† (1951, p. 59). The nature of this new beginning is well articulated by Hume himself. â€Å"Indulge your passion for science,† nature tells us, according to Hume, â€Å"but let your science be human, and such as may have a direct reference to action and society† (Hume, 1993, p. 3). If we listen carefully, the moral note that Hume is sounding is hardly different from that of the categorical imperative of Kant. Not for the person’s sake, but for humanity’s sake. Not for the particular good but for the universal good. This is the essence of Hume’s projected â€Å"science of man†, as it is also the heart of Kant’s metaphysics of morals. References Cassirer, E. (1951). The Philosophy of the Enlightenment. Trans. Fritz C. A. Koelln and James P. Pettegrove. Boston: Beacon Press. Hume, D. (1993). An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. E. Steinberg (Ed.) Boston: Hackett Publishing. Kant, I. (1999). Critique of Pure Reason. W. S. Pluhar (Trans.), E. Watkins (Ed.) Boston: Hackett Publishing. Kant, I. (2005). Kants Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics. Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing. Kant, I. (2005). The Moral Law: Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals. Translated by H. J. Paton. New York: Routledge. Mossner, E. C. (1936). Bishop Butler and the Age of Reason: A Study in the History Of Thought. New York: Macmillan.

The Diver :: essays research papers

â€Å"The Diver† Robert Currie’s â€Å"The Diver†, on the surface, recounts a diver’s descent and ascent into a river as onlookers eagerly anticipate his fate. Beneath the surface, this poem is actually very spiritual. The diver’s descent into the water, and his arising from the water, can be compared to the crucifixion of Jesus. Through the masterful use of imagery and Biblical comparisons, Currie depicts the message that rebirth and hope can captivate and revitalize our spirits. An essential key to the theme of â€Å"The Diver† is through the subtle yet prevailing use of Biblical references. From the very beginning of Currie’s poem, a simile is used when describing the â€Å"bridge like a Roman fort†. This helps to set the tone that something important is about to happen and also provides a Biblical base to the structure of the poem. Lines four to six describe the man’s journey up towards the bridge. This journey can be compared to Jesus’ struggle towards the top of the hill where he was crucified. Perhaps this man was also carrying a â€Å"load on his shoulders†, so to speak. The poem becomes even more Biblical as â€Å"others bet upon his chance†, much like Jesus’ own fate. As the diver prepares for the inevitable, his situation has Biblical meaning. â€Å"At the summit of the span he rose/ his arms outstretched/ flung a cross against the sun†Ã¢â‚¬â„¢, are perhaps three of the most powerful lin es in the poem. These lines are followed by much anticipation from the crowd below. The dive symbolizes the end of something, which is also supported when â€Å"The river circling away/ grew silent as held breath/ still as death†. These lines make is seem as though everything, and everyone, even the river, are â€Å"holding their breath† in anticipation of the outcome of the dive. Then, starting at line twenty-one, the rebirth begins, as, â€Å"from unknown depths/ his head broke the water/ shook out a crown of sunlit spray. There is a strong Biblical presence in the comparisons used in this poem, which help to support the theme of hope and rebirth, while providing powerful imagery. A vital element of Currie’s â€Å"The Diver† is the strong presence of imagery, which helps to sustain the theme of captivating hope. The image of â€Å"the solitary figure† provokes a strong sense of despair, followed by his painful struggle â€Å"up the arch†. The images give the impression that the events are unfolding in a captivating slow-motion means.

Culinarian Cookware: Pondering Price Promotion Essay

As a market leading brand primarily focusing in designing, manufacturing, distributing and marketing premium cookware, Culinarian Cookware takes pride in its outstanding product quality, advanced performance technology and the strong dealership with retail stores established throughout the years, which Donald Janus, the VP of Marketing believes makes Culinarian stands strong in its competitive industry. In regardless of Culinarian’s usual practice of avoiding price discounting, an official price promotion program was launched in 2004, which was later concluded by a consultant firm that these promotions had a negative impact on profits. There are different views toward the price promotion strategies and the corresponding report in the senior management: Janus felt price promotions were unnecessary, potentially damaging to the brand image, and possibly encouraged retailer hoarding; Brown believed the promotions strengthened trade support, improved brand awareness, and stimulated sales from both new and existing customers. While Janus trusted the report results, Brown believed the study assumptions were flawed and required further analysis, suspected the promotions had actually produced positive results. In November of 2006, debates among the senior management team had been going on regarding the pros and cons of price promotions for the company’s premium cookware products. A decision is needed to be made in terms of how price promotion can be utilized in Culinarian’s marketing strategy. Key Issue The urgent and key question is whether to run a price promotion in 2007 and, if so, to determine what merchandise to promote and on what terms. The broader issue is what strategy Culinarian should pursue to achieve its sales growth objective, and what role, if any, price promotion should play. Clearly there are attractive advantages and draw-backs with significant consequences for a price promotion program. The final recommendation will need to be in line with the four strategic objectives of the company: (1) Widen its distribution network; (2) Increase its market share of the premium cookware segment; (3) Preserve its prestigious image; (4) Capture its  revenue growth of at least 15% while maintaining pre-tax earnings margins of 12%. Possible Alternatives (1) No Price Promotion This alternative would means there will be no official price promotion, only occasional free gifts would be given out with purchase of items at regular price. There are least risks associated with this option but the company will need to seek other ways to maintain their competitiveness. (2) Discount on Slow Growing Items The second option would be to apply a 30% discounted price to the slow growing items like what the company did in 2006. (3) Price Promotion Campaign (Discount on selected premium items) To invest in a comprehensive price promotion campaign. Discount price will be applied not only to the cheapest and slow growing items but to selected items from all lines. The campaign will be assist with edgy advertising methods to create a â€Å"hype† to the price cutting. The Recommendation Alternative 3: Price Promotion Campaign The recommendation to pursue the third alternative was made based on a decision matrix with the following set of criteria: risk; ability to widen distribution network; positive impact on brand image; ease of implementation and financial return. The Rationale Price promotion is superior to a gift incentive in the following ways. As Culinarian is heavily relied on retailers for distribution, their opinions carry a certain weight of important. Many of the retailers expressed that a free gift approach often confuse them as to how many gifts to order. These 0 value-carrying gifts also occupy valuable inventory spaces and thus are generally not welcomed by these distribution channels. When looking at the company strategies, one should realize that the current very low brand awareness among the target groups (HHI $75,000+) is a big issue (Exhibit 4). Discounting merchandize can effectively attract attention and raise awareness, broaden its customer base and stimulate excitement for the brand among the customers. When looking at the analysis of Culinarian’s target group – the households with income over $75,000, 30% cited price as the most important criterion in selecting cookware; 30% of these consumers would be motivated to buy new cookware because of a price discount versus 20% being motivated by a free gift; 20% would intentionally wait for a sale and â€Å"Price† is ranked top 3 in the criteria of choosing a cookware. These study result show that the customers value a price promotion and even actively seek these promotion out. Clearly a cut in price will generate increased sale volume. Indeed it is true that there are uncertainties in whether the price promotion in 2004 was profitable or not. A report by a consultant firm concluded that the promotion program was not profitable. However, one group in the management team including Brown believes there are significant flaws exist in the analysis due to the following errors: the normal sales figures being too high; variable costs including overhead cost incorrectly; the cannibalization costs and inventory savings which, instead of being left out of calculations, were included and estimated inaccurately. Another argument being that when you look at the figures provided in the case exhibit, one could see that sales volume drop right after the price promotion in both 2004 and 2005, thus easily hurry to conclude that a price promotion does not benefit the company. However it is possible that the failure of these programs is due to other factors affecting the profitability including the level of discount rate, the ordering size allowances etc. execution considerations. Thus, these calculations cannot serve as a proof against a price promotion. Because of the above rationale, a price promotion would be appropriate to be run in 2007. Janus’s worries of the disadvantage of a price promotion could  be counteracted by the recommendation of the second alternative, which were recommended with two major objectives in mind: raise brand awareness (while maintaining a leading prestige image) and widen distribution network (which potentially serve as a gateway to increase market share and profit). The major concern of Janus was the potential negative impact to the brand’s premium image especially when the two direct competing premium cookware brands do not use price promotion. However this generally happen only when discounted items was focused on the cheapest line or the slow growing ones (which exactly was what happened in 2004 and 2005). In the new price promotion campaign, a limited number of premium items will needed to be selected for a discount to maintain the prestige and premium image of the brand while specific communication campaign will be employed to increase customer satisfaction on buying the premium product with a discount price. Expanding the discount to more expensive line could also The next question would be how the promotion will be executed. The Implementation Again a limited number of premium items (eg. PROX1) combine with cheaper lines (eg. CX1) will be selected for a discount. In fact, the selection will cover specific items of all 4 lines. A communication campaign will be employed to call out the message to the public: â€Å"Here is the premium brand, and we are selling it for a lower price so that YOU can also try out these high-quality cookware† (â€Å"Quality† remains the top motivator for choosing cookware). The discount period will still be around April and May to avoid direct competition with the other big cookware brands. In terms of the problem of retailers placing over-size trade orders and eating up the difference, Culinarian can counteract this by pre-print or attaching a discount notification on the product packaging and limiting each order size during the pre-discount period. In conclusion, Culinarian should implement a price promotion campaign in reaction to the demand of customers. Discount price will be applied to items based on the direction of boosting relationship between the company and retailers, and raise consumer awareness to the prestige brand name. With the appropriate calculation of discount rate and promotion tactics, market share is likely to increase and the profit margins will be brought to the new height.

GE Case Study - 2927 Words

Case Study GE’s Two-Decade Transformation: Jack Welch’s Leadership By For BUS 463 - AE Contents Summary of Background and Facts General Electric General Electric (GE) occupied the eighth spot on Fortune 500’s list of companies at the close of 2013. While number eight was a slide from 2012’s number six GE maintains its position, as one of the world’s largest and most influential corporations. Today, GE’s operates in over 160 countries and is led by Jeffery Immelt. During 2013 GE reported, total revenues approached 147 billion USD and profits around 13.6 billion USD. (CNNMoney, 2013). GE appears in textbooks from the third grade through the PhD. Level of the world’s best business and engineering†¦show more content†¦Corporate structures remained largely unchanged between the end of World War II and 1980 but that was all about to change. Competition from Japan, the desktop PC and the dawn of the information age forced GE to rethink its operational model and search for a strategy that would enable them to remain competitive as the century ended. Welch quickly assessed that GE w as too big and too slow to maintain its current market positions much less grow them. The strategic planning model Welch inherited held nine layers between idea and decision with over 200 personnel involved in the process, hardly â€Å"lean and agile†. John Boyd developed what he called the OODA Loop to describe winning in air combat maneuvers. The OODA Loop consists of a cycle of four steps; Observe, Orientate, Decide, Act (OODA), Boyd argued that when two aircraft are engaged in a dogfight the pilot who has the fastest OODA Loop cycle will win. â€Å"The OODA Loop found advocates not only in the U.S. military, but also in the realms of business and sports – anywhere a competitor seeks and edge.† (McIntosh, 2011). Welch recognized that if GE was to win against the completion he needed to cycle its strategic planning OODA Loop faster. He responded by eliminating 5 layers of bureaucracy and over 50% of the planning staff. â€Å"We used to have department managers, sector managers, subsector managers, unit managers, andShow MoreRelatedGe Cas e Study2081 Words   |  9 PagesDate: April 27, 2009 Course 5130: Strategic Thinking Session 3 Assignment: GE Case Study The culture at General Electric, before Jack Welch assumed his role as CEO in 1981, was highly decentralized, where significant emphasis on strategic planning was levied on 43 Strategic Business Units. However, Jack’s vision of changing the culture of the company was a priority to him. As a result, Jack began the culture change by replacing 12 of his 14 business heads. 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Secondly, Global Product Company (GPC) concept is introduced aiming at cutting cost by shifting the manufacturing activities from high-costRead MoreCase Study Analysis: Ge’s Talent Machine Essay1498 Words   |  6 PagesCase Study Analysis: GE’s Talent Machine Brandie Buffins Grand Canyon University HRM – 635 Acquiring, Developing, and Leveraging Human Capital September 19, 2012 Case Study Analysis: GE’s Talent Machine General Electric (GE) has been well known and valued for embracing quantifying talent as well as rising talent when it comes to leadership. This organization makes sure that this is a key factor when it comes to their business planning. GE requires learning sessions all year long, which entailsRead MoreCase Study: Ge Healthcare in India: an (Ultra) Sound Strategy?1142 Words   |  5 PagesCase Study: GE Healthcare In India: An (Ultra) Sound Strategy? What are the basic facts? 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