The Four Horsemen

On Fri, 8 Nov 2013 10:54:48 -0800 (PST), Dan O
wrote:


I didn't even know it was a "thing"; I thought I had made it up. Well,
I knew it was a patently obvious (to me) fundamental cognitive concept,
but I *thought* I had pulled it together as a label from discrete words
in my vocabulary; dunno maybe I heard it somewhere in my peripheral,
er... awareness. I suppose I may have been exposed to the term in EMR
training.

Anyway, you guys know I've always said situational awareness is head
and shoulders (and then some... hell, it's virtually *everything*) of
safe bicycling in traffic. I found the Wikipedia page for it today.
Cool stuff. Will start with the definition the

Situation Awareness (SA):

"the perception of elements in the environment within a volume of time
and space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of
their status in the near future,"

That's pretty good. To establish ~on-topic:

"... perception of the environment critical to decision-makers in...
complex tasks such as... bicycle."

A couple of other interesting notes:

"One with an adept sense of situation awareness generally has a high
degree of knowledge with respect to inputs and outputs of a system,
i.e. an innate "feel" for situations, people, and events that play out
due to variables the subject can control."

I wouldn't emphasize the variables that I can control, because those
I cannot are equally important, though those I can control do fall in
for special treatment. It's fuzzy, though, as one little controlling
action changes everything, including *relationship* with the things one
cannot control.

I agree with the characterization "innate 'feel'".

"Situation awareness has been recognized as a critical, yet often
elusive, foundation for successful decision-making across a broad range
of complex and dynamic systems... "

I agree with the characterization "elusive".

As for Bike School:

"... well-defined, highly-organized yet dynamic knowledge structures
developed over time from experience... "

I agree that SA depends on experience, and there is no substitute.

"... individuals vary in their ability to acquire SA; thus, simply
providing the same system and training will not ensure similar SA across
different individuals. Endsley's model shows how SA "provides the
primary basis for subsequent decision making and performance in the
operation of complex, dynamic systems"

Wow, it's quite an article. I've only just skimmed yet. Here's an
interesting gotcha:

"... unaware of information they do not know (the "unknown unknowns")."

But exactly the same holds true for Bike School graduates.

I liked the reference at Wikipedia about air combat dogfighting
"strategy... to "get inside" your opponent's OODA [observe, orient,
decide, act] loop". That's exactly what smart racing is to me; and I
use this in ordinary traffic, too - except that it can be inverse here
in that the objective is not (usually ;-) to outwit an opponent - maybe
even extended to tricking them by messing with *their* SA - but in
ordinary transportation the objective is more usually to feed their OODA
loop in ways that enhance getting along together. (The Four Horsemen
themselves are kind of inverse here in that it's not their presence, but
rather their absence, that is ominous.)

But of course aircraft don't "dog fight any more. Now they are
vectored in by ground, or sometimes Airborne radar until the on board
targeting system takes over and directs the pilot into missile range,
then notifies the pilot when a missile is locked on and will even
launch the missile if required.

Dog fights at modern interceptor speeds are impossible as the data
processing ability of the aircraft controller is too low and the data
processor often fails during high G maneuvers. :-)
--
Cheers,

John B.