Professor Paul Nugent has over 25 years of experience in the defense contracting world as a systems engineer working on Navy programs such as the Trident II Fire Control Systems and Guidance Systems.  He is now an Associate Professor of Management Information Systems at Western Connecticut State University and his research interests include organization theory, trust, labor studies, philosophy of technology, and information security.

This talk considers the qualitative differences between extrinsic and intrinsic properties and argues that there is a strong bias in science and engineering toward extrinsic properties. This imbalance can lead to excessive reductionism and a constrained view of objects as functions that can lead to problems in system modeling and design. The restoration of balance through an acknowledgment of intrinsic properties is explored.