Abstract for: Reflections on System Dynamics in 2025 - The Times They Are A-Changin'

After fifty years of system dynamics I decided that now is a good time to reflect on the field, where it has been and where it is going. I begin with comments on the character of system dynamics models gleaned from my own training and subsequent academic career. I then examine a snippet of contemporary system dynamics in the era of AI, using a critical review of a 2024 paper about the use of generative AI for model conceptualization. Next I return to my experiences of the field in a section about ‘Living with System Dynamics’. Here I insert a short paper, from 2021, to further illustrate the character of SD and style guidelines for modeling. The contrast between my characterization of the field and the selected AI snippet brings me to the final section ‘Where to Next?’ There’s a shift underway in modeling practice, which is also the focus of ISDC2025. I consider the shift drawing on evocative lyrics of folk singer Bob Dylan, so recently captured in James Mangold's acclaimed movie "A Complete Unknown". My conference paper was inspired by the movie. I argue that there’s relevance to ISDC2025 in both the movie and the poetry of Dylan's immortal 1960s song ‘The Times They Are A-Changin’: revisiting original creative power (of Dylan’s early acoustic folk); momentous and controversial transition (to electric instruments), and the lyrics of the song itself that emphasize the inevitability of change and the need for individuals – writers, politicians, and the public – to adapt or risk obsolescence. I critique a recent SD paper about the use of generatiive AI in causal mapping.