I said:
>> we might, with cybernetic ideas, make more progress.
>
>But why JUST CYBERNETIC IDEAS???? I find that kind of statement one of
>the key ways in which science mimics religion. Lets try ecumenicism!
I did not say JUST cybernetic ideas! I thought that you were interested in
newer approaches which cross traditional boundaries. My strong impression
is that ecumenicism lacks the operational specificity and results which are
key to cybernetics (and also that you are being facetious ;-)).
>> you probably do understand many of the principles of cybernetics, but
>> perhaps under a variety of different names in various sciences e.g.
>> homeostasis, hormonal relationships, neural nets, etc. etc.
>
>Notice how you split my thought. I am not saying I do not want to know
>the CONTENT and METHODS used in cybernetics. I just don't see any
>reason to be put in a box. The next was the thrust of my thought.
>
>>>Disciplinary boundaries are artificial and are of limited usefulness.
>What are my suppositions about cybernetics?
I don't know what your suppositions are. I would have supposed they would
not be inconsistent with the ideas which Cliff Joslyn has characterized for
discussion on the PCP Web, which I might excerpt as follows. (This is
primarily for the benefit of readers who may be following this discussion
and may not understand where I am coming from either.) I quote Cliff's
note from the WWW:
>The Nature of Cybernetic Systems
>
>While as a meta-theory, the ideas and principles of Cybernetics and Systems
>>Science are intended to be applicable to anything, the ``interesting''
>objects of study that Cybernetics and Systems Science tends to focus on are
>>complex systems such as organisms, ecologies, minds, societies, and machines.
>>Cybernetics and Systems Science regards these systems as complex, multi-
>>dimensional networks of information systems. We will generally call such
>>systems ``cybernetic systems''. Cybernetics presumes that there are
>underlying principles and laws which can be used to unify the understanding
>of such seemingly disparate types of systems. The characteristics of
>>cybernetic systems directly affect the nature of cybernetic theory, resulting
>>in serious challenges to traditional methodology. Some of these
>>characteristics are: Complexity: Mutuality: Complementarity: Evolvability:
>Constructivity: Reflexivity: [ see the Web notes for more details...]
Don says:
>Feedback principles are our invention to describe complexity in systems.
>I wrote a book on the application of NETWORK THERMODYNAMICS to
>problems in biology. It is replete with the kind of thing you ask why I
>>don't want to use.
I said I thought you _would want_ to use such ideas.
>Why are the ideas you are talking about necessarily CYBERNETIC principles?
>>How did you like Fuller's Synergicity? Was that cybernetics?
I am not hung up on words. I am interested in trying to communicate about
ideas, which I was trying to describe. Are you disagreeing about the ideas,
or the appropriateness of terminology? To what end? As far as I am
concerned the purpose of discussion is to clarify ideas, correct errors,
and reach agreement if it is in the cards.
As I said before, I think a number of insightful writers, including Fuller,
and Whitehead, and Jaspers, and Popper, who concerned themselved with ideas
of complex systems, organisms and interdisciplinary methods arrived at many
ideas in common, although they did not all use the same terminology.
General Systems Theory also carried related ideas forward. These and other
approaches tackled the problem of how elements may be related and
integrated within complex unities and systems.
As I understand cybernetics in comparison to such predecessors (and I would
be very interested indeed in the views any others who care to comment) it
provides additional insights and specifics of operational detail - negative
and positive feedback, requisite complexity, etc. etc. - and is at the
same time more universal in its applicability. It seems to have been the
techological potential which has got the most attention, but that aspect
may not be the most important.
>I guess as a physician you were trained in the Flexnerian mode. Science
>was the only thing on which medicine was to be based. That idea is
>changing very rapidly.
Of course a biological grounding is essential in medical practice.
Residency train in psychiatry taught me about the psychobiological approach
and the social context. From some philosophers (especially the
physician/psychiatrist Karl Jaspers) I learned something of human
limitations in an infinite universe of many dimensions. In cybernetics I
found a conceptual framework which could manage this complexity in ways
that made useful sense to me, providing ideas essential for understanding
organized open systems.
>The reasons seem economic to me, but the
>rationalizations are being couched in educational jargon and a "new"
>philosophy of medical education "the generalist initiative"
As the Ontario government program manager of budgets for clinical education
in all the health sciences, including medicine and all the specialties
($200 million plus, annually) over a couple of decades I met regularly with
the Deans and others in the medical schools, so I know that economic
factors are important. However it is also the case that poor medical care
is likely to be very expensive for all concerned in the long run. I found
that cybernetic ideas helped me to see complex relationships and to look
for possibilities that I would not otherwise have been aware of. (I never
did encounter, though, a medical administrator who, to my knowledge, had
any idea of the problems which might stem from the lack of requisite
variety, say, in information and decision-making.)
>It all fits the superorganism, end of reductionist dominance, etc
>which we seem mostly in agreement about. You don't have to convince me about
>new approaches, but they don't seem to be the "property" of any one sect
>(cybernetics).
What I was trying to say was not simply that there was a need, but that the
complex of ideas which goes under the name of cybernetics may provide a
useful guide to new approaches. In any case I hope you don't continue to
think of cybernetics as a sect. In my view it is a set of concepts at a
high level of abstraction, perhaps at the level where science and religion
have some common attributes in terms of truth and inclusive values. But
that would be another discussion!
Cheers!
Bruce B.