Body of previous message:
The following announcement and call for papers is the direct result of
recent conversations on PRNCYB-L that a number of us were engaged in. The
initial idea grew into a full-day session of the 43rd meeting of the
International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) to be held next
summer in Pacific Grove, CA. We are currently selecting panelists for the
special session, which we hope will include a teleconference link with
Robert Rosen (via Don Mikulecky). Other panelists may include Penrose,
Maturana, Searle, Chalmers, or others. In addition to the panel and general
discussion, contributed papers will be presented during the full-day program.
I want to invite all on PRNCYB to participate, but also suggest that some
pre-conference discussion might take place on PRNCYB between now and next
June. The announcement of the special session is copied below. Please see
related sessions and other information in the General Call, accessible at:
http://www.isss.org/1999call.htm
The general focus of the ISSS is on integrating scientific perspectives.
One idea being considered in this panel and discussion session is to seek
an integration between the relational perspective of Rosen and the quantum
indeterminacy approach of Penrose, while asking if the result can be made
directly relevant to human experience, ala Searle or Maturana.
Announcement and Call for Papers:
What is Life and Living?
An exploratory Session on the Nature of Life Itself
Controversy abounds in the study of life, which has been pursued mostly
from the perspective of an independent observer. Meanwhile, many branches
of science are being forced to consider non-physical, experiential
phenomena in dealing with, for example, human systems, our understanding of
the mind, evolution, and quantum "observership." This suggests a new
worldview where life is an active and participatory agent, expressible in
no terms other than its own. This situation has resulted in an
epistemological crisis: Is our scientific concept of reality and life
complete if it leaves out the mind or represents it in terms of physical
factors alone?
Many arguments have been put forward that explaining the mind in material
(spatio-temporal, computational, mechanical) terms either does not yet or
cannot ever work. In this Panel Discussion we will investigate the
possibilities for new scientific foundations that include both the
"objective" (What is life?) and the "experiential" (What is living?)
perspectives. Approaches that now seem unacceptable include those
frameworks (philosophy/epistemology) that preserve the material or
mechanical limitations of science, as a description of only a part of
"reality" (resulting in duality); and the "monistic" view that attempts to
reduce all of reality to material explanations. We wish to explore the
alternative possibilities for expanding the scope of modern science to
formally include non-materiality within our view of life, and thus within
our view of reality in general.
Our approach emphasizes two principles:
(1) Integration of assumptions in disciplinary science as a means for
achieving a more fundamental and trans-disciplinary "worldview."
(2) Relevance between the scientific perspective itself and what we know
from experience.
This dual agenda is necessary because of the great disparity that exists
between many traditional scientific views and everyday experience -- a
disparity that colors many of our social systems and personal psychology.
There is no greater service that science can provide to society today than
to resolve the difference between the "3rd-person" perspective on life, and
the "1st-person" perspective on experience.
There will be a panel presentation focused on the integration of two major
perspectives:
(1) What is life from a descriptive point of view?
(2) What is living from an experiential point of view?
Invited speakers will present their ideas following which there will be a
facilitated discussion between the panel and attendees.
There will be a paper stream to provide further elaboration of this topic.
Contributed papers on closely related topics are welcome. The following
topics are provided to stimulate interest:
1. What are the limitations of science in describing living phenomena?
2. Is the reality that science cannot fully describe, the same reality that
we experience and participate in?
3. What is the difference between the objective and subjective? Is it the
same as between material and non-material? Or between descriptive and
experiential?
4. What is experience, and what is its relationship to living?
5. Is experience, consciousness, free will, or "observership" the result of
unique systems organization, or a fundamental property of nature, or both?
6. If life includes "living" experience, what is the role of that phenomena
in biology (including ecology and evolution)?
7. Does including the experiential view of life in science introduce
unacceptable teleological assumptions?
8. What is the relationship between life and information?
9. What is the relationship between models of non-living and living systems?
10. What is complexity, with regard to life and living?
Please send Abstracts and Papers to:
John J. Kineman, Bear Mountain Institute (BMI), 1101 Bison Dr.,
Boulder, Colorado, 80302, USA. Phone/fax: (303) 443-7544. E-mail:
BMI@bayside.net, jjk@ngdc.noaa.gov
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John J. Kineman, Physical Scientist/Ecologist
National Geophysical Data Center
325 Broadway E/GC1 (3100 Marine St. Rm: A-152)
Boulder, Colorado 80303 USA
(303) 497-6900 (phone)
(303) 497-6513 (fax)
jjk@ngdc.noaa.gov (email)