W. Ross Ashby journal (1928-1972)
Filed under personal journal | Tags: · complex systems, cybernetics, psychiatry, self-organization, systems theory
On Monday, 7th May 1928, while a 24 year old medical student at Barts Hospital in London, Ross started writing a journal. In it he recorded his thoughts, theorems, and goals that would eventually bring him recognition as a pioneer in the fields of Cybernetics and Systems Theory. 44 years later, his journal had 7,400 pages, in 25 volumes.
In 1972, shortly after Ross died, Stafford Beer wrote in his condolence letter to Ross’s wife, Rosebud, “Look after Ross’s papers. I have no idea what should be done with them, but they are very precious.” — For the next 30 years, only members of his family had access to his journals.
Eventually, scans were made of all original archive material, and in January 2003, Ross’s daughters gave the whole archive to The British Library, in London. Then, in March 2004, at the end of the W. Ross Ashby Centenary Conference, his daughters announced that they would make Ross’s Journal available on the Internet. Now, in 2008, the digitally restored images of all 7,400 pages and 1,600 index cards are available on this web site in various views, with extensive cross-linking that is based on the keywords in Ross’s original alphabetical index.
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View online (Index view; HTML)
View online (Summaries view; HTML)
View online (Timeline view; HTML)
John Mingers: Self-Producing Systems: Implications and Applications of Autopoiesis (1995)
Filed under book | Tags: · artificial intelligence, autopoiesis, cognitive science, cybernetics, information theory, law, philosophy, systems theory, theory of communication
“This is the first volume to offer comprehensive coverage of autopoiesis-critically examining the theory itself and its applications in philosophy, law, family therapy, and cognitive science.”
Publisher Springer, Dordrecht
Contemporary Systems Thinking series
ISBN 0306447975, 9780306447976
246 pages
PDF (updated on 2012-7-29)
Comment (0)Stephan Fuchs: Against Essentialism: A Theory of Culture and Society (2001)
Filed under book | Tags: · avant-garde, communication, constructivism, culture, essentialism, ethnomethodology, hermeneutics, networks, social theory, society, sociology, systems theory, theory
Against Essentialism presents a sociological theory of culture. This interdisciplinary and foundational work deals with basic issues common to current debates in social theory, including society, culture, meaning, truth, and communication. Stephan Fuchs argues that many mysteries about these concepts lose their mysteriousness when dynamic variations are introduced.
Fuchs proposes a theory of culture and society that merges two core traditions–American network theory and European (Luhmannian) systems theory. His book distinguishes four major types of social “observers”–encounters, groups, organizations, and networks. Society takes place in these four modes of association. Each generates levels of observation linked with each other into a “culture”–the unity of these observations.
Against Essentialism presents a groundbreaking new approach to the construction of society, culture, and personhood. The book invites both social scientists and philosophers to see what happens when essentialism is abandoned.
Publisher Harvard University Press, 2001
ISBN 0674006100, 9780674006102
380 pages