Epistemic status: uncertain yet bold (working things out), and part of my thesis that there are no distinguishing fractures in the systems/cybernetics/complexity field, only many relevant and interesting dimensions of difference which cut across the supposed big distinctions.

Claims are made such as ‘complexity entails a scientific revolution, hence a radical shift in science’.

I believe that what is called complexity science is a continued working-through of ancient insights going back decades and centuries, and claiming a decisive shift leads us down dangerous paths and to miss out on powerful, valuable thinking.

That the world is fundamentally nebulous should not be denied.

It is true that a lot of work in the field (characterised as ‘systems thinking’) is used, naively and with the assumption of systematicity (or by ‘enforcing’ systematicity; reversing science and forcing the world to conform to the model) to sustain top-down, reductive, centralised…