March 1, 2022
Journal article Open Access
An Active Inference Ontology for Decentralized Science: from Situated Sensemaking to the Epistemic Commons
Friedman, Daniel; Applegate-Swanson, Shaun; Choudhury, Arhan; Cordes, RJ; El Damaty, Shady; Guénin—Carlut, Avel; Knight, V. Bleu; Metelkin, Ivan; Shrivastava, Siddhant; Singh, Amit Kumar; Smékal, Jakub; Tuttle. Caleb; Vyatkin, Alexander
In this work, we examine science from the vantage points of blockchain technology and its connection to decentralized science (DeSci). We consider science as a collective process using Active Inference, an integrative framework that models the cognitive processes of perception, planning, and action selection in terms of Bayesian probabilities and updating. We present the Active Entity Ontology for Science (AEOS, available at coda.io/@active-inference-lab/active-entity-ontology-for-science-aeos) as a composable and versionable system for modeling various science systems, using the Active Inference entity partitioning. Further steps for developing and utilizing AEOS in the context of scientific ecosystems are provided.
An Active Inference Ontology for Decentralized Science: from Situated Sensemaking to the Epistemic Commons | Zenodo
Category Archives: Discussion
A view or perspective on the world
Dennis Meadows on the 50th anniversary of the publication of The Limits to Growth – Resilience
Dennis Meadows on the 50th anniversary of the publication of The Limits to GrowthBy Richard Heinberg, Dennis Meadows, originally published by Resilience.orgFebruary 22, 2022
Dennis Meadows on the 50th anniversary of the publication of The Limits to Growth – Resilience
THE EVOLUTION OF OPEN SYSTEMS THEORY – Merrelyn Emery, 2022
The Evolution of Open Systems Theory is a revised and updated version of the paper that was published in 2000. As well as accurately documenting the main advances in OST, including that component of it which has traditionally gone by the name of sociotechnical systems, deriving in part from Lewin’s work on systemic structures, it shows it was a completely separate stream of work from that derived from the other side of Lewin’s work, that which was fully within the closed systems Human Relations school. These streams did not come together in any major way until Weisbord unsuccessfully tried to integrate them in the 1980s.
Perspectives on Science and Other Theories – social science that actually works
SOCIAL SCIENCE THAT ACTUALLY WORKS
SCIENCE AND OTHER THEORIES
Perspectives on Science and Other Theories
Contains:
INTRODUCTION TO PERSPECTIVES ON SCIENCE AND OTHER THEORIES
Merrelyn Emery, 2018
Open Systems Theory (OST) is just a branch or area of science like any other and those who work with OST see themselves as scientists much like any other. As such, most practitioners have a lively interest in science more generally and a scientific approach to matters of interest as they arise.
REVIEW OF TOMKINS
AFFECT, IMAGERY, CONSCIOUSNESS
Fred Emery, 1962
Note from ME. Here we see another example of how Fred worked, persisting with what he considered to be an important task over time. He had immense respect for Silvan Tomkins’ work to which he constantly returned and referred, particularly his first two volumes. These notes below were originally four separate ones which I have put into one chronological document.
THE CASE STUDY METHOD
Fred Emery, 1964
The case study is a detailed examination of the characteristics of single objects or events. When it concerns development it is a case history of life history. It may be contrasted with that other major method of observational study, the survey, which starts from an enumeration of the characteristics of all, or a representative sample of all of a given class of objects or events.
REINSTATEMENT OF EDITORIAL POLICY
Fred Emery, 1965
THE SPONSORING Institutes and the journal itself arose out of the stimulus given to social science by World War II, and the formative integrative effort of Kurt Lewin. His untimely death was sorely felt, and the postwar developments in social science have by no means followed predictions.
TOWARD A PROPER ROLE FOR SCIENCE AND SCIENTIST: AN OUTLINE FOR ANZAAS PAPER 1973, PERTH
Fred Emery, 1973
Since at least the late 1930s we have been faced with the increasing escalation of science-based industry and the part of research and development in economic growth. With the revolution in information technology and the burgeoning of the social sciences these trends have spilled over to most areas of organized social activity. It no longer shocks us that such a venerable organization as the Papacy might call on the services of McKinsey’.
O.R., SYSTEMS LEVEL AND THE ‘OPERATIONAL ENVIRONMENT’
Fred Emery, 1976
It is the contention of the author that O.R. has been steadily ‘painting itself into a corner’ and thereby reducing its utility.
IDEOLOGICAL OR IDEA-LOGICAL
Fred Emery, 1977
Note from ME: this little paper was written in the middle of an effort to rid the CCE of Open Systems Theory and the Emerys in particular. One prong of the attack was to label OST as an ‘ideology’, some sort of extremist or whacko belief system.
RESPONSIBILITY AND SOCIAL CHANGE
(THE CCE AND ITS INVOLVEMENT IN SOCIAL CHANGE)
Fred Emery and Merrelyn Emery, 1977
Note from ME: this little paper like that discussing the meanings of ‘ideology’ was part response to the protracted effort to denigrate and irretrievably damage our work. Many claims such as ideological and irresponsible were thrown around as a group within the ANU, and indeed the CCE, tried to wipe OST out of the Centre for Continuing Education. Fred wrote the first version which we revised and reissued the following year.
DISSIPATIVE STRUCTURE AND COMPLEX ENVIRONMENTS
Fred Emery, 1982
Prigogine and May have separately made contributions to the study of physical and biological organizations that have captured the imagination of those concerned with understanding social organization.
In this note I with to examine whether this interest is justified beyond the natural curiosity that something happening in distant fields might be of interest.
LETTER TO AL RE SIGNS BECOMING SIGHS
Fred Emery, 1982
This is a letter from Fred Emery addressed to Al regarding Signs Becoming Sighs
REVIEW OF STRETTON “THE POLITICAL SCIENCE”:
A CRITIQUE OF FUNCTIONALISM
Fred Emery, 1982
Stretton’s case seems to be:
- that a significant part of sociology is still hung up on a scientistic program that is fruitless.
- That this sterile scientism is being forced into the students of sociology (p. 398).
- That a fruitful model is available to sociology.
MANAGING THE LEARNING – IN SEARCH CONFERENCES
Fred Emery, 1983
We spent two years, mid 1982-84, in Philadelphia working at Russ Ackoff’s Social Systems Sciences (S3) program at the Wharton School, Uni of Pennsylvania. This and other notes illustrate something of the growing divergence of views between Fred and Russ (ME).
REFLECTIONS ON MONDAY 12/28/83
“MORE INTERVENTIONS”
Fred Emery, 1983
The significance of the open cut and thrust of that engagement did not strike me until, at the close I overheard three elated male students saying (as best I recall) “I have not sat in on such a discussion of S3 practice in the four years I have been here!”, “Not in the seven years I have been around,” “Yes, it was something.”
REGARDING THE PAPER BY RUSS ON “MESS MANAGEMENT”
Fred Emery, 1983
Russ’ critique of search conferences can hardly be based on their failure to address the five phases he identifies as the superior mode of ‘problem dissolution’ i.e. ‘design oriented planning’.
Search conferences were consciously designed to work through these phases since the 1959 design for Bristol-Siddeley. Plus, later, a sixth phase of generating a final report.
METAPHORS, ROOT METAPHORS AND SOCIAL SYSTEMS THINKING
Fred Emery, 1984
I want to come at my subject matter from consideration of the publishing history of On Purposeful Systems, touching, in passing on the publishing history of Gerd Sommerhoff’s Analytical Biology.
REFLECTION ON “HOW TO PUT AN ACTION RESEARCH STRATEGY INTO PRACTICE?”
Fred Emery, 1987
It is unclear as to just what empirical studies are being referred to here.
Clearly (1.1) the reference is to work conducted in the Norwegian tradition. Since there have been few detailed empirical reports of field experiments in Norway the reader must be inclined to believe that the prime reference is to the set of studies reported by Thorsrud and Emery in 1970.
If this be so then the gist of the introduction is that it is no longer appropriate to follow that model of action research.
LETTER TO PER: DEVELOPMENT IN NORWAY
Fred Emery, 1987
This is a letter exchange from Fred Emery addressed to Per regarding the development in Norway.
LETTER TO ROBERT KLEINER
Fred Emery, 1988
This is a letter exchange from Fred Emery addressed to Robert Kleiner
SALES FORCE INCENTIVES BY G. HOLMES & N. SMITH
A REVIEW BY F.E. EMERY
Fred Emery, 1988
It is understood that this book is directed at Sales Managers. It is assumed that Sales Managers usually arrive at this position after a career in sales and hence we can expect a reasonable level of general education and verbal fluency. If this assumption is correct then tertiary education is not to be expected, but they probably manage easily with the level of exposition to be found in Time and The Bulletin and are familiar with the ideas about management are in good currency in those magazines.
JAQUES’ CONCEPT OF REQUISITE ORGANIZATION
Fred Emery, 1990
Jaques takes a hard line on work organization.
His basic questions for organizational design are,
- what work really requires doing ?
- what people, with what capabilities, are needed to do the work ?
- what relationships do people need to form in order to get the work done ?
ACTION RESEARCH
Fred Emery, 1990
A great deal of the scientific work that I have done is what was termed “Action Research”. The Tavistock Institute of Human Relations was at the forefront in developing this field of Action Research in the post-war years. We went to considerable lengths to ensure that this research was defined so as to conform, as close as possible, to the accepted logic of scientific experimentation.
LETTER TO SA WHEELAN RE ADVANCES IN FIELD THEORY
Fred Emery, 1990
This is a letter exchange between Fred Emery and Susan A. Wheelan regarding Advances in Field Theory.
THE SEARCH CONFERENCE IN THE USA TODAY: CLARIFYING SOME CONFUSIONS
Merrelyn Emery, 1994
It appears that there is a new generation of people interested in methods of bringing people together to make change. Unfortunately many of these people have been educated particularly in American based social science which can be misleading. In this article I directly compare the Search Conference with the Future Search. Those interested in effective methods may find this comparison illuminating.
NOTES ON CIVILIZATION
Merrelyn Emery, 2009
These notes were written in response to discussion and queries from colleagues as to what really constitutes a ‘civilization’. This analysis shows that our Western cultures really do not qualify as civilizations. Unfortunately since that time, we have seen epidemics of mental illness and other distresses which can only reinforce this conclusion and help hasten moves towards the alternative base for a culture.
OPEN SYSTEMS IS ALIVE AND WELL
Merrelyn Emery
This paper was written for and presented to a special symposium on sociotechnical systems and organizational design at a time when many within the North American social science community were becoming aware of the short comings of their methods and practices more generally. It contains an analysis of the North American variant and presents the adaptive alternative. Some references have been updated.
THE EVOLUTION OF OPEN SYSTEMS THEORY
Merrelyn Emery, 2022
The Evolution of Open Systems Theory is a revised and updated version of the paper that was published in 2000. As well as accurately documenting the main advances in OST, including that component of it which has traditionally gone by the name of sociotechnical systems, deriving in part from Lewin’s work on systemic structures, it shows it was a completely separate stream of work from that derived from the other side of Lewin’s work, that which was fully within the closed systems Human Relations school. These streams did not come together in any major way until Weisbord unsuccessfully tried to integrate them in the 1980s.
International Conference on Systems Thinking & Women’s Empowerment | AMMACHI Labs & CWEGE
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON SYSTEMS THINKING & WOMEN’S EMPOWERMENT
International Conference on Systems Thinking & Women’s Empowerment | AMMACHI Labs & CWEGE
The conference has finished but the content link etc is above.
Videos are available:
Leading Complexity – Leadership in a volatile world – conference Sep-Dec 2022
Leading Complexity
Usual kind of stuff, but more expensive 🙂
A weekly series of master classes on the topic of leadership in a volatile world.
Leading Complexity – Leadership in a volatile world
The Flourishing of All Living Things • Flourishing of All Living Things / Master • Kumu
This map will be a snapshot attempting to make sense of the myriad of ways humanity is attempting to save itself. Naryan has compiled this map based on publicly available information, and hopes others may choose to join the network. To include or remove anything, please reach out to Naryan on twitter: @hinaryan
The Flourishing of All Living Things • Flourishing of All Living Things / Master • Kumu
Why We Try To Solve Problems By Adding Complexity – Paul Taylor
Why We Try To Solve Problems By Adding Complexity
Why We Try To Solve Problems By Adding Complexity – Paul Taylor
The impact of individual perceptual and cognitive factors on collective states in a data-driven fish school model – Wang et al (2022)
The impact of individual perceptual and cognitive factors on collective states in a data-driven fish school modelWeijia Wang,Ramón Escobedo,Stéphane Sanchez,Clément Sire,Zhangang Han,Guy Theraulaz Published: March 2, 2022
The impact of individual perceptual and cognitive factors on collective states in a data-driven fish school model
Jessica Flack on Twitter: “DISTRIBUTED VS CENTRALIZED: 1) not a binary distinction, 2) both architectures evolve in nature thru bottom up processes 3) both have robustness + evolvability issues. Be empirical not ideological.
DISTRIBUTED VS CENTRALIZED: 1) not a binary distinction, 2) both architectures evolve in nature thru bottom up processes 3) both have robustness + evolvability issues. Be empirical not ideological. Lamport’s contributions to CS:https://amturing.acm.org/award_winners/lamport_1205376.cfm…https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/time-clocks.pdf
Jessica Flack on Twitter: “DISTRIBUTED VS CENTRALIZED: 1) not a binary distinction, 2) both architectures evolve in nature thru bottom up processes 3) both have robustness + evolvability issues. Be empirical not ideological. Lamport’s contributions to CS: https://t.co/JtOIC5HKHt https://t.co/WvNv3Mrm76” / Twitter
Constructivism + Embodied Cognition = Enactivism: Theoretical and Practical Implications for Conceptual Change | Holton (201)
Constructivism + Embodied Cognition = Enactivism: Theoretical and Practical Implications for Conceptual Change
(PDF) Constructivism + Embodied Cognition = Enactivism: Theoretical and Practical Implications for Conceptual Change | Doug Holton – Academia.edu
Constructivism + Embodied Cognition = Enactivism: Theoretical and Practical Implications for Conceptual Change
Published 2010
The objective of this paper is to explore specific theoretical and practical implications of recent research on embodied cognition and enactivism for the design of effective learning environments, especially those targeting conceptual change. The ultimate goal is to illustrate how enactivism and embodied cognition can help meet the criteria that often define scientific progress (Laudan, 1977), for the purpose of advancing educational research and development and constructivist theory. [This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License]
Donald Schon Lecture (1989) – YouTube
Donald Schon Lecture
Donald Schon Lecture – YouTube
Video recording of Donald Schön lecture (1989)
Discovered by João Ferreira on the PHD-DESIGN discussion list (PHD-DESIGN@jiscmail.ac.uk)
Dear all,
I came across a video recording of a lecture by Donald Schön. It was published by the Iowa State University Library on YouTube.
There isn’t much information about it, but the description mentions the lecture was delivered on 4/28/1989. There is a transcript available as well.
I was delighted to see and hear Schön for the first time; I’m posting the link here because I think it may be helpful for PhD candidates looking to engage with the author’s ideas in an accessible format. During the lecture, Schön explains several of his ideas and insights that have become so influential for design theory.
Best regards,
João
Multiple Systems Thinking methods for resilience research – Wright (2012 MPhil thesis)
Multiple Systems Thinking methods for resilience research
Wright, Clare 2012.
Cardiff University
Multiple Systems Thinking methods for resilience research -ORCA
Systems View of Life with Fritjof Capra and Jeremy Lent – March 5, 9am PST
What happens when we bring together two great thinkers of Systems Theory and Deep Ecology in emergent conversation?Join us on Saturday, March 5at 9am PST / 12pm EST / 5pm GMT
for Systems View of Life. Fritjof Capra, author of many books including The Systems View of Life and Jeremy Lent, author of The Patterning Instinct: A Cultural History of Humanity’s Search for Meaning and The Web of Meaning will discuss three of the foundations of WTR – patterns, systems and deep ecology – and how we can use these theories to support our practices as activists, facilitators and change-makers. Together we will explore how evolutionary biology, history and spirituality interact and provide answers to the challenges we now face.
March 5: Systems View of Life with Fritjof Capra and Jeremy Lent
The Grammar of Systems: From Order to Chaos & Back – Hoverstadt
very exciting that this is now out!
The Grammar of Systems: From Order to Chaos & Back: Amazon.co.uk: Hoverstadt, Patrick: 9798414307754: Books
You can also see Patrick talking about this at the SCiO UK Virtual Open Meeting – March 2022
Monday 21 March, 18:30UK time
https://systemspractice.org/events/scio-uk-virtual-open-meeting-march-2022
(along with Roger Duck and Jane Searles talking about Designing Freedom Together: https://stream.syscoi.com/2022/02/08/discussion-designing-freedom-together-duck-and-searles-2021/)
The Grammar of Systems: From Order to Chaos & Back Paperback – 22 Feb. 2022
by Patrick Hoverstadt (Author)
The Grammar of Systems
If you feel as though the world has become more complex, you are not alone. There is a growing realisation of the need to deal with the complexity, uncertainty and speed of change of our world. These systemic factors increase the challenge for all of us and expose some traditional approaches which are unable to handle those challenges. This book sets out the fundamentals of Systems Thinking, a discipline developed specifically to grapple with complexity and uncertainty. It builds a compelling and useable guide to change the way you think about the world around you, for those wanting to understand or change systems, managers, policy makers and systems specialists alike.
Part One illustrates the nine thinking patterns involved in thinking like a systems thinker, which collectively form the core of Systems Thinking. Each pattern is contrasted with conventional thinking and shows the power of thinking differently, alongside practical ways to develop these patterns in yourself and your organisation. If you want a different way to be able to think about the world, the thought patterns in this book will give you that.
Part Two describes 33 Systems Laws and Principles on which Systems Thinking as a discipline was founded. These Systems laws show how both order and chaos are created in systems and the dynamic between them. The Laws and Principles provide the insight on how, when and why systems remain stable and change at the same time, and what happens when they don’t, instead collapsing into new forms or disintegrating. These powerful insights are vital for anyone designing a change or transformation.
The Grammar of Systems presents a very clear, coherent guide to the discipline of Systems Thinking.
Patrick Hoverstadt is a veteran systems practitioner, and chairs the professional body for Systems Practitioners.
Systems Community of Inquiry 
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