RIP Edgar Morin
https://festival-avignon.com/en/news/tribute-to-edgar-morin-1921%E2%80%932026-356521
https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/unesco-pays-tribute-legacy-edgar-morin
Recent Updates Page 9
RIP Jim Rutt (with John Krakauer on Why Neuroscience Needs Behavior and Tyson Yunkaporta on Ceremony, Skepticism, and Seeing in 3D)
Very sad to hear the news this morning that Jim Rutt died on May 27, 2026. Official announcement:
https://www.obaughfuneralhome.com/obituaries/james-jim-rutt
He was a big character and someone deeply involved with complexity, a Boomer Uncle or Grand-uncle par excellence, I think, and someone I listened to regularly with amusement and frustration – but a true, actual, explorer and thinker, open to challenge and deeply learning focused. Just yesterday I’d listened to and sent myself the link for this excellenct interview with John Krakauer, which aligns with so much of my thinking on neuroscience:
https://jimrutt.substack.com/p/ep-339-john-krakauer-on-why-neuroscience
And then I was pleased to see that his final published podcast was with Tyson Yunkaporta, his opposite in many ways – yet also someone with many similarities, finding commonality, who pays umprompted and heartfelt tribute to what he has learned from Jim, and which is openly reciprocated, and explored:
https://jimrutt.substack.com/p/ep-345-worldviews-tyson-yunkaporta
ChatGPT says I should summarise his life as:
“Jim Rutt occupied a rare position at the intersection of technology, complexity science and public discourse. As chairman of the Santa Fe Institute, an internet entrepreneur, co-founder of Game B, and host of The Jim Rutt Show, he spent decades creating conversations across disciplines and communities that otherwise might never have met. His enduring contribution wasn’t a single theory or institution but a relentless curiosity about how complex systems evolve and how humans might learn to navigate them more wisely.”
That’s pretty good actually, he was big and bold but also humble, a capitalist but also a convenor, a complexity thinker but always critical. Other links:
Longer biography
https://archania.org/p/individuals/internet-personalities/jim-rutt
Full backlog of his podcast
And his substack
https://jimrutt.substack.com/notes
And a recent interview with him:
https://blog.thomas.cr/p/the-next-10000-years-a-roadmap-for?hide_intro_popup=true
A typical bombacious perspective, and responses
A tribute from Jonathan Rowson
https://jonathanrowson.substack.com/p/howdy-on-the-other-side
And I’ll leave the last word to Jim
Problematique Dialogue 2026 retrospective – Ing (2026)
May 29, 2026 daviding
Problematique Dialogue 2026 retrospective – Coevolving Innovations
Icon, Likeness, Likely Story, Likelihood, Probability • 3
Re: Peirce List • Phyllis Chiasson
A more complete excerpt and the translator’s notes are very helpful here.
A probability (εικος) is not the same as a sign (σηµειον). The former is a generally accepted premiss ; for that which people know to happen or not to happen, or to be or not to be, usually in a particular way, is a probability : e.g., that the envious are malevolent or that those who are loved are affectionate. A sign, however, means a demonstrative premiss which is necessary or generally accepted.1 That which coexists with something else, or before or after whose happening something else has happened, is a sign of that something’s having happened or being.
An enthymeme is a syllogism from probabilities or signs ; and a sign can be taken in three ways — in just as many ways as there are of taking the middle term in the several figures : either as in the first figure or as in the second or as in the third.
- E.g., the proof that a woman is pregnant because she has milk is by the first figure ; for the middle term is ‘having milk’. A stands for ‘pregnant’, B for ‘having milk’, and C for ‘woman’.
- The proof that the wise are good because Pittacus was good is by the third figure. A stands for ‘good’, B for ‘the wise’, and C for Pittacus. Then it is true to predicate both A and B of C ; only we do not state the latter, because we know it, whereas we formally assume the former.
- The proof that a woman is pregnant because she is sallow is intended to be by the middle figure ; for since sallowness is a characteristic of woman in pregnancy, and is associated with this particular woman, they suppose that she is proved to be pregnant. A stands for ‘sallowness’, B for ‘being pregnant’, C for ‘woman’.
If only one premiss is stated, we get only a sign ; but if the other premiss is assumed as well, we get a syllogism,2 e.g., that Pittacus is high-minded, because those who love honour are high-minded, and Pittacus loves honour ; or again that the wise are good, because Pittacus is good and also wise.
In this way syllogisms can be effected ; but whereas a syllogism in the first figure cannot be refuted if it is true, since it is universal, a syllogism in the last figure can be refuted even if the conclusion is true, because the syllogism is neither universal nor relevant to our purpose.3 For if Pittacus is good, it is not necessary for this reason that all other wise men are good. A syllogism in the middle figure is always and in every way refutable, since we never get a syllogism with the terms in this relation4 ; for it does not necessarily follow, if a pregnant woman is sallow, and this woman is sallow, that she is pregnant. Thus truth can be found in all signs, but they differ in the ways which have been described.
We must either classify signs in this way, and regard their middle term as an index (τεκµηριον)5 (for the name ‘index’ is given to that which causes us to know, and the middle term is especially of this nature), or describe the arguments drawn from the extremes6 as ‘signs’, and that which is drawn from the middle as an ‘index’. For the conclusion which is reached through the first figure is most generally accepted and most true. (Aristotle, Prior Analytics 2.27, 70a3–70b6).
Translator’s Notes
- If referable to one phenomenon only, a sign has objective necessity ; if to more than one, its value is a matter of opinion.
- Strictly an enthymeme.
- If the signs of an enthymeme in the first figure are true, the conclusion is inevitable. Aristotle does not mean that the conclusion is universal, but that the universality of the major premiss implies the validity of the minor and conclusion. The example (<all> those who have honour, etc.) quoted for the third figure contains no universal premiss or sign, and fails to establish a universal conclusion.
- i.e. when both premisses are affirmative.
- Signs may be classified as irrefutable (1st figure) and refutable (2nd and 3rd figures), and the name ‘index’ may be attached to their middle terms, either in all figures or (more probably) only in the first, where the middle is distinctively middle.
- Alternatively the name ‘sign’ may be restricted to the 2nd and 3rd figures, and may be replaced by ‘index’ in the first.
Reference
- Aristotle, “Prior Analytics”, Hugh Tredennick (trans.), pp. 181–531 in Aristotle, Volume 1, Loeb Classical Library, William Heinemann, London, UK, 1938.
Resource
- Theme One Program • User Guide • Appendix A
cc: Academia.edu • Cybernetics • Laws of Form • Mathstodon
cc: Research Gate • Structural Modeling • Systems Science • Syscoi
Bet hedging (biology)
Shared by https://x.com/male_leo_xxvi in a cybernetics chat
Why we don’t get complexity: Stafford Beer, ‘requisite variety’ and systems thinking
Why we don’t get complexity: Stafford Beer, ‘requisite variety’ and systems thinking. Claire Hartnell. https://open.substack.com/pub/clairejhartnell/p/why-we-dont-get-complexity-stafford?r=slo6&utm_medium=ios
Machine Intelligence is not Artificial – Part 7
Machine Intelligence is not Artificial – Part 7. Sean Manion. https://seanmanion.substack.com/p/machine-intelligence-is-not-artificial-d42?r=slo6&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY article. Front. Syst. Neurosci., 24 March 2022
HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY article
Front. Syst. Neurosci., 24 March 2022
Volume 16 – 2022 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fnsys.2022.768201
Technological Approach to Mind Everywhere: An Experimentally-Grounded Framework for Understanding Diverse Bodies and Minds
Michael Levin 1,2*
1. Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University, Medford, MA, United States
2. Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, United States
Abstract
Synthetic biology and bioengineering provide the opportunity to create novel embodied cognitive systems (otherwise known as minds) in a very wide variety of chimeric architectures combining evolved and designed material and software. These advances are disrupting familiar concepts in the philosophy of mind, and require new ways of thinking about and comparing truly diverse intelligences, whose composition and origin are not like any of the available natural model species. In this Perspective, I introduce TAME—Technological Approach to Mind Everywhere—a framework for understanding and manipulating cognition in unconventional substrates. TAME formalizes a non-binary (continuous), empirically-based approach to strongly embodied agency. TAME provides a natural way to think about animal sentience as an instance of collective intelligence of cell groups, arising from dynamics that manifest in similar ways in numerous other substrates. When applied to regenerating/developmental systems, TAME suggests a perspective on morphogenesis as an example of basal cognition. The deep symmetry between problem-solving in anatomical, physiological, transcriptional, and 3D (traditional behavioral) spaces drives specific hypotheses by which cognitive capacities can increase during evolution. An important medium exploited by evolution for joining active subunits into greater agents is developmental bioelectricity, implemented by pre-neural use of ion channels and gap junctions to scale up cell-level feedback loops into anatomical homeostasis. This architecture of multi-scale competency of biological systems has important implications for plasticity of bodies and minds, greatly potentiating evolvability. Considering classical and recent data from the perspectives of computational science, evolutionary biology, and basal cognition, reveals a rich research program with many implications for cognitive science, evolutionary biology, regenerative medicine, and artificial intelligence.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/systems-neuroscience/articles/10.3389/fnsys.2022.768201/full
The Cybernetics Thought Collective (Digital Surrogates). Digital Collections at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library
The Cybernetics Thought Collective (Digital Surrogates) | Digital Collections at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library https://digital.library.illinois.edu/items/82eaef70-29ac-0136-4d81-0050569601ca-d
On Our Own Terms: Systems change through Lived Experience Leadership
On Our Own Terms: Systems change through Lived Experience Leadership. Morgan & Co. https://morganandco.au/project/on-our-own-terms/
Systems Practice as a Practice of the Middle Voice
Systems Practice as a Practice of the Middle Voice. Philippe Vandenbroeck. https://philippevandenbroeck.medium.com/systems-practice-as-a-practice-of-the-middle-voice-f89d81509e1e
Conceptual understanding is a myth – by Greg Ashman
Conceptual understanding is a myth – by Greg Ashman
Icon, Likeness, Likely Story, Likelihood, Probability • 2
Re: Peirce List • Phyllis Chiasson
I’m still a bit fuzzy on how Aristotle’s account relates to Peirce’s usage, though I’m pretty sure Peirce must have taken Aristotle’s usage into account, but it does seem that Aristotle drew some sort of distinction here, using a term “tekmerion” which gets translated as “index” to make the following remark later on in that chapter.
We must either classify signs in this way, and regard their middle term as an index [τεκµηριον] (for the name ‘index’ is given to that which causes us to know, and the middle term is especially of this nature), or describe the arguments drawn from the extremes as ‘signs’, and that which is drawn from the middle as an ‘index’. For the conclusion which is reached through the first figure is most generally accepted and most true. (Aristotle, Prior Analytics, 2.27.70b1–6).
Reference
- Aristotle, “Prior Analytics”, Hugh Tredennick (trans.), pp. 181–531 in Aristotle, Volume 1, Loeb Classical Library, William Heinemann, London, UK, 1938.
Resource
- Theme One Program • User Guide • Appendix A
cc: Academia.edu • Cybernetics • Laws of Form • Mathstodon
cc: Research Gate • Structural Modeling • Systems Science • Syscoi
The Last Redoubt of Complexity Theory – Downham (2026)
As launched on LinkedIn:
🔥 THE LAST REDOUBT OF COMPLEXITY THEORY is now live.
道 · 愛 · 革命 — The Way · Revolutionary Energy · Transformation of Things
📖 Full paper (HTML) → https://lnkd.in/eEQy_cKu
(6) Post | LinkedIn
Links to
https://markdownham88-crypto.github.io/the-last-redoubt-redux
[I have no way of evaluating this right now – it may be a heartbreaking work of staggering genius!]
Icon, Likeness, Likely Story, Likelihood, Probability • 1
Re: Peirce List • Benjamin Udell • Michael Shapiro
Here’s a likely locus classicus for “icon” in its logical sense —
A probability (εικος) is not the same as a sign (σηµειον). The former is a generally accepted premiss; for that which people know to happen or not to happen, or to be or not to be, usually in a particular way, is a probability: e.g., that the envious are malevolent or that those who are loved are affectionate. A sign, however, means a demonstrative premiss which is necessary or generally accepted. That which coexists with something else, or before or after whose happening something else has happened, is a sign of that something’s having happened or being. (Aristotle, Prior Analytics, 2.27.70a3–10).
Reference
- Aristotle, “Prior Analytics”, Hugh Tredennick (trans.), pp. 181–531 in Aristotle, Volume 1, Loeb Classical Library, William Heinemann, London, UK, 1938.
Resource
- Theme One Program • User Guide • Appendix A
cc: Academia.edu • Cybernetics • Laws of Form • Mathstodon
cc: Research Gate • Structural Modeling • Systems Science • Syscoi
Systems Community of Inquiry 
You must be logged in to post a comment.