Sociocybernetics

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Jump to: navigation, search This article is about an academic discipline. For use of the similar term, Sociocyberneering, as a socioeconomic governing technique, see Jacque Fresco. This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. No cleanup reason has been specified. Please help improve this article if you can. (January
2008)

Sociocybernetics is an independent chapter of science in sociology based upon the General Systems Theory and cybernetics. It also has a basis in Organizational Development (OD) consultancy practice and in Theories of Communication, theories of psychotherapies and computer sciences. The International Sociological Association has a specialist research committee in the area RC51 which publishes the (electronic) Journal of Sociocybernetics. The term "socio" in the name of sociocybernetics refers to any social system (as defined, among others, by Talcott Parsons and Niklas Luhmann). The idea to study society as a system can be traced back to the origin of sociology when the emergent idea of functional differentiation has been applied for the first time to society by Auguste Comte. The basic goal for which sociocybernetics was created, is the production of a theoretical framework as well as information technology tools for responding to the basic challenges individuals, couples, families, groups, companies, organizations, countries, international affairs are facing today.

Contents
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1 Sociocybernetics analyzes social 'forces' 2 Sociocybernetics aims to generate a general theoretical framework for understanding cooperative behavior. 3 Issues and challenges 4 See also 5 References 6 Further reading 7 External links

Sociocybernetics analyzes social 'forces'[edit source | edit]

One of the tasks of sociocybernetics is to map, measure, harness, and find ways of intervening in the parallel network of social forces that influence human behavior. Sociocyberneticists' task is to understand the guidance and control mechanisms that govern the operation of society (and the behavior of individuals more generally) in practice and then to devise better

ways of harnessing and intervening in them that is to say to devise more effective ways to operate these mechanisms, or to modify them according to the opinions of the cyberneticist.

Sociocybernetics aims to generate a general theoretical framework for understanding cooperative behavior. [edit source | edit]
It claims to give a deep understanding of the General Theory of Evolution. The outlook that Sociocybernetics uses when analyzing any living system lies in a Basic Law of SocioCybernetics. It says: All living systems go through five levels of interrelations (social contracts) of its subsystems:

A. Aggression: survive or die B. Bureaucracy: follow the norms and rules C. Competition: my gain is your loss D. Decision: disclosing individual feelings, intentions E. Empathy: cooperation in one unified interest

Going through these five phases of relationship theoretically gives the framework for the sociocybernetic study of any evolutionary system. It serves as an "equation for life."

Issues and challenges[edit source | edit]

Recent research from the Santa Fe Institute presents the idea that social systems like cities don't behave like organisms as has been proposed by some in sociocybernetics.[1]

See also[edit source | edit]

Anthropology Cliodynamics Complex systems Dynastic cycle General systems theory List of cycles Psychology Social cycle theory Sociocracy Sociology

Superorganisms Systems philosophy Systems thinking War cycles World-systems theory

References[edit source | edit]

1. Jump up ^ Lus M. A. Bettencourt, Jos Lobo, Dirk Helbing, Christian Khnert, and Geoffrey B. West. Growth, innovation, scaling and the pace of life in cities. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0610172104v1

Further reading[edit source | edit]

Felix Geyer and Johannes van der Zouwen (1992). "Sociocybernetics" in: Handbook of Cybernetics (C.V. Negoita, ed.). New York: Marcel Dekker, 1992, pp. 95124. Felix Geyer (1994). "The Challenge of Sociocybernetics". In: Kybernetes. 24(4):6-32, 1995. Copyright MCB University Press1995 Felix Geyer (2001). "Sociocybernetics" In: Kybernetes, Vol. 31 No. 7/8, 2002, pp. 10211042. Raven, J. (1994). Managing Education for Effective Schooling: The Most Important Problem Is to Come to Terms with Values. Unionville, New York: Trillium Press. (OCLC 34483891) Raven, J. (1995). The New Wealth of Nations: A New Enquiry into the Nature and Origins of the Wealth of Nations and the Societal Learning Arrangements Needed for a Sustainable Society. Unionville, New York: Royal Fireworks Press; Sudbury, Suffolk: Bloomfield Books. (ISBN 0-89824-232-0)

External links[edit source | edit]

Center for Sociocybernetics Studies Bonn Cybernetic Principles for Effective Control in Complex Organizations [hide]

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Subfields of and scientists involved in cybernetics

Subfields

Polycontexturality Second-order cybernetics Catastrophe theory Connectionism Control theory Decision theory Information theory Semiotics Synergetics Biological cybernetics Biosemiotics Biomedical cybernetics Biorobotics Computational neuroscience Homeostasis Management cybernetics Medical cybernetics New Cybernetics

Neurocybernetics Sociocybernetics Emergence Artificial intelligence Igor Aleksander William Ross Ashby Anthony Stafford Beer Claude Bernard Ludwig von Bertalanffy Valentin Braitenberg Gordon S. Brown Walter Bradford Cannon Heinz von Foerster Charles Franois Jay Wright Forrester Jacque Fresco Buckminster Fuller Ernst von Glasersfeld Francis Heylighen Erich von Holst Cliff Joslyn Stuart Kauffman Sergei P. Kurdyumov Niklas Luhmann Warren McCulloch Humberto Maturana Talcott Parsons Gordon Pask Walter Pitts Alfred Radcliffe-Brown Robert Trappl Valentin Turchin Jakob von Uexkll Francisco Varela Frederic Vester Charles Geoffrey Vickers Stuart Umpleby John N. Warfield William Grey Walter Kevin Warwick Norbert Wiener Anthony Wilden

Cyberneticists

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