Hi, Earlier in the year we at SCANZ put out a call for papers and presentations on interconnections between chaos theory, complexity, post-structuralism, cybernetics and Maori, Polynesian, Asian, Aboriginal, Indigenous knowledge and beliefs systems.
What we got back was an extraordinary range of abstracts. We thought that what we would do now is offer the accepted abstracts on a daily basis, as means of informing people about what is occurring. We called for both abstracts in the sense of paper and abstracts in the sense of artist projects, and the SCANZ symposium it seems will be richly laced with each. Today's abstract covers one of the interconnections we hadn't anticipated: that between complexity, cybernetics and mysticism. There are two important interconnections here - the first is to make formal the connection between complexity and cybernetics, and the second is to align these with mysticism. These are important interconnections to make and we are every happy to have the presentation included. Here then is artist/scientist Nina Czegledy's accepted abstract: Complexity and Cybernetics Redux (working title). There is a writers week at SCANZ to clarify and get feedback. [START] Recently identified correlations between biology, mathematics, mysticism, spirituality and the theory of complex systems provide an exciting frontier for research discoveries. It appears that certain theological and philosophical principles can be linked to chaos theory and complexity yet at the present time practical application of these theories are rare. Complexity remains difficult to define, as most of the current definitions are used to describe and analyze specific standard or systems. According to alternative speculations some systems might commence from a discrete or chaotic state and yet produce a complex order. The hypothesis has been used to investigate a wide range of models, including the behavior of animals, religious beliefs, organizations, and the human immune system. The theory is of additional interest as it is claimed that our comprehension of concepts such as chaos, enigma and complexity will fundamentally change our lives in the twenty-first century. Concerning mysticism, the interpretations and arrangements of Magic Squares for example, endowed with symbolic meaning and powerful mysticism has inspired mathematicians and philosophers for thousands of years. Magic Squares or cryptographic mathematics are often linked to divination, to what is called "human observer capability" in complexity theory. Buchanan proposed in his Spirituality and Complex Systems text that "from the point of view of systems sciences we may say that the world is sustained by complex relationships of which we understand relatively little". Before we proceed to further explore how cybernetics, magic squares and their mystic qualities relate to considerations of complexity, we need to establish a few facts about Systems Theory, a discipline that has fundamentally changed since the introduction of cybernetics by Norman Wiener in the 1940s. While fundamental network conventions have been corroborated, it might be illuminating to briefly review cybernetics or systems science. Cybernetics is a scientific paradigm originating from electronic engineering and is now widely applied to the analysis of an expanded range of systems embracing most traditional disciplines from mathematics, technology, quantum physics and biology to philosophy, commerce and the social sciences. Gregory Bateson and other early cyberneticists positioned cybernetics as a complete world -view, unifying principles underlying all phenomena, natural, cultural and technological. Contemporary cybernetics is closely related to the emerging "sciences of complexity". The extremely active and wide-ranging Cybernetics Serendipity Redux on-line discussion on the Yasmin mailing list in the month of September 2008 revealed numerous contemporary interpretations of this subject. The discussion focused on the reconsideration of the relationship between cybernetics and art. The copious contributions to this discussion will be reviewed in this presentation especially at as it might be useful to look beyond the conventional discourse restricted to established system structure and explore innovative seldom-charted domains such as the current interpretation of cybernetics, art and its relation to complex systems. [END] Well, I'm sure you can see why we thought this to be an interesting presentation. Nina needs little or no introduction and we are very happy she has considered this contribution to the symposium as well as attending the residency and putting forward a work for exhibition at the Govett-Brewster. The SCANZ residency takes place from January 25th to February 9th 2009; the symposium is on February 8th and 9th. The exhibitions open on February 8th 2009. Apologies for cross posting. Best +=+ Ian M Clothier Intercreate Research Centre intercreate.org Faculty of Arts, Commerce and Technology Western Institute of Technology at Taranaki www.witt.ac.nz New Plymouth, New Zealand South Pacific Ocean P= +64 6 757 3100 x8895 F= +64 6 757 3232 E= [EMAIL PROTECTED] This communication - including any attachments - may contain legally privileged information, and is confidential to the addressee. If you are not the intended recipient you should delete the communication and contact the sender immediately. If you have received this e-mail in error, you must not read, copy, disseminate, distribute or otherwise use or disclose any part of this communication, or any information on matters or persons to which it refers. WITT reserves the right to monitor all e-mail communications sent through its network. _______________________________________________ Ada_list mailing list [email protected] http://aotearoadigitalarts.org.nz/
