BCSSS

International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics

2nd Edition, as published by Charles François 2004 Presented by the Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science Vienna for public access.

About

The International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics was first edited and published by the system scientist Charles François in 1997. The online version that is provided here was based on the 2nd edition in 2004. It was uploaded and gifted to the center by ASC president Michael Lissack in 2019; the BCSSS purchased the rights for the re-publication of this volume in 200?. In 2018, the original editor expressed his wish to pass on the stewardship over the maintenance and further development of the encyclopedia to the Bertalanffy Center. In the future, the BCSSS seeks to further develop the encyclopedia by open collaboration within the systems sciences. Until the center has found and been able to implement an adequate technical solution for this, the static website is made accessible for the benefit of public scholarship and education.

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PERCEPTION (Purpose in) 3)

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… or, in M. MERLEAU-PONTY's terms "perceptive intentionality" (1945).

In G. BATESON's words: "I, the conscious I, see an unconsciously edited version of a small percentage of what affects my retina. I am guided in my perception by purpose.

"I see who is attending, who is not, or at least I get a myth about this subject… It is relevant to my purpose that you hear me…" (1973, p.408).

Perception must by necessity be selective. Otherwise we would be submerged by it and unable to act anymore. Such a purposeful organization of perception is the result of the progressive organization of our neural networks, through imprinting, training, or learning.

There is however a price to pay: selectivity blocks us slowly in routine grooves and much of reality becomes invisible, or again, subtly edited. As expressed in a untranslatable German pun by H.von FOERSTER: "… was man wahr-nimmt, nimmt man für wahr" (1992, p.51).

Categories

  • 1) General information
  • 2) Methodology or model
  • 3) Epistemology, ontology and semantics
  • 4) Human sciences
  • 5) Discipline oriented

Publisher

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science(2020).

To cite this page, please use the following information:

Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science (2020). Title of the entry. In Charles François (Ed.), International Encyclopedia of Systems and Cybernetics (2). Retrieved from www.systemspedia.org/[full/url]

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