Re: [xmca] activity (was concepts)

[Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>]

On 19 April 2011 13:27, Michael Glassman <MGlassman@ehe.osu.edu> wrote:

> Hi Huw,
>
> My worry about seeing activity in terms of cybernetics is that, for the
> most part, cybernetics is a dynamic system and has interesting ideas in
> terms of feeback loops, it is also representatitve of basically a closed
> system (at least that seems to be the way is was discussed at the Sears
> conference, which is one of the reason Bateson may have felt so out of place
> there - well that and the fact that nobody would talk to him.)
>
>
I think this is temperamental difficulty.  If you compare Beer and Ashby
they are, at least for me, worlds apart in tone and focus (open/closed).
Yet Beer actively recognised Ashby's genius.

For me, the most encouraging aspect of Bateson, Beer, Halliday, Vygotsky,
and others, is their insistence on holistic (systemic, relational, unitary)
approaches.

I didn't say it was easy (a justifiable worry) only that it seems to work
conceptually.


> All right, all right, I can already hear Andy saying, "What do you mean
> closed system Michael?"
>
> So by closed system I guess I mean that all the players are already there
> in the system, and while they change based on the ways they interact with
> each other and there is a dynamism to the interaction, it does not promote
> or welcome, or particularly know what to do with links out to unexpected
> information sources.
>

Yes, drawing a delimited boundary around a system: "I conceive of this
system as being uninfluenced by any other dynamics beyond this boundary".  I
think that for anyone who's got their head around mediation they're unlikely
to fall into that trap, although treating a system as closed can be a useful
simplification.

Huw


> Michael
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu on behalf of Huw Lloyd
> Sent: Tue 4/19/2011 8:20 AM
> To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu; lchcmike@gmail.com
> Subject: Re: [xmca] activity (was concepts)
>
>
>
> > > Huw--
> > >
> > > What notion of activity are you using when you write below:
> > >
> > > "The omission I'm noticing here is that knowing and experiencing is an
> > > activity" ?
> > >
> > > (I include the immediately preceeding paragraph for context)
> > > mike
> >
> > Mental activity.  Experiencing is not passive, it is met half way and is
> > actively interpreted (when I get round to it, Husserl is the place to go
> for
> > this, I believe).
> > [...]
>
>
> For clarity, with respect to further interpretations lifted from the other
> thread, I am conceiving of this activity cybernetically, i.e. as part of
> the
> process of self-regulation.  That is, our experience and our knowing is,
> amongst other things, mediated by our concepts (or the semiotic units
> derived from their employment) as part of our regulatory processes which we
> call activity.
>
> I hope that helps!
>
> Huw
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