CYBERNETICS & HUMAN KNOWING

Volume 6 No. 3, 1999

Søren Brier: Foreword Full Text

Dirk Baecker: Gypsy Reason: Niklas Luhmann’s Sociological Enlightenment Abstract

Niklas Luhmann: Sign as Form  Abstract

Nina Ort and Markus Peter: Niklas Luhmann: ‘Sign as Form’ — A comment Abstract

Burton Voorhees:
Correlational Analysis of Complex Systems Abstract

Columns
Louis H. Kauffman: Virtual Logic — The Matrix Full Text

Ranulph Glanville, Bob Barbour, Michael Schreiber and Stuart Umpleby: A (Cybernetic) Musing: The Millennium Bug Full Text

Reviews
John P. van Gigch: An Introduction to Epistemology 
 

ASC Pages
Pille Bunnell: An Invitation for Conversation and Reflection Full Text

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Index, forewords and abstracts to back volumes

Abstract: It is suggested that science is in the middle of an epistemological crisis brought about by the introduction of computational methods, in particular simulations, and that complexity theory is central to the resolution of this crisis. By consideration of previous epistemic crises it appears that a new epistemic criterion is required for evaluation of computer simulations, and a related new form of reasoning may be expected to appear. A concept of universality is proposed as an appropriate epistemic criterion, and a discussion of correlative reason offers support for this proposal. Connections are made to an epistemological claim of J.R. Royce based on factor analytic studies of human cognition