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.

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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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DEMOSOPHIA 4)

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"The wisdom of the people "(A. CHRISTAKIS, 1996, p.17). Christakis writes: "The name implies a paradigm shift from "the power of the people", which is the Greek meaning of the word democracy, to the "wisdom of the people". The underlying premise of the new paradigm is that discovering the wisdom of the people is necessary if the people are expected to exercize their power. However, because of the escalating complexity of the contemporary societal Situation, it is much more difficult today to uncover the wisdom of the people than it was two thousand and five hundred years ago during the golden era of the Athenian Republic"(Ibid)

Old Greek experience and present ones (for example in Switzerland the municipal participative debates open to all citizens) show that the "wisdom of the people"can be uncovered mainly (and possibly only) in reduced meetings of at most some few hundred citizens.

Moreover, the present complexity of human affairs at any level adds the need for sufficient information and evaluating learning for all stakeholders.

A special interest group of the International Society for the Systems Sciences, as well as the Fuschl Group have considered possible ways to revive demosophia in new style "agoras" of participative citizens, adapted to nowadays demographic, social and political conditions.

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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