[Fis] What are the most important 20% of Informatics?

Sat Jun 21 21:43:58 CEST 2025

Joe, I reckon you and I could set up a clinic to treat those who believe
they are ontologists!

But then I thought that there are some on this list who might object to
this might wish to set up their own clinics to treat us...

I don't think it matters providing the therapy is gentle and doesn't
involve berating people for holding to their ideas!

Best wishes

Mark

Dr. Mark William Johnson
Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health
University of Manchester

Department of Science Education
University of Copenhagen

Department of Eye and Vision Science (honorary)
University of Liverpool
Phone: 07786 064505
Email: johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com
Blog: https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9v0utSe6o$ 

On Sat, 21 Jun 2025, 17:14 , <joe.brenner at bluewin.ch> wrote:

> Dear Jason,
>
> The best steering can be useless if 1) you don't know your destination or
> 2) you are going nowhere. I appreciate your attempt at a new synthesis but
> cannot help finding it too Promethean, too Hegelian, in a word too
> Confucian, if I may. I miss the perspective provided by Chuang Tzü. Thus, I
> would like to be sure that your approach can include, because it belongs in
> science, the concept of "The Great Way that Leads Nowhere".
>
> I did not appreciate the reference to Lego, which is a "game" with inert
> building blocks. I did welcome the inclusion of systemics, but I hope it is
> a systemics in the broad sense of Gianfranco Minati. Can we include in your
> synthesis things that are neither systems nor non-systems?
>
> Dear Mark,
>
> I thus "abound" in your constructive critique with just one
> question/addition. Is it not desirable,, especially here, to add an
> ontological "therapy" to an epistemological one?
>
> I do not believe these questions are only philosophical or "abstract". AI
> now codifies low-dimensional thinking as the norm. SCI may be a good
> "vehicle" in the Buddhist sense, or "therapy" in Mark's sense, to get
> beyond it, but one must be careful not to reproduce errors due to the use
> of standard terms.
>
> Best wishes,
> Joseph
>
> Le 21.06.2025 11:44 CEST, Mark Johnson <johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com> a écrit :
>
>
> Hi Jason
>
> I think with regard to cybernetics, the essential point is what the word
> means. It is about steering, and steering is different from "knowing" or
> even "being". Mostly education deals with "knowing" - and I think even the
> various attempts to distil cybernetics into "key facts" misses the essence
> of what it is about.
>
> We might long for an institutional home for Cybernetics, with a codified
> curriculum, textbooks, etc. But forget it. Not only do institutions not get
> it, but the desire for this will destroy the essence of what steering is
> about.
>
> Mary Catherine Bateson put it most eloquently here:
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?feature=shared__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9vsORaTmE$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?feature=shared__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!S0yCJ3xMWdUqOg7BcoG3X5rMq_bnTTNwUD5f2LBinthg8jQhBYeuCxM6LaHY-a84tRNl6WSjEe23sOGDk9yTESc$>
>  (were you there? I wasn't unfortunately...)
>
> Universities do not have departments of epistemological therapy. That's
> what cybernetic way of thinking offers.
>
> Every discipline, every field of scientific and social inquiry needs
> epistemological therapy. There is no textbook whereby this can be achieved,
> nor can there be one. It can only be achieved through the skilful
> intervention of people who think differently and demonstrate the
> possibility of thinking differently by the way they are and the way they
> engage with others.
>
> So I am generally sceptical about distilling cybernetics - it's
> antithetical to what cybernetics is. For those who "think cybernetically",
> go and *be cybernetic* and ruffle feathers in politics, art, biology,
> education, psychology, physics, maths, health, engineering, etc. There's
> certainly no career in it, but it may be the best that we can do.
>
> Best wishes
>
> Mark
>
> Dr. Mark William Johnson
> Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health
> University of Manchester
>
> Department of Science Education
> University of Copenhagen
>
> Department of Eye and Vision Science (honorary)
> University of Liverpool
> Phone: 07786 064505
> Email: johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com
> Blog: https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9v0utSe6o$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!S0yCJ3xMWdUqOg7BcoG3X5rMq_bnTTNwUD5f2LBinthg8jQhBYeuCxM6LaHY-a84tRNl6WSjEe23sOGDxgeyN8U$>
>
> On Tue, 17 Jun 2025, 01:48 Jason Hu, <jasonthegoodman at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dear FIS colleagues:
>
> If your whole book of Informatics has 100 pages, what content would be the
> most important 20 pages (per 20:80 Law)? I'm asking this question to all of
> you since the Club of Remy is organizing a discussion to integrate
> Systemics-Cyberentics-Informatics sister fields into a unified trinity
> curriculum for the younger generation. Here is the original Call for
> Discussants. I wish some of you would be kind enough to provide your
> insights to answer the two questions raised in this call. You are also more
> than welcome to consider attending these discussions in our Zoom meetings
> later.  Best regards - Jason
>
> *Title:  It is time to wrap up cybernetics – and distill 20% of it for a
> new curriculum *
> *Author: Jason Hu*
> *Outline:*
>
> Two great cyberneticians in our Club of Remy have Rest-In-Peace:  Our
> beloved Professor Klaus Krippendorff and Professor Loet Leydesdorff. Our
> YouTube channel now has their “Playlist” of their contributions to our
> club.  A number of noted cyberneticians have reduced participation in the
> recent two years; the reasons might be aging, decline of health, and/or
> exhaustion of new insights from cybernetics per se. One of the used-to-be
> large cybernetics discussion forums, CYBCOM, initialized by me and Stuart
> Umpleby as a Listserv on an IBM mainframe more than 30 years ago, now has
> only one active user posting on it (not me).
>
> Meanwhile, huge tides in R&D and applications, initiated in 1943 by the
> McCulloch-Pitts, are currently changing our world in a profound way. Some
> of my colleagues might not like it, since these new waves discarded the
> term “cybernetics” but use the word “AI,” even though they are deeply
> related, if not identical.
>
> After studying (and working/practicing) in the field named “cybernetics”
> since 1979, through many mentors/advisors in those 47 years, I think it is
> time now that we wrap up what we call “cybernetics” and start a new field
> of human knowledge, SCI.” In a narrow definition, SCI stands for
> Systemics-Cybernetics-Informatics trinity. In a broader definition, it
> should also include and integrate Catastrophe Theory, Dissipative Theory,
> Synergetics, Chaos Theory, Complexity Science, and Evolution Theory (alas,
> a total of 9 names). All these names mentioned here have inner connections,
> but their ideas/models/insights are spread in many different books and
> papers that are severely siloed and confusing to young learners.
>
> The Oxford Project, which started last September at the WOSC conference,
> is an effort to develop a “standard model” of SCI for a new generation of
> learners, with the assistance of currently available AI tools. This Call of
> Discussants to all members of CoR asking if you are with me to go forward
> this transition from “only cybernetics” to “SCI,” Yes or No?
>
> If yes, here are two questions to be discussed in this session: 1-What are
> the 20%  most important knowledge pieces (per 20:80 law) from “cybernetics”
> that we need to present in the SCI curriculum? 2- What will be our feasible
> approach to use current AI tools to make this new SCI curriculum/online
> course?
>
> I shall post question #1 to “Systemics” colleagues (ISSS) and
> “Informatics” colleagues (FIS) to invite them into this Lego game (of
> redefining a new field of knowledge SCI in the format of an entry-level
> curriculum). ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok, and Perplexity will be invited too.
>
> If you have some ideas about these two questions, please sign up for a
> good discussion.
>
> ------------------------------------
> Jason Jixuan Hu, Ph.D.
> Independent Research Scholar
> Organizer: Club of REMY:  https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.clubofremy.org__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9vAcjzcME$ 
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.clubofremy.org__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!Q8jjJUy0YjeO0fqBBSUwi-_4zhvTAltAVs4SpOm5So10toInnuB90Te61YawEBftGBR52lL6thub6Bbr20yHmEqWmIjo$>
>
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>
> Introduction: https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://drjasonhu.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9v9C26Smw$ 
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>
> Video: https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://tinyurl.com/JJHsprach__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!QFHLkfyExt72M5tbiIsAh5vkotJleTlCx5zaRIDc-HkCMFdTG5Z219WQYELMlTDF1kdxc84Fr1GgFN9vXC4tbmo$ 
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> office: jjh at wintopgroup.com
> mobile: jasonthegoodman at gmail.com
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