Metasystem Transition Research Articles

Information Genesis and the Formation of Pedagogical Communication

The article analyzes the formation of educational communication as a special type of communicative activity that emerged from the life of people in their prehistoric and historical development. The author considers the autonomization of the educational system of society as a result of metasystem transitions that took place in the processes of social information genesis.

Overcoming the limits of natural computation in biological evolution toward the maximization of system efficiency

Abstract The goal-directedness of biological evolution is realized via the anticipatory achievement of the final state of the system that corresponds to the condition of its perfection in self-maintenance and in adaptability. In the course of individual development, a biological system maximizes its power via synergistic effects and becomes able to perform external work most efficiently. In this state, defined as stasis, robust self-maintaining configurations act as attractors resistant to external and internal perturbations. This corresponds to the local energy–time constraints that most efficiently fit the integral optimization of the whole system. In evolution, major evolutionary transitions that establish new states of stasis are achieved via codepoiesis, a process in which the undecided statements of existing coding systems form the basis for the evolutionary unfolding of the system by assigning new values to them. The genetic fixation of this macroevolutionary process leads to new programmes of individual development representing the process of natural computation. The phenomenon of complexification in evolution represents a metasystem transition that results in maximization of a system’s power and in the ability to increase external work performed by the system.

The drawbridge of nature: Evolutionary complexification as a generation and novel interpretation of coding systems

The phenomenon of evolutionary complexification corresponds to the generation of new coding systems (defined as а codepoiesis by Marcello Barbieri). The whole process of generating novel coding statements that substantiate organizational complexification leads to an expansion of the system that incorporates externality to support newly generated complex structures. During complexifying evolution, the values are assigned to the previously unproven statements via their encoding by using new codes or rearranging the old ones. In this perspective, living systems during evolution continuously realize the proof of Gödel's theorem. In the real physical world, this realization is grounded in the irreversible reduction of the fundamental uncertainty appearing in the self-referential process of internal measurement performed by living systems. It leads to the formation of reflexive loops that establish novel interrelations between the biosystem and the external world and provide a possibility of active anticipatory transformation of externality. We propose a metamathematical framework that can account for the underlying logic of codepoiesis, outline the basic principles of the generation of new coding systems, and describe main codepoietic events in the course of progressive biological evolution. The evolutionary complexification is viewed as a metasystem transition that results in the increase of external work by the system based on the division of labor between its components.

Symbiogenesis as a driving force of evolution: The legacy of Boris Kozo-Polyansky

We analyze evolutionary views of Boris Kozo-Polyansky (1890–1957) who was the first who formulated the symbiotic theory of evolution as a concept in his book, Symbiogenesis: A New Principle of Evolution (1924). Later, starting from 1967, Lynn Margulis independently formulated and further developed the concept of symbiogenesis. Although the ideas on the symbiotic origin of chloroplasts and mitochondria appeared earlier, the book of Kozo-Polyansky presented symbiogenesis as the main factor of complexification in the course of evolution, not only in relation to the origin of eukaryotic cell. Kozo-Polyansky incorporated the ideas of symbiogenesis into a broader paradigm that anticipated the important concepts of the modern Extended Evolutionary Synthesis such as the idea of net of life, the evolutionary role of apoptosis, the ideas of punctuated equilibrium, and the concept of metasystem transition.

The evolutionary dynamics of social systems via reflexive transformation of external reality

One of the main challenges of the social sciences is to explain metasystem transitions from biological to social systems in the process of evolution. These transitions correspond to the emergence of the structure of the subject in which the external world is internalized as a symbolic image. This structure has the potential of rationally reflecting the external world and encoding it in human language. The structure of the subject was defined by Freud and Lacan within the framework of psychoanalysis and modeled by Vladimir Lefebvre using the algebra of simple relations. In that context, the binary oppositions of the Western (W) and Eastern (E) types of cognitive reflection generate not only opposite types of societies but also form the spatiotemporal pattern within a society as a whole underlying its homeostasis and internal dynamics. This opposition between Western and Eastern types is not identical to, but mirrors the probably genetically determined opposition between individuals with primarily selfish or altruistic behavior. The structure of the reflexive subject represents the basis of a sociotype that can be considered as the third component of biosocial being in addition to genotype and phenotype; it is defined a social form of the individual bonded by the social environment and social interactions. The transition to a different type of social relations and structure is based on an anticipated reflexive choice by an individual that is accompanied by a coherent response from the society. This change is defined as a “social transaction” and can be modeled by the logic of the transactional interpretation of quantum mechanics. In the history of human civilization, social transactions have resulted in the advancement and distribution of new knowledge and technologies, and in the formation, merging, splitting and decline and re-emergence of particular types of societies.

Fire & Language: The Two-Faced Process of Progress in Deep-Structural Sociocultural Evolution

This paper attempts to show how the inherent structure of human becoming is evolutionarily determined to work toward a “meta-system transition” to a higher order of control with a growing risk of extinction as humanity approaches the “event horizon.” The “double helix” of progress technological and social caused manifold cultural surface structures according to the law of increasing entropy, which, however, are mechanically determined to reunite following the same law. Separate individual centers of cybernetic processing thus gradually turn themselves into discursive (“neural”) units, possibly collapsing into a super-conscious single will once information transmission in the network reaches a certain density and noise decreases below a certain threshold.

Technological Singularity: What Do We Really Know?

The concept of the technological singularity is frequently reified. Futurist forecasts inferred from this imprecise reification are then criticized, and the reified ideas are incorporated in the core concept. In this paper, I try to disentangle the facts related to the technological singularity from more speculative beliefs about the possibility of creating artificial general intelligence. I use the theory of metasystem transitions and the concept of universal evolution to analyze some misconceptions about the technological singularity. While it may be neither purely technological, nor truly singular, we can predict that the next transition will take place, and that the emerged metasystem will demonstrate exponential growth in complexity with a doubling time of less than half a year, exceeding the complexity of the existing cybernetic systems in few decades.

Metaphysics Of Controlled Evolution (Anthropic Principle, Evolutionary Epistemology And Ethics Of Nano-Bio Technologies)

With the entry of anthropogenic civilization into the stage of the information society, the post-academic phase of the historical evolution of scientific rationality began, the attributes of which are the specific methodology of scientific knowledge, scientific ethos and ontology. Natural philosophy becomes the meta-theoretical core of modern theory of anthropogenesis and the conceptual basis of biotechnology. As the initial postulate of the metaphysical structure of modern technologies and the transdisciplinary theory of their implementation (social verification), the most promising is the anthropic principle of participation. It is used as a starting postulate, on the basis of which the concept of a stable adaptive human strategy is formulated. It is represented by three systems of generation, coding, implementation and replication of adaptively significant information: respectively, biological (genetic), sociocultural and technorationalistic adaptive modules. A necessary and sufficient condition for the genesis of this cycle was the formation and complication of the system jf information communication between individuals through the symbolic sign system not directly related to the genetic code. As a result, the spontaneous coevolutionary process of interaction between the "subject" (living organisms) and the "object" (material world), is the teleological trend of the movement towards the complete rationalization of the World as It Is, its merger with the World of Due. The trajectory of evolution is determined by three parameters that can potentially be estimated empirically: descriptive-spontaneous (evolutionary efficiency), value-teleological (evolutionary correctness) and integral (quality of life). This metasystem transition can be called adaptive inversion, which, therefore, is the most important attribute of anthropogenesis, in general, and the formation of civilization, in particular. Adaptive inversion was established, in our opinion, as a supporting structure of human evolutionary strategy, embodied and maintained as an irresistible cultural and psychological intention to transform reality. This intention, although in different ideological and cultural forms in different types of civilization, was most pronounced precisely in the transatlantic ("Western") version of the technogenic civilization. Renunciation of it and replacing of the desire to slow down the transformation of our habitat and to bring it into the framework of acceptable risk by something less radical seems incompatible with the "human nature." A human (Homo sapiens), as the carrier of the rational beginning of reality, acts as a condition for observance of the anthropic principle . The integrity of reality has a time-bound dimension and assumes the constant emergence, formation and overcoming of the subject-object (epistemological) antinomy and its ontological (essential - obliging) equivalent. Thus, the stratification of the global evolutionary process into selective and semantic (teleological) coevolutionary and therefore ontologically inseparable components follows from the anthropic principle.

Evolutionary biosemiotics and multilevel construction networks.

In contrast to the traditional relational semiotics, biosemiotics decisively deviates towards dynamical aspects of signs at the evolutionary and developmental time scales. The analysis of sign dynamics requires constructivism (in a broad sense) to explain how new components such as subagents, sensors, effectors, and interpretation networks are produced by developing and evolving organisms. Semiotic networks that include signs, tools, and subagents are multilevel, and this feature supports the plasticity, robustness, and evolvability of organisms. The origin of life is described here as the emergence of simple self-constructing semiotic networks that progressively increased the diversity of their components and relations. Primitive organisms have no capacity to classify and track objects; thus, we need to admit the existence of proto-signs that directly regulate activities of agents without being associated with objects. However, object recognition and handling became possible in eukaryotic species with the development of extensive rewritable epigenetic memory as well as sensorial and effector capacities. Semiotic networks are based on sequential and recursive construction, where each step produces components (i.e., agents, scaffolds, signs, and resources) that are needed for the following steps of construction. Construction is not limited to repair and reproduction of what already exists or is unambiguously encoded, it also includes production of new components and behaviors via learning and evolution. A special case is the emergence of new levels of organization known as metasystem transition. Multilevel semiotic networks reshape the phenotype of organisms by combining a mosaic of features developed via learning and evolution of cooperating and/or conflicting subagents.

Economic and Social Institutions: Modelling the Evolution Paths for the Archaic Society

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)IntroductionThere are two key elements that motivated the researchers to investigate socio-cultural differences between different cultures and ethnic groups: Firstly, every country and ethnos has its own national idea that is explicitly or implicitly stated (e.g. wakon yosai in Japan combining Japanese spirit and Western knowledge) (Sawamura, 2002). Secondly, every national idea is based on a great historical period of a specific country that preceded and caused the appearance of the idea. And history is a process of cultural codes' mutation and accumulation (Canevacci, 1992). Cultural code is an object that represents cultural values as a sequence of characters. Therefore, there is an issue researchers have to face: using mathematical approach to describe the process of culture codes formation on macro-level (Malloy and Malloy, 1998). Cultural differences of Western and Eastern society models can be described by the means of sociology (Barkema et al., 2015).The most advanced from application potential point of view is the work of Rapaille (2007) that is dealing with the subject of studying various societies on the basis of collective unconscious. Bourdieu (1990) employs the frequency analysis of texts used to study the subject that was also studied in Rapaille (2007) by the means of sociological polls and interviews. National idea in these terms can be described as a system of cultural codes that that for some time can be considered to be a constant source of society evolution component. Turchin (1977) is close to our approach from the point of complexity theory as in this work meta-system transitions are described and substantiated in the humanity evolution process. The idea of cognitive factor in evolution process of living matter that was also well-described in Wynn (2002, Donald (1993), or, most notably, Red'ko (2014), with the latest being complementary to our work. Also, we most certainly agree with Bourdieu (1990) that cultural code is something similar to every set of habitus (system of acquired dispositions functioning on the practical level as categories of perception and assessment or as classificatory principles as well as being the organizing principles of action) of a particular social system.There are also other well-executed attempts to solve this problem that can be found in other research works (see e.g. Grinchenko and Shchapova, 2010; Lakic and Draskovic, 2015). However, their attempt is considered to be questionable because of the lack of substantiation for the statement that periods of human society development can be matched to a range of Fibonacci numbers. Other approaches that are described in other publication (see e.g. Walton and McKersie, 1965) are much closer to our approach from the point of methodology. However, some authors describe the methods that use labor division as a main criterion and therefore are more detailed and do not cover the very early phase of society evolution when gathering and hunting was the main domain of the human development. From our point of view, such approaches also provides questionable results by applying cultural values table to the global history without mentioning how these values were formed. From our point of view it might be much more correct to consider mega-historical role of cultural codes in lifestyles of nations and ethnos as it is done in Rapaille (2007). The effectiveness and high quality of Japanese labor is assumed to be a consequence of tough living conditions of high-populated nation with scarce natural resources. Antithetic situation was observed in America where the opposite cultural code hindered effective application of Japanese business strategies (see Rapaille, 2007, p. 108).1. Research methodologyIn outlining our research methods, we make an attempt to overcome the difficulties described in the similar works of other authors. These works are based on an idea that an increasing difficulty of social relations can be represented by increasing number of social institutions (kernels) and relations (evolution cycles) between them. …

Human Metasystem Transition (HMST) Theory

Metasystem transitions are events representing the evolutionary emergence of a higher level of organization through the integration of subsystems into a higher “metasystem” (A1+A2+A3=B). Such events have occurred several times throughout the history of life (e.g., emergence of life, multicellular life, sexual reproduction). The emergence of new levels of organization has occurred within the human system three times, and has resulted in three broadly defined levels of higher control, producing three broadly defined levels of group selection (e.g., band/tribe, chiefdom/kingdom, nation-state/international). These are “Human Metasystem Transitions” (HMST). Throughout these HMST several common system-level patterns have manifested that are fundamental to understanding the nature and evolution of the human system, as well as our potential future development. First, HMST have been built around the control of three mostly distinct primary energy sources (e.g., hunting, agriculture, industry). Second, the control of new energy sources has always been achieved and stabilized by utilizing the evolutionary emergence of a more powerful information-processing medium (e.g., language, writing, printing press). Third, new controls emerge with the capability of organizing energy flows over larger expanses of space in shorter durations of time: bands/tribes controlled regional space and stabilized for hundreds of thousand of years, chiefdoms/kingdoms controlled semi-continental expanses of space and stabilized for thousands of years, and nation-states control continental expanses of space and have stabilized for centuries. This space-time component of hierarchical metasystem emergence can be conceptualized as the active compression of space-time-energy-matter (STEM compression) enabled by higher informational and energetic properties within the human system, which allow for more complex organization (i.e., higher subsystem integration). In this framework, increased information-energy control and feedback, and the consequent metasystem compression of space-time, represent the theoretical pillars of HMST theory. Most importantly, HMST theory may have practical application in modeling the future of the human system and the nature of the next human metasystem.

HYPERSOCIETY AS THE ATTRACTOR OF THE SOCIAL SYSTEM EVOLUTION (PART 2): THE FEATURES OF THE NEW CIVILIZATION

This article is the attempt to apply the system approach for the long-term prognosis of civilization development and substantiation of the concept of the Hypersociety as the attractor of the evolution of social systems. Determined by the principles of the system prognosis. Analyzes the factors of metasystem transition to the Hypersociety and distinguish the main features of the new level of social organization. Considered questions of biological, psychological and technological development of human and society. Revealed specific structural and functional organization of Hypersociety and its relationship with Nature. This article introduces several new scientific concepts: Hypersociety, Socione, Technoevolution, Hypernetwork, Metaculture. The results of this research have principal importance for determining the prospects of civilizational development, in consequence of which are necessary for social science theorists and managers, as well as may be interesting for technical specialists. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.12731/2218-7405-2013-6-32

An evolutionary cybernetics perspective on language and coordination

Starting from the observation that many open issues in linguistics hinge on problems of semantics, we discuss three core semantic notions: categories, agency, and qualification or semiosis. We argue that the origin of these coincide with the emergence of self-regulatory systems, systems that control their own persistence as localizable dynamical systems. When such systems interact a metasystem transition can occur in which the regulatory capacity per system is increased through the mechanisms of extension and specialization. Newly arising mutual dependencies force the formerly independent systems to coordinate their behaviour which leads them to effectively become a single system – a novel agency at a higher level of organization – thus qualifying the emergence of a novel language or code. We go on to argue that natural languages are instances of such naturally occurring conventionalization processes, corroborating the view that language should primarily be characterized as coordination.

Higher-level supercompilation as a metasystem transition

Issues related to metasystem transitions in the context of supercompilation are discussed. Manifestations of the law of branching growth of the penultimate level in the case of higher-level supercompilation are considered. Based on this law, some approaches to the construction of metasystems by combining supercompilers are proposed. In particular, the usefulness of multi-result supercompilation for proving the equivalence of expressions and for two-level supercompilation is shown.

Metasystem transitions in human organizations: a route towards global sustainability

AbstractThis article deals with the problem of understanding the relations between viability and sustainability in the context of social metasystem transitions occurring in a global environment. To this aim the subject of Organizational Synergetics is introduced. A refinement of Stafford Beer's viable system model is proposed and the distinction is made between local sustainability and global sustainability, the latter seen as an undecidable property of the global system comprising both the system in focus and its environment. Finally, based on the concept of a viable holonic network, a strategy and a general heuristics for attaining global sustainability are proposed.

In Search of a Reconciliation Between Semiotics, Thermodynamics and Metasystem Transition Theory

The disciplines of cybernetics, semiotics and thermodynamics investigate evolutionary processes quite independently from each other. The aim of this paper is to draw the parallels and point out the possibility and necessity of a reconciliation between these disciplines. The concept of metasystem transition has been proposed by Turchin as a quantum of evolution from a cybernetic point of view. Semiotic processes are of prime importance for the realisation of metasystem transitions in the course of evolution. From a thermodynamic point of view, the emergence of more complex, self-producing agents depends on the emergence of more advanced forms of semiosis. As an evolutionary consequence, more symbolic forms of semiosis that allow higher competence for abstraction and anticipation emerge.

Evolution of the “window”

We propose a general model that integrates meta-system transition theory with biosemiotics on the basis of an “evolvable window” metaphor. The evolution of the “window” proceeds via meta-system transitions, during which new windows are created iteratively on the “inner” side of the preexisting ones, generating a “telescope” growing inwards starting from the “outside”. The tendency of “inwards growth” of the “telescope” can be explained in terms of the following circular causality: (1) the tendency leading from unity towards individualisation, (2) individual learning providing a basis for more complex semiotic interactions, (3) creation of additional, nonconflicting “values” leading to habit formation, (4) strong control bringing forth a unification at a higher (meta-system) level. Using the proposed metaphor we hope to provide clarity to the fluctuation between objectivity and subjectivity inherent to the circular causality loop described above.

Foundations and Methodology for an Evolutionary World View: A Review of the Principia Cybernetica Project

The Principia Cybernetica Project was created to develop an integrated philosophy or world view, based on the theories of evolution, self-organization, systems and cybernetics. Its conceptual network has been implemented as an extensive website. The present paper reviews the assumptions behind the project, focusing on its rationale, its philosophical presuppositions, and its concrete methodology for computer-supported collaborative development. Principia Cybernetica starts from a process ontology, where a sequence of elementary actions produces ever more complex forms of organization through the mechanism of variation and selection, and metasystem transition. Its epistemology is constructivist and evolutionary: models are constructed by subjects for their own purposes, but undergo selection by the environment. Its ethics takes fitness and the continuation of evolution as the basic value, and derives more concrete guidelines from this implicit purpose. Together, these postulates and their implications provide answers to a range of age-old philosophical questions.

Origin of life as the first MST—control hierarchies and Interlevel relation

We propose an explicit dialogue between MetaSystem Transition (MST) Theory and theoretical biology. Then MST is approached in a double and complementary way. We apply MST to the study of biological levels of organization and we draw some consequences for the understanding of MST mechanisms from the analysis of the essential features of living systems. We explain our understanding of control as specific constraint, of emergence as internal creation of novelty, and of creation of variety and functional selection as complementary phenomena. Grounded on such conceptual primitives, we put forward some theoretical conditions to be fulfilled by different kind of systems, from the classical mechanical ones to the living beings. In each case we apply such conditions to concrete examples. The conclusion is that dissipative structures have self‐organizing abilities but cannot be treated as a MST instance. By the contrary, the very origin of life comes to be a paradigmatic case of MST.

A dialogue on Metasystem transition

The theory of metasystem transitions is reviewed in the form of a dialogue; a discussion of underlying epistemology is also included. Metasystem transition is the formation of a new level of control, when systems of a certain kind become integrated as subsystems of an emerging metasystem. The main tenet of the theory is that the major steps of evolution—both biological and cultural—are metasystem transitions at various system levels. Metasystem transitions are thus seen as quanta of evolution. From this viewpoint we describe the past of the Universal Evolution and try to see its future. Our discussion is divided into these sections: Epistemology, Metasystem transition, Evolution, The Human Being, and The future of the world.