Using the Logic of the Life to Reduce the Complexity of Life

摘要

From a common sense perspective, it is clear that human life on this planet is complex and there is a need to understand this complexity if we are to address the many problems that we face.~3 In this paper I present a thesis about how the logic of life can shed light on how to understand the complexity of life in such a way as to how allow some degree of predictability about how possible futures for mankind might unfold. In order to set out the thesis it is first necessary to clarify the meaning of the key concepts. The expression "the logic of life" is used to refer to how the abstract truths (laws if you will) of cybernetics may be used to delimit both what is possible ontologically, that is, the forms that living systems may take, and also what is possible epistemologically, that is, the forms of knowing that living systems may construct. The ontological limits may be thought of as first order truths about observed systems that delimit what may happen and what may be done.