General systems research and the VSM

Engendering a Psychopter through Biomimicry and Technomimicry (Part #2)

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In the previous case, comparing dinosaurs with multinational corporations from a purely systemic perspective, the key issue was the minimum number of parameters required to describe an animal as a viable system in contrast with the number required to describe a corporation. As noted there, the recent literature on biomimicry is indicative of many fruitful possibilities for innovation now considered worthy of exploration -- previously considered improbable or far-fetched. The argument here takes its point of departure from the systemic organization of animals -- especially in information and energy terms -- and not from the more evident external forms which more readily inspire mimicry research.

One point of inspiration is the research on "general systems", originated by Ludwig von Bertalanffy (General System Theory: foundations, development, applications, 1976). General systems theory is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, applicable to biology, cybernetics, and other fields. Originally given focus by the Society for General Systems Research, the latter has been absorbed into the International Society for the Systems Sciences.

Of relevance to this argument is the subsequent work of management cybernetician Stafford Beer (The Heart of Enterprise, 1988; Brain of the Firm, 1981). His work resulted in the ongoing development of the Viable System Model (VSM) as a model of the organizational structure of any viable or autonomous system. Of particular relevance to the evolutionary question raised in this argument is that a viable system is any system organised in such a way as to meet the demands of surviving in the changing environment. One of the prime features of systems that survive is that they are adaptable. The VSM is an abstracted cybernetic description that is applicable to any organization that is a viable system and capable of autonomy.

Biomimicry as a methodology implies a conscious effort at learning from nature, the case explored here may depend on mimicry inspired by the collective unconscious -- some form of deep biocultural memory (John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization, 1995). It may additionally be engendered by an associated form of conditioning and determinism in response to environmental opportunities understood systemically. Whilst this may apply in the case of dinosaur biomimicry by multinational corporations, the question of interest here is the possibility of a more conscious, even self-reflexive, approach to the possibility -- notably when assisted by the sophisticated simulation technologies previously discussed (Simulation and representation, 2011; Identification of systemic correspondences, 2011).

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