http://attainable-utopias.org/tiki/FourthOrderCybernetics excerpt : Can we Define a Fourth Order System? - Fourth Order Cybernetics considers what happens when a system redefines itself. - It focuses on the integration of a system within its larger, co-defining context. - The 4th Order system is contextualised, embedded and integrated into the context - It can thereby become representative for the integrated context. - It therefore operates at two levels simultaneously. - It is no longer a system, but a meta-system. - It operates both as a system in its context, and as a system that is part of the context. - It thereby has the capacity to integrate and disintegrate the contact between both. - It is an active, interactive, reactive and ideally representative agent in/for/with/of that context. - This requires a different level of description: not in relationship to the system, but to the relationship between systems. - The Interface is now the system of reference, instead of the system. - This relationship is the basis of the interaction. - The transformation is the basis of the processing. - The integration is the basis of integrity. - The significant feature of the meta-system is its duality. - The essence is the same, but the relevance brings inversion. - The metasystem is an object; the meta-system is a subject. - Whereas a system can normally be described, a meta-system can only be experienced - The ‘pillars’ in this transition are the relationships (Second Order) and the interactions (Third Order). - Fourth Order Design would integrate all activities in an inverted, contextualised form - It would be embedded in its context and responsible in, and for, its actions - The system would act as meta-system and design would act as meta-design. - This represents the level of self-awareness. - It is where the system reflects upon itself and steers itself (i.e. is autopoietic). - These attributes facilitate self-regeneration, thus self-healing. - They can therefore be managed to enable a healing process. //// http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybern%C3%A9tique science des systèmes <http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syst%C3%A8me> autorégulés<http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autor%C3%A9gulation> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybernetics interdisciplinary <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interdisciplinary> study of the structure <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structure> of regulatory systems<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_system> .