Resposibility: a cybernetic model

What could be a definition (explanation) of "Responsibility"?
Starting with an operational definition by Silvio Ceccato (1970) and inspired by what Humberto Maturana called a "generative mechanism" I have tried to draft it here: as "a proposition which consists in a process or a mechanism that if it were to be allowed to operate" (Maturana 1992) would give as a consequence, as a result the concept of resposibility.

Generative mechanism of "Responsibility":

Responsibility for any process (or activity), for example "my life", is constituted by the following steps (operations):

1. to make the process (i.e. "my life") become the OBJECT of a feedback loop (control loop) constituted by a sequence of three activities: A, R and C (ARC loop).
2. the loop begins with activity A: the AWARENESS of the OBJECT
3. it continues with activity R: a REFLECTION on the OBJECT of AWARENESS
4. finally it ends with activity C: an intervention of reflected CHANGE of the OBJECT.

References:
Ceccato, S. (1970) Cibernetica per tutti. Milano: Feltrinelli, Vol. 2.
Maturana, H. (1992) Explanations and reality. Talk in Heidelberg. See: http://www.weknow.ch/marco/A1992/Heid/Maturana921018.htm

What means Cyber Ethics?

... I guess the discipline dealing with "ethical computer use and behavior" in all application domains; for the domain of education see

• International Journal of Cyber Ethics in Education (IJCEE)
• Published Quarterly. Est. 2011

What means "Cybernetics"?

I searched Wikipedia for a definition of the term "Cybernetics" and found a sentence, that in my view is rather wrong and misleading for various reasons (Cybernetics is the interdisciplinary study of the structure of regulatory systems; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybernetics, 11.12.2011).

Then I searched on the website of the American Society for Cybernetics (http://www.asc-cybernetics.org/foundations/definitions.htm), but could not find a convincing solution.

Finally, looking in my archive I found a folder with notes of 1988 in which I had tried to define the term "Cybernetics"; I have completed them now, and here is the summary of what came out (an article will follow later):

• We call Cybernetics the science that considers dynamic systems in terms of OPERATIONS and CONTROL and aims at enabling artificial systems to perform like organisms at 3 levels: physical, biological and mental.

 This definition is based on my experience as engineer in the fileds of System Dynamics and Process Control as well as on my cooperation with Silvio Ceccato and Ernst von Glasersfeld. I have tried to integrate in one sentence the definitions given by three cybernetic pioneers: Norbert Wiener, Heinz von Förster and Silvio Ceccato.

What Marcuse missed in Bridgman

 Marcuse saw in Bridgman's Operationalism a "total empiricism in the treatment of concepts" because it required an "adequate account of them in terms of operations"; he estimated that this approach was predominant "in philosophy, psychology, sociology, and other fields" and lamented that as a consequence "Many of the most seriously troublesome concepts are being "eliminated”." (Marcuse, 1964 "The One-Dimensional Man", ch. 1, pp. 14-16, http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/one-dimensional-man/ch01.htm)

What a pity, that Marcuse limited his assessment of Bridgman's approach to the weaknesses and missed the opportunity to build on its strenghts!

He could have connected Bridgman's operational view of concepts  with Kant's treatment of concepts in his Critique of Pure Reason; in that same period Ceccato, who did such a connection, was able to do pioneering work in developing a completely new approach to language: Operational Linguistics (http://www.vonglasersfeld.com/242)

Erzeugung der Realität und Verantwortung

"Wir bringen die Welt hervor, die wir leben. Weil das so ist, denke ich, dass wir alle Verantwortung übernehmen müssen für unsere Handlungen in Hinblick auf die Konsequenzen unserer Handlungen für andere menschliche Wesen." Maturana (1998), S. 20

"Dies bedeutet auch, dass wir Verantwortung für unsere Handlungen und Emotionen übernehmen oder nicht ... gemäss der Anerkennung oder Ablehnung unserer konstitutiven Mitwirkung an der Erzeugung der Realität, die wir in jedem Augenblick leben." Maturana (1998), S.304

"Wir sind verantwortlich in dem Moment, in dem wir in unserer Reflexion feststellen, ob wir die Konsequenzen unserer Handlungen wollen oder nicht wollen;" Maturana (1998), S.379

H. Maturana (1998) Biologie der Realität. Frankfurt a/M: Suhrkamp.

The sleep of dogmatism and its function

We sleep an intellectual sleep; it is the sleep of dogmatism - or “slumber” as Kant called it (1783). Why this dogmatic sleep?

Because this sleep helps us. How? Its function is to protect us against the troublesome affordances and the boulversing power of a question:

• how could the reality we refer to be constituted also by profound inner patterns and images made by ourselves?

To ask this question requires to be ready to accept an answer that explains the "how" asked for in the question. It means that we could have to accept an answer which shows, that the reality we claim to be independent from us and valid for all (and "social") is merely our own individual reality, valid for one single person.

As a consequence the dogmatic sleep protects us also against the potentially threatening insight that the reality we refer to (RWRT), although experienced as independent from us/me, is always merely our/my individual reality.

Kant 1783 - Dogmatic slumber

• "I openly confess, the suggestion of David Hume was the very thing, which many years ago first interrupted my dogmatic slumber, and gave my investigations in the field of speculative philosophy quite a new direction." Immanuel Kant, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics  (1783) full text on wikisource.org
• "J’avoue de grand cœur que c’est à l’avertissement donné par David Hume que je dois d’être sorti de­puis bien des années déjà du sommeil dogmatique, et d’avoir donné à mes recherches philosophiques dans le champ de la spéculation, une direction toute nou­velle." Emmanuel Kant (1783), Prolégomènes à toute métaphysique future qui aura le droit de se présenter comme science, Préface. texte complete sur fr.wikisource.org
• "Ich gestehe frei: die Erinnerung des David Hume war eben dasjenige, was mir vor vielen Jahren zuerst den dogmatischen Schlummer unterbrach, und meinen Untersuchungen im Felde der spekulativen Philosophie eine ganz andere Richtung gab.", Immanuel Kant (1783), Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik, die als Wissenschaft wird auftreten können, A13. Artikel auf Wikipedia.de

Ceccato 1946 - the birth of a paradigm shift

Today, 27. May 2011, I would like to tell a story of 1946 about the birth of a new research paradigm, that one day will be recognized as a crucial paradigm shift in science. My narration is based on what Silvio Ceccato himself told me and also wrote in his books, for example: Ceccato, S. (1968) Cibernetica per tutti, Vol. 1, Milano: Feltrinelli, 1968, p. 176.

Under the title "Order and Life", Yale University published in September 1936 the Silliman Memorial lecture given in 1935 by Joseph Needham, the famous British scientist. The italian translation had just appeared in 1946 when Ceccato (aged 32) and a group of friends met in Milan to discuss about it.

Needham used arguments from biology to justify his left-wing political ideas. The eye, he wrote, depends in various ways from the entire organism (the animal's body), a dependency of the part from the whole. Thus, he claimed, also the individual - as a part of society - should depend from society - the whole. As a consequence, a collectivist orientation must be considered as "natural" and its opposite, individualism, as "non-natural".

After the discussion, Ceccato spent a few days on the hills of his birthplace, Montecchio Maggiore, reflecting about Needham's argumentation in view of a public presentation of the book that he had to prepare ....

... eye-part, organism-whole, eye-part ....

Suddenly Ceccato saw the eye articulated in the few elements that he reminded from his high school education, like retina, pupil, lens, etc.

Ergo, Ceccato continued with excitement, the eye is not merely a part, but also its contrary, a whole!

Consequently, this being part or whole does not belong at all to the eye as such and we do not find them (part, whole) just by perceiving the eye (or a horse, a car, etc.); being part or whole is something that we do, mental operations done by ourselves ... and hence, he will explain later, our own responsibility.