Blog

Examples of Holon Theory
Posted on October 18, 2022 10:00 AM by John Kineman
 
 
I gave a talk via Zoom for a conference in Bangalore about consciousness last month. It was presented as a pre-recorded video. I thought I would share it here because it gives examples of the holon theory. I decided that the best way to understand cyclical causality is by example. That was what the Vedic masters also decided when they produced the Vedas and Upanishads. The reason is that the elements of the holon are archetypes that can apply to any system. Thus they will take on different labels depending on what it is describing. That can be confusing for a lot of people, it seems undefined. But it is self-defining - that is one of the most intriguing aspects of it. Basically, it describes causal order - how events and their contextual meanings relate to each other as a whole. 
 
In this talk I focus on “Post-truth” and challenge the popular view that truth is only relative. Holon relations reach throughout nature, so “truth” can have an ultimate meaning while also being locally relative to different contexts. The immanent harmony with nature is the gauge for truth. I proposed in this talk that truthfulness can be evaluated by the degree of harmony any system has with other systems, with itself, and with the cosmos (as a reflection of the holon causal order).
 
Comments welcome.
 
John
Comments
Comment By: Gary Smith
Posted on October 22, 2022 5:05 AM
Really liked the building the house example @3:30. This was very useful. It connects directly with the engineering (and system engineering experience).

Also very much appreciated the post truth slide. This shows very well the positive and negative quadrants of the human activity system that were expressed in "Towards an architecture for system science" (24:20).
https://vimeo.com/519125085
These expressions can be greatly enhanced now through synthesis of your post truth presentation.

Last Edited: 10/22/2022 at 06:56 AM