Describe the new page here. Attendees Kaya Jacolev, Renata Kowalczyk, DeAnna? Martin, Claudia Eilers, Jun Akutsu, Jackie Stratton, & Milt Markewitz (Convener)

THE SIMPLICITY UNDERLYING COMPLEXITY THROUGH UNDERSTANDING LIVING SYSTEMS

    We began the session with introductions and what attracted each of us to the session.  I introduced myself with a little of my background in studying and teaching Living Systems and the following questions --

    I presented Buz Hollins 'Panarchy' cycle of life with its external force always followed by Release, ReOrganization?, Exploitation and Conservation, and then five attributes of Living Systems - Dying & Composting, Emergence, Autopoeisis, Structural Coupling, and that there are fixed Organizational components and Structure is always in flux.

    We talked about the paradox of blending Complexity with Simplicity and they aren't a duality, and it became clear that where it might be able to describe the force that perturbs the system in simple terms, in real life there are a complex set of forces.  We then talked about our organizations as Living Systems and how this brought new insights for design and interventions, as well as the recognition of the life forces that reside both individually and collectively.  And we talked about the ancient languages that seem to be languages of life in that their organizational components appear to be all that's necessary to create and sustain life.  We spoke of how are own languages are strongly masculine, and the dissonance it creates in other cultures that seems to impact every cell of their bodies.

    This led us into the first two questions above, and we discussed the Native American language and how it facilitates both connection to the Earth and the overall purpose and ethics of living.  We talked of its three principles - masculine with its generative power, feminine with its re-generative power, and the blending of the two.