(from above)
https://youtu.be/xLqrVCi3l6E#t=1h7m 1:07:00
Heinz von Foerster is one of the pioneers of the theory of Constructivism, according to which we human beings construct our own reality. No objective reality exists independent of the observer.
During the 60's, Heinz von Foerster is head of his own research labratory, the "Biological Computer Lab" at the University of Illinois. Here, commissioned by research departments of the US Navy and Air Force, he works on, among other projects, the merging of digital and biological systems.
Heinz von Foerster has never owned a computer of his own because he apparently believes himself to be a more sophisticated machine...
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Foerster: What I see, and what I believe lies beneath your questioning, is that science, or "scientia" in Latin, has been amazingly successful in the 2,000 years since Aristotle. But, what does "scientia" derive from? The Indo-European word for "scientia" is "scy", and that is found in "science" and "sciencia" and in "schizophrenia", and in "schism", that is the word meaning "to separate". And so "systemics" is a parallel development, only it's the exact opposite of "science", for it integrates.
When you think about it today, all this system theory and systems research which crops up in both art and science... I wouldn't call that "science" any more, I would call it "systemics". Today's science has moved on to an approach that sees things together: "Systemics". So I would see the steps taken today as being from science to systemics.
In the course of my life, the more I concerned myself with physics, I realized that I was actually a "meta-physicist", and then I increasingly played with that idea, and if you ask me, "My dear Heinz von Foerster, what is a meta-physicist?", I would say the following:
There are questions among those we ask about the world that it is possible to answer: "Heinz von Foerster, how old are you?" Well, you can look that up in a catalog: Born in 1911, that means he is 90. Or you can ask questions which cannot be answered, like for example: "Heinz von Foerster, tell me, what was the origin of the universe?" Well, then I could give you one of the 35 different theories. Ask an astonomer, and he says: "There was this Big Bang about 20 million years ago." Or ask a good Catholic: "Everyone knows that God created the world, and after seven days he was weary and took a break, and that was Sunday... " So there are different, very interesting hypotheses about the origins of the universe. That is, there are so many different hypotheses because the question cannot be answered. So all that is relevant is how interesting the is the story that someone invents to explain the origins of the universe.
Question: If it's a matter of inventing a good story, a poetic story...
Foerster: Exactly, exactly... That's what it is. There is a struggle between two or three or even ten different poets. Who can invent a funny, amusing or interesting story so that everyone thinks: "That's exactly what happened!" ?
Question: But science, and your own research... those are not just inventions or good stories? Surely they're based on mathematics, on numbers, on provability, on indisputable scientific data?
Foerster: Well, yes, but these days there is already so much data that it is no longer possible to include all the different data in your "story". And then artificial data is invented, for example "particles"... Then, "particles" are invented that do whatever it is we don't understand. So in my opinion particles are always the solutions to problems that we can't solve any other way... They replace a hole in my theory. So I maintain that each particle we read about in today's physics is the answer to a question that we can't answer.
Question: But that's terrible. How can we let a world-wide network system of machines grow, more or less into infinity, if it is based on theories that apparently have holes or are only "good stories", I mean on such shaky foundations? Isn't that dangerous?
Foerster: Well, in this world-wide, functioning system of machines, all theories are correct, and of course that's what people want. Why are they correct? Because they can all be deduced from other theories and "stories" ...
Question: But what will it lead to? How does it go on?
Foerster: It goes on deducing indefinitely.
Question: But there have to be limits somewhere?
Foerster: No, not at all, that's the the good thing about it. You can go on forever.
Question: In logic?
Foerster: Yes, Precisely.
Question: But in reality?
Foerster: Where is reality? Can you show it to me?