Sustainability assessment and complementarity

Sustainability assessments bring together different perspectives that pertain to sustainability in order to produce overall assessments and a wealth of approaches and tools have been developed in the past decades. But two major problematics remain. The problem of integration concerns the surplus of possibilities for integration; different tools produce different assessments. The problem of implementation concerns the barrier between assessment and transformation; assessments do not lead to the expected changes in practice. This paper aims to analyze issues of complementarity in sustainability assessment and transformation as a key to better handling the problems of integration and implementation. Based on a generalization of Niels Bohr’s complementarity from quantum mechanics, we have identified two forms of complementarity in sustainability assessment, observer stance complementarity and value complementarity. Unlike many other problems of sustainability assessment, complementarity is of a fundamental character connected to the very conditions for observation. Therefore complementarity cannot be overcome methodologically; only handled better or worse. Science is essential to the societal goal of sustainability, but these issues of complementarity impede the constructive role of science in the transition to more sustainable structures and practices in food systems. The agencies of sustainability assessment and transformation need to be acutely aware of the importance of different perspectives and values and the complementarities that may be connected to these differences. An improved understanding of complementarity can help to better recognize and handle issues of complementarity. These deliberations have relevance not only for sustainability assessment, but more generally for transdisciplinary research on wicked problems

Perceiving Pain in Others: Automatic and Controlled Mechanisms

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Mental imagery of positive and neutral memories : a fMRI study comparing field perspective imagery to observer perspective imagery

Imagery perspective can influence what information is recalled, processing style, and emotionality; however, the understanding of possible mechanisms mediating these observed differences is still limited. We aimed to examine differences between memory recall from a field perspective and observer perspective at the neurobiological level, in order to improve our understanding of what is underlying the observed differences at the behavioral level. We conducted a fMRI study in healthy individuals, comparing imagery perspectives during recall of neutral and positive autobiographical memories. Behavioral results revealed field perspective imagery of positive memories, as compared to observer perspective, to be associated with more positive feelings afterwards. At the neurobiological level, contrasting observer perspective to field perspective imagery was associated with greater activity, or less decrease relative to the control visual search task, in the right precuneus and in the right temporoparietal junction (TPJ). Greater activity in the right TPJ during an observer perspective as compared to field perspective could reflect performing a greater shift of perspective and mental state during observer perspective imagery than field perspective imagery. Differential activity in the precuneus may reflect that during observer perspective imagery individuals are more likely to engage in (self-) evaluative processing and visuospatial processing. Our findings contribute to a growing understanding of how imagery perspective can influence the type of information that is recalled and the intensity of the emotional response. Observer perspective imagery may not automatically reduce emotional intensity but this could depend on how the imagined situation is evaluated in relation to the self-concept. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

Reflexive Monism

Reflexive monism is, in essence, an ancient view of how consciousness relates to the material world that has, in recent decades, been resurrected in modern form. In this paper I discuss how some of its basic features differ from both dualism and variants of physicalist and functionalist reductionism, focusing on those aspects of the theory that challenge deeply rooted presuppositions in current Western thought. I pay particular attention to the ontological status and seeming “out-thereness” of the phenomenal world and to how the “phenomenal world” relates to the “physical world”, the “world itself”, and processing in the brain. In order to place the theory within the context of current thought and debate, I address questions that have been raised about reflexive monism in recent commentaries and also evaluate competing accounts of the same issues offered by “transparency theory” and by “biological naturalism”. I argue that, of the competing views on offer, reflexive monism most closely follows the contours of ordinary experience, the findings of science, and common sense

Making qualitative research accessible and acceptable in the scientific management arena: a life-world perspective

Western organizational culture, in part founded on the scientific management (Taylorist) techniques employed by Henry Ford, tends to emphasize the capture and control of explicit forms of knowledge, and technological advancement has encouraged this tendency. This is apparent within hegemonic business practices (e.g. ITIL IT Service Management processes) which emphasize quantitative data collection. In contrast, managers are often frustrated by an inability to take control of tacit forms of knowledge, embodied within the worker and acknowledged as important for organizational success, yet resistant to effective quantitative data collection. As a business school researcher I was faced with the challenge of deciding upon a research method that would enable my interpretations to be both credible within the academic community and accessible and acceptable within the IT Service Management practitioner community. By close observation of specific work activity as it is experienced by the IT support worker, recording as much data as possible relating to the cerebral and sensory experience of the worker, the research attempts to draw diagrammatic patterns that provide some clarity for managers over the forms of knowledge that are used by a worker or team. The paper reflexively considers this qualitative research from the different life-world perspectives of the researcher-perceived academic and practitioner recipients of the research, seeking credibility, accessibility and acceptability across these life-worlds whilst maintaining researcher integrity

Complexity, BioComplexity, the Connectionist Conjecture and Ontology of Complexity\ud

This paper develops and integrates major ideas and concepts on complexity and biocomplexity - the connectionist conjecture, universal ontology of complexity, irreducible complexity of totality & inherent randomness, perpetual evolution of information, emergence of criticality and equivalence of symmetry & complexity. This paper introduces the Connectionist Conjecture which states that the one and only representation of Totality is the connectionist one i.e. in terms of nodes and edges. This paper also introduces an idea of Universal Ontology of Complexity and develops concepts in that direction. The paper also develops ideas and concepts on the perpetual evolution of information, irreducibility and computability of totality, all in the context of the Connectionist Conjecture. The paper indicates that the control and communication are the prime functionals that are responsible for the symmetry and complexity of complex phenomenon. The paper takes the stand that the phenomenon of life (including its evolution) is probably the nearest to what we can describe with the term “complexity”. The paper also assumes that signaling and communication within the living world and of the living world with the environment creates the connectionist structure of the biocomplexity. With life and its evolution as the substrate, the paper develops ideas towards the ontology of complexity. The paper introduces new complexity theoretic interpretations of fundamental biomolecular parameters. The paper also develops ideas on the methodology to determine the complexity of “true” complex phenomena.\u

Observing Environments

> Context • Society is faced with “wicked” problems of environmental sustainability, which are inherently multiperspectival, and there is a need for explicitly constructivist and perspectivist theories to address them. > Problem • However, different constructivist theories construe the environment in different ways. The aim of this paper is to clarify the conceptions of environment in constructivist approaches, and thereby to assist the sciences of complex systems and complex environmental problems. > Method • We describe the terms used for “the environment” in von Uexküll, Maturana & Varela, and Luhmann, and analyse how their conceptions of environment are connected to differences of perspective and observation. > Results • We show the need to distinguish between inside and outside perspectives on the environment, and identify two very different and complementary logics of observation, the logic of distinction and the logic of representation, in the three constructivist theories. > Implications • Luhmann’s theory of social systems can be a helpful perspective on the wicked environmental problems of society if we consider carefully the theory’s own blind spots: that it confines itself to systems of communication, and that it is based fully on the conception of observation as indication by means of distinction

Towards a systemic research methodology in agriculture: Rethinking the role of values in science

The recent drastic development of agriculture, together with the growing societal interest in agricultural practices and their consequences, pose a challenge to agricultural science. There is a need for rethinking the general methodology of agricultural research. This paper takes some steps towards developing a systemic research methodology that can meet this challenge – a general self-reflexive methodology that forms a basis for doing holistic or (with a better term) wholeness-oriented research and provides appropriate criteria of scientific quality. From a philosophy of research perspective, science is seen as an interactive learning process with both a cognitive and a social communicative aspect. This means, first of all, that science plays a role in the world that it studies. A science that influences its own subject area, such as agricultural science, is named a systemic science. From this perspective, there is a need to reconsider the role of values in science. Science is not objective in the sense of being value-free. Values play, and ought to play, an important role in science – not only in form of constitutive values such as the norms of good science, but also in the form of contextual values that enter into the very process of science. This goes against the traditional criterion of objectivity. Therefore, reflexive objectivity is suggested as a new criterion for doing good science, along with the criterion of relevance. Reflexive objectivity implies that the communication of science must include the cognitive context, which comprises the societal, intentional, and observational context. In accordance with this, the learning process of systemic research is shown as a self-reflexive cycle that incorporates both an involved actor stance and a detached observer stance. The observer stance forms the basis for scientific communication. To this point, a unitary view of science as a learning process is employed. A second important perspective for a systemic research methodology is the relation between the actual, different, and often quite separate kinds of science. Cross-disciplinary research is hampered by the idea that reductive science is more objective, and hence more scientific, than the less reductive sciences of complex subject areas – and by the opposite idea that reductive science is necessarily reductionistic. Taking reflexive objectivity as a demarcator of good science, an inclusive framework of science can be established. The framework does not take the established division between natural, social and human science as a primary distinction of science. The major distinction is made between the empirical and normative aspects of science, corresponding to two key cognitive interests. Two general methodological dimensions, the degree of reduction of the research world and the degree of involvement in the research world, are shown to span this framework. The framework can form a basis for transdisciplinary work by way of showing the relation between more and less reductive kinds of science and between more detached and more involved kinds of science and exposing the abilities and limitations attendant on these methodological differences

Deprojection of light distributions of nearby systems: perspective effect and non-uniqueness

Deriving the 3-dimensional volume density distribution from a 2-dimensional light distribution of a system yields generally non-unique results. The case for nearby dust-free systems is studied, taking into account the extra constraints from the perspective effect. It is shown analytically that a new form of non-uniqueness exists. We can design a Phantom Spheroid (PS) for a nearby system which preserves the intrinsic mirror symmetry and projected surface brightness of the system while changing the shape and the major-axis orientation of the system. A family of analytical models are given as functions of the distance ($D_0$) to the object and the amount ($\gamma$) of the superimposed PS density. The PS density, different from the well-known konuses of extragalactic systems, makes the luminosity of the system vary slightly with the distance $D_0$. The physical ranges for $\gamma$ and the major axis angles are constrained analytically by requiring a positive volume density everywhere. These models suggest that observations other than surface brightness maps are required to lift the degeneracy in the tilt angles and axis ratio of the central bar of the Milky Way.Comment: 21 single-spaced pages including 12 figures. Submitted to MNRA

Researching sustainable agriculture: The role of values in systemic science

This paper presents a specific perspective on the science demarcation issue, the perspective of systemic science. A systemic science is a science that influences its own subject area. Agricultural science is an example of such a science - a point that is particularly evident in connection with research in organic farming, which forms the practical context of this paper. Far from the ideal of being 'value-free' and objective, the systemic science must, upon recognising itself as systemic, acknowledge the role of values in research and include value inquiry as a specific research task. But still, the systemic science insists that it is science. Given that it is science, what then demarcates 'science' as different from other social activities? Or, in other terms, what are the proper criteria of scientific quality for systemic sciences? The paper aims to develop the conception of systemic science and investigate some basic aspects of science as a learning process, in order to work towards a more adequate foundation for developing and evaluating systemic research methods, and for determining appropriate criteria of scientific quality in systemic science