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Principia Cybernetica Web ©


Author: F. Heylighen, C. Joslyn,
Date: Jun 13, 1995 (modified); Feb 6, 1995 (created)

Parent Node(s):

Mailing Lists and Newsgroups on Cybernetics and Systems

The following is an (incomplete) list of electronic discussion forums on cybernetics and systems science. Please annotate this page, or send me an email if you want to add a forum, or if you find some information to be out of date.

For mailing lists, the first address mentioned is the address to which you should send mail if you want it distributed to all subscribers of the mailing list (for "closed" lists, such as PRNCYB-L this is only possible if youare a subscriber yourself). The subscription address is the one where you should send mail to subscribe, unsubscribe or perform other administrative commands. The maintainer address is the one of the person who is responsible for administering or moderating the list, and where you might send questions if the automatic subscription procedures somehow don't work for you.

There are basically three types of mailing lists:

For more details on lists in general: see Directory of Scholarly E-Conferences

CYBSYS-L

List Address:
CYBSYS-L@BINGVMB.CC.BINGHAMTON.EDU
Subscription Address:
LISTSERV@BINGVMB.CC.BINGHAMTON.EDU
Maintainer:
cybsys@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn)
An electronic mailing list dedicated to Systems Science and Cybernetics on the SUNY-Binghamton computer system. The list is commited to discussing a general understanding of the evolution of complex, multi-level systems like organisms, minds, and societies as informational entities containing possibly circular processes. Specific subjects include Complex Systems Theory, Self-Organizing Systems Theory, Dynamic Systems Theory, Artificial Intelligence, Network Theory, Semiotics, fractal geometry, Fuzzy Set Theory, Recursive Theory, computer simulation, Information Theory, and more.

The purposes of the list include: 1) facilitating discussion among those working in or just interested in the general fields of Systems and Cybernetics; 2) providing a means of communicating to the general research community about the work that Systems Scientists and Cyberneticians do; 3) housing a repository of electronic files for general distribution concerning Systems and Cybernetics; and 4) providing a central, public directory of working Systems Scientists and Cyberneticians.

The list is coordinated by members of the Systems Science department of the Watson School at SUNY-Binghamton, and is affiliated with the International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS) and the American Society for Cybernetics (ASC). Different levels and kinds of knowledge and experience are represented.

Principia Cybernetica Mailing list

List Address:
PRNCYB-L@BINGVMB.CC.BINGHAMTON.EDU
Subscription Address:
LISTSERV@BINGVMB.CC.BINGHAMTON.EDU
Maintainer:
cjoslyn@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn)
Associated server:
Principia Cybernetica Web
Official mailing list (closed) of the Principia Cybernetica Project. See the description of PRNCYB-L for information on how to subscribe.

Cybernetics Discussion Group

List Address:
cybcom@gwuvm.gwu.edu
Subscription Address:
listserv@gwuvm.gwu.edu
Maintainer:
jixuanhu@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU (Jixuan Hu)
CYBCOM stands for the "CYBernetic COMmunications Group" over the Internet. It is based on the George Washington University in Washington, D.C., USA. CYBCOM, was established in Fall 1993. The Center for Social and Organizational Learning at the GWU invited a group of people to form a "steering committee" for the CYBCOM List, to facilitate future discussions. This is an effort to make sure that, whenever one of the committee members is not available for some reason, conversations on the list can still be facilitated and kept going. Currently, Dr. Stuart Umpleby (Director of the Center for Social and Organizational Learning, GWU), Dr. Paul Pangaro (President, PANGARO INC., Boston), Dr. Sanaullah Kirmani (Visiting Professor of Management Science, GWU), and Jixuan-Hu are on the committee.

Systems and (human) Values

List Address:
sysval-l@netcom.com
Subscription Address:
listserv@netcom.com
Maintainer:
martin@netcom.com (Martin L.W. Hall)
This is a list that tries to investigate and encourage the investigation of Systems (science), (human) values and organizations. In a nutshell, it tries to look at the human side of using systems science. Of the systems oriented lists I had not seen many that addressed the human and organizational issues of using systems science. I named it sysval because I think that the merging of systems and (human) values is of particular importance but I would welcome any issues that are related to systems science, humans and organizations.

Control Systems Group Email List (CSG-L)

List Address:
CSG-L@UIUCVMD.bitnet
Newsgroup Address:
bit.listserv.csg-l
Subscription Address:
LISTSERV@VMD.CSO.UIUC.EDU
Maintainer:
g-cziko@uiuc.edu (Gary A. Cziko)
Associated server:
WWW-server, FTP- archive
CSGnet links together those members and affiliates of the Control Systems Group who have access to electronic mail. The Control Systems Group is a collection of people from many fields, including (so far) biology, economics, education, engineering, ethology, law, management consulting, medicine, psychology (clinical developmental, experimental physiological, and social), social work, and sociology. Our common interest is exploring control theory as a way to understand behavior. Our shared conviction is that control theory offers not just an improvement of or an extension to mainstream concepts of behavior, but a replacement for them. Our aim is to continue to develop an understanding of the organization of living systems, using control-system models, to explain how behavior is generated and why it occurs.

The basic concept accepted by members of the Control Systems Group is that all organized behavior continuously controls the portion of perceptual experience which can be influenced by the actions of organisms. This is not an article of faith. It follows from a detailed quantitative analysis of behavior, showing that action affects the very perceptions on which action is based. The action might be as simple the tightening of a muscle, and the perception as elementary as the signal generated by a sensory nerve attached to a tendon Or the action might be as complex as formulating sentences, inflections, and expressions used in a conversation, and the perception as rich as judging the effects of one's communication on the attitudes of the listener, even as the words are being spoken.

As important function of the Control Systems Group is to provide a support system for people who have become dissatisfied with the quality of explanations in their own fields, and who have come to see control theory as a source of inspiration and a tool for productive and creative work.

Newsgroup: sci.systems

Newsgroup Address:
sci.systems
STATUS: Unmoderated. Sci.systems provides a forum for the discussion of the theory and application of systems science. In the broadest sense, systems science is the study of the nature of systems. Such systems can be physical, chemical, biological, sociological, economic, etc. Systems science and system theory can be applied to systems of all types. Systems science as defined here includes mathematical systems analysis, systems engineering, general systems theory, etc. This definition is intentionally vague in order to encourage discussion on all aspects of the study of sytems.

Discussion might include, but is not limited to:

Newsgroup: alt.cyb-sys

Newsgroup Address:
alt.cyb-sys

Autopoiesis

List Address:
autopoiesis@think.net ?
Subscription Address:
listserv@think.net
Maintainer:
palmer@think.net (Kent Palmer)
Discussions about autopoiesis

ISSS-L

List Address:
isss-l@dhvx20.csudh.edu
Subscription Address:
isss-l-Request@dhvx20.csudh.edu
Maintainer:
?
List for people affiliated with the International Society for the Systems Sciences. Closed, unmoderated.

The Observer

List Address:
rwhitaker@falcon.aamrl.wpafb.af.mil
Subscription Address:
rwhitaker@falcon.aamrl.wpafb.af.mil
Maintainer:
rwhitaker@falcon.aamrl.wpafb.af.mil (Randall Whitaker)
Discussions about autopoiesis, distinction algebras and enactive cognitive science.

Complex Systems Forum

List Address:
complex@life.anu.edu.au
Subscription Address:
complex-requests@life.anu.edu.au
Maintainer:
david@rsbs13.anu.edu.au (David Green)
Associated server:
Complex Systems Web
The list's aim is to help researchers interested in complex systems to keep in touch with each other and with current developments in the field. Relevant topics include artifical life, cellular automata, chaos, criticality, fractals, genetic algorithms, learning systems, neural networks, non-linear dynamics, parallel computation, percolation, self-organization, and more. This is an unmoderated list: messages are automatically distributed.

Arachnet

List Address:
arachnet@uottawa.BITNET
Subscription Address:
?
Maintainer:
M034050@MARSHALL.MU.WVNET.EDU (Ermel Stepp )
ARACHNET is concerned with discussion groups, electronic journals, and the humanities, and I would like to infuse metacybernetics and the cybernetic philosophy into emergent e-journals on reflective networking (communication and information retrieval).

CYBERMIND

List Address:
cybermind@jefferson.village.virginia.edu
Subscription Address:
majordomo@jefferson.village.virginia.edu
Maintainer:
sondheim@panix.com
An Electronic Forum For The Discussion Of The Philosophical And Psychological Implications Of Subjectivity In Cyberspace. CYBER-MIND is devoted to an examination of the new subjectivities that have emerged and might yet emerge in this arena. We are interested in particular in the philosophical, psychological/psychoanalytic and social issues engendered, particularly as they concern the user and the social. Some issues that might be relevant: the psychology of intimacy, the role of gender, the phenomenology of the terminal screen, neurosis and paranoia on the Net, the relationship of lag to community and communi- cation, sex/gender/sexual orientation theory and electronic subjectivity, the role of the symbolic or imaginary in computer communication, the implications of symbolic extensions of the human ("external memory", and so forth), fantasy and the hallucinatory aspects of email/USENET groups/MUDs, and the psychoanalysis of lurking.


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