Developing a cybernetic lifestyle

Abstract

Purpose

The dominant paradigms of the world today are reductionist and linear and have led us towards crises in the environment, economics, health and more. Cybernetics is one alternative paradigm, which moves beyond reductionist thought. The paper aims to investigate cybernetics and how it might move from a paradigm to a way of living. A cybernetic worldview enables us to see ourselves as partners in dynamic co-creative processes reaching beyond dualities. To live by such a life requires courage. This paper concentrates on how cybernetics principles may be applied on an individual basis to provide a more holistic way of coping with the challenges of everyday life in the early twenty-first century. The author sees how he can live a balanced life, cope with uncertainty, live with courage, move beyond dualities and develop a breadth of knowledge to help us navigate the events of the lives.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper provides a brief outline of some cybernetic principles and how they might be transferred to a cybernetic lifestyle. The focus is on how the author might integrate cybernetic principles into the individual life on a day-to-day basis.

Findings

Breadth of knowledge, moving beyond dualities, the observer, living with courage, uncertainty and living a balanced life are discussed from a cybernetic viewpoint.

Practical implications

It gives cyberneticians cause to consider their lives and how cybernetic principles help them in everyday life.

Social implications

The more cyberneticians exhibit cybernetics principles in their life, the more it will be noticed by those around them.

Originality/value

The approach of this paper is about cybernetics as an individual lifestyle rather than a more generalised examination of the role of cybernetics.

Citation

Ronald David MacGill, V. (2013), "Developing a cybernetic lifestyle", Kybernetes, Vol. 42 No. 9/10, pp. 1424-1430. https://doi.org/10.1108/K-09-2012-0043