<html><div>>Ralph... </div>
<div>> </div>
<div>>you are a self-organizing system. you don't need to go beyond
your "self" </div>
<div>>to find a complex adaptive system either. I won't write about
CAS </div>
<div>>here...perhaps I can just say that the terms CAS and living
systems are </div>
<div>>nearly synonymous, just not quite. DOC </div>
<div>*********************************************</div>
It is a real pleasure to see this sort of discussion showing up on the
listserve. OST does better meetings, but it represents a lot more. From
the late '70s onwards I have been facinated with the thought of Ilya
Prigogene and more recently Stuart Kauffman. There was never any attempt
on my part to design Open Space as a dissapative structure /
self-organizing system / complex adaptive system -- if only because OST
was never truly designed. It just happened. But when you come to the
truly interesting question of why OST works, and how do we work better
with it -- I find the notions of Prigogine, Kauffman et al to be most
helpful. Add a little Zen, and the stew gets truly interesting. I am not
a practitioner myself, at least in any thorough-going way. But my Zen
friends, as also my Hindi friends tell me that there must be some
connection, if only in a prior life. I'll accept that. In any event, Open
Space is all about creating a bounded moment in which life (Spirit) shows
up. Call that self-organization or manifestation -- it seems pretty much
the same thing to me. When I wrote my book, "Expanding Our Now: The
Story of Open Space," (Berrett-koehler, 1997), that was where I was
headed. Who knows if I got there
<br>
<div align="center">
Harrison Owen <br>
7808 River Falls Drive <br>
Potomac, MD 20854 USA <br>
301-469-9269 (phone) <br>
301-983-9314 (fax) <br>
email owen@tmn.com<br>
Website
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/~owen" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/~owen</a><br>
Open Space Institute website<br>
<a href="http://www.tmn.com/openspace" eudora="autourl">http://www.tmn.com/openspace</a></html>