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Author: F. Heylighen,
Date: Jun 14, 1995 (modified);

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Bibliography "The Evolution of Complexity"

The people who submitted abstracts for the Symposium "The Evolution of Complexity" : Evolutionary and cybernetic foundations for transdisciplinary integration" were asked to include references to the literature. I have now used these to compile a bibliography on the subject of the symposium. I have simply added all references together in one file, sorted it on the name of the first author, and counted recurring entries. It turns out that a number of works or authors are mentioned independently by different symposium contributors. Those can be seen as the most important ones for the field.

Note that there is a social science bias in the full bibliography (less in the selection). This is not due to a more numerous presence of social scientists at the Symposium (in fact there are slightly more natural scientists), but to the social science tradition of making much longer reference lists.

The books mentioned by four different contributors are the following:

****Kauffman S. A., The Origins of Order: Self-Organization and Selection in Evolution, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1993)

This book, and Kauffman's work in general, is obviously a "must" for all people interested in evolution and complexity. It is a pity he could not accept the invitation to lecture at the congress.

****Prigogine, Ilya and Stengers, Isabelle, "Order out of Chaos" Bantam Books, 1984

I am glad to see that since the conference takes place in Brussels, the main exponent of the Brussels school is prominently present. This book is a non-technical overview of his philosophy. Happily, Prigogine did accept the invitation and will give a plenary lecture.

The books mentioned by three different contributors:

***Waldrop, M. Mitchell, Complexity: The Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos, Simon & Schuster, 1992.

This is a good popular overview of the development of ideas that was at the basis of the Santa Fe Institute for the sciences of complexity.

***Wiener Norbert , 1961, Cybernetics: Or control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine, The M.I.T. Press, New York.

Of course, the founder of the field of cybernetics could not be absent. The following works were mentioned by 2 different contributors, and seem all worth reading:

Here is the full bibliographyv of works that were mentioned once: