This Week’s Citation CIassic~
FEBRUARY
Maruyama M. The second cybernetics: deviation-ampli~ingmutual causal processes.
Amer. Sci. 51:164-79, 1963.
[fnstitue of Human Development. University of California. Berkeley. CAl
Some causal loops amplify change, while other phostasis” paper, deleting the mathematical
loops counteract change. Heterogeneity in- technicalities. The manuscript was rejected by
creases, structures develop-and the amount of
10 American journals, but finally American
information grows in biological, social, and Scientist accepted it.
some physical processes. Similar initial condiThe readers understood the quantitative side
tions may lead to dissimilar results, making in- of it immediately. However, its qualitative side,
ferential procedure in traditional hypothesis- (Le., the notion that heterogeneity is indispensmaking invalid. [The SC/® and SSCJ~indicate able, desirable, and increasing) went almost
I had to write “Hetthat this paper has been cited in over 230 unnoticed. Consequently,
2
publications.]
erogenistics” 3 and “Heterogenistics and morphogenetics” to emphasize the role of heter—
p
ogeneity. When I wrote “The second cybernetics,” what I meant was “a different kind
Magoroh Maruyama
of cybernetics” compared to what Wiener had
School of International Politics,
formulated. I meant nothing numerical in the
Economics and Business
term “the second.” However, in subsequent
Aoyama Gakuin University
years several authors wrote articles that they
Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150
called “the third cybernetics,” “the fourth cyJapan
bernetics,” and soon. Their sequential pattern
of thinking differed from my nonserial conceptualization of cybernetics.
In my student years in Sweden I noticed that
December 22, 1987
the difficulty among Europeans in comprehending simultaneous interactions as well as
the role of heterogeneity was due to episteThe principle of interactions among heter- mological rather than intellectual limitations.
ogeneous elements is implicit in the traditional Therefore, I developed theories on epistemoJapanese garden design and floral art. More- logical limitations
4 6such as “Communication- “Mindscapes and science
over, the notions of change amplification and al epistemology,”
7
pattern development are inherent in Japanese theories,” and several others. I see eminent
cosmology. In my postgraduate years in Swe- scholars trapped in epistemological prisons.
den I was puzzled by the fact that these no- Prigogine is striving to find “the prime mover”
tions were not natural to Europeans who were in Big Bang, Catastrophe Theory, dissipation,
educated in the Aristotelian and Cartesian fluctuation, bifurcation points, and so on, delogic systems. I began writing mathematical spite the fact that, for interactive thinking, the7
papers on change-amplifying interactions for notion of the prime mover is a straw man.
seminars in Sweden in 1957. In 1959t I wrote The inventor of photoklystron, John Freeman,
“Morphogenesis and morphostasis,” which as well as some eminent physicists such as
was published in an Italian journal, Methodos, Henry KoIm of the Massachusetts Institute of
in 1960. It dealt mathematically with the pro- Technology and G.K. O’Neill of Princeton, excess of development of structure and increase cluded electromagnetic mutual induction in
of information. In 1962 Norbert Wiener’s their initial design of klystron arrays to send
writing on change counteracting was still the solar energy, and it was only after my suggesprevailing paradigm. I felt somewhat fed up tion that they
7 decided to make use of mutual
and wrote “The second cybernetics” by sim- induction. Many economists are still8 trapped
plifying my earlier “Morphogenesis and mor- in equilibristic or cyclistic theories.
I. Maruyama M. Morphogenesis and morphoslasis. Methodos 12 251-96. 980
2.
. Hecerogenisi,cs. Aria Biotheor. 26:120-36. l977.
3. --——.
}-teierogenistics and inorphogenetics. Theor. Soc. 5:75-96. 978.
4.
. Cornnianicanonaj epistemology. Pan I. Bnr. J Phil. Sri. 11.319.27. l961
5. -—--—.
~
epistemology. Pan 2. 8th. 1. Phil. Sri 12:5262. 1961.
6. ——.
Communicational epistemology Purl 3. 8th. J. PhiJ. Sri. 12:117-31. l9hl.
7. —-—.
Mindscapes and science theories. Curt. .SnrI,ropol. 21:589-99, 1980.
8. -----———--. Morphogenetic economics. Technol. Foreca.it. Soc. Change 29:205-13. 1986
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