Differentiation and integration

See in the anterior post:

2. Differentiation and integration

Differentiation-and-integration is a foundational pattern in calculus, the life and social sciences, evolutionary theory, ancient wisdom traditions, and Western masters of dialectics. It seems to be the most suitable starting point to build a conceptual framework for addressing our question-in-focus.

The main evolutionary drivers of the social and technical--just like the biological--worlds are differentiation (generating variety) and integration (generating interdependence) produced by the selection of the fit.

If “the purpose of differentiation is for a further integration, and a further integration is for a even farther differentiation,” as thought by the Special Integration Group of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (Tang, 1996), then differentiation--without the requisite complementary integration--leads to a separation fallacy.

When that happens at a global scale, then concerted corrective action is needed to let humankind move on its “learning expedition” from breakdown to the next breakthrough. The “learning expedition” is a metaphor, a model, and a myth that can inform and guide us towards that breakthrough. We will explore it in more depth, after reviewing a particular form of differentiation-and-integration introduced by Joël de Rosnay, the “time bubble” (de Rosnay, 2001).