John Holland is one of the few scientists, who all by themselves and by their pursuits, helped change the course of science and the wealth of human knowledge. There is hardly a field of science or problems, that is not affected by John's work on complexity and in particular, complex adaptive systems. On the occasion of his 85th birthday, many of his friends wrote about John, about facets of this remarkable man that only people close to him can know and tell.This book collects those stories...

In March 2013, Para Limes organized the conference A Crude look at the Whole. It turned out to be an extraordinary meeting, even more so eleven years later. During the conference the speakers, all giants on their own turf, captured the excitement about what the new field of complexity science could mean for understanding our world and molded it in approaches to extract meaning from these budding insights. Now, eleven years later, the (video's of the) talks create a thrill, that may be simi...

Our age is characterized by global access to information, places and cultures: we can gain more and more knowledge about 'the others': other people and their cultures by 'indirect knowledge' — learning about them via the global information net assisted by electronic and other high-tech communication channels, as well as by 'direct knowledge': personally visiting various parts of the world and meeting local people in their own natural and social environments.East and West, two major worlds ...

Schools and universities educate (mostly young) people, to equip them to deal with the future as it unfolds from the present. The question — whether these schools and universities are fit for that purpose — has always been relevant, even in slow-paced times of relative stability, where the future seems predictable as a simple extension of the past.Now that the future is not predictable anymore. Slow-paced times have gone. The relative stability in which universities developed and e...

The 2021 IPCC report made one thing crystal clear — global climate change is here to stay. Time is up. We need to act or climate change will lead to inconceivable suffering by billions of people. Buying Time for Climate Action is the combined narrative of world class experts, all committed to help humanity survive its largely self-induced destructive course. Changing that course requires urgent action. Determining which actions will lead to helpful change requires insights into the stumbli...

This interesting book is a compilation of the lectures and discussions held during a four-day event — Grand Challenges for Science in the 21st Century — organized by Para Limes at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.The elite group of speakers included Nobel laureate Sydney Brenner who called on all scientists to adopt a truth-seeking approach and not be afraid of challenging assumptions. The other panellists were Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal and past President of the Royal ...

Human society is no stranger to catastrophe, but the challenges the world faces today — a ballooning population, intense global connectivity and the unquenchable thirst of human consumption — have synergised to make disruptions more frequent, intense and far reaching.Despite the complexity of these problems, the response should not be to give up and surrender to these forces, the crash can be avoided. Humanity does possess the scientific, technological and social knowledge to not just surv...

The contents of this book continues the theme as in the previous volume on cultural patterns and cognitive patterns in the East and West, with special regard to those patterns which are determined by our natural-genetic endownments in contrast to those patterns which are influenced by our cultural ('East-West') influences, and within this context a unique flavour is given to the 'good life' aspects of adapting to this global community.The chapters written by leading neuroscientists, give a...

Renowned playwright George Bernard Shaw once said "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world, the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." By this definition, some of today's entrepreneurs are decidedly unreasonable--and have even been dubbed crazy. Yet as John Elkington and Pamela Hartigan argue in The Power of Unreasonable People, our very future may hinge on their work.Through vivid ...

In the wake of economic crisis on a global scale, more and more people are reconsidering their role in the economy and wondering what they can do to make it work better for humanity and the planet. In this innovative book, J. K. Gibson-Graham, Jenny Cameron, and Stephen Healy contribute complex understandings of economics in practical terms: what can we do right now, in our own communities, to make a difference?Full of exercises, thinking tools, and inspiring examples from around t...

This landmark book shows how the old model of corporate sustainability and responsibility is being replaced by a second generation movement that goes beyond the outmoded approach of CSR as philanthropy or public relations concern to a more authentic, stakeholder-driven model. The author describes the new concept and mission of the new movement and explains its agenda in a succinct guide that will be useful for CSR professionals, including managers, consultants, academics, and non-governmen...

"Asks difficult questions and offers bold, provocative answers . . . These pages open our eyes to some of the most urgent problemss facing humanity. A must-read." —Moisés Naím, author of The Revenge of PowerThe free-market, limited-government development model has been an ecological and social disaster for the developing world. Sustainable and equitable development is only possible with the active involvement of a strong central state that can guide the ec...