Generative Complexity in a Complex Generative World

This book introduces a refreshing approach to twenty-first-century scientific approach in an age, which is also known as the Century of Complexity. It deals with the deep problem of complexity, being operative from the bottom-up. The current lack of understanding of complexity has led scholars into the so-called embarrassment of complexity. A long overdue paradigm shift is necessary to address complexity as generative complexity and brings readers to the edge of a scientific revolution: that is, a generative revolution in the Century of Complexity.  The book offers a radical shift of paradigm from the paradigm of simplifying into the new generative paradigm of complexifying about processes that develop from the bottom-up. The book links complex generative reality with a corresponding radical new generative nature of order and explores new fronts in science. This book explores innovative concepts of interaction, of causality, of the unit of study, and of reality itself and enables readers to see complexity as generative, emergent complexity as being operative from the bottom-up. The book discusses and suggests solutions for the problem of complexity in this Century of Complexity. The author provides a new understanding of complexity based on a generative flux of forces and relations. The book aims to bring about a fundamental and foundational change in how we view and ‘do’ science for an interdisciplinary audience of academics ranging from social science and humanities to economy and biology.

Ton Jörg has been an educational scientist since 1982 at the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands. He studied Physics and Mathematics at the University of Amsterdam (B.Sc. 1970). In 1969, he started to study Psychology at the same university (M.A. 1977). He worked as an evaluation researcher in different national (on adult education and physics education) and international projects (3rd SISS-International Science Project). In 1994, he finished his dissertation about the choice of physics as an examination subject. He has been involved in complex systems and complexity thinking since 1971. He wrote articles on invitation to open up a conversation on complexity and education, for journals like Educational Research Review, in 2007, and for Complicity, in 2009, with extended comments of experts in the field.