Living-Systems Principles

A strange thing is happening in the sciences. We saw the world in one way, and now we are starting to see it in an entirely different way. 

We thought that the more we dug down to smaller and smaller scales, we would find the "building blocks" from which the universe is made.  But instead, we have found that the universe is all processes. There are no 'solid things', everything consists of processes. So, breaking down the universe into "parts" no longer makes sense because there are no separate parts: everything is the interconnected flow of processes. Thus, the (new) essential understanding of life is that it is a networked structure, a "web of life", that is characterised by patterns of behaviour. That is, we now think in terms of interconnected systems and systemic patterns.

This is a paradigm shift of immense proportions: we need a new science, new tools, new heuristics, and to rethink our assumptions. The emerging science of interconnected systems ("complex systems") is called complexity science. 

The human body is a living system. Human society as a whole is a living system. Our ecosystem is a living system. The earth is a living system. In complexity science terms, living systems are complex-adaptive and autopoietic systems. 

Below is a summary list of properties and principles of living systems.