Talk:Holon (philosophy)

Untitled
"a holon is a historical event that makes other historical events inevitable."

Maybe this falls in to the class holon but this is not what a holon is. As the word holon means part-whole any structure that exhibits a part-whole characteristic falls into the class holon. I think someone should remove the above part from the article.

I might be a good idea to include an example of such a historical event. This wil make the subject more conprehensible (at least it would for me). Sparkie

Corrected Panda's false edit. atoms are lower than molecules since molecules are made up of atoms. - check SES. --82.35.193.80 17:52, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Holarchy is not hierarchy

I simply want to question the statement in the article saying that holarchy is a hierarchy - "This hierarchy of holons is called a holarchy". I don't find that Holarchies necessarily are arborescent hierarchical structures. I think it is absolutely possible to perceive holonarchy as a rhizome (philosophy) or non-hierarchical panarchy.

--Xact 22:50, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

David Boje

 * David Boje (2000) Holon and Transorganization Theory  --gybag 14:29, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Reference to Hierarchy of Needs
I think I understand why one would use Maslow's HoN as an example for this. There are a variety of smaller imperatives making the totality of a person's needs, so the analogy of memes making up a memeplex fits in that respect. At first I was just making a grammar/spelling change (The sentence read "An simple characterisation...", I changed it to "A simple..."). But that made me think about the wording more thoroughly.

The specific instance given ('eat' and 'have friends') doesn't seem to work. Since those would both be memes, there isn't a 'memeplex' in the example. This lead me to try and think of something to correspond with 'memeplex', at which point I realized that using the HoN as an example in this case is a far reaching analogy. To me, it implies that there is a corresponding overarching need that human beings have beyond satisfying those expressed in the HoN. I wanted to remove the reference entirely at that point, since it seems unnecessary and potentially misleading. I decided against making a large change like that without first making an attempt to explain why and see what other people thought. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.92.47.30 (talk) 22:01, 1 January 2008 (UTC)


 * There is a problem with this necessity theorem of Wilber's. While it is true that molecules could not exist without atoms, they could also not exist without stars, as stars cook the Hydrogen of the Big Bang to make other atoms, which in turn make the molecules.  And stars form in molecular clouds of gas and dust, so in a real sense it is molecules that make stars, that make other atoms that make further molecules.  Such "Chicken and the egg" paradoxes are comon in holarchies.


 * With Maslow's hierarchy of needs, Manfred Max Neef has suggested that they too are non hierarchical. For example eating is an activity that is not solitary.  A chield raised outside a society could not eat and would perish, thus a sense of belonging to a social group is necessary to meet the need for sustenance.  Max-Neef suggests that Fundamental Human Needs are limited in number (he defines 9), are non-hierarchical, are ontological (defining the being of human being), are universal and are non variant across historical time or between human cultures. What varies historically or between cultures is the "satisfiers" through which these needs are met.  This is very similar to the destinction between needs and strategies adopted by Marshall Rosenberg in Nonviolent Communication theory.  John D. Croft (talk) 08:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

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Popper is mentioned as the one who coined this word as a portmanteau word that comes from Greek Holos + the -on suffix as in neutr-on, prot-on, et.c. in order to mean an entity (whole, all, όλον) that derives from very small parts (suffix -on).

In my oppinion, as with most portmanteau words, this is nonsense.

However, the particular one is an UGLY bastardisation of a very significant philosophical term, "το όλον" ("to holon") which means absolutely and ONLY "the whole" and NOT "the part" or the "whole" and the "part".

DO NOT USE THIS WORD BECAUSE YOUR WORK MIGHT BE REDICULED. I've seen it in scientific journals, which I've classified in the round file (i.e. the bin) for this reason alone.

____________________________________________________________________________ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.218.182.153 (talk) 11:28, 23 March 2008 (UTC) Koestler is the originator of the term 'holon'. Ridicule may be due to spelling mistakes rather than terminology. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.138.191.87 (talk) 18:14, 21 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I stumbled upon this article by chance and noted the peculiar accreditation of the word holon. The synholon, or "same-whole", that which together is one (whole and part) is a known Aristotelian term from the Metaphysics. The ancient Greek physics already had quotable texts involving this term, which the author seems to draw on. It just puzzled me to credit someone AD for a term we already had BC.. Sigg3.net (talk) 13:14, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

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This may be a naive question to ask, but to me the definition of a holon seems to be all-inclusive. It would be informative to have information about what, if anything, is NOT a holon.Martino3 (talk) 14:07, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

How can the word both have a Greek origin AND be coined in the modern era? 173.57.111.97 (talk) 03:09, 4 March 2014 (UTC)
 * It happens a lot, like cinema (f. Greek for movement). Basically, it's re-appropriation of old words for new purposes. The verb to coin is used loosely here: meaning not to first use a unique word or phrase but rather to apply a new usage or meaning to a word or phraseBtljs (talk) 10:01, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

add explain about Holism vs. Reductionism debate
Example

D. Bergandi, P. Blandin (1998), "Holism vs. Reductionism: Do Ecosystem Ecology and Landscape Ecology Clarify the Debate?". DOI.

--Krauss (talk) 20:35, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Fractal picture
The caption under the picture of a fractal introduces ideas which are not present elsewhere in the page. It is also rather clumsy in its grammar. I do find sources that refer to a holon as a fractal unit e.g. a small mound of earth which makes up larger hills here and to describe seeds here, but surely these examples should be in the main body of the page if they are significant? Btljs (talk) 09:47, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Plagiarism
I would like report a plagiarism by the author of the book: Duco A. Schreuder, Vision and Visual Perception, 2014, which has copied the contribution of John D. Croft: ''08:21, 30 June 2009‎ John D. Croft (talk | contribs)‎. . (8,585 bytes) (+601)‎. . (→‎General definition)'', and more thoroughly in the section "General definition" in this page of the book: click here, 3rd paragraph without citing him.

I apologize in advance for my not very well English level.

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Respect to original ancient Greek word 'Holon(ὅλον)'
W-as-journey (talk) 06:19, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

At this modification, "Holon(ὅλον)" as an ancient Greek word was overwritten to just Greek word. However Aristotle Metaphysics had already metioned about "holon(ὅλον)".

Although the meaning of ancient 'holon' was updated by Arthur Koestler as almost newly coined word, we would respect this original term in this page, don't we?