Humans as Self-Constructing Living Systems

This book describes a scientifically based theoretical framework about the nature and development of individual humans. Its aim is to integrate all of the biological, psychological, behavioral and social aspects of a person into a representation of them as a dynamic unit. It is designed to be a tool for professionals whose work focuses on helping individuals solve their problems of living and create satisfying lives. Everyone agrees a person is a physical entity, but they also agree that is only part of who they are. We all have goals, personalities, beliefs, feelings, knowledge, skills, values etc. that exist at the person level. People don't just react to forces, events and their environments. Instead they proactively seek to shape themselves and their environments to produce the life they want. Scholars who rejected the mechanistic reductionism model for understanding a person struggled to create a scientifically based alternative. This new theoretical model has emerged from theoretical seeds planted a century ago. The first seeds led to identifying a pattern of interrelated processes that function as a team to cooperatively produce a single adaptive dynamic system. This theoretical framework is now called general systems theory. The second theoretical seeds produced recognition that phenomena represented by the concept of information are of fundamental importance in the dynamics of human development and functioning. This led to the creation of a new science of information and communication theory. It provided a theoretical basis for understanding how subunits of a system could influence one another not only through physical means but also through non-material means called information. The merging of general systems theory and information-communication theory produced powerful new technologies that imitate some inborn human capabilities like self-direction (e.g., control systems; computers; internet). But those technologies do not have the key process that makes a unit a living system: They do not have self-constructing capabilities, i.e., they cannot create life! That is why humans as living systems are so creative and flexibly adaptive. This theoretical model has been applied to understanding and helping people deal with their problems and possibilities in their lives (e.g., developmental psychology; counseling and psychotherapy; motivation; child development; vocational and career development; Alzheimer's).