This unique book offers a comprehensive and integrated introduction to the five fundamental elements of life and society: energy, information, feedback, adaptation, and self-organization. It is divided into two parts. Part I is concerned with energy (definition, history, energy types, energy sources, environmental impact); thermodynamics (laws, entropy definitions, energy, branches of thermodynamics, entropy interpretations, arrow of time); information (communication and transmission, modulation-demodulation, coding-decoding, information theory, information technology, information science, information systems); feedback control (history, classical methodologies, modern methodologies); adaptation (definition, mechanisms, measurement, complex adaptive systems, complexity, emergence); and self-organization (definitions/opinions, self-organized criticality, cybernetics, self-organization in complex adaptive systems, examples in nature).

In turn, Part II studies the roles, impacts, and applications of the five above-mentioned elements in life and society, namely energy (biochemical energy pathways, energy flows through food chains, evolution of energy resources, energy and economy); information (information in biology, biocomputation, information technology in office automation, power generation/distribution, manufacturing, business, transportation), feedback (temperature, water, sugar and hydrogen ion regulation, autocatalysis, biological modeling, control of hard/technological and soft/managerial systems), adaptation and self-organization (ecosystems, climate change, stock market, knowledge management, man-made self-organized controllers, traffic lights control).

Inhalt

Chapter 1. Life and Human Society: The Five Fundamental Elements.- Chapter 2. Energy I: General Issues.- Chapter 3. Energy II: Thermodynamics.- Chapter 4. Information I: Communication, Transmission, and Information Theory.- Chapter 5. Information II: Science, Technology, and Systems.- Chapter 6. Feedback and Control I: History and Classical Methodologies.- Chapter 7. Feedback and Control II: Modern Methodologies.- Chapter 8. Adaptation, Complexity, and Complex Adaptive Systems.- Chapter 9. Self-Organization.- Chapter 10. Energy in Life and Society.- Chapter 11. Information in Life and Society.- Chapter 12. Feedback Control in Life and Society.- Chapter 13.Adaptation and Self-Organization in Life and Society.