Synergy. A History of Knowledge
The term synergy (from the Greek συνεργία, ‘working together’) is, in its most general sense, used to describe cooperative interactions and structural formations in nature, art, and society, which lead, or are supposed to lead, to a new quality. Inspired by Richard Buckminster Fuller’s work on synergetic planning and design as well as the synergetic model developed by the physicist Hermann Haken, concepts of synergy have emerged as a productive paradigm in interdisciplinary research and areas of practical application at the beginning of the 21st century. They gave new theoretical impulses to numerous disciplines such as psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, sociology, economy, and theology. The notion of synergy opens up new connections between the natural sciences, the humanities, and the arts. But how do such models intervene in generating and structuring knowledge and how might they contribute in the long term to innovation in our knowledge-based society? Focused by specific research tasks as well as our interdisciplinary Forum SynergieWissen, the project aims to contribute to a general history of knowledge about synergy/synergetics. The project’s Wiki-Platform SynergieWissen gives insights into our current work.
Subproject(s)
Synergeia. Technology and Faith in the Slavia Orthodoxa
Tatjana Petzer investigates synergy concepts from the Slavic-Orthodox cultural sphere and their religious prefigurations. The research project takes up the idea that Russian modernism was influenced by the doctrine of synérgeia, the interaction between human and divine energies in theosis. Russian religious philosophy translates this synergetic, transformative potential into modern terms that complement the discourse on humans as synergoi of nature from the realm of natural philosophy and holism. Petzer’s study analyzes the synergy paradigm within the contexts of ideological theories, aesthetic concepts of transformation, and future technology – factors that have drawn special attention thanks to cutting-edge thinkers working between disciplines and their sense of crisis around 1900 as they strove to create a “new humanity.”
Interpreting Nature. On the Theological Reception of Synergetics
Stephan Steiner’s research is devoted to a scientific-historical reconstruction of the current theological reception of synergetics, as it aims to clarify the basic concept of nature. The search for mediation between religion and science—characteristic of 20th-century debates—forms the background of this exchange. Theological discussions of synergetics focus on the desideratum of a holistic understanding of nature. The prevailing gap between scientific and everyday experience—illustrated by the disjunction between science’s mathematized understanding of nature and “naïve” ethical, aesthetic or religious views of nature—appears increasingly problematic from such a perspective. Today, in Christian (Alexandre Ganoczy) as well as in Jewish contexts (Edgar Morin), synergetics constitutes a framework that allows for dealing with the multidimensional facets of nature. As a theory of interaction, synergetics promises to sidestep the hostile antagonism of the dismembered notions of nature and, through a hermeneutical project, replace them with an interdisciplinary, multilayered description of reality. The project thus addresses the heterogeneous symbolizations of nature and analyzes their interwoven complexity.
Science and Prophecy in the Literature of the Russian Avant-Garde
The search for the synthesis of art, religion, and science in Russian modernity resulted in the development of new artistic methods that engendered a complex conception of the future. The dissertation seeks to comprehend this universalistic conception as it appears in Russian avant-garde literature, one that takes shape before the backdrop of changing knowledge and science systems in modernity. Employing projective thinking and prophetic writing, this conception mediates between the organic and the material, phantasms and knowledge, faith and reason. With the aid of the poetic-scientific visions of Velimir Chlebnikov and other writings from the futurist movement, Anar Imanov analyzes aesthetic schemes and literary objectives that, through the speech acts of prophecy, entangle literature with the scientific disciplines, as well as with scientific mythologems.
Immortality (Anthology)
Editor: Tatjana Petzer
Since the fin de siècle modern research and technology have taken inspiration from dreams of extending longevity, resurrecting the dead, and elevating humans to a higher form of existence.
This anthology presents a collection of historical and more recent texts by Slavic authors, writing about various immortal, long-living, anabiotic, and cybernetic organisms. These authors picked up on developments in experimental fields such as bionics, electrophysiology, genetics, gerontology, immunology, transplantation medicine, cell biology, or cryobiology and saw in them the potential for eternal physical existence. The texts not only engage with contemporary debates on immortality, they also leave a culturally specific mark on the corpus immortalis.
Publications
Wissen und Glaube
Figurationen des Synergos in der slavischen Moderne
UNSTERBLICHKEIT
GESCHICHTE UND ZUKUNFT DES HOMO IMMORTALIS
Synergie
Kultur- und Wissensgeschichte einer Denkfigur
Tatjana Petzer
- Ed.: Unsterblichkeit. Slavische Variationen. Berlin: Matthes & Seitz (forthcoming 2021)
- “Ageless, Vital, Immortal. Human Transformation in 20th-Century Russian Science and Literature”, in: Dagmar Gramshammer-Hohl, Oana Hergenröther (eds.): Foreign Countries of Old Age. East and Southeast European Perspectives on Aging, Bielefeld 2021, 253–269
- Synergiewissen als Freies Wissen, in: ZfL Blog. Blog des Leibniz-Zentrums für Literatur- und Kulturforschung, Berlin, 12 Nov 2018
- “Slavische Variationen der Unsterblichkeit”, in: Sebastian Kempgen, Monika Wingender, Ludgar Udolph (eds.): Deutsche Beiträge um 16. Internationalen Slavistenkongress, Belgrad 2018 (= Die Welt der Slaven. Sammelbände 63), Wiesbaden 2018, 491–511
- “Synergie”, in: Falko Schmieder, Georg Toepfer (eds.): Wörter aus der Fremde. Begriffsgeschichte als Übersetzungsgeschichte, Berlin 2017, 191–194
- “Auferweckung als Programm. Entgrenzungen des Lebendigen in der russischen Moderne”, in: Katrin Solhdju, Ulrike Vedder (eds.): Das Leben vom Tode her. Zur Kulturgeschichte einer Grenzziehung, München 2015, 117–123
- “Symbol und Theurgie. Zur Transformationsästhetik der russischen Moderne”, in: Poetica 45 (2013) 3–4, 347–375
- “Eisige Archive. Auftauen – Einfrieren – Sondieren – Konservieren”, in: Trajekte 27 (Oct 2013), 8–12
- “Wirksame Worte: Übertragungsphantasien in der russischen Moderne”, in: Barbara Gronau (ed.): Szenarien der Energie. Zur Ästhetik und Wissenschaft des Immateriellen, Bielefeld: transcript 2012, 45–66
- Synergie in Kunst und Konstruktion (mit Linda Pelchat, Anar Imanov), in: Forum SynergieWissen ZfL Berlin (15 Oct 2012)
- Synergie – Vom Begriff zur Figur des Wissens, in: Forum SynergieWissen ZfL Berlin (01 Jan 2012)
- »Das Wort ist synergetisch«. Pavel Florenskijs Kulturtheorie des Zusammenwirkens, in: Forum SynergieWissen ZfL Berlin (01 Aug 2011)
- “Selbstorganisation, Spiel, Synergie”, in: Trajekte 22 (Apr 2011), 38–39
- “‘Überall ist Energie’ Nikola Teslas Entdeckungen und Visionen”, in: Trajekte 21 (Oct 2010), 30–36
- “Kultakte der Wissenschaft. Synergie und Synthese im russischen Kosmismus”, in: Nadežda Grigor’eva et al. (eds.): Das Konzept der Synthese im russischen Denken. Künste – Medien – Diskurse, München et al.: Sagner 2010, 161–182
Anar Imanov
- “Wissenschaft und Prophetie in der Dichtung der russischen Avantgarde rund um das budetljanische Gamma”, in: Nina Frieß, Gunnar Lenz, Erik Martin (eds.): Grenzräume – Grenzbewegungen. Ergebnisse der Arbeitstreffen des JFSL Basel 2013/Frankfurt (Oder) und Słubice 2014. Bd. 2, Potsdam 2016, 73–85
- Velimir Chlebnikovs imaginäre Synergie, in: Forum SynergieWissen ZfL Berlin (01 Aug 2011)
Stephan Steiner
- “Naturhermeneutik. Zur theologischen Rezeption der Synergetik”, in: Tatjana Petzer, Stephan Steiner (eds:): Synergie. Kultur- und Wissensgeschichte einer Denkfigur, München 2016, 329–344