Foreword: The Oroborous and the Glass Bead Game

This double issue of Cybernetics and Human Knowing is dedicated to celebrating the life and work of Heinz von Foerster, cybernetician extraordinaire. He died on October 2nd, 2002. Mai von Foerster, his wife of over 60 years, died on June 22nd, 2003. They lived as a team and it is wrong to think of the work that appeared under the authorship of Heinz von Foerster without thinking of Mai's part in it. In life they were inseparable. Death did not separate them for long, either. It is fitting to start this introduction by recording this, and by commemorating Mai von Foerster, nee Sturmer, along with her husband, Heinz.