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Welcome to the LoF50 website
the online home of The Spencer-Brown Society
LoF26
Laws of Form Conference at Cambridge in August 2026
We are delighted to announce that LoF26,
the fourth Laws of Form conference, will be held from
Monday 10 August 2026
to
Friday 14 August 2026
at
The Faculty of Education
University of Cambridge
184 Hills Road
Cambridge CB2 8PQ
United Kingdom
There is no charge for attending the conference, and we are greatly indebted to the Faculty of Education, and to Cambridge University, for providing the conference venue free of charge.
Audiovisual facilities are likely to be available for those unable to attend the conference in person.
In addition to the conference, it is intended that there will be additional activities, including:
A programme detailing these and other activities, will be announced in due course.
We are delighted to announce that LoF26,
the fourth Laws of Form conference, will be held from
Monday 10 August 2026
to
Friday 14 August 2026
at
The Faculty of Education
University of Cambridge
184 Hills Road
Cambridge CB2 8PQ
United Kingdom
There is no charge for attending the conference, and we are greatly indebted to the Faculty of Education, and to Cambridge University, for providing the conference venue free of charge.
Audiovisual facilities are likely to be available for those unable to attend the conference in person.
In addition to the conference, it is intended that there will be additional activities, including:
* Punting on the River Cam
* Evensong at King’s College Chapel
* A visit to The Eagle pub, where in 1953,
Francis Crick announced that he and James Watson
had discovered “the secret of life”.
A programme detailing these and other activities, will be announced in due course.
The Unknown Storyteller Award
An annual 'Unknown Storyteller Award' of £100 for a high-quality paper submitted for publication to 'Distinction: Journal of Form' in which the author applies the story structure methodology outlined in Leon Conrad's book Story and Structure: A complete guide (2022).
Laws of Form 2024 Conference (LoF24)
We received an exciting variety of proposals for LoF24 inspired by George Spencer-Brown's work and LoF24 was an exciting and intellectually inspiring conference.
It was held from Wednesday 7 August 2024 to Saturday 10 August, 2024
at the Old Library, Room 115, School of the Arts
University of Liverpool
19-23 Abercromby Square
Liverpool L69 7ZG
Day 1 - Wednesday August 7
Day 2 - Thursday August 8
Day 3 - Friday August 9
Day 4 - Saturday August 10
Full Programme (1-page PDF)
The conference celebrated the fact that in addition to Laws of Form (1969), George Spencer-Brown wrote other books: his 1972 book Only Two Can Play This Game includes an extension of the deepest insights from Laws of Form. We explored work that reflects on themes found in Only Two Can Play This Game such as the nature of the first distinction, game play, game theory, narrative and story, poetry, cosmology, humanity, love, philosophy, mysticism, physics, logic, mathematics, and spirituality.
It was held from Wednesday 7 August 2024 to Saturday 10 August, 2024
at the Old Library, Room 115, School of the Arts
University of Liverpool
19-23 Abercromby Square
Liverpool L69 7ZG
Day 1 - Wednesday August 7
Day 2 - Thursday August 8
Day 3 - Friday August 9
Day 4 - Saturday August 10
Full Programme (1-page PDF)
The conference celebrated the fact that in addition to Laws of Form (1969), George Spencer-Brown wrote other books: his 1972 book Only Two Can Play This Game includes an extension of the deepest insights from Laws of Form. We explored work that reflects on themes found in Only Two Can Play This Game such as the nature of the first distinction, game play, game theory, narrative and story, poetry, cosmology, humanity, love, philosophy, mysticism, physics, logic, mathematics, and spirituality.
Presentations have been made available online, courtesy of West Den Haag.
Presentations from LoF22 and LoF24 will be published in the journal of the Spencer-Brown Society, Distinction: Journal of Form (College Publications, Ltd).
Presentations from LoF50 were published as the book Laws of Form: A Fiftieth Anniversary (World Scientific Publishing Company).
Presentations from LoF22 and LoF24 will be published in the journal of the Spencer-Brown Society, Distinction: Journal of Form (College Publications, Ltd).
Presentations from LoF50 were published as the book Laws of Form: A Fiftieth Anniversary (World Scientific Publishing Company).
Membership of the recently-formed Spencer-Brown Society is open to anyone who is interested in Spencer-Brown's work and its impact on different fields of study. There are no membership fees. You can view the constitution here. Joining is easy. To enquire about membership, simply fill in the form below.
JOIN THE SPENCER-BROWN SOCIETY TODAY!
If you would like to join the Spencer-Brown Society and receive information on future conferences, please send us your details via this form.
Laws of Form conferences are free to attend, and are facilitated thanks to the generosity of sponsors, host organisations and individuals.
Voluntary donations to the costs of running the conference and making its results available are very gratefully received and may be made through SumUp via these links:
Donate £5 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £10 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £25 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £100 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Thank you for any donation you are able to make!
Florian, Graham, Leon, Sahoo & Randy
Conference Organisers
LoF24 is being organised in cooperation with West Den Haag, an international platform for contemporary art.
Voluntary donations to the costs of running the conference and making its results available are very gratefully received and may be made through SumUp via these links:
Donate £5 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £10 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £25 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Donate £100 to the Spencer-Brown Society
Thank you for any donation you are able to make!
Florian, Graham, Leon, Sahoo & Randy
Conference Organisers
LoF24 is being organised in cooperation with West Den Haag, an international platform for contemporary art.
Want to know how you can use Laws of Form notation in your work? Click here.
Laws of Form is the title of the seminal work of George Spencer-Brown, first published in 1969.
His book gave a new point of view on the role of distinction, markedness,
and the unmarked state in the creation of knowledge.
Laws of Form continues to inspire authors - many of whom presented at
or were present at the LoF50 and LoF22 conferences.
To browse the exciting list of their recent
publications, click here.
To submit a paper to Distinction: Journal of Form,
the journal of The Spencer-Brown Society, please
register at DistinctionJournal.com.
His book gave a new point of view on the role of distinction, markedness,
and the unmarked state in the creation of knowledge.
Laws of Form continues to inspire authors - many of whom presented at
or were present at the LoF50 and LoF22 conferences.
To browse the exciting list of their recent
publications, click here.
To submit a paper to Distinction: Journal of Form,
the journal of The Spencer-Brown Society, please
register at DistinctionJournal.com.
Thinking the Float Tank: AUM Fiftieth Anniversary Conference
Cybernetics, Float Tanks, and Phenomenology
Commemorating 50 Years since the
1973 Esalen Institute Conference
Organised by Randolph Dible
in association with
West Den Haag
From Thursday 24 August 2023
To Saturday 26 August 2023
At West Den Haag
Lange Voorhout 102, 2514 EJ
Den Haag, The Netherlands
Cybernetics, Float Tanks, and Phenomenology
Commemorating 50 Years since the
1973 Esalen Institute Conference
Organised by Randolph Dible
in association with
West Den Haag
From Thursday 24 August 2023
To Saturday 26 August 2023
At West Den Haag
Lange Voorhout 102, 2514 EJ
Den Haag, The Netherlands
LoF22
The second Laws of Form conference was held
in 2022 (LoF22) at Liverpool University
from Wednesday 3 August 2022
to Saturday 6 August 2022
in 2022 (LoF22) at Liverpool University
from Wednesday 3 August 2022
to Saturday 6 August 2022
Thank you to all participants, remote and in-person, for making LoF22 a great success!
Videos of presentations are available at West DenHaag and via this website.
Videos of presentations are available at West DenHaag and via this website.
LoF50
The first Laws of Form conference commemorating the 50th anniversary
of the first publication of Laws of Form (LoF50)
was held at Liverpool University
from Thursday 8 August 2019
to Saturday 10 August 2019
of the first publication of Laws of Form (LoF50)
was held at Liverpool University
from Thursday 8 August 2019
to Saturday 10 August 2019
Thank you to all participants for making LoF50 a great success!
Videos of presentations are available at West DenHaag
and via this website.
Videos of presentations are available at West DenHaag
and via this website.
Just supposing (as we might) that the ultimate reality, the basic ground, as it were, that renders everything exactly as it is, is something so incredibly sensitive—like a sort of infinitely fast film—that the minutest outside probe, of any kind, obscures it so that we cannot see it. If this were so, either we should never know it at all, or we should have to find a totally different way to approach it.
George Spencer-Brown (writing under the pseudonym of James Keys)
Only Two Can Play This Game (1971), 30–31
I realized that the only 'thing' (i.e. nonthing) that would be sensitive enough to be influenced by a stimulus so weak that it didn't exist, was nothing itself. That is, nothing is the only 'thing' that is so unstable that it can 'go off' of its own accord, the only 'thing' sensitive enough to be changed by nothing
George Spencer-Brown (writing under the pseudonym of Richard Leroy)
A Lion's Teeth (2008), 148
