Title: How to ground the observer in second order cybernetics, autopoiesis and Luhmanns system theory
1How to ground the observer in second order
cybernetics, autopoiesis and Luhmanns system
theory?
- Søren Brier
- Copenhagen Business School
- Departement of International Culture and
Communication - Centre for Language, Cognition and Mentality
- Ed. of Cybernetics Human Knowing
2Krippendorff on constructivism
- The task of constructivism ... is to describe a
system's operation within its own domain of
description and - account for the constitution of its identity and
the conditions of its continued persistence in
its own terms. - ... constructivists need to find a way of putting
the knower into a known that is constructed so as
to keep the knower viable in practice. - (Krippendorff 1991)
3The observer and second order cybernetics
- I have the theory of observing, I am myself an
observer, so I am doing the observing, - I am including myself into the loop of
argumentation. And in which way can I handle
that? - So, my proposition here is now that in the
second phase of cybernetic evolution a serious
attempt was made to cope with the epistemological
and the methodological Grundlagen propositions
that appear if you begin seriously to include the
observer in the descriptions of his observations.
- With the first appearance of Maturanas
autopoietic system for us all who were working in
this field the suggestion was immediately made
that for the first time we can start here with a
biological theory of autonomy, because if we do
not stipulate autonomy, observation is not an act
of interaction or something like that,
observation would just be a transducer " - (von
Foerster, 1981, p. 104)
4Problem, plot and conclusion of this talk
- Neither cybernetics nor general systems, second
order cybernetics or autopoiesis theory have
produced a first person concept of mind as
awareness and experience of qualia! Thus we have
not managed to put the knower into a known ! - We only have a informational theory of computing
(Bateson) or circularity (HvF) or a
bio-constructivist theory of observing
(Maturana). - Luhmanns theory combines them in a social theory
of communication! - To give a solution to the problem of awareness of
the observer he invents a psychic
autopoietic system and communicative
autopoiesis. - He then attempts to integrate Husserls
phenomenology in his theory. - He fails, but is unaware that his use of
Spencer-Browns mystical theory of mind as
Firstness based on a Buddhist -Christian
panentheism as a foundation can save his project.
5Norbert Wieners cybernetic world view
- Information is information, neither matter nor
energy. - Connect statistical information concept with
thermodynamically entropy and information becomes
negentropy (Schrödinger, Brillouin and Wiener) - Information as negentropy becomes the organizing
and sometimes creative aspect of nature. - A probabilistic, thermodynamic and informational
grounding.
6Bateson Information and mind
- Gregory Bateson developed a non-technical and
more wide-ranging concept of cybernetic
information as a difference that makes a
difference for a cybernetic mind. -
- He linked information, mind and meaning in a
cybernetic systems of circulating differences
including the whole biosphere, as well as culture
and social systems.
7Cybernetics mind in Steps to an Ecology of Mind
- 1. The system shall operate with and upon
differences. - 2. The system shall consist of closed loops or
networks of pathways along which differences and
transforms of differences shall be transmitted.
(What is transmitted on a neuron is not an
impulse it is news of a difference). - 3. Many events within the system shall be
energized by the responding part rather than by
impact from the triggering part. - 4. The system shall show self-correctiveness in
the direction of homeostasis and/or in the
direction of runaway. Self-correctiveness implies
trial and error.
8Developed further in Mind and Nature
- A mind is an aggregate of interacting parts or
components. - The interaction between parts of mind is
triggered by difference, and difference is a
nonsubstantial phenomenon not located in space or
time difference is related to negentropy and
entropy rather than to energy. - Mental processes require collateral energy.
- Mental processes require circular (or more
complex) chains of determination. - In mental processes, the effects of difference
are to be regarded as transforms (i.e., coded
versions) of events preceding them. The rules of
such transformation must be comparatively stable
(i.e., more stable than the content) but are
themselves subject to transformation. - The description and classification of these
processes of transformation disclose a hierarchy
of logical types
9Pan-computational philosophy.
- Bateson develops the idea of the biosphere as the
ultimate cybernetic mind and HvF widened the
computational concept beyond Turing and imagined
mind, life and matter a computational system. - We can call this Pan-computational philosophy.
- Where is the phenomenological dimension of
experience, qualia, emotions and free will in
that? Wieners ontological foundation is not
changed.
10Von Foersters observer
- Realizes that he sees and invents the universe
from within. - That he is made of the same stuff as his brain.
- That there has to be some partly independent -
energy and structure in the environment. - There has to be other real observers to create
reality and meaning in language. - We are observing in communication together and
computing a reality. - Could be construed as radical social
constructivIsm. - But where is first person conscious awareness?
11Mind as circulating differences
- Maturanas autopoiesis bases the observer in
biology and behavioural science (coordination of
coordinations of behaviour). But only let objects
appear though language. -
- Both Bateson, von Foerster, Maturana and Luhmann
do refer to human sense experience, qualia and
emotion. - But my concern is these these concepts are not
defined within their paradigms but just refer to
common sense understandings of them and take them
as theoretically given. - They take first person awareness as given, but
the ontology produced does not allow subjective
experience such as the phenomenological life
world as foundational in the theory.
12Luhmanns system theory
- Luhmann allows social systems to observe each
other and to communicate. - He differentiates his theory from both the
information processing paradigm and pan-
computational philosophy. - In his system theory the embodied psychic system
is the indispensable environment for this
socio-communicative system to function. - It is the vital environment for communicative
systems. - As such, his theory is not only meta-biological
but also meta-sociological.
13Luhmanns meaning world
- There is a biological system in Luhmanns system
theory, but I am not sure that you can call it a
body or the body. - Luhmann's revolutionary idea is to distinguish
between biological, psychological and social
autopoiesis. - Autopoietic operational closure creates a
'meaning world' of its own that does not exclude
outside influences, but selects them to have
influence only according to the systems own
inner world of meaning and survival.
14AUTOPOIESIS
SOCIO-COMMUNICATIVE AUTOPOIETIC LANGUAGE GAMES
15The psychic system
- Luhmann identifies the psychic and
socio-communicative autopoiesis to operate in the
medium of meaning. - Thus psychic systems which are not the same as
classical subjects - have a competitor in the
social system, which has the ability to cognize
through communication (circulating differences). - The psychic system only has its own closed world
of meaning, thoughts and feelings.
16Dynamics of meaning
- The dynamics of meaning processing may be very
different from the dynamics of information
processing. - Meaning often has an existential component and is
connected to the life world of individuals, as
well as cultures as a whole where myth,
religions and political ideologies contribute to
the possible frameworks of interpretation. - While having specific meanings and communicating
them can be considered as codifying information
then the ability to produce meaning in itself is
not informational. - To Luhmann meaning is the field in which we make
the significant differences (that make a
difference).
17Ego and Alter
- Luhmann has a concept of Ego connected to a
concept of an Alter to characterize the psychic
system, but his ego is observational and thus not
a traditional subject. - It is nevertheless the basis for the creation of
the person. - The person, in Luhmanns system theory, is only
brought into existence as the social dimension of
ego and alter.
18Circulating differences -no center - no free will
- Thus in this theoretical framework, we do not
have a personal core with a free will, and a
communication-independent great variety of qualia
that controls the communications and actions. - Rather it is the other way round, that the
communication creates conditions to which the
psychic system can make a structural coupling,
through interpenetration. - We are discussing an abstraction, in which one
essentially separate out the communications that
are occurring, as if nothing else existed, but
communications as circulating differences.
19The missing subject
- For Luhmanns a human body-mind is not really a
human being when it is without language. - There are no persons in his system theory -
understood as embodied subjects with a conscious
free will, having causal influences on both
natural and social systems in system science
20The root of subjectivity
- But where natural science will not accept any
concept of meaning, Luhmann builds his system
theory in part on a Husserlian phenomenological
foundation interpreted in a special way as
communication. - Most of all Husserls phenomenology is known for
a fundamental theory of subjectivity. But Luhmann
has none! This I a paradox!
21Phenomenological life world
- To Husserl directed conscious experiences (the
observer) is before any distinction between
subject and object. - Subjectivity and experience is the basic reality
and an outer world of independent objects is
considered as an artificial constructed ontology. - The reality of subjectivity is a life world
with in which the observer makes distinction in a
horizon of the experienced world. - This has never really been connected with the
world of natural science including biology
cybernetic information theory, autopoiesis and
system theory.
22Spencer-Brownian observer
- Luhmann cannot connect phenomenology and system
science and leaves his ontology open, much like
Maturana. - Still Spencer-Browns the observer making a
distinction between system and environment is
the epistemological foundation of their special
brands of operational constructivism. - Spencer-Brown seems to works in a pure logical
framework and does not systematically discuss the
ontology necessary to support the epistemology of
differences and form that he promotes in Laws of
Form. - But he discusses it another of his less
scientific works, written under the name James
Keys It takes Two to Play This Game.
23The timeless foundation of observing
- Spencer-Brown addresses the emergence of form at
that level where the observer, the universe and
the distinction between universe and observer
occur at once/together from 'the void'. He speaks
of the first distinction between system and
environment. He writes - Space is a construct. In reality there is no
space. Time is also a construct. In reality there
is no time. In eternity there is space but no
time. In the deepest order of eternity there is
no space. It is devoid of any quality whatever.
This is the reality of which the Buddhas speak.
Buddhists call it Nirvana. Its order of being is
zero. Its mode is completeness.
-
Spencer-Brown (1974 p. 127 ).
24Spencer-Brown (1974 p. 127)
- It is known to western doctrine, sometimes as the
Godhead or that which was in the beginning, is
now, and ever shall be. - This way of describing it, like any other, is
misleading, suggesting that it has qualities like
being, priority, temporality. Having no quality
at all, not even (except in the most degenerate
sense) the quality of being, it can have none of
these suggested properties, although it is what
gives rise to them all. - It is what the Chinese call the unnamable Tao,
the Mother of all existence. It is also called
the Void. - In a qualityless order, to make any distinction
at all is at once to construct all things in
embryo. Thus the First Thing, and with it the
First Space and the First Existence and the First
Being, are all created explosively together.
25Form and emptiness
- Thus we are in that void from which mind, matter,
time and space emerges. - This is the unity that is broken by the first
indication creating the first distinction. - The Heart Sutra, which is central in Mahayana
Buddhisms ontology says - "Form is emptiness, emptiness is form."
26Connecting back to the ontology of science
- This does not of course mean that the "big bang"
theory that cosmologists suggest for the creation
of the universe is the true one. The "explosion"
into existence does not take place in time, and
so from the point of view of time is a continuous
operation. Thus the "big bang" theory and the
"continuous creation" theory, like all famous
"rival" theories in western culture, are both
equally true. - Spencer-Brown (1974 p. 127)
27Spencer-Browns trinity of distinction
- The explanation of the Trinity in fact turns out
to be simple enough. - When you make a distinction of any kind whatever,
the easiest way to represent its essential
properties mathematically is by some sort of
closed curve like a circle. - Here the circumference distinguishes two sides,
an inside and an outside. - The two sides, plus the circumference itself,
which is neither the inside nor the outside,
together make up three aspects of one
distinction. - Thus every distinction is a trinity. Hence the
First Distinction is the First Trinity.Spencer-B
rown 1974 p. 128-129
28Making a distinction is semiotics
- Then there is thus a first observer and it is
this very abstract observer. - The system as a whole the form in
Spencer-Browns philosophy is form or sign
producing as C.S. Peirce saw it and now has
produced that inherited agency that was not
accounted for in Luhmanns system theory. - Thus we have put the knower into a known that is
constructed so as to keep the knower viable in
practice, - and we have made a deep connection
between cybernetics and semiotics - CYBERSEMIOTICS