Schwaninger M. & Groesser S. N. (2012) Operational closure and self-reference: On the logic of organizational change. Systems Research and Behavioral Science 29: 342–367.
The concept of autopoiesis introduced by Maturana and Varela has, in the last four decades, triggered intellectual efforts for the understanding of phenomena of selforganization in general. This contribution aims at conceptualizing and applying two aspects of autopoiesis – operational closure and self-reference – in respect of social organizations. We formalize these concepts and demonstrate their power to explain change processes. This is achieved by means of a qualitative case study and a quantitative simulation model, which lead to counterintuitive insights about the dynamics of organizational transformation.
This paper reviews ideas developed by the late Gordon Pask as part of his Conversation Theory CT. CT uses theories of the dynamics of complex, self-organising systems, in conjunction with models of conceptual structures, in order to give an account of conceptual coherence for example, of a theory or a belief system as a form of organisational closure. In Pask’s own terms, CT is concerned both with the kinematics of knowledge structures and the kinetics of knowing and coming to know. The main features of Pask’s ways of modelling conceptual structures and processes are presented. The author goes on to present a summary two cycle model of learning, aimed to capture some of Pask’s key insights with respect to conceptual coherence and the organisational closure of conceptual systems. Parallels are drawn with other work in epistemology classic cybernetic studies of self-organisation and the concept of autopoiesis. The two cycle model is then applied recursively to generate learning cycles and conceptual structures at different levels of abstraction, as a contribution to Pask’s work on the topology of thought. Finally, the model is applied reflexively. That is, its own form is considered as a topic for conversation and conceptualisation. Carrying out such a reflection provides a coherent way of characterising epistemological limits, whilst retaining a clear sense of there being an in principle unlimited praxeology of awareness.
Scott B. (2000) Organizational closure and conceptual coherence. In: Chandler J. & Van de Vijver G. (eds.) Closure: Emergent organizations and their dynamics. New York Academy of Sciences, New York: 301–310.
This paper reviews ideas developed by the late Gordon Pask as part of his conversation theory (CT). CT uses theories of the dynamics of complex, self-organizing systems, in conjunction with models of conceptual structures, in order to give an account of conceptual coherence (for example, of a theory or a belief system) as a form of organizational closure. In Pask’s own terms, CT is concerned both with the kinematics of knowledge structures and the kinetics of knowing and coming to know. The main features of modelling conceptual structures and processes used by Pask are presented. We continue by presenting a summary two-cycle model of learning, aimed to capture some of Pask’s key insights with respect to conceptual coherence and the organizational closure of conceptual systems. Parallels are drawn with other work in epistemology, classic cybernetic studies of self-organization, and the concept of autopoiesis. The two-cycle model is then applied recursively to generate learning cycles and conceptual structures at different levels of abstraction, as a contribution to the work of Pask on the topology of thought. Finally, the model is applied reflexively. That is, its own form is considered as a topic for conversation and conceptualization. Carrying out such a reflection provides a coherent way of characterizing epistemological limits, while retaining a clear sense of there being an (in principle) unlimited praxeology of awareness.
Sharov A. A. (2009) Role of utility and inference in the evolution of functional information. Biosemiotics 2: 101–115. https://cepa.info/1005
Functional information means an encoded network of functions in living organisms, which is represented by two components: code and an interpretation system, which together form a self-sustaining semantic closure. The interpretation system consists of inference rules that control the correspondence between the code and the function. The utility factor operates at multiple time scales: short-term selection drives evolution towards higher survival and reproduction rates within a given fitness landscape, and long-term selection favors those inference rules that support adaptability and lead to evolutionary expansion of certain lineages. Inference rules make short-term selection possible by shaping the fitness landscape and defining possible directions of evolution, but they are under the control of the long-term selection of lineages. Communication normally occurs within a set of agents with compatible interpretation systems, which I call a “communication system” (e.g., a biological species is a genetic communication system). This view of the relation between utility and inference can resolve the conflict between realism/positivism and pragmatism. Realism overemphasizes the role of inference in evolution of human knowledge because it assumes that logic is embedded in reality. Pragmatism substitutes usefulness for truth and therefore ignores the advantage of inference. The proposed concept of evolutionary pragmatism rejects the idea that logic is embedded in reality; instead, inference rules are constructed within each communication system to represent reality, and they evolve towards higher adaptability on a long time-scale. Relevance: This paper applies pragmatism and ineractivism (Bickhard) to biological evolution. It suggests that biosemiotics rests on evolutionary pragmatism.
Sheets-Johnstone M. (2000) The formal nature of emergent biological organization and its implications for understandings of closure. In: Chandler J. & Van de Vijver G. (eds.) Closure: Emergent organizations and their dynamics. New York Academy of Sciences, New York: 320–331.
This paper shows how recognition of biological form, of which the dynamics of closure is an integral part, is mandated by research on autopoietic systems, self-organization, evolutionary theory, and on topics in a variety of other areas, including infant and child development. It shows how a “matter pure and simple” (a mechanical concept of nature) is inimical to veridical understandings and explanations of emergent organization from the level of cells to the level of intact organisms-animate forms. By means of an analysis and discussion of writings by prominent researchers in diverse fields, a brief inquiry into neuron firing, and a consideration of intrinsic dynamics and primal animation, this paper shows that a principle of motion or animation informs biological nature. In other words, the fundamentally dynamic character of biological form at all levels exemplifies the kinetic character of living matter. The final section of this paper pinpoints implications for closure, emphasizing the need for an acknowledgement of the dynamics of closure and the need for theoretical and biological reformulations of living systems that incorporate that dynamics. It exemplifies the implication in each instance with reference to authors represented in this volume.
Stewart J. (2000) From autopoiesis to semantic closure. In: Chandler J. & Van de Vijver G. (eds.) Closure: Emergent organizations and their dynamics. New York Academy of Sciences, New York: 155–162. https://cepa.info/4000
This article addresses the question of providing an adequate mathematical formulation for the concepts of autopoiesis and closure under efficient cause. What is required is metaphorically equivalent to reducing the act of writing to a set of mathematical equations, habitually effected by a human mathematician, within the ongoing function of the system itself. This, in turn, raises the question of the relationship between autopoiesis and semantics. The hypothesis suggested is that whereas semantics clearly requires autopoiesis, it may be also be the case that autopoiesis itself can only be materially realized in a system that is characterized by a semantic dimension.
Stichweh R. (1998) Systems theory and the evolution of science. In: Altmann G. & Walter A. K. W. A. (eds.) Systems: New paradigms for the human sciences. de Gruyter, Berlin: 303–317.
Excerpt: What is systems theory? There are obviously a number of variants of it. This paper is focussed on the tradition of social scientific functionalism which was established by Talcott Parsons and has been continued by Niklas Luhmann (Cf. Parsons 1977; Luhmann 1984). In a first approximation this tradition may be described as being based on system/environment as its most fundamental distinction. But who makes this distinction system/environment? It is the system itself which distinguishes itself from its environment by constituting its basic operations. That means a system is defined by its constitutive operations or elementary operations. There are two main points to be made regarding these constitutive operations of any system, and these two points represent, by the way, the most recent developments of systems theory. 1. Constitutive operations result from the production processes of the system itself, and that means there is a circular relation of the constitution of a system and the production of its basic operations. A system is constituted by the production of its basic operations and the reproduction of the system is the reproduction of these basic operations. Humberto Maturana, the neurobiologist from Chile, who formulated this as a theory of cognitive systems, baptized this kind of theory a theory of autopoietic (i.e. self-producing) systems (Maturana 1985). 2. The constitutive operations of a system define a kind of closure of the system in relation to its environment. The system can neither import these operations from its environments nor can it intervene into its environment by introducing its own operations into other systems. Other systems in the environment possess their own operational basis. This second thesis is normally called operational closure, and it obviously identifies rather precise and extensive restrictions for the interaction of any system with its environment.
Umerez J. (1995) Semantic closure: A guiding notion to ground artificial life. In: Moran F., Moreno A., Merelo J. J. & Chaco P. (eds.) Advances in artificial life. Springer, Berlin: 77–94. https://cepa.info/3850
The lack within AL of an agreed-upon notion of life and of a set of criteria for identifying life is considered. I propound a reflection upon the codified nature of the organization of living beings. The necessity of a guiding notion based on the coding is defended. After sketching some properties of the genetic code I proceed to consider the issue of functionalism as strategy for AL. Several distinctions ranging from plain multiple realizability to total implementation independence are made, arguing that the different claims should not be confused. The consideration of the semantic and intrinsically meaningful nature of the code leads to discuss the “symbol grounding” in AL. I suggest the principle of Semantic Closure as a candidate for confronting both problems inasmuch as it can be considered an accurate guiding notion to semantically ground Artificial Life.
Urrestarazu H. (2011) Autopoietic Systems: A Generalized Explanatory Approach – Part 2. Constructivist Foundations 7(1): 48–67. https://constructivist.info/7/1/048
Context: In this paper I expand aspects of the generalized bottom-up explanatory approach devised in Part I to expound the natural emergence of composite self-organized dynamic systems endowed with self-produced embodied boundaries and with observed degrees of autonomous behavior. In Part I, the focus was on the rules defined by Varela, Maturana & Uribe (VM&U rules), viewed as a validation test to assess if an observed system is autopoietic. This was accomplished by referring to Maturana’s ontological-epistemological frame and by defining distinctions, concepts, and abstractions necessary to describe dynamic systems in any observational domain. This approach concentrates on pure causation flow rather than on domain-specific interaction mechanisms. Problem: It is essential to analyze the requirements imposed by the VM&U rules on the “intra-boundaries” phenomenology for compliance with the self-production capabilities expected from an autopoietic system. Beyond what is merely implied by the compact wording of the VM&U rules, a key point needs to be addressed explicitly: how to describe some “peculiar” capabilities that the components should be endowed with to participate in new component production (as macro-molecules do in the biological domain) so that system’s self-production can be assessed. Method: Using this approach, I first describe the process of constituting self-organized dynamic structures provided with embodied boundaries. Then I explain how a capability of self-organization emerges and how this results in ephemeral configurations that may evolve into self-regulated long-lasting dynamic system stability within a continuous causation flow inside the boundaries, up to the emergence of some “specialized” subsets of components. This explication allows us to distinguish the medium, the boundaries, and the core of a self-organized dynamic system and to focus attention on the “intra-boundaries” phenomenology that should be at the heart of self-production capabilities, as prescribed by the 5th and 6th VM&U rules. Results: I propose an abstract, domain-free description of the “peculiar” composition and decomposition transformation capabilities that components should possess while subject to state transitions triggered within the “intra-boundaries” causation flow. This is combined with a discussion concerning the “intra-boundaries” causation structure’s possible topological layouts that could be compliant with the 6th rule. Implications: The above-mentioned results allow us to improve our analytic criteria when observing dynamic systems existing in non-biological domains in order to assess their autopoietic nature. They also reveal that the task of consistently identifying possible non-biological autopoietic systems is harder than merely identifying self-organized dynamic systems provided with boundaries and some observable autonomous behavioral capabilities in a given observational domain. More implications will be discussed further in Part III.
Context: In previous papers, I suggested six rules proposed by Varela, Maturana and Uribe as a validation test to assess the autopoietic nature of a complex dynamic system. Identifying possible non-biological autopoietic systems is harder than merely assessing self-organization, existence of embodied boundaries and some observable autonomous behavioural capabilities: any rigorous assessment should include a close observation of the “intra-boundaries” phenomenology in terms of components’ self-production, their spatial distribution and the temporal occurrence of interaction events. Problem: Under which physical and components’ relational conditions can some social systems be properly considered as autopoietic unities compliant with the six rules? Results: Dynamic systems can be classified according to “degrees of autonomous behaviour” that they may acquire as a result of the emergence of organizational closure (i.e., autonomy. Also, the different “degrees of attainable systemic autonomy” depend on the “degrees of autonomy” shown by a system’s dynamic components. For human social systems, a necessary balance between individuals’ autonomy and the heteronomous behaviour brought about on people by social norms (laws, culture, tradition or coercion) sets limits to the “degree of systemic autonomy” that human organizations may acquire. Therefore social systems, defined as dynamic systems composed of physical agents, could not attain the high “levels of systemic autonomy” ascribable to autopoietic systems without constraining the autonomy of agents to “levels” that are incompatible with spontaneous human behaviour. Also, social organizations seen as composed of physical agents interacting in physical space cannot be construed as autopoietic systems. Alternatively, if seen as composed of “process-like” entities, where agents participate as actors within processes, some social systems could be described as autopoietic wholes existing in the abstract space in which we distinguish interactions between processes, provided that we can assess compliance with the rules for some specific cases. Implications: These conclusions contribute to the debate on the possible autopoietic nature of some human social systems and to grasping the opportunity to shift focus to the more interesting issue of the “degrees of systemic autonomy” that human organizations could acquire (if needed) without imposing unbearable limitations on the autonomy of human actors. Also, the conceptual framework of this explanatory approach could be used in practical terms to assist the development of new dynamic modelling languages capable of simulating social systems.