Open peer commentary on the article “Interactivity and Enaction in Human Cognition” by Matthew Isaac Harvey, Rasmus Gahrn-Andersen & Sune Vork Steffensen. Upshot: To sort out their differences with enactive theory, interactivity theorists would do better to focus on operational closure only insofar as it constitutes a condition of intrinsic normativity or self-regulated coupling.

Human thinking uses other peoples’ experience. While often pictured as computation or based on the workings of a language-system in the mind or brain, the evidence suggests alternatives to representationalism. In terms proposed here, embodiment is interlaced with wordings as people tackle the integration problem. Using a case study, the paper shows how a young man uses external resources in an experimental task. He grasps a well-defined problem by using material resources, talking about his doings and switching roles and procedures. Attentional skills enable him to act as an air cadet who, among other things, connects action, leadership and logic. Airforce practices prompt him to draw timeously on non-local resources as, using impersonal experience, he interlaces language, action and perception. He connects the cultural and the metabolic in cognitive work as he finds a way to completion of the task.

Key words: cognitive science, distributed cognition, ecological psychology, enactivism, integration problem, interactivity, problem solving, river problem, systemic cognition, thinking

Recognition of the importance of autopoiesis to biological systems was crucial in building an alternative to the classic view of cognitive science. However, concepts like structural coupling and autonomy are not strong enough to throw light on language and human problem solving. The argument is presented though a case study where a person solves a problem and, in so doing relies on non-local aspects of the ecology as well as his observer’s mental domain. Like Anthony Chemero we make links with ecological psychology to emphasize how embodiment draws on cultural resources as people concert thinking, action and perception. We trace this to human interactivity or sense-saturated coordination that renders possible language and human forms of cognition: it links human sense-making to historical experience. People play roles with natural and cultural artifacts as they act, animate groups and live through relationships drawing on language that is, at once, artificial and natural. Thus, while constrained by wordings, interactivity is able to fine-tune what we do with action-perception loops. Neither language nor human problem solving reduce to biological sense-making.

Key words: enactivism, ecological psychology, distributed cognition, distributed language, problem solving, sense-making, interactivity, organism–environment system

Open peer commentary on the article “Interactivity and Enaction in Human Cognition” by Matthew Isaac Harvey, Rasmus Gahrn-Andersen & Sune Vork Steffensen. Upshot: Enaction, as a paradigm, is still negotiating its position with respect to science done in an objective key. Some of the problems identified by the authors arise by treating enactive descriptions as if they were realist accounts. Negotiating a resolution here will demand progress all round.

Open peer commentary on the article “Interactivity and Enaction in Human Cognition” by Matthew Isaac Harvey, Rasmus Gahrn-Andersen & Sune Vork Steffensen. Upshot: Enaction is a diverse research program and some of its texts can be interpreted in terms of a critical contrast to interactivity. Yet much of the former has already started to move in a direction favored by the latter: toward systematic studies of how human activity is shaped by social, cultural, and technological influences. Interactivity could therefore help enaction to provide a better account of such highly mediated and augmented forms of sense-making.

Second-order cybernetics (also known as the cybernetics of cybernetics, and the New cybernetics ) was developed between 1968 and 1975 in recognition of the power and consequences of cybernetic examinations of circularity. It is cybernetics, when cybernetics is subjected to the critique and the understandings of cybernetics. It is the cybernetics in which the role of the observer is appreciated and acknowledged rather than disguised, as had become traditional in western science: and is thus the cybernetics that considers observing, rather than observed systems. In this article, the rationale from and through the application of which, second-order cybernetics was developed is explored, together with the contributions of the main precursors and protagonists. This is developed from an examination of the nature of feedback and the Black Box both seen as circular systems, where the circularity is taken seriously. The necessary presence of the observer doing the observing is established. The primacy of, for example, conversation over coding as a means of communication is arguedone example of circularity and interactivity in second-order cybernetic systems. Thus second-order cybernetics, understood as proposing an epistemology and (through autopoietic systems) an ontogenesis, is seen as connected to the philosophical position of Constructivism. Examples are given of the application of second-order cybernetics concepts in practice in studies of, and applications in, communication, society, learning and cognition, math and computation, management, and design. It is asserted that the relationship between theory and practice is not essentially one of application: rather they strengthen each other by building on each other in a circularity of their own: the presentation of one before the other results from the process of explanation rather than a necessary, structural dependency. Finally, the future of second-order cybernetics (and of cybernetics in general) is considered. The possibility of escalation from second to third and further orders is considered, as is the notion that second-order cybernetics is, effectively, a conscience for cybernetics. And the popular use of “cyber-” as a prefix is discussed.

Key words: Autopoiesis, communication, control conversation, distinction, epistemology, goal, individual, knowing, memory, mutualism, purpose, reality, recursion, responsibility, time, variety, whole and part.

Second order Cybernetics (also known as the Cybernetics of Cybernetics, and the New Cybernetics) was developed between 1968 and 1975 in recognition of the power and consequences of cybernetic examinations of circularity. It is Cybernetics, when Cybernetics is subjected to the critique and the understandings of Cybernetics. It is the Cybernetics in which the role of the observer is appreciated and acknowledged rather than disguised, as had become traditional in western science: and is thus the Cybernetics that considers observing, rather than observed systems. In this article, the rationale from and through the application of which, second order Cybernetics was developed is explored, together with the contributions of the main precursors and protagonists. This is developed from an examination of the nature of feedback and the Black Box – both seen as circular systems, where the circularity is taken seriously. The necessary presence of the observer doing the observing is established. The primacy of, for example, conversation over coding as a means of communication is argued – one example of circularity and interactivity in second order cybernetic systems. Thus second order Cybernetics, understood as proposing an epistemology and (through autopoietic systems) an ontogenesis, is seen as connected to the philosophical position of Constructivism. Examples are given of the application of second order Cybernetics concepts in practice in studies of, and applications in, communication, society, learning and cognition, math and computation, management, and design. It is asserted that the relationship between theory and practice is not essentially one of application: rather they strengthen each other by building on each other in a circularity of their own: the presentation of one before the other results from the process of explanation rather than a necessary, structural dependency. Finally, the future of second order Cybernetics (and of Cybernetics in general) is considered. The possibility of escalation from second to third and further orders is considered, as is the notion that second order Cybernetics is, effectively, a conscience for Cybernetics. And the popular use of “cyber-” as a prefix is discussed.

Key words: autopoiesis, Black Box, circularity, control, conversation, cybernetics, distinction, epistemology, ethics, feedback, learning, Object, observer, organisational closure, purpose, recursion, responsibility, second order cybernetics, variety

Context: Distributed language and interactivity are central members of a set of concepts that are rapidly developing into rigorous, exciting additions to 4E cognitive science. Because they share certain assumptions and methodological commitments with enactivism, the two have sometimes been confused; additionally, while enactivism is a well-developed paradigm, interactivity has relied more on methodological development and on a set of focal examples. Problem: The goal of this article is to clarify the core conceptual commitments of both interactivity-based and enactive approaches to cognitive science by contrasting the two and highlighting their differences in assumptions, focus, and explanatory strategies. Method: We begin with the shared commitments of interactivity and enactivism - e.g., antirepresentationalism, naturalism, interdisciplinarity, the importance of biology, etc. We then give an overview of several important varieties of enactivism, including sensorimotor and anti-representationalist enactivism, and then walk through the history of the “core” varieties, taking care to contrast Maturana’s approach with that of Varela and the current researchers following in Varela’s footsteps. We then describe the differences between this latter group and interactivity-based approaches to cognitive science. Results: We argue that enactivism’s core concepts are explanatorily inadequate in two ways. First, they mis-portray the organization of many living systems, which are not operationally closed. Second, they fail to realize that most epistemic activity (i.e., “sense-making”) depends on engagement with non-local resources. Both problems can be dealt with by adopting an interactivity-based perspective, in which agency and cognition are fundamentally distributed and involve integration of non-local resources into the local coupling of organism and environment. Implications: The article’s primary goal is theoretical clarification and exposition; its primary implication is that enactive concepts need to be modified or extended in some way in order to explain fully many aspects of cognition and directed biological activity. Or, read another way, the article’s primary implication is that interactivity already provides a rich set of concepts for doing just that, which, while closely allied with enactivism in several ways, are not enactivist concepts. Constructivist content: The article consists entirely of a comparison between two constructivist fields of theory. Key Words: Interactivity, enactivism, distributed language, radical embodied cognitive science, ecological psychology, autonomy.

Circular Therapeutics offers a groundbreaking contribution to the application of second order cybernetics and radical constructivism to the performance of psychotherapy. Drawing the distinction between interactivity and narrativity, the Keeneys re-emphasize and expound upon the most important contribution of second order cybernetics to change-oriented interaction: inclusive circularity (bringing the therapist more inside circular interaction). When cybernetic epistemology is embodied in therapeutic performance, therapists act improvisationally, allowing circularly organized interaction rather than interpretive knowing to guide their participation in therapeutic change. This way of “acting in order to know how to act next” becomes the heart of change-oriented performance. The authors trace the history of cybernetic thinking in family therapy, including discussion of the field’s (mis)handling of Gregory Bateson’s ideas. The case is made for abandoning predetermined therapy models, including those that claim to be cybernetic or systemic, as they limit our capacity to interact without benefit of an imposed and presupposed interpretation. Relevance: Klaus Krippendorf writes that “Circular Therapeutics transcends that disconnect and offers compelling accounts of what cybernetics can do when actually embodied in the practices of living.”

Open peer commentary on the article “Interactivity and Enaction in Human Cognition” by Matthew Isaac Harvey, Rasmus Gahrn-Andersen & Sune Vork Steffensen. Upshot: In contrasting an interactivity account alternative to variants on the enactive approach, the authors discuss the role of sense-making. They claim that their interactivity perspective, unlike enactive approaches, accounts for a dependency on “non-local” resources characteristic of many organisms. I draw attention to the cybernetic-enactivist perspective on homeostatic sense-making, which may fundamentally fail to explain the operationally open nature of organismic regulatory processes better captured by Sterling’s notion of “allostasis.” This sense-making model appears to be more in line with Harvey et al.’s interactivity framework, focusing as it does on the regulatory effect of extrinsic “norms” rather than the cybernetic-enactivist focus on intrinsic “norms.”