Open peer commentary on the article “In Maturana’s Wake: The Biology of Cognition’s Legacy and its Prospects” by Randall Whitaker. Abstract: Maturana’s body of understanding is an epistemological shift that can only be experienced as a profound transformation as a result of letting go of the assumption of an observer-independent reality. This imposes some restrictions to the formalization of it. I share reflections and questions to set the distinctions of certain critical elements that could compromise Maturana’s proposal.

Abstract: The commentators pose questions and note issues arising within multiple contexts invoked in the target article. In this response, I endeavor to address as many of the points and queries as I can within the prescribed space afforded me. The responses are organized with regard to the three main topical areas within the target article: engaging with and learning Maturana’s BoC; employing BoC orientations and tenets to practical effect; and the prospects for continuing to refine and extend Maturana’s work.

The paper discusses aspects of a project that strives to base an understanding of what economics call “productivity” on a complexity theoretic foundation. The core thesis of this project is that productivity can best be grasped by referring to two features commonly associated with knowledge – “nonreducibility in consumption” and “time preference”. The paper in hand focuses on theoretical aspects concerning the ontological status of the observer in defining productivity alongside these features. Oriented on the Theory of Social Systems by Niklas Luhmann and methodologically drawing on Multi-Agent-Simulation, it investigates the thesis that the observer itself – circularly – can be conceptualized as a consequence of these two features.

The author provides a comparative analysis of the approach to cognition in the theory of self-organization and radical constructivism from the position of synergy between man and nature. It is advanced the idea on the basis of radical constructivism representatives’ concepts by such authors as H. von Foerster, H. Maturana, F. Varela, N. Luhmann, F. Wallner that epistemological subject should be considered as a complex self-organizing object. Its cognitive activity takes place according to the logics of synergetic models. The author proves that cognition based on the constructive realism is the most appropriate to the modern stage of epistemology development as it cancels the opposition of constructivism and realism to some extent as the cognition process from synergetic point of view is an act of projective and constructive thinking which is open for further criticism.

Key words: epistemological subject, epistemological object, radical constructivism, constructive realism, self organization, synergy, anthropic principle.

The article provides an analysis of the approach to cognition in the theory of constructivism according to different constructivism concepts such as: methodical constructivism, scientific-theoretical constructivism, natural epistemology, personal construct theory, social constructivism, concepts of some radical constructivism representatives, constructive realism. The analysis demonstrates that constructivism helps to establish subject’s control over the reality perceived by him when eliminating any deviations or resentments from his preferable target condition. In this case, the model of the world cognized contains only the aspects which are relevant to subject’s purposes and actions. It is advanced the idea the current stage of science development is connected with the change of its fundamental bases. As a result, the model of the reality becomes a result of interaction between subject of scientific and cognitive activity with the reality, but the ideas of constructivism in its classical meaning don’t correspond to this conclusion. The author proves that cognition based on the constructive realism is the most appropriate to the modern stage of epistemology development as it cancels the opposition of constructivism and realism in some extent and promotes getting a rational knowledge about the reality by subject.

Key words: constructivism, epistemology, cognition, rational knowledge, interpretation, perception

Constructivism has recently aroused more and more interest in the scholarly debate with two opposing stances: advocates of constructivism and those who remain skeptical. Despite its faults, constructivism exerts significant impact on foreign language pedagogy and offers promising teaching prospects due to the paradigm shift (construction instead of instruction). The paper asks the question whether this revolutionary change is a real breakthrough or rather yet another buzzword and next attempts to answer it.

Key words: constructivism, construction, instruction.

Even though both Ernst von Glasersfeld, the founding father of radical constructivism, and his epistemological alter ego, Heinz von Foerster, one of the principal architects of second-order cybernetics, would both repeatedly stress the formative importance of communication, neither would ever model communication as a phenomenon per se. I will propose a first modelling of communication as seen through the stereoscopic lens of these two schools of thought. I will first present, discuss and evaluate how communication is traditionally modelled. This will serve as an informed backdrop when I proceed to integrate the common denominators pertaining to communication from relevant works of both scholars. In addition to the fact that both would willingly profess to the ‘Linguolaxis’ of Maturana and Varela, i.e., that humans exist suspended in communication, two basic assumptions have proven formative. Firstly, that communication is perceived as a flux, as an almost William-James-like ‘stream of communication’. Secondly, and this is more in the vein of Heraclitus, that both communicators and communication alike undergo transformations in the process of immersion. This implies favouring a view of communication in which communication is a perpetual oscillation between ongoing reciprocal perturbations (Glasersfeld), that occur over time, and the endeavours to re-establish (cognitive) homeostasis (Foerster). The latter must not be reduced to either mere compliance, as it were, i.e., that the ‘other’ does as s/he is told, or to the mutual understanding of a dominance-free communication of a Habermasian persuasion, but rather in the pragmatic notion of ‘compatibility’ (Glasersfeld). For illustrative purposes I will end this paper by translating these notions into a model depicting what I have labelled co-actional communication, in effect forging an exemplar.

This study investigated the relationship between a constructivist learning environment and students’ attitudes toward statistics. The Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES) and the Attitude Toward Statistics scale (ATS) were used to measure the environment and attitudes respectively. Participants were undergraduate students of an introductory college statistics course. They were drawn from Seattle Pacific University in the US and the University of Zimbabwe. The study had two components. One component addressed hypotheses examining potential differences between groups and the other explored relationships between variables. The environment was not manipulated and the data was collected from courses that already existed in the form studied. For this reason, the overall design of the study had causal comparative and correlational elements. A constructivist learning environment was found to be significantly related to students’ attitude toward statistics. Furthermore, there were significant differences between the groups based on location. The study examined the similarities and differences in perceptions and attitudes of students from two very different learning milieus. Cross-cultural comparisons have the potential to generate new insights into statistical pedagogy and the role noncognitive socio cultural variables play in teaching statistics to college-age students.