Context: Both Luhmann and Pask have developed detailed theories of social systems that include accounts of the role of learning. Problem: Rather than see the theories as competing, we believe it is worthwhile to seek ways in which a useful synthesis of the two approaches may be developed. Method: We compare the two approaches by identifying key similarities and differences. Results: We show it is possible to make useful mappings between key concepts in the two theories. Implications: We believe it is worthwhile for social scientists to be familiar with the two theories and that it is not a case of “either/or,” rather, it is a case of “both/and.”

Key words: learning, conversation, interaction, expectation, Niklas Luhmann, Gordon Pask

The view that knowledge cannot be transmitted but must be constructed by the mental activity of learners underpins contemporary perspectives on science education. This article, which presents a theoretical perspective on teaching and learning science in the social setting of classrooms, is informed by a view of scientific knowledge as socially constructed and by a perspective on the learning of science as knowledge construction involving both individual and social processes. First, we present an overview of the nature of scientific knowledge. We then describe two major traditions in explaining the process of learning science: personal and social constructivism. Finally, we illustrate how both personal and social perspectives on learning, as well as perspectives on the nature of the scientific knowledge to be learned, are necessary in interpreting science learning in formal settings.

When subjects learn a transformation skill in conditions that allow them to direct their attention freely to different subgoals, they adopt definite learning strategies which can be externalized by special techniques. Two of these techniques are described (expts. 1 and 2) and the free-learning strategies revealed with their assistance are discussed. Such strategies may also be used in ‘controlled learning’ conditions, i.e. when a subject is taught the skill. In this case, the (computerized) teaching system acts as a surrogate for, and may be viewed as a model of, the subject’s attention-directing mechanism. Experiment 3 is concerned with learning controlled by a conversational system which entails a model based on a class of learning strategies; expt. 4 with a simple adaptive system, based on a single learning strategy. There are marked differences between the form and efficiency of learning in the free conditions and each of the two controlled conditions. These differences are described and a theoretical interpretation is proposed.

The concepts of systems theory and cybernetics have played a fascinating role in the development of contemporary biology and social science. In the decades of the 40s, 50s and 60s, there was much resistance to some of the more grandiose claims concerning the aims and aspirations of the emerging disciplines: that here, indeed, were new paradigms that brought order and unity to inter and intra-disciplinary conceptual confusion. What tended to happen was that useful concepts were borrowed by specialists working within particular disciplines and their origins obscured or forgotten. In recent years, concepts from systems theory have been introduced into the practice of educational psychology. In this essay, I attempt to give some proper grounding for these concepts.

For some of us, the attraction of cybernetics is the very idea of it, the idea that the search for transdisciplinary truths is both possible and valuable. Many would accept that cybernetics has helped unify the first-order study of observed systems. In this paper, I explore ways in which second-order cybernetics may unify debates and discussions in the vast range of disciplines concerned with the observer, his experiences and his accounts of those experiences. The first part of the paper is deliberately first person and anecdotal, in the spirit of von Foerster’s dictum, life is studied in vivo not in vitro. The second part re-examines the classic cybernetic concepts of self-organisation and circular causality from the perspective of the constructivist epistemology of second order cybernetics and, by making the metaphorical status of the concepts explicit, shows how second order cybernetics may serve as a methodology for exploring modes of being. A major aim of the paper is to seek ways of navigating or building bridges between the praxes of rational science and the discourses of phenomenology and poetics.

In a complex sociotechnical organization, which is what many of us are part of much of the time, the human operator receives informative signals of many different types from many different parts of the organization. Typically many of the procedures for effective control and communication are proceduralized as tasks that may be carried out by automata, by machines or by humans acting as machines. Indeed, it is increasingly the case these days that operations that have been proceduralized are carried out by machines. The human operator may play only a small part in such systems. However, there are many cases where, even if operations have been proceduralized, human operators do play a key part in the system of control and communication. In other cases, where there is an element of discretion in deciding on what operations should be carried out, the role of the human operator is critically important. Indeed, the set of permissible operations may be open ended in some way and not fullydefined beforehand. This paper discusses the inadvertent pathologies of communication that may arise when both sender and receiver are human operators.