Re: Operational Closure

[Tim Gwinn <***>]

Steve,

> 1. How are the words "trigger" and "cause" different
> in this context? Do Rosen and Maturano/Varela mean
> different things by the word "cause" or is there a
> deeper disagreement?

As I understand it, an environmental input (trigger) does not 'cause' the
resultant behavior of  an autopoietic system in the sense that the system
itself (by virtue of its internal organization) determines how (and if) it
will respond to that trigger, as opposed to the system's behavior being
merely reducible to a chain of causes beginning with the initial trigger. I
think it is just a different sense of the term 'cause' and not anything
contrary to Rosen. I do not think that M&V were denying causality as a
physical property or were proposing acausality. Instead, I think they were
denying a mechanistic determinism.


> 2. Is "Closure Under Efficient Cause" equivalent to
> "Operational Closure" and if not then what are the
> differences?

They are very similar. I defer to a very useful paper (see end of post) from
Letelier, Marin and Mpodozis entitled "Autopoietic and (M,R)-Systems", which
concludes that autopoietic systems constitute a subset of (M,R)-systems.
This is because in addition to the requriement of organizational closure -
which is satisfied by any (M,R)-system - the autopoietic systems definition
additionally has a topological requirement that the system possess a
physical boundary within which the organizational closure occurs. Since
(M,R)-systems have no such specific requirement, then autopoietic systems
are a further constrained subset of the set of (M,R)-systems.


> 3. Rosen never extended his concept of closure to
> societies or "third order structural couplings" as M/V
> refer to them. (first and second order couplings being
> unicellular and metacellular organism)

My thought is that because the (M,R)-system is intended to be a model
specifically of _individual_ living organisms, then it would seem to be
inappropriate to employ it as a model for a society (i.e., a population of
organisms).


Some of the papers I consider informative for comparing (M,R)-systems and
autopoietic systems:
============================================================================
==
Letelier, Marin, Mpodozis. "Autopoietic and (M,R)-systems". J. Theo. Bio.
222(2):261-272
Zaretzky, Letelier. "Metabolic Networks from (M,R)-systems and Autopoietic
Perspective". J. Bio. Sys. 10(3):265-280
Nomura, Shimohara."A Description of Quasi-Autopoietic Systems based on the
Framework of (M,R) Systems". AROB III 1998:658-661
Nomura. "Quasi-Autopoietic Systems Using Metabolism Repair Systems". ECAL
1997:48-56

You can find the links to these (and others) on my website at:
http://www.panmere.com/rosen/webresources.htm#mrsys

Regards,
Tim


> -----Original Message-----
> From: ROSEN Forum [mailto:*** Behalf Of Steve
> Johnson
> Sent: Saturday, November 27, 2004 6:16 PM
> To: ***
> Subject: Operational Closure
>
>
> I was reading Maturano and Varela's "Tree of
> Knowledge" as well as "Autopoesis and Cognition" and I
> want to hear your opinions on a point that I found
> confusing.
>
> One of the key concepts in the book is "Operational
> Closure". As far as I can tell this is defined as
> follows: "changes in the system are determined only by
> the internal structure and dynamics of the system not
> by external inputs".
>
> They labour the point that external stimuli only
> "trigger" the changes in an organism but they do not
> "determine" them. The changes are determined by the
> internal structure/dynamics of the system. The
> external stiumulus merely "selects" one of the
> possible paths for the ontogenetic drift from the
> space  defined by the internal structure/dynamics.
>
> A single cell, a multicellular organism, as well as a
> society are all said to have operational closure.
>
> At first I thought this was analogous to Rosen's
> definition that organisms are closed under efficient
> cause, that they are self-causing. But as I read
> Maturano/Varela further I was puzzled to come across
> repeated protestations that there is no causality,
> that external stimuli only "trigger" but do not
> "cause" behaviours (or rather internal changes whose
> motor expressions we perceive as behaviour).
>
> So my questions:
>
> 1. How are the words "trigger" and "cause" different
> in this context? Do Rosen and Maturano/Varela mean
> different things by the word "cause" or is there a
> deeper disagreement?
>
> 2. Is "Closure Under Efficient Cause" equivalent to
> "Operational Closure" and if not then what are the
> differences?
>
> 3. Rosen never extended his concept of closure to
> societies or "third order structural couplings" as M/V
> refer to them. (first and second order couplings being
> unicellular and metacellular organism)
>
>
> I know causality is a sore topic on this list so I'm
> sorry if I'm adding oil to the fire.
>
> Thanks,
>
> - Steve