Hi,
It’s very interesting
though extremely philosophical…
IDK
From: News and discussion about
computer simulation in the social sciences [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Loet
Leydesdorff
Sent: Sunday,
April 03, 2005 12:48 PM
To:
[log in to unmask]
Subject: Computing Anticipatory Systems
(CASYS05), Liege,
Belgium, August
2005
Hyper-incursion and the
Globalization of the
Knowledge-Based
Economy
In the case of biological
systems, the model which makes the system anticipatory, can be considered as
naturally given <social can be defined as natural regardless the
level> . Human languages enable
psychological systems to construct and exchange mental models of the system
and its environments reflexively <there is different opinions: languages “create”
thinking or thinking “create” language: both angles are valid cause there is a
close interaction between them…>, that is,
without the necessity of a materialization <for every “meaning” we transmit, one can find an
electro-chemical reaction in our mind? There are numerous adepts…>
. The social system of interhuman communication contains
the distribution of agents as an additional degree of freedom <agree… but why
“additional” degree of freedom?>. When this
communication system is functionally differentiated <alias has changed its
social geometry>, for example, in terms of
an economy and a subsystem of scientific communications, the subsystems can be
expected to entertain different models and to update with different
frequencies<updating is
communicating>. Using this additional degree of freedom the
social system can become strongly anticipatory<Why? Anticipation of what?
>.
Over time each subsystem can
provide the events with its respective meaning or value from the perspective
of hindsight <Yes, none can foresee, anyway>. For example, the market operates according to its own
rules. Because the economic relations are codified (e.g., using currency), the
network can retain value from the exchanges. By using prices the capitalist
system contains an economic model of itself (Marx, 1869). Analogously, the
science system has increasingly developed its own codifications since the
Scientific Revolution of the 17th century. The sciences develop and
differentiate rewriting their history along trajectories over time, while
market clearing occurs at each moment in time. These two
anticipatory mechanisms can be expected to develop along nearly orthogonal
axes
<Difficult conclusion: each try of explaining something is an attempt of
“rationalization” more or less succeded…>.
The interaction of two
anticipatory mechanisms <equilibrium oriented…> allows for coevolution and stabilization, but additionally for
meta-stabilization and globalization using a hyper-incursive routine. The
hyper-incursion can develop into a third axis of codification if
decision-rules coevolve among the subsystems which are organized by them at
the level of the social system<there are rules but rules do not necessarily lead to
equilibrium… I would say that they are meta-rules: rules for changing “rules”
aiming maintaining dynamics>. A triple helix
can thus endogenously be generated<Why “DNA”-like?>.
Historically, the interfacing of economic and scientific communications
since the late 19th century has first stabilized a techno-economic
coevolution during the 20th century. The interface had to be
supported by a ‘technostructure’ because economic expectations and research
perspectives tend to stand orthogonal. The organized interfacing of these two
types of expectations provides room for hyper-incursion and the consequent
development of decision rules at the systems level. However, decision rules
induce a local trajectory in a global space of other possibilities. Three
subdynamics thus interact: (1) economic wealth generation, (2) systematic
novelty production, and (3) structuration of the decision-making at the
interfaces. The knowledge-based subdyanamics which emerges, reconstructs
previous states and co-constructs future ones from a global perspective. The
knowledge-based options are traded-off against the historical retention of
wealth in the economy by making decisions in an increasingly anticipatory
mode.
________________________________
Loet
Leydesdorff
Université de Lausanne, School of Economics (HEC);
Amsterdam
School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
