Theory, Culture &

Society http://tcs.sagepub.com

Autopoiesis
Jakob Arnoldi
Theory Culture Society 2006; 23; 116
DOI: 10.1177/026327640602300220

The online version of this article can be found at:

http://tcs.sagepub.com

Published by:

http://www.sagepublications.com

On behalf of:
The TCS Centre, Nottingham Trent University

Additional services and information for Theory, Culture & Society can be found at:

Email Alerts: http://tcs.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts

Subscriptions: http://tcs.sagepub.com/subscriptions

Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav

Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav

Downloaded from http://tcs.sagepub.com at KoBSON on June 28, 2007

2006 Theory, Culture & Society Ltd.. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution.
07_complexity_062818 10/5/06 10:26 am
116 Theory, Culture & Society 23(23)
Autopoiesis
Jakob Arnoldi
Keywords autopoiesis, complexity theory,
cybernetics, Luhmann
A
utopoiesis means self-production or self-
creation and is a recent word created by
means of the two ancient Greek words
auto and poiesis (birth, creation or production).
The term was coined by Chilean biologists
Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela who
worked together in Santiago, Chile, in the 1970s.
The theory of autopoiesis is a theory of biological
life and cognition that has sparked debates in
research fields as diverse as artificial intelligence
and sociology.
Maturana, who was the older of the two, had
obtained his PhD from Harvard in 1958. Back in
Chile in 1970, collaborating with his former
student Varela who following the footsteps of his
mentor also had done his PhD at Harvard,
Maturana came to develop a theory that combines
two central aspects of early cybernetics, namely
cognition and biological life. Hence Maturana talks
of biological cognition.
The concept of autopoiesis was developed to
give an answer to the question what is life?
Maturana was dissatisfied with existing answers to
the question such as vitalist theories, systems
theory, or functionalist or teleological theories
that would define life through notions of a hidden
spark (vitalism), feedback loops and equilibrium
(systems theory), and core functions or features
(biological theories of reproduction and evolu-
tion). Instead, Maturana and Varela defined life as
networks of processes of production of
components that are continuously and recursively
generated and realized as a concrete entity (unity)
in the physical space, by the interactions of the
same components that are produced as such a
network (Maturana, 1975: 313). This is a descrip-
tion of a specific form of organization which
constitutes the system as a unity and Maturana
and Varela claimed it is this principle of organiz-
ation (and not genetic reproduction) which is the
key to the definition and understanding of life
(Varela et al., 1975: 187).
Maturana and Varela typically use a single cell
organism (e.g. an amoeba) as an example of an
autopoietic entity. A cell is a network of molecular
components in ongoing interaction normally
referred to as metabolism. But metabolism does
Downloaded from http://tcs.sagepub.com at KoBSON on June 28, 2007
2006 Theory, Culture & Society Ltd.. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution.
Page 116
not alone explain life. Metabolism is a dynamic
process that produces the components that consti-
tute a network which produces the very same
components. That process also produces a specific
type of network that constitutes the systems
spatial boundaries, for instance the membrane of a
cell. A cell and any other autopoietic system is
therefore a system that creates itself or pulls itself
up by its own bootstraps (Maturana and Varela,
1998: 467). This does not mean that a living
system first metabolizes and then forms bound-
aries. The two things happen simultaneously.
Metabolism and boundary formation are two sides
of the same coin; an organizational process that
constitutes a living system as a unity (see Figure 1).
Maturana and Varela make a (rather unusual)
distinction between organization and structure.
Autopoiesis is as written many times already a
certain form of (self-)organization, that is, a recur-
sive process where the system produces its own
elements and integrates them in its own network.
Structure, on the other hand, denotes the specific
network at a specific time. Therefore a system
may have a general form of organization but the
structure will change when specific elements are
replaced. To use Maturana and Varelass own
example, a toilet is organized in a specific way but
single elements can be replaced by similar
elements (e.g. a plastic seat can be replaced by a
wooden one) which changes the structure but not
the organization.
For Maturana and Varela, autopoietic systems
are structure-determined systems: anything that
happens in or to a system is determined by the
systems structure at that specific point in time.
This has far-reaching implications for questions of
cognition and knowledge. If a living system is
autopoietic all its operations including any
form of interaction with or response to its environ-
ment, i.e. cognition in a broad sense take place
according to the structures it itself has built
Dynamics Boundary
(Metabolism) (Membrane)
Figure 1. The combination of metabolism and
boundary formation (reproduced from Maturana
and Varela, 1998: 46).
07_complexity_062818 10/5/06 10:26 am
autopietically. Things that happen in the environ-
ment can trigger structural changes in the system,
but such structural changes, and any other
response to outside information, are determined
by the systems own structure. Maturana had
already formulated these ideas in the 1960s when
working with members of the Macy group. In a
now famous experiment they measured the
responses in a frogs visual cortex to various
(visual) stimuli. They found that frogs, so to speak,
are pre-programmed to react to fast moving small
objects while big, still or slow moving objects are
almost ignored. Frogs are thus equipped to see
flies, but much less well equipped to see trees. This
leads to questions of constructivism and Maturana
and Varelas claim that everything that is said (or
known) is said (or known) by an observer. Any
system humans beings included can only see or
know according to its own structure. For Maturana
and Varela, this discovery has become a basis for a
sort of radical constructivism which poses serious
questions to notions of objectivity and positivism
(see also Foerster, 1984; Hayles, 1999: 13154).
It should also be mentioned that they hold all
living systems to be responsive to external stimuli
through structure-dependent processes, which
means that all living systems, even those without
a nervous system, are cognitive systems (Maturana
and Varela, 1980: 13).
Maturana and Varelas work has not attained a
paradigmatic status in biology, which has main-
tained its focus on reproduction (DNA), but it has
inspired and influenced cybernetics and related
fields of study (e.g. informatics, artificial intelli-
gence) just as it has sparked debates about
constructivism and objectivism. Maturana and
Varelas theory has also been scrutinized by
scholars who seek to establish philosophical and
theoretical affinities to other thinkers and theories
from other disciplines. They often point out that
Maturana and Varelas theory has many similarities
with Heideggerian phenomenology (e.g. Mingers,
1995) and compare autopoiesis to Heideggers
Dasein. This influence, however, remains implicit
in Maturana and Varelas early thinking. That said,
particularly Varelas later thinking was influenced
by Heidegger, albeit mainly indirectly through
Merleau-Ponty.
In the social sciences, the notion of autopoiesis
and several of Maturana and Varelas other
concepts such as structural coupling have been
adopted by Niklas Luhmann and used for an
Downloaded from http://tcs.sagepub.com at KoBSON on June 28, 2007
2006 Theory, Culture & Society Ltd.. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution.
Page 117
Problematizing Global Knowledge Complexity 117
elaborate theory of social and cognitive systems
which combines Maturana and Varelas notion of
cognition with Husserlian phenomenology.
Luhmann defines social systems as communicative
systems. Based on a notion of double contingency,
he develops a theory of communication that
understands communication not as a transmission
of meaning or information from one subject to
another but as an autopoietic system that emerges
out of the double contingent encounter of
subjects. Because of the intrinsic impossibility of
knowing if ones interpretation of the others
impartation matches the others intentions (who
has similar difficulties interpreting ones own
impartations) communication tends to evolve on
its own as an autopoietic system removed from
the conscious processes of the subjects communi-
cating. Based on this premise, Luhmann analyses
historically different ways in which and the
means by which social systems evolve, stabilize
and reproduce themselves.
References
Foerster, Heinz von (1984) Observing Systems,
2nd edn. Seaside, CA: Intersystems
Publications.
Hayles, N. Katherine (1999) How We Became
Post Human. Chicago, IL: The University of
Chicago Press.
Maturana, Humberto R. (1975) The
Organizations of the Living: A Theory of the
Living Organization, International Journal
Man-Machine Studies 7: 31332.
Maturana, Humberto R. and Francisco J. Varela
(1980) Autopoiesis and Cognition. Dordrecht:
D. Reidel.
Maturana, Humberto R. and Francisco J. Varela
(1998) The Tree of Knowledge. Boston, IL:
Shambhala.
Mingers, John (1995) Self-producing Systems.
New York: Plenum Press.
Varela, F., H.R. Maturana and R. Uribe (1975)
Autopoiesis: The Organization of Living
Systems, Its Characterization and a Model,
BioSystems 5: 18796.
Jakob Arnoldi is an Assistant Professor at the
University of Munich, Germany. His research
fields are sociology of finance, sociology of intel-
lectuals and experts, and social theory.