Organizational Closure and Conceptual Coherence

301

Organizational Closure and Conceptual Coherence

BERNARD SCOTT

a

Centre for Educational Technology and Development, Portland Building, De Montfort University, The Gateway, Leicester LE1 9BH, United Kingdom

A

BSTRACT

: This paper reviews ideas developed by the late Gordon Pask aspart of his conversation theory (CT).

1,2

CT uses theories of the dynamics ofcomplex, self-organizing systems, in conjunction with models of conceptualstructures, in order to give an account of conceptual coherence (for example,of a theory or a belief system) as a form of organizational closure. In Pask’sown terms, CT is concerned both with the

kinematics

of knowledge structuresand the

kinetics

of knowing and coming to know. The main features of model-ling conceptual structures and processes used by Pask are presented. We con-tinue by presenting a summary

two-cycle

model of learning, aimed to capturesome of Pask’s key insights with respect to conceptual coherence and the orga-nizational closure of conceptual systems. Parallels are drawn with other workin epistemology,

3–5

classic cybernetic studies of self-organization,

6–8

and theconcept of autopoiesis.

9

The

two-cycle

model is then applied recursively togenerate learning cycles and conceptual structures at different levels of ab-straction, as a contribution to the work of Pask on the topology of thought.Finally, the model is applied reflexively. That is, its own form is considered asa topic for conversation and conceptualization. Carrying out such a reflectionprovides a coherent way of characterizing epistemological limits, while retain-ing a clear sense of there being an (in principle) unlimited praxeology ofawareness.

INTRODUCTION

Many of the ideas expressed in this paper are inspired by and derived from con-versation theory (CT) as developed in a number of publications by the late GordonPask.

1,2,10–12

In an early outline of the scope of CT, Pask demarcated a subtheory ofconversational domains.

13

This subtheory is predicated on the assumption that con-versations are about something, the conversation has a subject matter, a topic to beaddressed. The subtheory of conversational domains has itself many ramificationsand research goals, including:

• How do conversational domains come into being and evolve?

• What constitutes a conversational domain as a coherent knowable, whole?

• How may the structure of a conversational domain be analyzed and described?

a

Telecommunication: Voice: 0116 257 7662; fax: 0116 250 [email protected]

302 ANNALS NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

Narrative forms, dramatic stories, and expositions can be described in a variety ofways using scripts, frames, and general schemas, and by carrying out after the eventanalyses of discourse and written text. These structures represent only a limited viewof the knowledge content of a conversational domain.

14,15

Pask’s subtheory of con-versational domains provides a canonical way of modelling the structure of knowl-edge content such that all possible narrative forms may be revealed and articulatedas particular forms.

The first part of the paper provides a brief introduction to the main concepts ofCT. This is followed by the construction of a generic model for the knowledge con-tent of conversational domains. Novel aspects of the model are that, in a unifiedframework, it distinguishes conceptual and procedural knowledge, relations ofentailment and analogy, and hierarchical and heterarchical conceptual structures. Byadopting a particular perspective on a body of knowledge, a class of expository nar-ratives may be distinguished that are semantically equivalent but structurally variedin well defined ways.

In the later part of the paper, the model is interpreted dynamically, as a model ofconceptualization and directed thought. These ideas are summarized in the form ofa

two-cycle

model of learning. The model affords discussion of the relation betweenthe conceptual coherence of belief systems and the dynamics of organizationallyclosed systems.

Pask distinguished two complementary aspects to the dynamics of directedthought: generalization (voiding distinctions) and bifurcation (making distinctions).The two-cycle model is applied recursively to generate learning cycles and concep-tual structures at different levels of abstraction, as a contribution to Pask’s work onthe topology of thought.

Finally, the model is applied reflexively in order to a provide a coherent way ofcharacterizing epistemological limits (referred to by Pask as the “ineffable” and the“ineluctable” aspects of knowing). There is a discussion of the sense in which,despite such limits, the praxeology of awareness (what may be experienced) isunlimited.

CONVERSATION THEORY

Although CT may be elaborated as a general theory of human communication andsocial interaction, here, for the sake of brevity, it is interpreted as a theory of learningand teaching, in which one participant (the teacher) wishes to expound a body ofknowledge to a second participant (the learner). Parts of the body of knowledge arereferred to as

topics

; the term

concept

is reserved for the mental procedures that in-dicate understanding of a topic. Particular instantiations or models of topics are re-ferred to as

relations

, which may be defined canonically with respect to a particularuniverse of discourse and associated modelling facility (see F

IGURE

1).Pask’s formal definition of a concept is that it “is a procedure for recognizing,

reproducing or maintaining a relation”. As discussed later in the paper, correspond-ing to the idea of a body of subject matter being a knowable, coherent whole, Pask

303SCOTT: ORGANIZATIONAL CLOSURE AND COHERENCE

distinguishes cognitive organizations that are self-reproducing

qua

organizationallyclosed systems of concepts. Pask refers to such systems as

psychological

(

p

-)

individuals

.A major innovation of CT is that psychological unities (p-individuals) are not

necessarily in one-to-one correspondence with biological unities (Pask refers to thelatter as

mechanical

(

m

-)

individuals

). Thus, one brain may house several conceptualsystems as p-individuals and several brains and bodies (m-individuals) may houseone conceptual system as a single p-individual (as in the

distributed cognition

of ateam at work).

For any particular topic within a conversational domain, it is possible to distin-guish between

why

and

how

levels of explanation and understanding. The

why

levelis concerned with explaining or justifying what a topic is in terms of other topics.The

how

level is concerned with describing how to

do

a topic, how to recognize it,construct it, maintain it as a relation (see F

IG

. 1; the horizontal arrows represent sym-bolic exchanges about the

why

and

how

of topics). Pask refers to learning about

why

as

comprehension learning

and learning about

how

as

operation learning

.

FIGURE 1. The “skeleton” of a conversation (after Pask).


A MODEL FOR THE STRUCTURE OF KNOWLEDGE

Pask’s starting point for constructing a model of knowledge is the basic idea thata body of knowledge or subject matter consists of a set of topics related one toanother. Two basic forms of relations between topics are distinguished: entailmentrelations (hierarchical) and relations of analogy (heterarchical). A static representa-tion of such relations is called an

entailment structure.

Entailment structures reveal the

why

of knowledge, the conceptual structures thatrelate topics one to another. For a full semantics, the content of topics, their

how

,needs to be specified. This can be done operationally in the form of

task structures

,defined with respect to a canonical modelling facility. In Pask’s phrase, task struc-tures show “what may be done”. They show the “procedural knowledge” or “perfor-mance competencies” that someone who understands a particular topic is deemed tohave. Task structures may be represented in a variety of ways, for example, as a pre-cedence chart showing order relations between the goals and subgoals of a task or asa flow chart showing a sequence of operations, tests, branches, and iterations.

In order to encompass the idea of the coherence of a conversational domain, theidea of a body of knowledge being a learnable, memorable whole, it is necessary toextend and elaborate the entailment structure model as follows.1. Any topic at the lowest level of an hierarchical entailment structure may be ana-lyzed further in order to reveal subtopics. Pask’s term for such an analysis of a topicis

unzipping.

For example, the topic “table” may be unzipped to reveal subtopicsconcerned with “having legs” or “having a flat surface”.2. An entailment structure may be embedded within a larger hierarchical form. Forexample, topics to do with “furniture” may be embedded within a larger structure oftopics concerned with “human dwellings”.3. Topics may be explained in terms of each other in different ways. If an entail-ment structure shows that topic

A

can be explained in terms of entailed topics

B

and

C

, then, in principle, topic

B

can be explained in terms of topics

A

and

C

, and topic

C

can be explained in terms of topics

A

and

B

. If these

local cycles

are added to anentailment structure, the resulting form is what Pask refers to as an

entailmentmesh.

As modelled so far, the conversational domain, qua entailment mesh, is but a lab-

yrinth of topics, albeit with extensible

edges

. It does not represent the intuitive ideathat a body of knowledge is coherent globally, as a totality.

Strawson expresses the general idea thus: “Let us imagine…the model of an elab-orate network, a system, of connected items, concepts, such that the functionof…each concept, could…be properly understood only by grasping its connectionswith the others, its place in the system…there will be no reason to worry if, in theprocess of tracing connections from one point to another of the network, we find our-selves returning to our starting point…the general charge of circularity would loseits sting for we might have moved in a wide, revealing, and illuminating circle.”

5

As an example, within the domain “biology”, in explaining the topic “evolution”

one may refer to the topic “cell”; conversely, in explaining the topic “cell”, one mayrefer to the topic “evolution”. It perhaps should be pointed out that it is only in recentyears that mainstream philosophers, like Strawson, have accepted the legitimacy ofvirtuous (i.e., not vicious) circularities in conceptual systems.


Pask models the global aspect of coherence as follows. Imagine that the edges ofan entailment mesh extend until they meet. The meeting of opposing edges, top andbottom, left and right results in a closed form, a torus. Pask refers to the resultingclosed systems of concepts as a

globally cyclic

entailment mesh. A conversational domain can also be extended by analogy. However, for analogy

relations to be coherent, the bodies of knowledge they are relating together mustthemselves be coherent.

Having modelled the coherence of a conversational domain as a globally cyclicentailment mesh, we can now retrace our steps in order to articulate the concept of a

narrative form

and to reveal the set of possible narrative forms that a particular con-versational domain may engender.

CONSTRUCTING AN EXPOSITORY NARRATIVE

For present purposes, a composer of an expository narrative is taken to be some-one whose conceptual repertoire includes a coherent, stable conceptual system forthe subject matter in question. We thus avoid considering the case where, in the actof composition, new understandings evolve. This simplifies the task of modellingnarrative forms but, of course does not do full justice to the reality of composition.In Pask’s writings, it is axiomatic that conceptual systems evolve, that “man is a sys-tem that needs to learn”.

16

As above, we may model a body of subject matter as an entailment mesh. The first

step of composition then becomes that of

adopting a perspective

, assuming a pointof view about that which is to be explained. Adopting a perspective on an entailmentmesh has two complementary aspects, corresponding to the complementary process-es of comprehension learning and operation learning referred to earlier. 1. A head topic is distinguished with a supporting set of subordinate, entailed top-ics that are its conceptual support and justification from that perspective. In essencethis corresponds to the act of isolating an hierarchical entailment structure from theentailment mesh in which it is embedded. Pask refers to this operation as

pruning.

The only cyclic connections permitted in a pruned structure are those that relate twoor more simple structures analogically.

2. In principle and, at least, potentially, the adoption of a perspective calls forth oneor more particular universes of discourse that can be conceived of as a multidimen-sional

spaces

in which possible relations may be recognized, constructed, andmaintained. As earlier, Pask’s generic term for a canonical version of such a uni-verse is “modelling facility”.

Where the topic hierarchy is a simple entailment structure with one head topic andwhere the context does indeed serve as a universe of discourse that supports the per-mitted operations on relations, then the topic hierarchy may, by a suitable semantic,be placed in one-to-one correspondence with the task structures that operationallyspecify the content of those topics. That is, in general, where concepts are executableas a set of operations, there is an isomorphism between the declarative, coherenceaspects of conceptualization concerned with saying

why

something is what it is, andthe procedural aspects of conceptualization concerned with saying

how

operations


are carried out, how the concepts may be modelled or instantiated as relations in aparticular context (modelling facility or universe).

The combination of conceptual coherence with executability of operations as thebasis for an epistemology or model of knowledge is not peculiar to Pask, althoughhe perhaps has developed the most detailed models. Rescher

3,4

refers to “conceptualidealism” combined with a “methodological pragmatism”. George

17

succinctlystates that “a theory is a model together with its interpretation”. Miller and Johnson-Laird

18

propose “a conceptual theory of meaning…tied to procedural interpretationof sentences.”

Particular narratives composed may have different emphases, depending on thenarrators’ aims. Where there is an emphasis on teaching the

how

of operational con-tent, for example, mastery of a set of skills, a clear mapping between topic descrip-tions (minimally, topic names) and particular operations is of signal importance. Inmilitary operations, such as dismantling an automatic weapon, there is a requirementto be able to “name parts” but the emphasis is on being able to carry out operations.

Where the emphasis is on conceptual descriptions and

why

type explanations,task structures may be less well defined. They may even be tacit assumption that thestudent is already familiar with the basic operational topology of the universe that isbeing talked about, that he or she has the required set of operators to model and in-stantiate topics if so required. In this latter case it is not usual to insist on makingexplicit the isomorphism between entailment structure explanations and task struc-ture operations. An example of this would be a lesson about the social consequencesof genetic engineering, where a basic understanding of genetics is assumed.

Analogies may be thought of as topics that say how one set of topics maybe trans-formed into another set of topics or, equivalently, as metanarratives that say how onenarrative may be transformed into or derived from another.

When expounding analogies, different narrative sequences may be adopteddepending on the students’ needs and the demands of the subject matter beingexpounded. For example, one may set up a framework of description correspondenc-es, saying that topics in one universe are indeed similar to another and, at a laterstage, demonstrate this by matching operations and clarifying and highlighting bydemonstration just what are the similarities and the differences between the topics inthe two universes of discourse. Alternatively, one may provide operational experi-ence and conceptual description in the two distinct contexts and establish the analo-gy relations at a later date. Indeed, part of a teaching strategy might be that one givesthe learner the opportunity to recognize and establish those relations himself, by aprocess of what Spearman

19

refers to as

education

(see Mason

20

for recent studiesof the role of analogies in conceptual change).

THE

TWO-CYCLE

MODEL OF LEARNING

Introduction

Pask was fascinated by the dynamics of mental life and conceptualization. Theaccount given above of narrative composition and entailment meshes may be inter-preted as a series of static snapshots of activities within a dynamic, organizationallyclosed, self-reproducing system of concepts. Such a system learns by evolving,


becoming more informed, but it is also constrained to maintain a focus of attention,to survive as a centre of awareness. In doing so, it may become informed about itself.

Rescher, in his writings on epistemology

1,2

develops ideas about

truth

and con-ceptualization that are remarkably close to those of Pask. F

IGURE

2 summarizesthese ideas. The important thing to note is that the conceptual system depicted is, asin Pask’s models of conceptualization, dynamic.

What we see here is an evolutionary epistemology, one in which

rationality

is anemergent concept. The logics of coherence and correspondence/executability thatare used to justify the

truth

of belief systems, have themselves emerged precisely be-cause they do serve to maintain the organizational closure

9

of the self-organizing,

7,8

“information-tight”

6

m-individuals that embody them. Some have argued that suchan emergence (consciousness, as “knowing with oneself”) occurred as a singularityin human evolution, and which is recapitulated in child development.

21–23

What the concept of the organizational closure of an observing system providesis a coherence in our theorizing. In the terms used earlier, organizational closure im-plies the existence of a set of executable operations but with the dynamic imperativethat, whatever other relations they may serve to produce, they must reproduce them-

FIGURE 2. The two-cycle model of learning (after Rescher).


selves. This is the essence of biological autopoiesis.

9

The relation of reproducibilityis the “essential variable”

6

that must be maintained.Whatever else it may achieve as a mutually supportive set of declarations about

why

and

how

, the “bottom-line” for the coherence of a conversational domain andthe systems of concepts (p-individuals) that inhabit it is whether or not it is also sup-portive of the reproduction of the m-individuals that embody those p-individuals.

Recursive Application of the

Two-Cycle

Model

The

two-cycle

model may be applied recursively to generate learning cycles andconceptual structures at different levels of abstraction. Generalization of forms ofknowledge leads to generalizations about forms of knowing and, ipso facto, logicand logics of logics, cybernetics and cybernetics of cybernetics. It is clearly these op-erations that Rescher has in mind. Beliefs are not only coherent because they are mu-tually supportive (as in one of Strawson’s cycles), they are also coherent becausethey conform to canons of justification.

Reason

assesses the logical hygiene of beliefsystems.

Pask, as well as noting the dynamics of generalization (abstracting the form or

genus

of an analogy), also notes there is a dynamics of “bifurcation” or “speciation”of ideas. We do, in our “need to learn”, generate novelty. We make distinctions aswell as void them.

24

Reflexive Application of the

Two-Cycle

Model

The model may be applied reflexively. That is, its own form may be consideredas a topic for conversation and conceptualization. Carrying out such a reflection pro-vides a coherent way of characterizing epistemological limits (referred to by Pask asthe “ineffable” and the “ineluctable” aspects of knowing), but retaining a clear senseof there being an (in principle) unlimited praxeology of awareness. The observermay “enter himself into the domain of descriptions”

23

and know himself as someonewho is telling/being told a story but for whom the whole story can never be finallytold (ineffability). He may also recognize that as someone living a story, his partici-pation cannot be withdrawn. Life, as experience, is un-unlockable (ineluctable) (cf.,Wittgenstein’s aphorism, “Death is not an event in life”

25

).As an observer he or she may make and void distinctions. One may journey in the

hope that the ineluctable may yet yield a key; the ineffable may be experienced.However, then we would have found the singularity that allows us to “transcend intoanother domain” (to use another of von Foerster’s phrases

23

), one in which theknower/known distinction has been voided.

CONCLUDING COMMENTS

A more detailed account of the relationship between knowledge structures andnarrative forms is provided elsewhere.

26 For more on the concept of the organiza-tional closure of conceptual systems see Pask’s own accounts.27,28

This paper has outlined an evolutionary “bottom-up” epistemology, where we seeourselves as constructors and inventors and where reasoner and reason have


co-evolved. It would be remiss, particularly in view of the clear limits such an epis-temology demarcates, not to indicate that other epistemologies, predicated on othermetaphysical assumptions, are not ruled out. As von Foerster23 elegantly notes,“there are undecideables”. If we so choose, we may also countenance a “top-down”,idealist epistemology, where we see ourselves as approaching and discovering “thegood, the true, the beautiful”.

REFERENCES

1. PASK, G. 1975. Conversation Cognition and Learning. Elsevier. Amsterdam.2. PASK, G. 1976. Conversation Theory: Applications in Education and Epistemology.

Elsevier. Amsterdam.3. RESCHER, N. 1973. Conceptual Idealism. Basil Blackwell. Oxford.4. RESCHER, N. 1977. Methodological Pragmatism. Basil Blackwell. Oxford.5. STRAWSON, P.F. 1922. Analysis and Metaphysics. Oxford University Press. London.6. ASHBY, W.R. 1956. Introduction to Cybernetics. Wiley. New York.7. VON FOERSTER, H. 1960. On self-organizing systems and their environments. In

Self-Organising Systems. M.C. Yovits & S. Cameron, Eds. :30–50. Pergamon Press.London.

8. BEER, S. 1965. Decision and Control. Wiley. New York.9. MATURANA, H. & VARELA, F.J. 1980. Autopoiesis and Cognition. Reidel. Dordrecht,

Holland.10. PASK, G., B. SCOTT & D. KALLIKOURDIS. 1973. A theory of conversations and individ-

uals exemplified by the learning process on CASTE. Int. J. Man-Machine Stud. 5:443–566.

11. PASK, G., D. KALLIKOURDIS & B. SCOTT. 1975. The representation of knowables. Int.J. Man-Machine Stud. 7: 15–134.

12. SCOTT, B. 1993. Working with Gordon: developing and applying conversation theory1968–1978. Syst. Res. 10: 167–182.

13. PASK, G. 1972. A fresh look at cognition and the individual. Int. J. Man-Machine Stud.4: 211–216.

14. FLOOD, J., Ed. 1984. Understanding Reading Comprehension: Cognition, Languageand the Structure of Prose. International Reading Association, Newark, DE.

15. BRITTON, K. & A.C. GRAESSER, Eds. 1996. Models of Understanding Text. LawrenceErlbaum Associates. Mahwah, NJ.

16. PASK, G. 1968. Man as a system that needs to learn. In Automaton Theory and Learn-ing Systems. D. Stewart, Ed. :137–208. Academic Press. London.

17. GEORGE, F.H. 1973. The Brain as a Computer, 2nd edit. Pergamon. Oxford.18. MILLER, G.A. & P.N. JOHNSON-LAIRD. 1976. Language and Perception. Cambridge

University Press. Cambridge.19. SPEARMAN, C. 1923. The Nature of “Intelligence” and the Principles of Cognition.

Macmillan. London.20. MASON, L. 1994. Cognitive and metacognitive aspects in conceptual change by anal-

ogy. Instruct. Sci. 22: 157–187.21. MEAD, G.H. 1934. Mind, Self and Society. C.W. Morris, Ed. Spartan Books. New

York.22. MATURANA, H. 1995. Biology of self-consciousness. In Consciousness: Distinction

and Reflection. G. Tratteur, Ed. :145–175. Bibliopolis. Napoli.23. VON FOERSTER, H. 1993. Ethics and second-order cybernetics. Psychiatria Danubia 5:

40–46.24. SPENCER-BROWN, G. 1969. Laws of Form. George, Allen and Unwin. London.25. WITTGENSTEIN, L.L. 1961. Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Routledge. London.26. SCOTT, B. 1999. Knowledge content and narrative structures. In Words on the Web:

Language Aspects of Computer Mediated Communication. L. Pemberton and S.Shurville, Eds. :13–24. Intellect Books. Exeter.


27. PASK, G. 1981. Organizational closure of potentially conscious systems. In Autopoie-sis. M. Zelany, Ed. :265–307. Elsevier. Amsterdam.

28. PASK, G. 1996. Heinz von Foerster’s self-organization, the progenitor of conversationand interaction theories. Syst. Res. 13: 349–362.

Organizational Closure and Conceptual Coherence

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