The distinction operation/observation is the basis for Luhmann’s constructivist approach [→Constructivism] and for the extension of the concept of →Autopoiesis from biological to meaning-constituting systems. Starting from this distinction, the absolute determination of autopoietic operations can be combined with the contingency of observation.
An operation is understood as the reproduction of an element in an autopoietic system by means of the elements in that system, i.e., the condition for the very existence of the system. There is no system without a system-specific mode of operation, but there is also no operation that does not belong to a system. According to the theory of autopoiesis, everything that exists must be traced back to the operations of a system. Every possible object only exists because a system constitutes it as an entity.
At the level of autopoiesis, the problem for the system is simply one of reproduction, which requires the ability to connect a new operation to every other operation in the same system and thereby maintain operative closure. Operations always run blind. Basic reproduction is not guided by either a teleological project or the orientation to a function, or by the need to adapt. Even →time does not exist for the operations because they are always, in their immediacy, bound to simultaneity with the world. Like the distinction earlier/later, these categories are introduced only by an observer observing the running of the operations (which basically reproduce themselves in an uncontrolled manner).
Hence, only an observer can speak of operations. It is therefore of great important to distinguish the level of operations from that of observations—even though observations are themselves operations. If observations were not themselves operations, it would be impossible to trace them back to a system, and thus impossible to take their existence into account.
Observation is a specific mode of operation that uses a distinction [→Identity/Difference] to indicate one side of the distinction or the other. Observations are always present when a system operates on the basis of distinctions and can obtain and process information. It is the system-specific mode of operation in →meaning-constituting systems, which allows their reference to further possibilities via the respective actualized datum.
This definition of observation is very abstract and is independent of references to people or vision. It refers to the logical calculus of George Spencer Brown, according to which each construction is based on an initial distinction. This separates the space into two sides (for instance the distinction system/environment, which splits the world into two separate areas) and, at the same time, indicates one of the two sides (the system or the environment). It is therefore impossible to draw a distinction without indicating something as distinct from something else (in the distinction between system and environment, the system is indicated as distinct from the environment). In this sense, the initial operation realizes the functions of both indication and distinction at the same time. Proceeding from the initial distinction, it is then possible to accomplish further operations, which can either repeat the earlier indication (in this case, there is a condensation that leads to the constitution of an identity [→Identity/Difference]) or refer to the other side (and thereby realize a crossing that “deletes” the earlier indication). The sequence of operations leads to the constitution of a complex system, which, however, always remains dependent on the first distinction.
Each observation uses a particular distinction (e.g., system/environment, whole/part, form/background) that allows its construction of a network of further distinctions and thereby the achievement of →information from what it observes. While an operation that realizes the self-reproduction of a system runs blind (and this also holds for observation as operation), it has more freedom as observation. This is because it is not subject to the condition of simultaneity with the world. It does not coincide instantaneously with its object. Observation is able to identify objects and can (when, for instance, it is oriented to the distinction system/environment) distinguish a system internal processes from those that do not belong to it; can determine causal relationships between inside and outside; can attribute a goal to the system.
The initial distinction is at the same time the condition both for being able to observe and for limiting the observation: without a distinction, we cannot observe, but each distinction allows us to observe only what it allows us to observe. The selection of the initial distinction determines everything that can (later) be observed. We see differently depending on how we observe. The distinction system/environment, for instance, leads to other information than that obtained through the distinction whole/part. It implies the inclusion of psychic systems in the environment of social systems: psychic systems are no more regarded as parts of society. Additionally, the distinction system-environment is incompatible with a concept of the individual as a unity of the psychic and organic systems. Organism and consciousness become autonomous and separate autopoietic systems.
However, observation is also an operation in a system and, as such, just as blind to its own reproduction. The initial distinction is its blind spot [→Constructivism], i.e., the point that it cannot observe. An observation oriented to the distinction true/untrue cannot observe whether this distinction is itself true or untrue. Thus, based on the distinction legal/illegal, we cannot determine whether it is on the side of legality or illegality. No distinction can be applied to itself in order to produce an unequivocal indication, because it is and remains an autopoietic operation. Besides observing something, it is produced as operation. This results in the form of the →paradox that always arises when applying a distinction to itself. We can say that the initial distinction is itself the observation as operation, which is distinguished from another distinction, i.e., the initial distinction for another observer. No operation of observation can observe itself: in order to see what an observer cannot see we need a “second-order observer” that observes this observation without coinciding with it [→Constructivism]. However, this always occurs based on a distinction that second-order observers themselves cannot observe, which a third-order observation can determine, and so on.
Observation does not represent a privileged from of knowledge (in the sense of access to an objective reality). It is itself the operation of a system that accomplishes its autopoiesis based on its specific limitations. Additionally, as an operation, it can always be observed and no final position exists from which “right” observations can be made. Besides, the distinction right/wrong is an observational schema with its own limitation and blind spot, and thus offers no particular guarantee of adequacy to the world.
Every entity we refer to is the construction of an observer and depends on the particular distinction that has been applied. Every distinction inevitably translates the world into its forms and as such grants no access to an objective world independent of the observer. The world can, therefore, never be observed from outside: the observation unavoidably changes the world with which it is confronted. In epistemology, the distinction operation/observation assumes the position of the classic distinction of subject and object. Radical constructivism elaborates the consequences of these considerations.
A special case is that of self-observation, which is when the observation is an operation of the system it is observing and takes part in the autopoiesis of that system. Self-observation, however, is not understood as an operation that observes itself as an ongoing observation (which is impossible), but as an operation that observes something to which it, too, belongs (another operation of the system in which it participates [→Self-Reference]). This operation of observation must be compatible with the ongoing process of reproducing the elements and is subject to specific conditions that regulate the autopoiesis of the system. Based on the condition of the operational closure of autopoi- etic systems [→Autopoiesis], an observation from outside can never know if and how it affects the running of the operations in the observed system. On the other hand, self-observation—since it directly contributes to autopoietic reproduction—inevitably influences the further development of operations and is a factor in their dynamics. Localization within the system, however, does not imply the ability to observe it as a whole. The dependence on a specific distinction cannot be overcome and self-observation, too, delivers only a selective picture of the observed system. It can observe only what its distinction allows it to observe and, in contrast with an observation from outside, is also limited by the necessity to find a connection within the system. Thus, self-ob- servation cannot determine the reproduction of operations that always run blind.
Depending on which distinction it uses, self-observation takes on different forms. A rudimentary self-observation appertains to all operations in meaning-constituting systems: in order to connect themselves recursively to other operations in the system, they must distinguish the system from everything else that does not belong to it [→Self-Reference]. In terms of, for instance, a social system, each communication must simultaneously communicate that it is a communication, who is communicating and what is communicated. Only in this way can they produce other communications. Thus, every operation of communication must observe itself, using for this purpose the particular distinction between information and utterance. More complex forms of self- observation emerge when the system switches from observing its own operations to observing its own observations, and finally to observing the system itself (based on the distinction system/environment; i.e., the distinction between self-reference and other-reference). In this way, a →Re-entry occurs and the system observes itself based on the distinction that constitutes it.
Self-observation serves to inform the system and obtain new knowledge from itself. However, self-observations as operations are always →Events and remain bound to the respective situation. It is therefore useful to coordinate these observations with one another. Texts are produced accordingly, which allow observations to be repeated, commented upon and articulated: these texts are the self-description of the system. The form of the self-description of society changes with the evolution of society itself. In pre-modern society, there were forms of self-description that always assumed the separation of the description from its object: they made recourse to externalizations [→Asymmetrization]. Today, on the contrary, an appropriate self-description of society must always include an “autological” component: it must reflect that the at- tempt to describe society can only take place within society. The description itself falls within the scope of its object, which must be described as an object that describes itself. [E.E.] – (Unlocking Luhmann, p 157–161)
Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschaft (1990: Ch. 1.VII, Ch. 2.VII); Art as a Social Sys- tem (2000: Ch. 1.VII, Ch. 2.I).