" See his "What Is Mem- ory That It May Have
Hindsight
and Foresight as Well?
Niklas Luhmann - Art of the Social System
1
1. This distinction has since been relativized on the basis of neurophysiological research. See Gerhard Roth, Das Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit: Kognitive Neuro- biohgie undihrephilosophischen Konsequenzen (Frankfurt, 1994).
2. As Derrida has pointed out repeatedly, this move has turned the philosoph- ical tradition against itself. Assuming the primacy of thought, it treats writing as something external, although the tradition itself could only exist as writing!
3. We speak of "double closure" in the sense that the brain, in separating lev- els of operation, puts itself in a position to coordinate the coordination of its pri- mary processes. See Heinz von Foerster, "On Constructing a Reality," in his Ob- serving Systems (Seaside, Calif. , 1981), pp. 288-309 (304ff. ).
4. This reverses the common Cartesian doctrine (hetero-reference is doubtful; self-reference is certain). Kenneth J. Gergen, Toward Transformation in Social Knowledge (New York, 1982), p. 66.
5. Here and in the following, we disregard the neurophysiological correlates of perception. At this level, perception must be understood as a kind of mea- surement that functions selectively in that it cannot measure everything when it
519
32. 0 Notes to Pages 6-p
measures something. See Howard H. Pattee, "Cell Psychology: An Evolutionary Approach to the Symbol-Matter Problem," Cognition and Brain Theory 5 (1982): 325-41; A. Moreno et al. , "Computational Darwinism as a Basis for Cognition," Revue Internationale de systimique 6 (1992): 205-21. See also Roth, Das Gehirn
und seine Wirklichkeit. Regarding this process, consciousness begins with a der- ealization, that is, by erasing all information about the location where the per- ception actually takes place.
6. On this topic, see Heinz von Foerster, "Das Gleichnis vom Blinden Fleck: Cber das Sehen im allgemeinen," in Gerhard Johann Lischka, ed. , Der entfesselte Blick (Bern, 1993), pp. 14-47.
7. On space and time as media, see Chapter 3, section III, below.
8. One can arrive at different results only if one fails to distinguish between brain activity and consciousness. For a typical example in the realm of neuro- physiology, see Gerhard Roth, "Erkenntnis und Realitat: Das reale Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit," in Siegfried J. Schmidt, ed. , Der Diskurs des radikalen Kon- struktivismus (Frankfurt, 1987), pp. 229-55. Roth even ascribes "semantic" capa- bilities to the brain.
9. One reason for this may be that the neurophysiologist occupies the posi- tion of an external observer for whom the internal/external difference defining
his object of research is already given. Then the only question remains how the brain enables itself to perform representational or semantic functions. On this topic, see: Paul M. Churchland, A NeurocomputationalPerspective: The Nature of Mind and the Structure ofScience (Cambridge, Mass. , 1989), esp. p. 77; Gerhard Roth, "Kognition: Die Entstehung von Bedeutung im Gehirn," in Wolfgang Krohn and Giinther Kiippers, eds. , Die Entstehung von Ordnung, Organisation und Bedeutung (Frankfurt, 1992), pp. 104-33. Consider further the distinction between "reality," from the perspective of an external (second-order) observer, and actuality, from the perspective of the brain or consciousness, in Gerhard Roth and Helmut Schwegler, "Self-Organization, Emergent Properties and the UnityoftheWorld,"Philosophical (1990):45-64(56ff. ).
10. See George Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm (1969; rpt. New York, 1979), pp. 56S. , 69fT.
11. For good reasons, Benny Shanon has argued against this prevailing view. See Shanon, "Metaphors for Language and Communication," Revue internationale de systemique 3 (1989): 43-59. In his theory of language, Maturana rejects the metaphor of transmission as well--but only because he conceives of language in terms stricdy internal to the organism as a structural coupling of the nervous sys- tem with itself (which may be justified but is of no help for a theory of social com- munication). See Humberto R. Maturana, Erkennen: Organisation und Verkor-
perung von Wirklichkeit: Ausgewdhlte Arbeiten zur hiologischen Epistemologie
(Braunschweig, 1982), esp. pp. 54ff. , I54f. On transmission as one of many meta-
Notes to Pages 10-12
321
phors that have influenced our understanding of communication, see also Klaus Krippendorff, "Der verschwundene Bote: Metaphern und Modelle der Kommu- nikation," in Klaus Merten, Siegfried J. Schmidt, and Siegfried Weischenberg,
eds. , Die Wirklichkeit der Medien: Eine Einfuhrung in die Kommunikationswissen- <<? /<</? (Opladen, 1994), pp. 79-113.
12. See, e. g. , Paul de Man, Blindness and Insight: Essays in the Rhetoric ofCon- temporary Criticism, 2d ed. (Minneapolis, 1983), pp. 232f. --but in a somewhat different terminology, replacing reference by constitution.
13. See Roth, Das Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit, pp. 25off.
14. For Husserl, as we know, this meant that conscious activity and phenom- enon were strictly the same thing (this is why he called his philosophy "phe- nomenology") and that intention was the form of the act that continually re- produced this unity.
15. From this insight follows an epistemological "constructivism" thatfindsits equivalents in the realms of biology and psychology--that is, in the world of Jean Piaget, Humberto Maturana, and Heinz von Foerster. See Niklas Luhmann, Erkenntnis als Konstruktion (Bern, 1988); Luhmann, "Das Erkenntnisprogramm des Konstruktivismus und die unbekannt bleibende Realitat," in Luhmann, So- ziologische Aufkldrung, vol. 5 (Opladen, 1990), pp. 31-58 (trans, as "The Cognitive Program of Constructivism and a Reality That Remains Unknown," in Wolfgang Krohn et al. , eds. , Self-Organization: Portrait ofa Scientific Revolution [Dordrecht, 1990], pp. 64-85); and Luhmann, Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschafi (Frankfurt, 1990); see further Helmut Wilke, "Systemtheoretische Strategien des Erkennens: Wirklichkeit als interessierte Konstruktion," in Klaus Gotz, ed. , Theoretische Zu-
mutungen: Vom Nutzen der systemischen Theoriefur die Managementpraxis (Hei- delberg, 1994), pp. 97-116.
16. Quite differently, Wil Martens, "Die Autopoiesis soziale Systeme," Kolner Zeitschrififur Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 43 (1991): 625-40. See also the sub- sequent discussion in Kolner Zeitschrifi 44 (1992): 139-45.
17. See Heinz von Foerster, "Fur Niklas Luhmann: Wie rekursiv ist Kommu- nikation? " Teoria Sociologica 1/2 (1993): 61-85. His answer is that communication is recursion or, more accurately, that "Kommunikation ist das Eigenverhalten in einem rekursiv operierenden, zweifach geschlossenen System" (p. 83).
18. The significance of the "unfinished" in Leonardo da Vinci and Michelan-
gelo was already debated in the sixteenth century. On the intentional use of am- biguity, often to the point of infinite interpretive possibilities, see Umberto Eco, Opera aperta (1962), 6th ed. (Milan, 1988). See also the notion of "blanks" [Un- bestimmtheitsstellen] in Roman Ingarden, Das literarische Kunstwerk (1931), 4th ed. (Tubingen, 1972), pp. 26iff; see further William Empson, Seven Types of Ambiguity (1930; 2d ed. Edinburgh, 1947).
19. On the Parsonsian distinction between simple and double contingency,
322 Notes to Pages 13-16
see James Olds, The Growth and Structure ofMotives: Psychological Studies in the Theory ofAction (Glencoe, 111. , 1956).
20. For a similar argument, see Peter Fuchs, Moderne Kommunikation: Zur Theorie des operativen Displacements (Frankfurt, 1993), pp. i$ff.
21. The notion of "reading" may become questionable here, although it gen- erally includes reading poetry. At any rate, artistic perception blocks our habit- ual, hasty, carefree reading, or we are not reading the text as literature.
22. "See"Bliithenstaub,"no. 19:"DerSitzderSeeleistda,wosichInnenwelt
und Aufienwelt beriihren. Wo sie sich durchdringen, ist er in jedem Punkt der Durchdringung," quoted from Hans Joachim Mahl and Richard Samuel, eds. , Novalis: Werke, Tagebiicher und Briefs Friedrich von Hardenbergs, vol. 2 (Darm- stadt, 1978), p. 233.
23. When guided by thought, perception can distinguish between movements and changes. While driving to the gas station, I see someone climbing a ladder and changing the price tag. The man's movements are one thing, his changing of the price, in relation to before/after, is another. The man might fall off the lad- der, the prices cannot. But both can be seen! The same capacity for discrimina- tion must be present whenever we participate in communication and, once again, already at the level of perception.
24. A longer quotation is warranted here. In Jonathan Richardson, A Dis- course on the Dignity, Certainty, Pleasure and Advantage of the Science ofa Con- noisseur (1719), quoted from The Works (London, 1773; rpt. Hildesheim, 1969), pp. 241-346 (247), we read that works of art are suited "to communicate ideas;
and not only those which we may receive otherwise, but such as without this art could not possibly be communicated; whereby mankind is advanced higher in
the rational state, and made better; and that in a way easy, expeditious, and de- lightful. " See also p. 250: "Painting is another sort of writing, and is subservient
to the same ends as that of her young sister. " Richardson goes on to emphasize
the temporal advantage of painting over the much slower sequentiality of words.
25. Baumgarten, the founder of aesthetics as a special branch of philosophy, in- troduces the topic as follows: "Aesthetica (theoria liberalium artium, gnoseologia inferior, ars pulchre cogitandi, ars analogi rationis) est scientia cognitionis sensiti- vae. " Alexander Gotdieb Baumgarten, Aesthetica (Frankfurt/Oder, 1750), ? 1, p. 1. Baumgarten considered beauty the goal and perfection of sensuous knowledge (as
if we looked into the world to discover beauty, and only occasionally encountered deformities)--a figure burdened with tradition that propelled aesthetics toward its later development. See Aesthetica, ? 14, p. 6: "Aestheticesfinisest perfectio cog- nitionis sensitivae qua talis, ? 1. Haec autem est pulchritude" Baumgarten does consider other possible orientations of perception, but when sensuous cognition searches for its own perfection, beauty is the exclusive goal.
26. See also Moreno et al. , "Computational Darwinism. "
Notes to Pages 16-20
323
27. See also Niklas Luhmann, "Wie ist Bewufitsein an Kommunikation be- teiligt? " in Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds. , Materialitdt der Kommunikation (Frankfurt, 1988), pp. 884-905 (trans, as "How Can die Mind Participate in Communication? " in Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds. , William Whobrey, trans. , Materialities ofCommunication [Stanford, Calif. , 1994], pp. 371-87); and Luhmann, Die Wtssenschaft der Gesellschaft, pp. nff.
28. We are not investigating, in Kantian fashion, the conditions of possibility for language, nor are we conducting a Darwinian inquiry into the evolution of language.
29. In the realm of alphabetic writing. Ideographic writing in China and Japan has preserved the connection between art and writing in the form of a cherished artistic genre.
30. See Horst Wenzel, "Visibile parlare: Zur Representation der audiovisuel- len Wahrnehmung in Schrift und Bild," in Ludwig Jager and Bernd Switalla, eds. , Germanistik in der Mediengesellschaft (Munich, 1994), pp. 141-57.
31. See Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, "Stimme als Form: ZurTopik lyrischer Selb- stinszenierung im vierzehnten und funfzehnten Jahrhundert," ms. 1992.
32. This idea is not entirely new, as a quotation from David Hume would show. Compare Peter Jones, "Hume and the Beginning of Modern Aesthetics," in Peter Jones, ed. , The "Science ofMan" in the Scottish Enlightenment: Hume, Reid, and Their Contemporaries (Edinburgh, 1989), pp. 54-67. See also n. 24 above.
33. "Bliithenstaub," no. 23, Novalis, Werke, p. 237.
34. For variations on this problem, see Niklas Luhmann and Peter Fuchs, Re- den und Schweigen (Frankfurt, 1989).
35. See esp. Pierre Bourdieu, La distinction: Critique sociale du jugement de gout (Paris, 1975); Bourdieu, Ce queparler veut dire: L'economie des ichanges lin- guistiques (Paris, 1982).
36. In other words, Bourdieu's analyses make it possible to converse about Bourdieu and his analyses--but in the host's home we would be reluctant to comment on Diirer's rabbits hanging above the piano.
37. Heinz von Foerster calls this capacity "memory.
" See his "What Is Mem- ory That It May Have Hindsight and Foresight as Well? " in S. Bogoch, The Fu- ture ofthe Brain Sciences (New York, 1969), pp. 19-64.
38. This conclusion is supported by quite different theoretical foundations. For Lyotard, a "phrase" is a language event that makes a difference and vanishes
if it is not linked to other events (enchainement). See Jean-Francois Lyotard, Le differend(Paris, 1983). Regarding the consequences for aesthetics, see, e. g. , the es- say "Newman: The Instant" in Jean-Francois Lyotard, The Inhuman: Reflections on Time (Stanford, Calif, 1991), pp. 78-88. There is no need for a subject that "supports" and "grounds" the event. It realizes itself: "Occurrence is the instant which 'happens,' which 'comes' unexpectedly but which, once it is there, takes
324
Notes to Pages 21-23
its place in the network of what has happened. Any instant can be the beginning, provided that it is grasped in terms of its quod rather than its quid" (ibid. , p. 82).
39. An entirely different question is whether there is a kind of meditation, a motionless standstill of consciousness without reference that refrains from mak- ing distinctions--e. g. , in the perception of artworks, in the gardens of Zen monasteries, or in the contemplation of landscapes. But none of these types of meditation would qualify as communication related specifically to art.
40. This crucial difference between communication through art and com- munication about art is often overlooked (e. g. , by Gerhard Plumpe, Asthetische KommunikationderModerne,vol. 1,VonKantbisHegel(Opladen,1993). Asare- sult, the differentiation of an autonomous art system is treated only in terms of
the differentiation of a particular topic of communication about art.
41. Compare Kritik der Urteilskraft, ? 21-, which is a strange text in need of
clarification. On the one hand, the text glosses over the question ofwhether per- ceptions are communicable, or, to put it differendy, how that which is commu- nicable can be sorted out of what is perceived. Furthermore, the text leaves open what is currendy discussed under the topic of intersubjectivity, namely, the ques- tion concerning the transcendental conditions of possibility of an alter ego. In both respects, the text operates naively. It almost looks as if transcendental con- trols could not be introduced at all via the inner reflection on facts of conscious- ness but Only by (reflecting on) how and in what ways these facts are mediated. Let me provide an excerpt: "Erkenntnisse und Urteile miissen sich, samt der Oberzeugung, die sie begleitet, allgemein mitteilen lassen; denn sonst kame ih- nen keine Obereinstimmung mit dem Objekt zu; sie waren insgesamt ein blofi subjektives Spiel der Vorstellungskrafte, gerade so wie es der Skeptizismus ver- langt. " The problem of perception is covered up by Kant's sole concern with the (even more problematic) communication of a mental state, that is, with "die Stimmung der Erkenntniskrafte zu einer Erkenntnis uberhaupt, und zwar die- jenige Proportion, welche sich fur eine Vorstellung (wodurch uns ein Gegen- stand gegeben wird) gebiihrt, um daraus Erkenntnis zu machen. "
42. For an older account of the disposition concerning awareness/unaware-
ness in museums, see Roger de Piles, Course de peinture par principes (Paris, 1708), pp. 12-13. The painter gets annoyed or specializes in capturing the viewer's attention. In a similar vein, and roughly at the same time, Jonathan Richardson complains that gendemen "overlook the beauties which they do not expect to
find" and searches for a new science of connoisseurship that would rectify this problem. A Discourse on the Dignity, Certainty, Pleasure andAdvantage ofthe Sci- ence ofa Connoisseur (1719), quoted from The Works (London, 1773; rpt. Hilde- sheim, 1969), pp. 241-346 (244). Baudelaire begins his famous essay "Le peintre
de la vie moderne" with exactly the same observation about preinformed ob- servers (CEuvres completes, Plelade ed. [Paris, 1954], p. 881).
Notes to Pages 23-26
315
43. On the notion of the "in sich selbst Vollendete" and the idea of purpose without purpose, see Karl Philipp Moritz, Schriften zurAsthetik undPoetik: Kri- tische Ausgabe (Tubingen, 1962), p. 6. Moritz retains the category of purpose be-
cause "das Unniitze oder Unzweckmafiige [kann] unmoglich einem vernunftigen Wesen Vergniigen machen. " The naturalized anthropology of teleological orien- tation does not keep up with the development of the art system. Giving up this view would require a radical revision of what it means to be human.
44. ThismaybewhyHegelconsideredaconceptofimmediacyindispensable, although in retrospect, immediacy presents itself to thinking always as mediated. 45. "Erst durch das Kunstwerk erfahrt er [der Kiinsder, N. L. ], was er mit
seiner Thatigkeit gewollt hat," we read in Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger's Vor- lesungen uberAsthetik, ed. Karl Wilhelm Ludwig Heyse (Leipzig, 1829; rpt. Darm- stadt, 1973), p. 115. And on p. 122: "Dem Kiinsder entstehtdas Kunstwerk mehr, als es von ihm gemacht wild. Er lernt seinen vollen Vorsatz und seine Idee selbst erst dann ganz kennen, wenn das Kunstwerk vollendet ist. "
46. Using Franz Erhard Walther's conception of art as example, Michael
Lingner shows that artists themselves not only see but also want to see their role
in such terms. "Kunst als Projekt der Aufklarung jenseits reiner Vernunft," in
Michael Lingner, ed. , Das Haus in dem ich wohne: Die Theorie zum Werkentwurf 2
von Franz Erhard Walther (Klagenfurt, 1990), pp. 15-53 (4 ff-)- See also the other contributions in the same volume.
47. Specifically on this point, see Winfried Menninghaus, "Genie und Un- sinn: Zur Poetik Immanuel Kants und Ludwig Tiecks," quoted from ms. , 1994. 48. According to Friedrich Schlegel, poetry, too, ought to be treated as art.
See his Gesprdch uber die Poesie, quoted from Werke in zwei Banden (Berlin, 1980), vol. 2, p. 155. Obviously, Schlegel's demand does not go without saying, or else there would be no need for it.
49. Cleanth Brooks arrives at this conclusion on the basis of thoroughgoing interpretations. See his The Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure ofPoetry (New York, 1947). For a summary of Brooks's position, see pp. i92ff; for an ab- breviated version, see p. 74: "The Poem says what the poem says," and it cannot
be said in any other way. And p. 201: "to refer . . . to . . . a paraphrase of the poem is to refer . . . to something outside the poem. " In the meantime, this view
has advanced to the level of textbook knowledge. See, e. g. , John Ciardi and Miller Williams, How Does a Poem Mean? (1959; 2d ed. Boston, 1975).
50. See Christoph Menke-Eggers, Die Souveranitdt der Kunst: Asthetische Er- fahrung nach Adorno undDerrida (Frankfurt, 1988), pp. 4$ff.
51. Experts in modern literature are aware of explicidy unreadable texts. Such texts, however, only intensify a limitation that has always existed.
52. For an elaboration of this point, see Chapter 3, below.
53. See Dietrich Schwanitz, "Zeit und Geschichte im Roman--Interaktion
326 Notes to Pages 26-29
und Gesellschaft im Drama: Zur wechselseitigen Erhellung von Systemtheorie und Literatur," in Dirk Baecker et al. , eds. , Theorie als Passion (Frankfurt, 1987), pp. 181-213.
54. In order to elucidate the self-reference of poems (as opposed to hetero- reference), Earl R. Wasserman, The Subtler Language: Critical Readings ofNeo-
Classic and Romantic Poems (Baltimore, 1959), p. 7, speaks of "the interactive capacities of any of the properties of words . . . including connotation and the ca- pacity of a word to carry more than one reference as a symbol, metaphor, ambigu- ity, or pun; position and repetition; word order; sound, rhyme; even orthography. "
55. For an older formulation of this principle (comparing it to the oudine in the visual arts), see Moritz, Schriften zur Asthetik, pp. 99f.
56. Umberto Eco, for example, defines the concept of form as "un tutto or- ganico" {Opera aperta [1962; 6th ed. Milan, 1988], p. 22. )
57. See, e. g. , Abraham Moles, Information Theory and Esthetic Perception (Ur- bana, 111. , 1966), p. 57: "Byform (Gestalt) we mean here a group of elements per- ceived as a whole and not as the product of a random collection. More precisely,
a form is a message, which appears to the observer as not being the result of ran- dom events. "
58. Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art and Painting in Partic- ular(1912; Engl, trans. New York, 1947), p. 47.
59. Ciardi and Williams, How Does a Poem Mean? p. xxii (authors' emphasis). 60. Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm, p. 1.
61. Gilles Deleuze, Logique du sens (Paris, 1969), pp. 37, 41.
62. We shall encounter this insight again under rhe name of "autopoiesis. " 63. Stephan Mussil, "Literaturwissenschaft, Systemtheorie und der Begriff der
Beobachtung," in Henk de Berg and Matthias Prangel, eds. , Kommunikation und Differenz: Systemtheoretische Ansatze in der Literatur- und Kunstwissenscha. fi (Opladen, 1993), pp. 183-202. Mussil points out correctly that the world prior to
all distinctions (for which Spencer Brown has no concept) must be distinguished from the "unmarked space" that emerges when a "marked space" is severed. Ini- tially, Spencer Brown uses only the second concept, which designates the space accessible from the marked space by crossing its boundary. This conceptual lim- itation, while it serves the purposes of a calculus, does not exclude an inquiry into
the state of the world that is severed by the injunction "draw a distinction. " Nor does it prevent us from thematizing the unity of the distinction between marked and unmarked space. Spencer Brown acknowledges this by introducing the con- cept of the "unwritten cross" during a later phase of his calculus. (Spencer Brown, Laws of Form, p. 7. ) See also, Matthias Varga von Kibed and Rudolf Matzka, "Motive und Grundgedanken der 'Gesetze der Form,'" in Dirk Baecker, ed. , Kalkul der Form (Frankfurt, 1993), pp. 58-85 (691". , 77); as well as Hegel's distinc- tion between the infinite as the opposite of the finite and as true infinity in his
Notes to Pages 30-31
327
Vorlesungentiberdie Philosophie der Religion I, quoted from Werke, vol. 16 (Frank- furt, 1969), pp. i78f. For the purpose of distinguishing these two concepts, we
shall speak of the unmarked state when referring to a state of the world prior to
all distinctions and of the concept of the unmarked space when referring to the opposite of the marked space.
64. "And, if such a verse as this/may not claim another kiss. " From "Claim- ing a Second Kiss by Desert," quoted from Ben Jonson, The Complete Poems (New Haven, Conn. , 1975), pp. i3if.
65. The internal rhetoric of the Art & Language Group uses the term re- description but primarily for styles or exemplary works. See Michael Baldwin, Charles Harrison, Mel Ramsden, "On Conceptual Art and Painting, and Speak- ing and Seeing: Three Corrected Transcripts," Art-Language, n. s. 1 (1994): 30-69. However, the full significance of a continual reactualization of "redescriptions" becomes apparent only when it is referred to individual acts arranged as a form. Then we recognize that we are dealing with attempts to objectify double contin- gency, to observe works of art as conversations. Baldwin et al. (p. 63) speak of a "dialogic aura" (where "aura" could be taken to imply a reference to the un- marked space). I am grateful to Christian Matthiessen for arranging a meeting with the members of the Art & Language Group.
66. For an analysis using modern theoretical means, see, e. g. , Friedrich Cramer, "Schonheit als dynamisches Grenzphanomen zwischen Chaos und Ordnung-- ein neuer Laokoon," Selbstorganisation 4 (1993): 79-102.
6j. Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm.
68. Michael Riffaterre, Semiotics ofPoetry (Bloomington, Ind. , 1978), p. 26, understands the poetic value of neologisms in terms of a "a relationship between two equivalent forms, one marked and one unmarked. The unmarked form an- tedates the text, the marked one does not. " See also his "Po&ique du n^olo- gisme," in Riffaterre, La production du texte (Paris, 1979), pp. 61-74.
1. This distinction has since been relativized on the basis of neurophysiological research. See Gerhard Roth, Das Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit: Kognitive Neuro- biohgie undihrephilosophischen Konsequenzen (Frankfurt, 1994).
2. As Derrida has pointed out repeatedly, this move has turned the philosoph- ical tradition against itself. Assuming the primacy of thought, it treats writing as something external, although the tradition itself could only exist as writing!
3. We speak of "double closure" in the sense that the brain, in separating lev- els of operation, puts itself in a position to coordinate the coordination of its pri- mary processes. See Heinz von Foerster, "On Constructing a Reality," in his Ob- serving Systems (Seaside, Calif. , 1981), pp. 288-309 (304ff. ).
4. This reverses the common Cartesian doctrine (hetero-reference is doubtful; self-reference is certain). Kenneth J. Gergen, Toward Transformation in Social Knowledge (New York, 1982), p. 66.
5. Here and in the following, we disregard the neurophysiological correlates of perception. At this level, perception must be understood as a kind of mea- surement that functions selectively in that it cannot measure everything when it
519
32. 0 Notes to Pages 6-p
measures something. See Howard H. Pattee, "Cell Psychology: An Evolutionary Approach to the Symbol-Matter Problem," Cognition and Brain Theory 5 (1982): 325-41; A. Moreno et al. , "Computational Darwinism as a Basis for Cognition," Revue Internationale de systimique 6 (1992): 205-21. See also Roth, Das Gehirn
und seine Wirklichkeit. Regarding this process, consciousness begins with a der- ealization, that is, by erasing all information about the location where the per- ception actually takes place.
6. On this topic, see Heinz von Foerster, "Das Gleichnis vom Blinden Fleck: Cber das Sehen im allgemeinen," in Gerhard Johann Lischka, ed. , Der entfesselte Blick (Bern, 1993), pp. 14-47.
7. On space and time as media, see Chapter 3, section III, below.
8. One can arrive at different results only if one fails to distinguish between brain activity and consciousness. For a typical example in the realm of neuro- physiology, see Gerhard Roth, "Erkenntnis und Realitat: Das reale Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit," in Siegfried J. Schmidt, ed. , Der Diskurs des radikalen Kon- struktivismus (Frankfurt, 1987), pp. 229-55. Roth even ascribes "semantic" capa- bilities to the brain.
9. One reason for this may be that the neurophysiologist occupies the posi- tion of an external observer for whom the internal/external difference defining
his object of research is already given. Then the only question remains how the brain enables itself to perform representational or semantic functions. On this topic, see: Paul M. Churchland, A NeurocomputationalPerspective: The Nature of Mind and the Structure ofScience (Cambridge, Mass. , 1989), esp. p. 77; Gerhard Roth, "Kognition: Die Entstehung von Bedeutung im Gehirn," in Wolfgang Krohn and Giinther Kiippers, eds. , Die Entstehung von Ordnung, Organisation und Bedeutung (Frankfurt, 1992), pp. 104-33. Consider further the distinction between "reality," from the perspective of an external (second-order) observer, and actuality, from the perspective of the brain or consciousness, in Gerhard Roth and Helmut Schwegler, "Self-Organization, Emergent Properties and the UnityoftheWorld,"Philosophical (1990):45-64(56ff. ).
10. See George Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm (1969; rpt. New York, 1979), pp. 56S. , 69fT.
11. For good reasons, Benny Shanon has argued against this prevailing view. See Shanon, "Metaphors for Language and Communication," Revue internationale de systemique 3 (1989): 43-59. In his theory of language, Maturana rejects the metaphor of transmission as well--but only because he conceives of language in terms stricdy internal to the organism as a structural coupling of the nervous sys- tem with itself (which may be justified but is of no help for a theory of social com- munication). See Humberto R. Maturana, Erkennen: Organisation und Verkor-
perung von Wirklichkeit: Ausgewdhlte Arbeiten zur hiologischen Epistemologie
(Braunschweig, 1982), esp. pp. 54ff. , I54f. On transmission as one of many meta-
Notes to Pages 10-12
321
phors that have influenced our understanding of communication, see also Klaus Krippendorff, "Der verschwundene Bote: Metaphern und Modelle der Kommu- nikation," in Klaus Merten, Siegfried J. Schmidt, and Siegfried Weischenberg,
eds. , Die Wirklichkeit der Medien: Eine Einfuhrung in die Kommunikationswissen- <<? /<</? (Opladen, 1994), pp. 79-113.
12. See, e. g. , Paul de Man, Blindness and Insight: Essays in the Rhetoric ofCon- temporary Criticism, 2d ed. (Minneapolis, 1983), pp. 232f. --but in a somewhat different terminology, replacing reference by constitution.
13. See Roth, Das Gehirn und seine Wirklichkeit, pp. 25off.
14. For Husserl, as we know, this meant that conscious activity and phenom- enon were strictly the same thing (this is why he called his philosophy "phe- nomenology") and that intention was the form of the act that continually re- produced this unity.
15. From this insight follows an epistemological "constructivism" thatfindsits equivalents in the realms of biology and psychology--that is, in the world of Jean Piaget, Humberto Maturana, and Heinz von Foerster. See Niklas Luhmann, Erkenntnis als Konstruktion (Bern, 1988); Luhmann, "Das Erkenntnisprogramm des Konstruktivismus und die unbekannt bleibende Realitat," in Luhmann, So- ziologische Aufkldrung, vol. 5 (Opladen, 1990), pp. 31-58 (trans, as "The Cognitive Program of Constructivism and a Reality That Remains Unknown," in Wolfgang Krohn et al. , eds. , Self-Organization: Portrait ofa Scientific Revolution [Dordrecht, 1990], pp. 64-85); and Luhmann, Die Wissenschaft der Gesellschafi (Frankfurt, 1990); see further Helmut Wilke, "Systemtheoretische Strategien des Erkennens: Wirklichkeit als interessierte Konstruktion," in Klaus Gotz, ed. , Theoretische Zu-
mutungen: Vom Nutzen der systemischen Theoriefur die Managementpraxis (Hei- delberg, 1994), pp. 97-116.
16. Quite differently, Wil Martens, "Die Autopoiesis soziale Systeme," Kolner Zeitschrififur Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 43 (1991): 625-40. See also the sub- sequent discussion in Kolner Zeitschrifi 44 (1992): 139-45.
17. See Heinz von Foerster, "Fur Niklas Luhmann: Wie rekursiv ist Kommu- nikation? " Teoria Sociologica 1/2 (1993): 61-85. His answer is that communication is recursion or, more accurately, that "Kommunikation ist das Eigenverhalten in einem rekursiv operierenden, zweifach geschlossenen System" (p. 83).
18. The significance of the "unfinished" in Leonardo da Vinci and Michelan-
gelo was already debated in the sixteenth century. On the intentional use of am- biguity, often to the point of infinite interpretive possibilities, see Umberto Eco, Opera aperta (1962), 6th ed. (Milan, 1988). See also the notion of "blanks" [Un- bestimmtheitsstellen] in Roman Ingarden, Das literarische Kunstwerk (1931), 4th ed. (Tubingen, 1972), pp. 26iff; see further William Empson, Seven Types of Ambiguity (1930; 2d ed. Edinburgh, 1947).
19. On the Parsonsian distinction between simple and double contingency,
322 Notes to Pages 13-16
see James Olds, The Growth and Structure ofMotives: Psychological Studies in the Theory ofAction (Glencoe, 111. , 1956).
20. For a similar argument, see Peter Fuchs, Moderne Kommunikation: Zur Theorie des operativen Displacements (Frankfurt, 1993), pp. i$ff.
21. The notion of "reading" may become questionable here, although it gen- erally includes reading poetry. At any rate, artistic perception blocks our habit- ual, hasty, carefree reading, or we are not reading the text as literature.
22. "See"Bliithenstaub,"no. 19:"DerSitzderSeeleistda,wosichInnenwelt
und Aufienwelt beriihren. Wo sie sich durchdringen, ist er in jedem Punkt der Durchdringung," quoted from Hans Joachim Mahl and Richard Samuel, eds. , Novalis: Werke, Tagebiicher und Briefs Friedrich von Hardenbergs, vol. 2 (Darm- stadt, 1978), p. 233.
23. When guided by thought, perception can distinguish between movements and changes. While driving to the gas station, I see someone climbing a ladder and changing the price tag. The man's movements are one thing, his changing of the price, in relation to before/after, is another. The man might fall off the lad- der, the prices cannot. But both can be seen! The same capacity for discrimina- tion must be present whenever we participate in communication and, once again, already at the level of perception.
24. A longer quotation is warranted here. In Jonathan Richardson, A Dis- course on the Dignity, Certainty, Pleasure and Advantage of the Science ofa Con- noisseur (1719), quoted from The Works (London, 1773; rpt. Hildesheim, 1969), pp. 241-346 (247), we read that works of art are suited "to communicate ideas;
and not only those which we may receive otherwise, but such as without this art could not possibly be communicated; whereby mankind is advanced higher in
the rational state, and made better; and that in a way easy, expeditious, and de- lightful. " See also p. 250: "Painting is another sort of writing, and is subservient
to the same ends as that of her young sister. " Richardson goes on to emphasize
the temporal advantage of painting over the much slower sequentiality of words.
25. Baumgarten, the founder of aesthetics as a special branch of philosophy, in- troduces the topic as follows: "Aesthetica (theoria liberalium artium, gnoseologia inferior, ars pulchre cogitandi, ars analogi rationis) est scientia cognitionis sensiti- vae. " Alexander Gotdieb Baumgarten, Aesthetica (Frankfurt/Oder, 1750), ? 1, p. 1. Baumgarten considered beauty the goal and perfection of sensuous knowledge (as
if we looked into the world to discover beauty, and only occasionally encountered deformities)--a figure burdened with tradition that propelled aesthetics toward its later development. See Aesthetica, ? 14, p. 6: "Aestheticesfinisest perfectio cog- nitionis sensitivae qua talis, ? 1. Haec autem est pulchritude" Baumgarten does consider other possible orientations of perception, but when sensuous cognition searches for its own perfection, beauty is the exclusive goal.
26. See also Moreno et al. , "Computational Darwinism. "
Notes to Pages 16-20
323
27. See also Niklas Luhmann, "Wie ist Bewufitsein an Kommunikation be- teiligt? " in Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds. , Materialitdt der Kommunikation (Frankfurt, 1988), pp. 884-905 (trans, as "How Can die Mind Participate in Communication? " in Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht and K. Ludwig Pfeiffer, eds. , William Whobrey, trans. , Materialities ofCommunication [Stanford, Calif. , 1994], pp. 371-87); and Luhmann, Die Wtssenschaft der Gesellschaft, pp. nff.
28. We are not investigating, in Kantian fashion, the conditions of possibility for language, nor are we conducting a Darwinian inquiry into the evolution of language.
29. In the realm of alphabetic writing. Ideographic writing in China and Japan has preserved the connection between art and writing in the form of a cherished artistic genre.
30. See Horst Wenzel, "Visibile parlare: Zur Representation der audiovisuel- len Wahrnehmung in Schrift und Bild," in Ludwig Jager and Bernd Switalla, eds. , Germanistik in der Mediengesellschaft (Munich, 1994), pp. 141-57.
31. See Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, "Stimme als Form: ZurTopik lyrischer Selb- stinszenierung im vierzehnten und funfzehnten Jahrhundert," ms. 1992.
32. This idea is not entirely new, as a quotation from David Hume would show. Compare Peter Jones, "Hume and the Beginning of Modern Aesthetics," in Peter Jones, ed. , The "Science ofMan" in the Scottish Enlightenment: Hume, Reid, and Their Contemporaries (Edinburgh, 1989), pp. 54-67. See also n. 24 above.
33. "Bliithenstaub," no. 23, Novalis, Werke, p. 237.
34. For variations on this problem, see Niklas Luhmann and Peter Fuchs, Re- den und Schweigen (Frankfurt, 1989).
35. See esp. Pierre Bourdieu, La distinction: Critique sociale du jugement de gout (Paris, 1975); Bourdieu, Ce queparler veut dire: L'economie des ichanges lin- guistiques (Paris, 1982).
36. In other words, Bourdieu's analyses make it possible to converse about Bourdieu and his analyses--but in the host's home we would be reluctant to comment on Diirer's rabbits hanging above the piano.
37. Heinz von Foerster calls this capacity "memory.
" See his "What Is Mem- ory That It May Have Hindsight and Foresight as Well? " in S. Bogoch, The Fu- ture ofthe Brain Sciences (New York, 1969), pp. 19-64.
38. This conclusion is supported by quite different theoretical foundations. For Lyotard, a "phrase" is a language event that makes a difference and vanishes
if it is not linked to other events (enchainement). See Jean-Francois Lyotard, Le differend(Paris, 1983). Regarding the consequences for aesthetics, see, e. g. , the es- say "Newman: The Instant" in Jean-Francois Lyotard, The Inhuman: Reflections on Time (Stanford, Calif, 1991), pp. 78-88. There is no need for a subject that "supports" and "grounds" the event. It realizes itself: "Occurrence is the instant which 'happens,' which 'comes' unexpectedly but which, once it is there, takes
324
Notes to Pages 21-23
its place in the network of what has happened. Any instant can be the beginning, provided that it is grasped in terms of its quod rather than its quid" (ibid. , p. 82).
39. An entirely different question is whether there is a kind of meditation, a motionless standstill of consciousness without reference that refrains from mak- ing distinctions--e. g. , in the perception of artworks, in the gardens of Zen monasteries, or in the contemplation of landscapes. But none of these types of meditation would qualify as communication related specifically to art.
40. This crucial difference between communication through art and com- munication about art is often overlooked (e. g. , by Gerhard Plumpe, Asthetische KommunikationderModerne,vol. 1,VonKantbisHegel(Opladen,1993). Asare- sult, the differentiation of an autonomous art system is treated only in terms of
the differentiation of a particular topic of communication about art.
41. Compare Kritik der Urteilskraft, ? 21-, which is a strange text in need of
clarification. On the one hand, the text glosses over the question ofwhether per- ceptions are communicable, or, to put it differendy, how that which is commu- nicable can be sorted out of what is perceived. Furthermore, the text leaves open what is currendy discussed under the topic of intersubjectivity, namely, the ques- tion concerning the transcendental conditions of possibility of an alter ego. In both respects, the text operates naively. It almost looks as if transcendental con- trols could not be introduced at all via the inner reflection on facts of conscious- ness but Only by (reflecting on) how and in what ways these facts are mediated. Let me provide an excerpt: "Erkenntnisse und Urteile miissen sich, samt der Oberzeugung, die sie begleitet, allgemein mitteilen lassen; denn sonst kame ih- nen keine Obereinstimmung mit dem Objekt zu; sie waren insgesamt ein blofi subjektives Spiel der Vorstellungskrafte, gerade so wie es der Skeptizismus ver- langt. " The problem of perception is covered up by Kant's sole concern with the (even more problematic) communication of a mental state, that is, with "die Stimmung der Erkenntniskrafte zu einer Erkenntnis uberhaupt, und zwar die- jenige Proportion, welche sich fur eine Vorstellung (wodurch uns ein Gegen- stand gegeben wird) gebiihrt, um daraus Erkenntnis zu machen. "
42. For an older account of the disposition concerning awareness/unaware-
ness in museums, see Roger de Piles, Course de peinture par principes (Paris, 1708), pp. 12-13. The painter gets annoyed or specializes in capturing the viewer's attention. In a similar vein, and roughly at the same time, Jonathan Richardson complains that gendemen "overlook the beauties which they do not expect to
find" and searches for a new science of connoisseurship that would rectify this problem. A Discourse on the Dignity, Certainty, Pleasure andAdvantage ofthe Sci- ence ofa Connoisseur (1719), quoted from The Works (London, 1773; rpt. Hilde- sheim, 1969), pp. 241-346 (244). Baudelaire begins his famous essay "Le peintre
de la vie moderne" with exactly the same observation about preinformed ob- servers (CEuvres completes, Plelade ed. [Paris, 1954], p. 881).
Notes to Pages 23-26
315
43. On the notion of the "in sich selbst Vollendete" and the idea of purpose without purpose, see Karl Philipp Moritz, Schriften zurAsthetik undPoetik: Kri- tische Ausgabe (Tubingen, 1962), p. 6. Moritz retains the category of purpose be-
cause "das Unniitze oder Unzweckmafiige [kann] unmoglich einem vernunftigen Wesen Vergniigen machen. " The naturalized anthropology of teleological orien- tation does not keep up with the development of the art system. Giving up this view would require a radical revision of what it means to be human.
44. ThismaybewhyHegelconsideredaconceptofimmediacyindispensable, although in retrospect, immediacy presents itself to thinking always as mediated. 45. "Erst durch das Kunstwerk erfahrt er [der Kiinsder, N. L. ], was er mit
seiner Thatigkeit gewollt hat," we read in Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger's Vor- lesungen uberAsthetik, ed. Karl Wilhelm Ludwig Heyse (Leipzig, 1829; rpt. Darm- stadt, 1973), p. 115. And on p. 122: "Dem Kiinsder entstehtdas Kunstwerk mehr, als es von ihm gemacht wild. Er lernt seinen vollen Vorsatz und seine Idee selbst erst dann ganz kennen, wenn das Kunstwerk vollendet ist. "
46. Using Franz Erhard Walther's conception of art as example, Michael
Lingner shows that artists themselves not only see but also want to see their role
in such terms. "Kunst als Projekt der Aufklarung jenseits reiner Vernunft," in
Michael Lingner, ed. , Das Haus in dem ich wohne: Die Theorie zum Werkentwurf 2
von Franz Erhard Walther (Klagenfurt, 1990), pp. 15-53 (4 ff-)- See also the other contributions in the same volume.
47. Specifically on this point, see Winfried Menninghaus, "Genie und Un- sinn: Zur Poetik Immanuel Kants und Ludwig Tiecks," quoted from ms. , 1994. 48. According to Friedrich Schlegel, poetry, too, ought to be treated as art.
See his Gesprdch uber die Poesie, quoted from Werke in zwei Banden (Berlin, 1980), vol. 2, p. 155. Obviously, Schlegel's demand does not go without saying, or else there would be no need for it.
49. Cleanth Brooks arrives at this conclusion on the basis of thoroughgoing interpretations. See his The Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure ofPoetry (New York, 1947). For a summary of Brooks's position, see pp. i92ff; for an ab- breviated version, see p. 74: "The Poem says what the poem says," and it cannot
be said in any other way. And p. 201: "to refer . . . to . . . a paraphrase of the poem is to refer . . . to something outside the poem. " In the meantime, this view
has advanced to the level of textbook knowledge. See, e. g. , John Ciardi and Miller Williams, How Does a Poem Mean? (1959; 2d ed. Boston, 1975).
50. See Christoph Menke-Eggers, Die Souveranitdt der Kunst: Asthetische Er- fahrung nach Adorno undDerrida (Frankfurt, 1988), pp. 4$ff.
51. Experts in modern literature are aware of explicidy unreadable texts. Such texts, however, only intensify a limitation that has always existed.
52. For an elaboration of this point, see Chapter 3, below.
53. See Dietrich Schwanitz, "Zeit und Geschichte im Roman--Interaktion
326 Notes to Pages 26-29
und Gesellschaft im Drama: Zur wechselseitigen Erhellung von Systemtheorie und Literatur," in Dirk Baecker et al. , eds. , Theorie als Passion (Frankfurt, 1987), pp. 181-213.
54. In order to elucidate the self-reference of poems (as opposed to hetero- reference), Earl R. Wasserman, The Subtler Language: Critical Readings ofNeo-
Classic and Romantic Poems (Baltimore, 1959), p. 7, speaks of "the interactive capacities of any of the properties of words . . . including connotation and the ca- pacity of a word to carry more than one reference as a symbol, metaphor, ambigu- ity, or pun; position and repetition; word order; sound, rhyme; even orthography. "
55. For an older formulation of this principle (comparing it to the oudine in the visual arts), see Moritz, Schriften zur Asthetik, pp. 99f.
56. Umberto Eco, for example, defines the concept of form as "un tutto or- ganico" {Opera aperta [1962; 6th ed. Milan, 1988], p. 22. )
57. See, e. g. , Abraham Moles, Information Theory and Esthetic Perception (Ur- bana, 111. , 1966), p. 57: "Byform (Gestalt) we mean here a group of elements per- ceived as a whole and not as the product of a random collection. More precisely,
a form is a message, which appears to the observer as not being the result of ran- dom events. "
58. Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art and Painting in Partic- ular(1912; Engl, trans. New York, 1947), p. 47.
59. Ciardi and Williams, How Does a Poem Mean? p. xxii (authors' emphasis). 60. Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm, p. 1.
61. Gilles Deleuze, Logique du sens (Paris, 1969), pp. 37, 41.
62. We shall encounter this insight again under rhe name of "autopoiesis. " 63. Stephan Mussil, "Literaturwissenschaft, Systemtheorie und der Begriff der
Beobachtung," in Henk de Berg and Matthias Prangel, eds. , Kommunikation und Differenz: Systemtheoretische Ansatze in der Literatur- und Kunstwissenscha. fi (Opladen, 1993), pp. 183-202. Mussil points out correctly that the world prior to
all distinctions (for which Spencer Brown has no concept) must be distinguished from the "unmarked space" that emerges when a "marked space" is severed. Ini- tially, Spencer Brown uses only the second concept, which designates the space accessible from the marked space by crossing its boundary. This conceptual lim- itation, while it serves the purposes of a calculus, does not exclude an inquiry into
the state of the world that is severed by the injunction "draw a distinction. " Nor does it prevent us from thematizing the unity of the distinction between marked and unmarked space. Spencer Brown acknowledges this by introducing the con- cept of the "unwritten cross" during a later phase of his calculus. (Spencer Brown, Laws of Form, p. 7. ) See also, Matthias Varga von Kibed and Rudolf Matzka, "Motive und Grundgedanken der 'Gesetze der Form,'" in Dirk Baecker, ed. , Kalkul der Form (Frankfurt, 1993), pp. 58-85 (691". , 77); as well as Hegel's distinc- tion between the infinite as the opposite of the finite and as true infinity in his
Notes to Pages 30-31
327
Vorlesungentiberdie Philosophie der Religion I, quoted from Werke, vol. 16 (Frank- furt, 1969), pp. i78f. For the purpose of distinguishing these two concepts, we
shall speak of the unmarked state when referring to a state of the world prior to
all distinctions and of the concept of the unmarked space when referring to the opposite of the marked space.
64. "And, if such a verse as this/may not claim another kiss. " From "Claim- ing a Second Kiss by Desert," quoted from Ben Jonson, The Complete Poems (New Haven, Conn. , 1975), pp. i3if.
65. The internal rhetoric of the Art & Language Group uses the term re- description but primarily for styles or exemplary works. See Michael Baldwin, Charles Harrison, Mel Ramsden, "On Conceptual Art and Painting, and Speak- ing and Seeing: Three Corrected Transcripts," Art-Language, n. s. 1 (1994): 30-69. However, the full significance of a continual reactualization of "redescriptions" becomes apparent only when it is referred to individual acts arranged as a form. Then we recognize that we are dealing with attempts to objectify double contin- gency, to observe works of art as conversations. Baldwin et al. (p. 63) speak of a "dialogic aura" (where "aura" could be taken to imply a reference to the un- marked space). I am grateful to Christian Matthiessen for arranging a meeting with the members of the Art & Language Group.
66. For an analysis using modern theoretical means, see, e. g. , Friedrich Cramer, "Schonheit als dynamisches Grenzphanomen zwischen Chaos und Ordnung-- ein neuer Laokoon," Selbstorganisation 4 (1993): 79-102.
6j. Spencer Brown, Laws ofForm.
68. Michael Riffaterre, Semiotics ofPoetry (Bloomington, Ind. , 1978), p. 26, understands the poetic value of neologisms in terms of a "a relationship between two equivalent forms, one marked and one unmarked. The unmarked form an- tedates the text, the marked one does not. " See also his "Po&ique du n^olo- gisme," in Riffaterre, La production du texte (Paris, 1979), pp. 61-74.
