No More Learning

How, in other words, can one abstract from a system that is fully established at the level of second-order observation and return to the paradise of first-order ob- servation? Usually this happens when the artist allows himself to be capti- vated by his own work while observing its emergence. But this begs the question of how one can demonstrate, or make observable, that one is not irritated, influenced, or manipulated by the fact of being observed.
Perhaps this problem is merely one of the forms in which art reflects, for its own sake and for the sake of other functional systems, on what modern society has rendered impossible.
X
The question of how the world can observe itself is not new, nor can it
84
be traced exclusively to Wittgenstein.
world order and the erosion of the observation of God as world observer, the questions arose: "Who else? " and "What else? " At this moment the subject began to announce itself, occasionally under the pseudonym "Spirit. " Here, ever since romanticism, art has found its niche. One re- jected alternative options for the self-observation of the world, above all, those provided by physics. "Suppose we think of nature as a self-conscious being," writes August Wilhelm Schlegel, "what would it consider the
85
greatest imposition? To study itself in terms of experimental physics. " He meant that nature finds its way "blindly. " In the twentieth century, one can no longer follow this. Instead, the world's self-observation has fallen primarily into the domain of physics, which must take into account its physically functioning tools, including living physicists, so that the world can observe itself in a manner that is irritating (and therefore in need of reflection). In this situation, can "poetry" still compete? Now that
With the retreat of the religious
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 91
such an epistemological insight is everywhere, how can poetry stand the pressure of reflection it is bound to apply to itself?
In mathematics, physics, biology, and sociology alike, the form of re- flection adapts to the radicality with which the problem is framed. A prob- lem of second-order observation is always at stake--how to observe how the world observes itself, how a marked space emerges from the unmarked space, how something becomes invisible when something else becomes visible. The generality of these questions allows one to determine more precisely what art can contribute to solving this paradox of the invisibi- lization that accompanies making something visible.
The shift to a level of second-order observation radically alters what is presupposed as the world. The first-order observer finds his objects amidst other objects and events. He can assume that his observations are linked to other objects and events and together constitute a world. To him, the world is a universitas rerum. Since he cannot see everything, he imagines invisible things. This leads to the development of symbols that represent the invisible in the visible world. Among other things, art can take over such symbolizing functions.
The second-order observer, by contrast, observes the distinctions that first-order observers (including himself) employ to emphasize and indicate something. This operation renders the world invisible. First, the world it- self cannot be observed. The act of observing, which constitutes itself in the move from an unmarked to a marked space, does not make the un- marked space disappear. (It is not clear how this could happen without a prior marking of that space. ) Rather, observation preserves that space as a necessary component of its capacity to distinguish. The unmarked space remains the other side of the form. Second, the distinguishing operation produces a two-sided form that cannot be observed as a unity (unless one employs yet another distinction) and thus remains invisible in the opera- tion. In this twofold sense, the notion of a final unity--of an "ultimate re- ality" that cannot assume a form because it has no other side--is displaced into the unobservable. With regard to the world, the distinction between inside and outside does not apply. Nor does it make sense to say that the world has an inside but no outside. The inside/outside distinction is a "pri-
86
mary distinction" that must be introduced into the world.
of the world is retained to indicate reality in its entirety, then it is that which--to a second-order observer--remains invisible in the movements of observation (his own and those of others).
If the concept
9 2 Observation of the First and of the Second Order
From this perspective, art can no longer be understood as an imitation pf something that presumably exists along with and outside of art, al- though both artworks and artists can be found and indicated in the world along with other observers. To the extent that imitation is still possible, it now imitates the world's invisibility, a nature that can no longer be appre- hended as a whole and must therefore be represented by emphasizing its
87
curves, its "lines of beauty. "
Art activates distinctions that operate in a
"connexionist" manner, thus hiding the unity of the distinction that guides
the observation. Regarding texts (and with a slightly different slant) one
might speak with Kristeva of a "zone of multiple marks and intervals whose
non-centered inscription makes possible in practice a multi-valence with-
88
out unity. "
Theology initially investigated such issues in conjunction with the no-
tion of God. Inspired by the idea of God as observer, theology began to observe this observer, even though it was forced to concede that an ob- server who creates and sustains the world by virtue of his observation ex-
89
cludes nothing and hence cannot assume an observable form.
nalizing this paradox and by incorporating the notion of observing the unobservable into the idea of God, one sought to shield the conventional notion of the world as universitas rerum from infection by logical para- doxes. To the extent, however, that modern society imbued all of its func- tional systems with second-order observation and itself ceased to provide a stable counterbalance, the concept of the world had to be altered. The world was now conceived, along the lines of a Husserlian metaphor, as an unreachable horizon that retreats further with each operation, without ever holding out the prospect of an outside.
This epochal turning point results in a shift in the "eigenvalues" that gain stability in the recursive operations of observing observations. With
90
regard to the world, they assume the modality of contingency. Whatever
exists or is made in the world could be otherwise. At least so far as con- cerns the world, the counterconcepts of necessity and impossibility are dropped; henceforth they apply only to temporally or regionally limited affairs. The world no longer owes its stability to a scaffold of essential forms that separate the necessary from the impossible. All forms, espe- cially the forms of art, must persist against the challenge that they could be different. They convince by evoking alternative possibilities while neu- tralizing any preference for forms not chosen.
However, the contingency of forms by no means prevents us from estab-
By exter-
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 93
lishing what is so in everyday life. To the first-order observer, the world re- mains exactly what it used to be. And any second-order observer is always also a first-order observer to the extent that he must focus on the observer he wants to observe. Systems theory, too, needs to establish a system refer- ence from which it can observe how a given system observes itself and the world. Not everything is other than what it is, nor does the unobservabil- ity of the world imply that we can no longer find our way from one place to the next because there is nothing "in between. " But understanding the specificity of modern society and of modern art requires taking into ac- count that these systems establish their advanced structures recursively at the level of second-order observation and that they have become so adapted to this situation that it is difficult to imagine how society could continue to operate if it were to regress entirely to a level of first-order observation.
This confirms once again that in the modern world neither consensus nor authenticity can be taken for granted or presumed to be attainable. Neither the unobservable world nor the paradox of form can secure these conditions. It means further that individuals cannot participate "authen- tically" in matters of consensus and that consensus cannot be justified simply by pointing out that individuals consent without force (that is, au- thentically). Such losses must be accepted by a society that carries out its most important operations at the level of second-order observation. The notion of the individual has long since adapted to that situation.
Individuals are self-observers. They become individuals by observing their own observations. Today, they are no longer defined by birth, by so- cial origin, or by characteristics that distinguish them from all other indi- viduals. Whether baptized or not, they are no longer "souls" in the sense of indivisible substances that guarantee an eternal life. One might argue with Simmel, Mead, or Sartre that they acquire their identity through the gaze of others, but only on condition that they observe that they are being observed.
Participating in art (which is neither necessary nor impossible) provides an opportunity for individuals to observe themselves as observers and to experience themselves as individuals. Since in art their experience is medi- ated by the perception of improbable things and events, the chances for self-observation are greater than in verbal communication. It does not mat- ter whether one acts or experiences "uniquely" in the sense of employing forms that occur only to oneself and that are inaccessible to anyone else. How could one, if there is no way to prove it? The point of self-observation
9 4 Observation of the First and of the Second Order
is not to cultivate self-reference at the expense of hetero-reference. It is merely a question of attributing visual perceptions to a perceiver, thus cre- ating an awareness of contingency that relies neither on necessities nor on impossibilities. By no means is the individual free to interpret at will. We learn from participating in art that any attempt at arbitrary interpretation is thwarted, and in what ways. This is why we can remain content with ob- serving ourselves as observers despite the fact that there is no ultimate cer- tainty of the One, the True, and the Good.
XI
The old European tradition explained the nature of society (domestic
or political) by appealing to the nature of man. From the very beginning,
however, the notion of a common nature contained a time bomb, built
into the necessity of distinguishing human nature from other creatures.
The rift between human and nonhuman nature continued to deepen--
partly because of religious concerns about "souls" and their salvation,
pardy because of the growing demands an increasingly complex society
placed on human resources. In the transition to the modern age, special-
ized human faculties such as reason and cunning were sharply empha-
91
sized. As a result, the natural foundation of society began to erode, and
its unity had to be reconstituted on the basis of reasonable motives-- hence the escape into a social contract that engages subjects and no longer relies on objects to stabilize society. Even German Idealism, despite its im- portance for aesthetics, never managed to develop a theory of observation that would acknowledge the dependence of observation on distinctions. Distinctions began to multiply, but they were always taken to be a pre- liminary step in the inquiry into the ultimate unity or ground proclaimed
92
under the name of the Idea or the Ideal.
The trajectory of this line of
questioning ends in a rejection of ontological metaphysics and the hu-
manist tradition--in the postulate of an "exemplary Being" or the reduc-
tion of society to the anonymity of the "they," as in Heidegger's Being and
93
Time, which preserves the traces of the tradition it rejects.
In the course of modernization, previous forms of grounding society in nature lost their plausibility. A normative concept of social unity displaced nature--by transforming natural law into a law of reason, by introducing the doctrine of the social contract, or by advancing the notion, shared by sociologists such as Durkheim and Parsons, that the unity and persistence
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 9 5
of society depend on a moral or, at any rate, a value-driven consensus. To- day, this notion still blocks recognition of the unity of a global system or world society, apparently because of a prevailing need for security, partic- ularly in modern society. Appeals to solidarity seek to compensate for dra- matically increasing inequalities that are still interpreted in stratificatory terms and experienced as unjust. In the face of the inevitable insecurity and volatility of crucial structures, one holds on to basic expectations, even though they are frustrated in the particular instance. The obligatory form of the normative brings this about, although it can promise nothing but counterfactual validity.
By contrast, many domains lack normative determination, especially when seen from the viewpoint of the individual. Consider love or money. Norms cannot prescribe or prohibit whether or not we love and whom. The economy would collapse (or lose its unique rationality) if rules pre- scribed how we should spend our money. Some normative constraints cer- tainly do exist in these domains. As one can learn from specific cases or from the movies, love is no excuse for espionage, and there are countless legal constraints on business transactions. But the core of these symboli- cally generalized media eludes normative regulation in much the same way as the interior of the home once did.
This basic fact refutes any theory that would establish the structure of society in the normative domain--in a tacitly assumed social contract or in a moral consensus. No one denies that expectations need to be pro- tected against disappointment. This is indispensable, as are many other things. Such protection is above all the function of law, and without law there is no society. But neither the unity nor the reproduction (auto- poiesis) of society can be reduced to that function.
All of this concerns the function of second-order observation--hence this lengthy excursus. Second-order observation takes the place of the su- pervisory authorities that a normative theory of the social system would consider indispensable and name as such. The second-order observer may be a guardian but is not necessarily so. He is not adequately described-- following the tradition of the past two centuries--as a critic who knows better. Rather, by reducing and increasing the complexity that is available to communication, his function is to arrive at a level compatible with the autopoiesis of the social system.
Second-order observation has a toxic quality. It alters one's immediate contact with the world, eroding the mode of first-order observation, which
9 6 Observation of the First and of the Second Order
it nonetheless retains. It plants the seeds of suspicion within the life-world (in the Husserlian sense) without being able to leave that world. While the first-order observer could still cherish the hope of penetrating beneath the surface and grasping a Being beyond appearance, the second-order observer harbors suspicion about this "philosophical" project. He is not particularly fond of wisdom and know-how, nor does he love knowledge. Rather, he wants to understand how knowledge is produced and by whom, and how long the illusion might last. To him, Being is an observational schema that produces "ontology," and nature is nothing more than a concept that promises a comfortable end and blocks further questioning. Equally toxic is the second-order observer's penchant for questioning the "meaning of life"--for roughly one hundred years, from the mid-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth, he was intoxicated by this question, only to realize that it, too, must be observed as nothing more than the specialty of a certain epoch.
But this analysis already assumes the position of an observer of the third (and ultimate) order. Or we are second-order observers who draw the au- tological conclusion and observe ourselves as second-order observers. As second-order observers, we can balance our account, though without hope of finding a resting place or final formula. Second-order observation makes possible various types of communication--both utterance and un- derstanding--that would be inconceivable without it. Modern art is a good example. It cannot be adequately described as supporting the nor- mative pretensions of religion or political power, nor does it progress to- ward ever more excellent works, spurred on by perpetual self-criticism. Art makes visible possibilities of order that would otherwise remain invis- ible. It alters the conditions of visibility/invisibility in the world by keep- ing invisibility constant and making visibility subject to variation. In short, art generates forms that would never exist without it. Whether this justifies the existence of art is a gratuitous question. For sociologists it suf- fices to take note of the fact that this is happening here and nowhere else.
Our insistence on distinctions as forms of observation adds little that is new. The theory of art has always used distinctions (otherwise, it would have been unable to observe, at least in terms of our theoretical concept), and it distinguished distinctions that play a role in art. This raises the ques- tion of what new insights the concept of observation (first- and second- order observation) has to offer. The answer is: it traces the problem of unity back to the ultimate form of paradox.
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 97
The tradition did not dare to take this step, despite its sensitivity to dis- tinctions and its oscillation between a skeptical and worldly philosophical taste and a more idealistic one.
To illustrate this point, we select two extreme cases from the final days
of rhetoric and of German Idealism. Baltasar Gracian's Agudezay arte de
ingenio^ consists of nothing but distinctions--presented one after the
other apparently without any order. Nonetheless, the text is held to-
gether by a distinct motive, namely, by the question of how one can
cause effects in a world that generates and feeds on appearances. Refer-
ring to text-art, his answer is: by arranging the textual body in a beauti-
ful fashion. Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger's lectures on aesthetics are
equally chaotic and almost compulsive in assigning distinctions, mainly
because he inherits many of his distinctions from an eighteenth-century
95
tradition.
meaning. This unity is presupposed in the idea of beauty, which he con- ceives of as neither a goal nor a product but as a primordial unity that supports and renders possible the Aufhebung of all distinctions. In Gra- cian's text, the meaning of the world is opaque and inaccessible but taken for granted in a religious sense. For Solger, the world recommends itself by virtue of its ultimate values. His argument is interchangeable with re- ligious formulas without depending on them. In both cases, an unques-
tionedpremisepoints the argument toward an ultimate unity. The concept of observation drops this premise. It takes the unity of form, of every distinction, as a self-induced blockage of observation, whose form is paradox. Paradox is nothing more than an invitation to search for dis- tinctions that, for the time being, are plausible enough to be employed "direcdy" without raising questions regarding their unity or the sameness of what they distinguish.
This shift from unity to difference has far-reaching consequences. It displaces, for example, the metaphysical premise of the world as Being by suggesting that it is always possible (albeit questionable) to focus one's ob- servations on the distinction between being and nonbeing. This means, in the theory of art, that the notion of "beauty" as an ultimate value, a value that excludes only what is inferior and what can be dismissed, must be re- placed by die logical concept of a positive/negative coding of the system's operations. One might ask whether it still makes sense to speak of beauty to indicate the positive value of the art system's code. But in view of the paradigm shift at issue here, this is merely a question of terminology.
But Solger, too, cannot do without a unity that provides
9 8 Observation of the First and of the Second Order
XII
Second-order cybernetics, the theory of observing systems, has much in common with the critique of ontological metaphysics debated under the name of "deconstruction" in the wake of Jacques Derrida's and Paul de Man's work. Deconstruction has become fashionable above all in theories of literary criticism in the United States. These theories refer to what is given using the concept "text" and designate the operation concerning it "reading. " The theory of deconstruction (if it is a theory at all) is thus compelled to draw autological conclusions, because it merely generates texts for readers.
This insight surrounds deconstruction with an aura of radicalism that
96
provokes comparison with the theory of second-order observation.
find a common ground for such a comparison, we must expand the no- tion of the text to include every object in need of interpretation. This in- cludes any kind of artwork. "Reading" then turns into "observing," or, if one's goal is to produce texts, "describing. " Deconstruction questions the
"materiality" of objects that suggest the presence of something to be de- scribed. The critique of this assumption--of the presumed distinction be- tween a given text and its interpretation, or between a material object and its description--is one of the most crucial insights that has emerged from
97
the context of deconstruction.
pretation is, for its part, a textual distinction. Like any other distinction, it presupposes itself as its own blind spot, which deconstructive tech- niques can point out and emphasize as indispensable.
The theory of observing systems has no difficulties with this proposi- tion. What distinguishes and constrains deconstruction is a kind of affect directed against the ontologico-metaphysical premises of Being, presence, and representation. As a result, the dissolution of metaphysics is preoccu- pied with affirming itself through perpetual self-dissolution. All distinc- tions can be deconstructed without exception if one asks why they, rather than others, rely on their own blindness to distinguish and indicate some- thing specific. The theory of second-order observation provides more ele- gant and more rigorous forms for such a project. It can do without the assumption of given (existential) incompatibilities and restricts itself to observing the incompatibilities that arise, at the operational level, among
98
the observations of a given system.
tological concepts. But even if we accept this proposition, we still might
The distinction between text and inter-
It need no longer seek refuge in on-
To
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 99
ask whether some constructions have proven more stable than others, al- though they, too, can be deconstructed.
At this point, it might be worthwhile to shift our attention away from deconstruction's philosophical radicalism--the heir of ancient skepticism --toward scientific research. In this domain, the theory of self-referential systems has much to offer. It can accept the deconstructive reservation while pointing out the cognitive benefits one gains if one abstains, for the time being, from deconstructing this distinction.
The distinction between (self-referential, operatively closed) systems and (excluded) environments allows us to reformulate the distinction be- tween text and interpretation. The materiality of texts or other works of art always belongs to the environment and can never become a component of the system's operational sequences. But the system's operations deter- mine how texts and other objects in the environment are identified, ob- served, and described. The system produces references as its own opera- tions, but it can do so only if it is capable of distinguishing between self-reference and hetero-reference, if, in other words, it can determine whether it refers to itself or to something other. The next step is to specify the kind of operation by which the system reproduces itself. The distinc- tion between perception and communication prepares the ground for such a move. Just like the deconstructionists, we can now deconstruct the con- cept (the distinction) of the "reader" and replace it with the concept of communication, which situates our theoretical design within a general theory of social systems and, in particular, a theory of the social system.
These interventions (all of which, as we point out again, can be decon- structed) connect our findings to empirical research that works with a sys- tems-theoretical design. This holds for the type of research that goes by the name of "cognitive science" but also for the sociology of social systems. With these assumptions in mind, we can set out to explore whether, and in what ways, the historical specificity of modern art can be understood in terms of the differentiation of a specialized functional system of society.
XIII
A final remark will distinguish second-order observation from the cher- ished criticalattitude that has been with us since the eighteenth century. A critic knows and makes known what is wrong with others. Although it refers to the external world, critique has a strong self-referential compo-
i o o Observation of the First and of the Second Order
nent. This is why it was long hailed as a scientific, if not a political, achievement. The critical attitude--and therein lies its historical signifi- cance--launched a search for acceptable criteria and suffered shipwreck in the process, repeating the effort over and over again with ever more ab- stract means. Armed with philosophical pretensions, aesthetics reacted against this manner of criticizing art and taste. In the wake of the critique of an ontologically grounded metaphysics, a long philosophical tradition emphasized subjective knowledge, the will to power (the claim to master existence through an affirmation of repetition), and finally "Being" itself or writing. In this context, one should mention Kant, Nietzsche, Heideg- ger, and Derrida. Eventually, identity was displaced by difference, and rea- sons gave way to paradoxes in an attempt to gain jfritical distance from preestablished models--until critique itself was recognized as a historical phenomenon, a "sign of the times," a possibility residing in a belatedness that allows for the contemplation of already printed and finished products.
Second-order observation refrains from critique. It is no longer de- ceived by the inherent ambiguity of the word krinein (to separate, distin- guish, judge). It resolutely embraces a perspective interested in "how" things emerge, rather than in "what" they are.
Evidence for this tendency abounds. Consider, for example, the widely accepted shift from substan- tive to procedural rationality. " The critics, who will probably still be around for a while, tend to respond to this shift with the evasive question: What's the point if one can no longer state the point of one's endeavors?
There is a response to this question. If one cannot deny that there are observers in the world (the critic can do so only in the form of performa- tive contradiction), then a theory that claims universality must acknowl- edge their existence; in other words, it must learn how to observe obser- vations. And it cannot help realizing that second-order observation has been around for a long time and operates today at structurally important junctions in society.
This is not to silence the critics. Nor are we proposing a paradoxical cri- tique of criticism. Plenty of work remains to be done if one wants to fig- ure out what is wrong--whether witli metaphysics or with the system of public garbage disposal. All we want is to raise the possibility for second- order observation so we can ask what kinds of distinctions the critics work with and why they prefer these distinctions to others.
Perhaps the art system is a good starting point for such a revision. As early as the eighteenth century, art critics became targets of a criticism fu-
Observation of the First and of the Second Order 101
eled by artistic experience. Critique was soon exiled from art to find a home in philosophy, which at least refrained from criticizing works of art. After the short-lived revival of critique in the romantic notion of reflec- tion, we arrive at an unmatched historicism that exploits the advanced ob- servational possibilities that come with belatedness, focusing on what kinds of distinctions have been used in the past and feeling the urge to cross their inner boundaries. The observation of previous limitations leads to the possibility--as if on its own--of doing things differently. Or bet- ter--who could tell? That is beside the point.
? 3 Medium and Form
I
The art system operates on its own terms, but an observer of art can choose many different distinctions to indicate what he observes. The choice is his. Of course, there is an obligation to do justice to the object and its surrounding distinctions. It would be wrong to say an object is made of granite if it is really made of marble. But what about the distinc- tion granite/marble? Why not old/new, or cheap/expensive, or "Should we put this object into the house or in the garden? " Theory has even more freedom in choosing its distinctions--and this is why it needs justification!
In the first chapter we introduced the distinction perception/commu- nication in order to keep distinct system references separate. We further distinguished operation/observation and system/environment. When one deals with multiple distinctions, their relative significance becomes a the- oretical problem that can be resolved only through further investigation. Any somewhat complex theory needs more than just one distinction, and whether it makes sense to arrange distinctions hierarchically (by distin- guishing them in rank) is doubtful, although familiar terms such as systems theory might suggest a conceptual hierarchy.
This chapter is about the distinction between medium and form as ex-
1
emplified in the domain of art. That distinction is meant to replace the
distinction substance/accidence, or object/properties--a guiding distinc- tion, crucial for any object-oriented ontology, that has long been criti- cized. The question is: With what can we replace it? By defining properties in terms of object determinations (colors, for example, as determinations
102
Medium and Form 103
of paintings) this distinction separates the "internal" too sharply from the
"external," or subject from object. The distinction between primary and
secondary qualities was meant to correct this bias. However, it ended up
dividing the problem between subjects and objects rather than suggesting
the compelling consequence that both entities, subjects andob)ects, must
be thought "ecstatically. " Nor does the distinction between being and hav-
2
ing, favored by many critics of modernity, point beyond this impasse.
The distinction between medium and form suggests another primary distinction designed to replace and render obsolete the object-oriented on- tological concept of matter. In traditional notions of matter, one thinks of
3
the wax mass that suffers the engraving and erasure of inscriptions. From
a systems-theoretical standpoint, by contrast, both media and forms are constructed by the system and therefore always presuppose a specific sys- tem reference. They are not given "as such. " The distinction between me- dium and form, just like the concept of information, is strictly internal to the system. There is no corresponding difference in the environment. Nei- ther media nor forms "represent" system states of an ultimately physical nature. The perceptual medium of "light," for example, is not a physical concept but rather a construct that presupposes the difference between lightness and darkness. Accordingly, the internally projected distinction between medium and form is relevant exclusively to the art system (just as monetary media and prices are relevant only to the economy), even though the distinction can be applied not only to art but equally well to nature, in a manner that transcends the boundaries of both.
What both sides of the medium/form distinction have in common,
and what distinguishes this distinction from other distinctions, lies in the 4
notion of a coupling of elements. The term element does not refer to natural constants--particles, souls, or individuals--that any observer
5
would identify as the same. Rather, it always points to units constructed
(distinguished) by an observing system--to units for counting money,
for example, or to tones in music. Furthermore, these elements cannot be
self-sufficient in the sense that they could determine or in-form them-
6
selves. They must be thought of as dependent on couplings. They would
be invisible as pure self-references, since one can observe them only by using distinctions. Certain media employ the same elements but distin- guish themselves with regard to the coupling--loose or tight--of their elements.
Let us begin with the notion of medium, which applies to cases of
104 Medium and Form
"loosely coupled" elements. The choice of terminology is awkward, but
7
since the concept has been introduced in the literature, we adopt it here. Loose coupling has nothing to do with a loose screw, for example. Rather, the concept indicates an open-ended multiplicity of possible connections that are still compatible with the unity of an element--such as the num- ber of meaningful sentences that can be built from a single semantically identical word.
To decompose further whatever functions as an "element" in specific media is to broach the operatively impalpable--just as in physics, where the question of whether we are dealing with particles or waves boils down to a matter of prejudice. There are, in other words, no ultimate units whose identity would not refer back to the observer. Hence, there is no in- dication without a sufficient (observable) operation that executes it.
Loose coupling, which leaves room for multiple combinations, can be understood in both a factual and a temporal sense. Factually, it means that a number of tight couplings are likely and selection is inevitable. Tempo- rally speaking, a medium is often understood as a condition for transfers. In addition, there are close ties to the theory of memory, if memory is un- derstood in terms of a delay in the reactualization of meaning. An ob- server must employ modal-theoretical terms to describe such media.
This explains further why media can be recognized only by the contin- gency of the formations that make them possible. (This insight corre- sponds to the old doctrine that matter as such, as sheer chaos, is inacces-
8
sible to consciousness. ) Observed from within the schema of medium
and form, all forms appear accidental; or, to put it differently, no form ever expresses the "essence" of the medium. This is another way of for- mulating the insight that what matters is the distinction between medium and form; we are dealing with two sides that cannot be separated or thought of in isolation. This leads to the realization that the distinction between medium and form is itself a form, a form with two sides, one of which--the side of the form--contains itself. The distinction between medium and form is a paradoxical construct insofar as it reenters itself
9
and reappears within one of its sides.
Forms are generated in a medium via a tight coupling of its elements.
This process, too, presupposes two-sided forms, and our two-sided con- cept of form remains valid here. The forms that emerge from the tight coupling of a medium's possibilities distinguish themselves (their inside) from the remaining possibilities contained in the medium (their out-
Medium and Form 105
10
side).
rather than with its general form, for which the other side is the sur- rounding unmarked space.
The specificity of the medium/form distinction points to the emergence of distinctive features of such forms. This specificity depends on evolution. Forms are always stronger and more assertive than the medium. The medium offers no resistance--words cannot struggle against the forma- tion of phrases any more than money can refuse to be paid at specific prices. Of course, media impose limits on what one can do with them. Since they consist of elements, media are nonarbitrary. But their arsenal of possibilities is generally large enough to prevent fixation on a few forms. If this happened, then the medium/form distinction would collapse.
We can further elucidate the medium/form distinction by means of the distinction between redundancy and variety. The elements that form the medium through their loose coupling--such as letters in a certain kind of writing or words in a text--must be easily recognizable. They carry litde information themselves, since the informational content of an artwork must be generated in the course of its formation. The formation of the work creates surprise and assures variety, because there are many ways in which the work can take shape and because, when observed slowly, the work invites the viewer to contemplate alternate possibilities and to ex-
11
periment with formal variations.
It is worth noting that forms, rather than exhausting the medium, re-
generate its possibilities. This is remarkable and can be easily demonstrated with reference to the role of words in the formation of utterances. Forms fulfill this regenerating function, because their duration is typically shorter than the duration of the medium. Forms, one might say, couple and de- couple the medium. This feature highlights the correlation between the medium/form difference and a theory of memory. The medium supports the retarding function (which regulates the reuse of elements in new forms) that underlies all memory. Memory does not store items belonging to the past (how could it? ); memory postpones repetition. The creation of forms, by contrast, fulfills an equally important function for memory, namely, the function of discrimination, remembering and forgetting. We remember the elements we frequently employ when creating forms and forget the ones we never use. In this way, a system memory can delimit it-
12
self by adapting to the incidents the system experiences as chance events. The difference between medium and form implies a distinctly tempo-
Of course, we are dealing with a special case of distinguishing
io6 Medium and Form
ral aspect as well. The medium is more stable than the form, because it re- quires only loose couplings. No matter how short-lived or lasting they turn out to be, forms can be created without exhausting the medium or causing it to disappear along with the form. As we noted earlier, the me- dium receives without resistance the forms that are possible within it, but die form's resilience is paid for with instability. Even this account is far too simple. It disregards the fact that the medium can be observed only via forms, never as such. The medium manifests itself only in the relationship between constancy and variety that obtains in individual forms. A form, in other words, can be observed through the schema of constant/variable,
13
because it is always a form-in-a-medium.
Finally, let us return to the notion that media and forms consist of
(loosely or tightly coupled) elements. Such elements always also function as forms in another medium. Words and tones, for example, constitute forms in the acoustic medium just as letters function as forms in the opti- cal medium of the visible. This terminology does not allow for the bound- ary concept of matter as defined by the metaphysical tradition, where matter designates the complete indeterminacy of being regarding its readi- ness to assume forms. Media are generated from elements that are always already formed. Otherwise, we couldn't speak of their loose or tight cou- pling. This situation contains possibilities for an evolutionary arrange- ment of medium/form relationships in steps, which, as we shall see
14
shortly, entails an essential precondition for understanding art.
fore turning to art, let us consider yet another example that illustrates the generality of this step-wise arrangement. In the medium of sound, words are created by constricting the medium into condensable (reiterable) forms that can be employed in the medium of language to create utter- ances (for the purpose of communication). The potential for forming ut- terances can again serve as the medium for forms known as myths or nar- ratives, which, at a later stage, when the entire procedure is duplicated in the optical medium of writing, also become known as textual genres or theories. Theories can subsequently be coupled in the medium of the truth code to form a network of consistent truths. Such truths function as forms whose outside consists of untruths lacking consistency. How far we can push this kind of stacking depends on the evolutionary processes that lead to the discovery of forms. The logic of the distinction between me- dium and form cannot determine the limits of what may be possible in this regard. It does, however, permit judgments concerning chains of de-
But be-
Medium and Form 107
pendencies that point to the kinds of evolutionary achievements that must be present so that further, more and more improbable constellations can arise. Most likely, we will be able to demonstrate sequences of this sort in the evolution of art as well.
II
The most general medium that makes both psychic and social systems possible and is essential to their functioning can be called "meaning"
15
[Sinn]. Meaning is compatible with the temporalized manner in which
psychic and social systems operate. It is compatible, in other words, with the way these systems constitute their elements exclusively in the form of events that are bound to a certain point in time (such elements are unlike particles, which possess a duration of their own and can be altered, repli- cated, or replaced). Meaning assures that the world remains accessible to the events that constitute the system--in the form of actualized contents of consciousness or communications--although they vanish as soon as they emerge, each appearing for the first and for the last time. The world itself is never accessible as a unity--as a whole, or totality, a mystical "all at once"--but is available only as a condition and domain for the tempo- ral processing of meaning. Each meaning-event can lead to another. The question is: How?
Initially, the problem presents itself as follows: no matter how distinct, how obtrusive and indubitable any momentary actualization may be, meaning can represent the world accessible from a given position only in the form of a referential surplus, that is, as an excess of connective possi- bilities that cannot be actualized all at once. Instead of presenting a world, the medium of meaning refers to a selective processing. This is true even when concepts, descriptions, or semantics referring to the world are gener- ated within the world. Actualized meaning always comes about selectively and refers to further selections. It is therefore fair to say that meaning is constituted by the distinction between actuality and potentiality (or be- tween the real as momentarily given and as possibility). This implies and confirms that the medium of meaning is itself a form constituted by a spe- cific distinction. But this raises the further question of how to comprehend the selective processing of meaning and in what ways it is accomplished.
At this point, we will have to rely again on the (paradoxical) notion of reentry. The meaning-producing distinction between actuality and poten-
io8 Medium and Form
tiality reenters itself on the side of actuality, because for something to be actual it must also be possible. It follows that the distinction between medium and form is itself a form. Or, considered in terms of meaning: as medium, meaning is a form that creates forms in order to assume form. Meaning is processed via the selection of distinctions, of forms. Some- thing specific is indicated (and nothing else): for example, "This yew-tree is nothing but itself, and it is a yew-tree and no other tree. " The two-sided form substitutes for the representation of the world. Instead of presenting
16
the world as phenomenon,
something else--whether this something is unspecified or specific, neces- sary or undeniable, only possible or dubitable, natural or artificial. The form of meaning is at once medium and form, and is such in a way that the medium can be actualized only via the processing of forms. This shows clearly that, and in what ways, one can speak of meaning (as we are doing right now) and that the actual infinity of the unreachable, intangi- ble world of Nicholas of Cusa can be transformed into, and set in motion as, an infinite process. As a self-reproducing (autopoietic) process, mean- ing must always begin with the actual, a historically given situation in
17
which it has placed itself. It follows that systems constructed in such a
manner cannot observe their own beginning or end and that they experi- ence whatever constrains them temporally or factually from within a boundary they need to transcend. In the medium of meaning there is no finitude without infinity.
These observations go far beyond the specific domain of art. Consider- ing, however, that art possesses meaning, they are relevant to art as well. This is true especially for the realization that we will have to cope with paradoxical but structured phenomena whenever we inquire into meaning or into the world as such, while at the same time we must give a specific meaning to this inquiry in the world In art, too, world can be symbolized only as indeterminable (unobservable, indistinguishable, formless), for any specification would have to use a distinction and confront the question of
18
what else there could be.
One thing is certain, however: the distinctions we have at our disposal to raise such questions cannot be selected arbitrarily (although they can be criticized in each case), and any decision in this realm limits the selection of forms in ways that may be fruitful for an observation of artworks.
The case of art clearly shows that, and in what ways, a form can be used as a medium for further formations. As form, the human body can be
this form reminds us that there is always
In the end, suggestions of this sort lead nowhere.
Medium and Form 109
used as a medium for the presentation of different postures and move-
ments. A play can count as form to the extent that it is determined by a
script and stage directions; at the same time, it functions as a medium in
which different productions and individual performances can assume a
specific form. (We see clearly that, and how, this difference emerges along
with the evolution of the theater. ) For its part, a medium--the material of
which the artwork is crafted, the light it breaks, or the whiteness of the pa-
per from which figures or letters emerge--can be used as form, provided
that this form succeeds in fulfilling a differentiating function in the work.
In contrast to natural objects, an artworks material participates in the for-
mal play of the work and is thereby acknowledged as form. The material
is allowed to appear as material; it does not merely resist the imprint of
form. Whatever serves as medium becomes form once it makes a differ-
ence, once it gains an informational value owing exclusively to the work
19
of art.
mains dependent on the primary medium and ultimately on the medium of perception. There is no other way to render perception as a form that can bring about communication.
The question of whether there is a special medium for what we experi- ence as art today--an art-specific medium with corresponding forms-- poses a significant challenge. Several primary media capable of fulfilling this function already exist in the realm of perception for seeing and hear- ing, and, dependent on these, in the realm of language. One immediately notices a number of striking differences between these media, which raises the question of whether one can speak of a unified artistic medium at all and, if so, in what sense. This situation has a unique explanatory force, however: after all, a plurality of artistic genres traceable to these different media does exist--sculpture and painting, music and dance, theater and poetry. We must therefore radicalize the question and ask whether there is a "unity of art" in this multiplicity (as we have assumed naively) and whether this unity may reside in the specific logic of medium and form, that is, in the evolution of derived medium/form differences that attempt to realize analogous effects--with regard to a special function of art, for example--in different media. This line of questioning abstracts from in- dividual media of perception and regards even language merely as one form of artistic expression among others, which shows how improbable this question, this way of drawing internal or external boundaries, really is.
The beginnings of a theory of a special medium of art date back to the
At the same time, the emergence of more demanding forms re-
Medium and Form
no
late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, before the arts began to emerge as a unified subject matter in the mid-eighteenth century. The notion of a special artistic medium was still concealed behind die idea of "beautiful appearance," a counterconcept that referred not only to theater and po- etry but also to the visual arts and even (as in Baltasar Gracian) to the beau- tiful self-presentation of human behavior. "Beautiful appearance" may be an illusion, as in perspectival painting or the stage theater; but if it is, one can see through it. It is an illusion whose frame or stage ensures that one does not mistake it for the real world. Including the entire range of hu- man behavior, as in Gracian, requires a functional equivalent for the ex- ternal frame, a special desengano (disillusionment), a clever strategy for seeing through the deception, which, in this case, equals self-deception. The problem is that the reality of the artworks, the actual existence of the paintings and texts, of the stage and its productions, can hardly be denied. The differentiation of beautiful appearance does not remove art from the accessible world. This is why the artistic medium must be constituted by the double framing of an illusion that, at the same time, is recognized as such on the basis of specific clues. It is constituted by an internal medium that shapes materials--paint, language, bodily movement, spatial arrange- ments--within an external medium that isolates the forms in their strik- ing particularity and guarantees that they are perceived as art rather than as wood, a coat of paint, a simple communication, or human behavior. One hundred years later, Diderot will speak of the paradox of the come-
20
dian who must simultaneously perform and disrupt the illusion.
The technique of double framing for the sake of illusion and disillusion- ment separates the medium of art from other objects and events, from na- ture as well as from commodities and utilities of all sorts. It places high de- mands on the observer, demands that require special arrangements--the stage theater, for example, as opposed to the merely symbolic religious plays of the Middle Ages--but may also have emerged in response to the truth claims of an ever more hectic religious activity in the post-Reformation pe-
21
riod, to the new sciences, or to profit hunger in the world of trade. dissolution of the religiously nourished, unified cosmos of the Middle Ages favors bifurcations of this sort; but we still need to show how this double framing comes about in the case of art. The stage theater and perspectival painting may have provided models capable of illustrating the general con- cept of "beautiful appearance. "
The other arts, in particular poetry, the spatial arrangements of baroque
The
Medium and Form
in
architecture, and eventually the modern novel could follow these develop- ments. At the same time, however, the internal formative media of these genres were still too disparate to allow for a unified concept of the arts.
Ill
Before turning to the diversity of artistic genres, we must clarify a basic distinction that needs to be integrated into the theoretical context we are
22
proposing here: the distinction between space and time. Any further dif-
ferentiation or evolution of artistic genres is based on this distinction, even if some artistic genres, such as dance, deploy both space and time. Whatever one might suppose their "underlying" hypokeimenon (substra- tum) to be, we understand space and time to be media of the measurement
and calculation of objects (hence not forms of intuition! ). By measurement and calculation we do not have in mind culturally introduced criteria;
23
rather, we are thinking of the neurophysiological operation of the brain. On the one hand, space and time are always already attuned to the brain's quantitative language; on the other hand, neither consciousness nor com- munication can follow the brain's computations. They must presuppose the relevant achievements on the basis of structural couplings and permit their interpenetration. In this way, consciousness is free to develop its own procedures of measurement, which rest on comparisons and are used only sporadically, not in a constitutive manner. From the internal viewpoint of conscious operations or communications, the world is always already tem- porally and spatially disclosed. They have no power to control, let alone prevent, the operations that bring about this disclosure; only in position- ing objects within these media do they have a certain freedom. This ac- counts for a certain uniformity of space and time that is presupposed in any meaningful constitution of objects and that can be used as a medium. This uniformity is needed to apprehend discontinuities, caesurae, and boundaries, as well as to estimate distances in both space and time.
The ability to identify places independently of the objects that occupy these places generates space and time. This is true even when the destruc- tion of an object implies the loss of its "ancestral" place (which is not a loss of space as such). Differences between places qualify the medium, whereas differences between objects define its forms. Places are coupled differently from objects but by no means arbitrarily.