Are there alternatives to the piping model of communication?
Maturana and Varela’s Autopoiesis and Cognition has been suggested to me as an original work that crosses biology, cognitive science, and information theory (not to mention applications to philosophy and literary theory.) In a paper by Maturana called Biology of Language:The Epistemology of Reality he looks at “languaging” or the relationship of saying and observing.
They to understanding dialogue as more than just the piping of messages from one system to another is that we observe our own sayings (and writings) as we create them. There is a folding back of the message to the sender that recursively changes the sender and what is being sent as it is sent. In other words we listen to ourselves speak as we speak while simultaneously watching the reception in the other in order to manipulate the saying in real time.
Continue reading Maturana and Languaging