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Conflits des interprétations dans la société de l'information : thique et politique de l'environnement (2012) 26-39

La société recommandée

David Chavalarias 1

(2012)

The conjecture of von Foerster describes the circular causal relationship between a whole (eg, a human community) and its elements (individual members). It establishes that when the relationship between individuals become more and more "rigid" (social influence is getting stronger) the behavior of the whole could appear, to the individual elements that compose it, as an autonomous dynamics beyond their control, despite the fact it will be more predictable by an outside observer. While at the time of this conjecture in 1987, few people were inclined to accept the idea that a theorem could account for social dynamics, or even predict them, we show that information and communication technologies (ICT), which have become ubiquitous in our societies, provide both an example of what von Foerster called "rigid relations" between individuals, a testing ground and an empirical validation of this conjecture. We then explore the societal consequences of the conjecture.

1:	Centre de recherche en épistémologie appliquée (CREA)
	CNRS : UMR7656 – Polytechnique - X

Subject

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Computer Science/Computers and Society Computer Science/Web Nonlinear Sciences/Adaptation and Self-Organizing Systems Humanities and Social Sciences/Sociology

Keyword(s): opinion dynamics – social networks – von Foerster conjecture – recommendation systems – social influence – web 2.0 – complex systems – social dynamics

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From: David Chavalarias <>

Submitted on: Sunday, 14 October 2012 07:00:02

Updated on: Sunday, 14 October 2012 10:06:10