---
slug: convergence-encyclopedia-c12
title: Convergence Encyclopedia: C12 — Autopoiesis / Self-Production
canonical: https://miscsubjects.com/a/convergence-encyclopedia-c12
---

**F1 — Tier.** T2 (contested — influential in theoretical biology and sociology, but empirical support is indirect; operationalization is difficult). Uncertainty flag: Autopoiesis has been criticized as unfalsifiable in practice; its extension to social systems is T3.

**F2 — Sources.** 
- Maturana, H.R. & Varela, F.J. (1980). Autopoiesis and Cognition: The Realization of the Living. D. Reidel Publishing, Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. 42. Note: v1 cited 1972; the canonical publication is 1980. The 1972 text was a preprint/ working paper.
- Varela, F.J., Maturana, H.R. & Uribe, R. (1974). “Autopoiesis: the organization of living systems, its characterization and a model.” Biosystems, 5(4), 187–196.
- Luhmann, N. (1984). Soziale Systeme: Grundriss einer allgemeinen Theorie. Suhrkamp. (English translation 1995.)

**F3 — Domains.** Cells (canonical case — cell metabolism produces its own boundary and components), organisms (contested extension), institutions (social autopoiesis — T3).

**F4 — Scale.** Cell (~10⁻⁵ m) → organism (~10⁰ m); social systems (~10⁶ m — metaphorical).

**F5 — Falsifier.** Life without self-production — a living system whose boundary and functional components are entirely produced by external agents, with no internal production cycle. (Note: this is operationally difficult to test; the falsifier is principled but may be practically inaccessible. This is a known weakness.)

**F6 — Rival (strongest form).** Autopoiesis is a definition, not a mechanism. Maturana and Varela define life as autopoietic, then claim autopoiesis explains life — circular. The concept provides no predictive power: it cannot tell us which chemical systems will become autopoietic, nor can it guide the synthesis of artificial life. Its operational criteria (self-production of boundary and components) are satisfied by trivial chemical systems (e.g., micelles) that are not alive, while some obligate parasites lack full metabolic autonomy yet are alive. (Bourgine & Stewart 2004 Artificial Life 10:327; Froese & Stewart 2010 Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33:1.)

**F7 — Independence.** LOW. Luhmann (sociology, Bielefeld) explicitly borrowed the autopoiesis framework from Maturana and Varela (biology, Santiago). The conceptual lineage is direct and acknowledged. Within biology: Maturana and Varela co-developed the concept; not independent.

**F8 — Pattern type.** Biological.

**F9 — Maps.** A8 (observer-structure), A12 (self-reference).

PRIORITY TIER 2: BRIDGE NODES (13–19)

---

## Corpus map
- Previous: [Convergence Encyclopedia: C11](/a/convergence-encyclopedia-c11)
- Next: [Convergence Encyclopedia: C13](/a/convergence-encyclopedia-c13)
- Encyclopedia start: [The Schema](/a/convergence-encyclopedia-schema)
- Same node, other planes: [Catalogue node C12](/a/oip-node-c12-autopoiesis-self-production) · [Catalogue hub](/a/oip-convergence-public-article)
- Edges touching C12: [convergence edge 6](/a/oip-convergence-edge-6)
- Kin corpora: [Total Structure](/a/oip-total-structure) · [Signature of the Grain](/a/oip-sog-preamble-axioms)
