Participant: Thomas Fischer
Affiliation: Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University
Format: Poster and Conversation
Themes: paradigm, recursion, praxis

In the proposed paper I aim to use the Non-Trivial Machine as a paradigm to recursively explain a change in the idea of the Non-Trivial Machine. The described paradigm shift has implications regarding computability and regarding ethics in epistemological praxis, for example in the contexts of design and education.
I recently wrote about the Non-Trivial Machine (NTM), a hypothetical device invented by Heinz von Foerster who contrasted it to its counterpart, his Trivial Machine (TM) (von Foerster 2003, pp. 310-311). I discussed my writing with Ranulph Glanville, who himself refers to the NTM frequently in his own lecturing and writings (Glanville 2003, pp. 98ff.). In this context, some differences became apparent in the way von Foerster and Glanville describe the qualities of the NTM. This became evident when Glanville suggested that von Foerster “may have gotten the idea wrong” – a strange suggestion given that von Foerster himself invented it. In the proposed paper I will offer a description of the differences between both ways of understanding the NTM and speculate about possible reasons for these differences apparently having escaped Glanville (and possibly others). I propose to briefly introduce the TM and the NTM as described originally by von Foerster. I will then present how Glanville describes the idea, and describe the differences between von Foerster’s and Glanville’s descriptions of the NTM, as I was able to investigate them in my readings of von Foerster and in my readings and in my recent exchanges with Glanville.