Functionality and normativity

• FUNCTIONALITY: a process is functional for the system if it contributes to its self-maintenance

• NORMATIVITY: a process becomes normative if it is dynamically presupossed by other processes in their contribution to the overall self-maintenance.

  • e.g.: the normative (proper, necessary) function of the kidney is to filter blood because the dynamic-metabolic organization of the rest of the organism relies on this blood filtering

• NOTE THAT:

  • No structural decomposition is required.
  • Functional description is not arbitrary (the far-from-equilibrium system) would not exist otherwise.