Binary codes let complex systems generate exactly paired alternatives for further operations

Evidence

Structures with the characteristics of a code seem to be extremely significant, perhaps even indispensable, for the construction of complex systems. The reasons for this capacity lie in the type of selection possible on the basis of a code and, more precisely, in its combination of universalism and particularity. The code is in a position to attach to each item an exactly corresponding complement, relatively independent of distributions already existing in the system’s environment. Thus, for example, to each linguistic communication is attached the negation which corresponds exactly to it, to each true statement its exactly corresponding negation, to each outlay of income the corresponding cross-entry, to each sound its corresponding letters, etc. In this way the code produces, as opportunity requires (though independently of the distribution of opportunities, except as concerns the duration or probability of the process), system-specific couplings as a prerequisite for further operations. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 641

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines what a code is in systems-theoretic terms: universalism plus particularity, attaching exact complements to each item.
• XREF: This is the core mechanism Luhmann later uses for ‘system trust’ — the reader’s thesis ties it to Giddens’s expert systems and Stevens’s role-deference. ‘Not-wanting to be a student becomes not-wanting conscription’ in the next paragraph directly dramatizes faceless commitment.