1. Lars Taxén Linköping University, Sweden
An Investigation of the Nature of Information Systems from a Neurobiological Perspective
Lars Taxén
Linköping University, Sweden

2. Motivation
“In our academic discipline of information system, there are key concepts that lack agreed-upon definitions … They include such bedrock concepts like ‘information’, ‘system’ ‘technology’ and even ‘theory’” (Lee, 2014)
NeuroIS
The motivation for this contribution is that the essence of what an IS is still, after some 25 years of research, unclear
The purpose of this contribution in to see whether a neurobiological perspective can clarify the nature of ISs
Which I believe is particularly important for the further development of the NeuroIS line of research
So, what I will do is to analytically split “NeuroIS” into its two parts

3. Motivation
“In our academic discipline of information system, there are key concepts that lack agreed-upon definitions … They include such bedrock concepts like ‘information’, ‘system’ ‘technology’ and even ‘theory’” (Lee, 2014)
Neuro IS
Motivation for this contribution is that the essence of what an IS is still, after some 25 years of research, unclear

4. Point of departure
“The mental is inextricably interwoven with body, world and action: the mind consists of structures that operate on the world via their role in determining action” (Love, 2004)
Neural realm
Mind
Social realm
World ?
Analytically, we may think of this as a neural and social realms which are interwoven

5. Action requires coordination
“I do not see any way to avoid the problem of coordination and still understand the physical basis of life” (Pattee, 1976)
Neural realm
Mind
Social realm
World
coordination?
(read quote)
So the focus will be on conceptualizing coordination from a neurobiological perspective

6. IS in the wild
In order to concretize this approach, I will use an example from my own professional practice at Ericsson

7. The project Some 15 years ago I was involved in this project
Developing a node in the 3rd generation of mobile systems
What you see here is an integration plan for the project
White squares indicate sub-projects, lines dependencies, arrows dates for delivery of a certain functionality for integration with the overall system
A major problem was management of requirements

8. The ICT platform
To this end, an ICT platform was acquired, a so called Product Life-cycle Management system
A small group of people, including myself was set up to work out how to manage requirements

9. The information model
We began by discussing what we thought was relevant for RM context using and modifying an IM like this one
You can see the req, req issuer, what development increment the req’s were directed to

10. The IT application
As soon as we had a first version of the IM it was implemented in the IT platform, which meant that we began developing an Ericsson-specific IT application on the IT platform
Loaded with project data
Here you can see the requirement issuer, their requirements, …
The IM and its implementation was ceaselessly modified until a “good enough” IT application had emerged
Took about a year and involved several hundred modifications

11. Where is the IS? Neural realm coordination? Social realm The project
The information model
The people
Neural realm
The ICT platform
The IT application
So this what we had: a project, an IM, an IT platform, and an IT application built on that platform
This is all in the social realm, tangible
And then each person has individual minds which of course are intangible; we cannot know what is going in in each brain
So the question then is: Where is the IS?
coordination?
Social realm

12. Acting in the wild - what enables everyday action?
In order to answer this question, we have to take a step back and look at what enables the coordination of ordinary, every-day actions

13. An ordinary activity… About something Context of relevance
Which dimensions characterizes an activity like this?
So, to begin with, every activity is about something, in this case a concert.
In this situation, we attend to relevant things and disregard that which is not relevant, we cognize a context of relevance
For example, players, guitars, scores, note stands, the public are certainly relevant.
The books in the shelves are not

14. Coordinating individual action
Normative
Spatial
Temporal
Next, what is required of an individual player in order to participate in the concert activity?
Well, he must be proficient in reading the score and integrate this with his guitar playing.
This means that he must be able to cognize a temporal dimension …
This notion …
Since it has been around for such a long time…
Guido of Arezzo (991/992 – after 1033) was a music theorist of the Medieval era. He is regarded as the inventor of modern musical notation (staff notation)
Notation is more than 1000 years old!
Harmonized with human mental organization

15. Reliant on
Any activity is reliant on other activities, in this case for example building the guitar

16. Dimensions of activity
About something – an object Context of relevance Spatial orientation Sequencing of actions Routinization of relevant actions Transition between activities
The dimensions just outlined seems to be indispensable for carrying out any human activity

17. About something – an object Context of relevance Spatial orientation
Sequencing of actions
Routinization of relevant actions
Transition between activities
If we take this activity some years ago, we find the same dimensions
That is a strong indication that the ultimate origin of these dimensions are to be found in the neurobiological constitution that evolution has brought about in order for our species to act and survive in the world

18. The Activity Modalities
Objectivation
Contextualization
Spatialization
Temporalization
Stabilization
Transition
I have coined the notion of “activity modalities” in order to theorize about and articulate the link between the social and neural realms
Objectivation - focusing on the task at hand
Contextualization - attending relevant things
Spatialization – orientating in space
Temporalization - sequencing of actions
Stabilization – habituation of relevant actions
Transition - changing attention

19. Coordination as a mental functional system
Activity modalities
Neural realm
Social realm
Alexander Luria, the distinguished Russian neuroscientist, found that higher mental functions such as logical reasoning counting, reading, writing etc. must be considered as complex functional systems consisting of certain factors, each contributing to the overall function.
Based on this, by I have suggested that the mental function of coordination may be modeled as dependencies between such factors,.
No time to explain this in detail, other NeuroIS conferences.
Staring down here with ‘conation’, striving, including desire and volition.
Sensing… attention …
The idea is then that the AMs provide, as it were, a “wormhole” between neural and social realms in that we may device external artifacts attuned to the AMs
For example, when you first come to a new place you are probably lost without a means like this – a map. After a while you get around without it. What has happened is that networks in your brain that realizes spatialization, the entorhinal or hippocampus areas, have been restructured to accommodate the new place
If these areas are destroyed by a lesion in in the brain, spatialization and thus action is inhibited

20. Functional organs Neural realm Mind Social realm Action
Activity modalities
Artefacts
A further step in the conceptualization of the link between mind and action is provided by the notion of functional organs

21. Functional organs (Luria)
“External, historically formed artefacts such as tools, symbols, and objects ‘tie new knots [functional organs] in the activity of man’s brain’”
“This means that areas of the brain which previously were independent become the components of a single functional system”

22. Mstislav Rostropovich (1927 –2007)
Functional organs
“There no longer exist relations between us. Some time ago I lost my sense of the border between us…. I experience no difficulty in playing sounds…. The cello is my tool no more”
Mstislav Rostropovich (1927 –2007)
Here is an example
So the tight interweaving is between the functional organ in the brain of Rostropovich and his cello
But still no problem to separate the cello from the player; they do not somehow metamorphose into another existence where they cannot be separated ontologically from each other
Neural realm
Mind
Social realm
Action
Activity modalities
Artefacts

23. Joint action - individuals acting together
So far we have been focusing on coordinating of individual actions.
In order to theorize about the situation were several individuals work together, we may use the concept of “joint action” suggested by the American sociologist Herbert Blumer
"joint action" refers to the collective form of action that is constituted by the fitting together individual lines of behavior.

24. Common identifier Neural realm Idiosyncratic Social realm Common
Activity modalities
Joint action
temporalization
spatialization
stabilization
So if we take the example of the guitar quartet again, the layout of the score is basically the same as before, only now arranged to mitigate the coordination of individual actions;
it functions as what Blumer called a common identifier for fitting together the playing of each individual into a nice musical experience.
And as before the common identifier signifies the same modalities

25. Common identifier Neural realm Idiosyncratic Social realm Common
spatialization
The same is of course valid also in this situation
Here, the IM has a distinct spatial character, much like a map
Neural realm
Idiosyncratic
Social realm
Common
Activity modalities
Joint action

26. Communication
Communication is of course indispensable for coordinating actions between humans

27. Integrational linguistics – a new theory of communication
Roy Harris, Oxford
(1931 – 2015)
“Every act of communication, no matter how banal, is seen as an act of semiological creation”
One philosophy of language that in consort with the activity modality construct is integrational linguistics as elaborated by the distinguished Oxford professor Roy Harris, who unfortunately passed away in Feb. this year
---
Won’t have time to go …

28. “Integrational Realism” – a philosophical stance
Neurobiological point of departure
Activity modalities
Objectivation
Contextualization
Spatialization
Temporalization
Stabilization
Transition
Functional organs
Joint action
Integrational linguistics
I have tentatively called the neurobiological approach “Integrational realism” (it should have a name!)

29. Implication for IS - some examples
I will contrast some examples of extant IS views with that of Integrational Realism

30. IS conceptualization – Integrational Realism
ISA
ISB
ISC C A B …
So, in general, there will be as many ISs as there are people engaging with the IT artefact
IS intrinsically related to the individual; without the individual, no IS
IS the entity constituted by the IT artefact and the functional organ in the brain of the user

31. Ontology – Bunge-Wand-Weber
“The world is made of things … All concrete things in the world possess properties… We “know” about properties … through our perceptions of them”
(Weber, 2012)
Concerning ontology, a very influential ontology is Bunge-Wand-Weber.
In this ontology (read quote)…
This means that properties are intrinsic to things in the world
So, for example, a grand piano possess a certain set of properties. Which ones?

32. Ontology – Integrational Realism
“The nature of an object is constituted by the meaning it has for the person for whom it is an object…. this meaning is not intrinsic to the object but arises from how the person is initially prepared to act toward it”
(Blumer, 1969)
Tons!
Tones!
In contrast, integrational realism means that (read quote) …
So, if the person is a concert pianist he is interested in the tuning, timbre, attack, etc.
If however the person is involved in moving the piano, properties like size and wheight

33. Representation
“We consider the IS artifact as a representation of some underlying reality” (Davern et al, 2012)
REALITY
representation
So the IT artefact the user is interacting with is not in the real world, it only represents something real, which we cannot perceive (underlying reality)

34. Representation - Integrational Realism
“[We] are tempted to say the brain represents. The flaws with such an assertion, however, are obvious: there is no precoded message in the signal, …, no judge in nature to provide decisions on alternative patterns, and no homunculus in the head to read a message” (Edelman, 1999)
Activity modalities
Neural realm
Social realm
the mind consists of structures that operate on the world via their role in determining action

35. Distributed mind
“[We] envisage a bright future for cognitive research in IS: a future in which the study of cognition in IS extends beyond the individual to consider cognition distributed across teams, communities and systems” (Davern et al, 2013)
“Distributed mind” is refers to the idea that the mind somehow “leaks” into the environment as in expressions like “distributed cognition”, “collective mind”, “collective knowledge”, “shared understanding”, “shared mental models” and the like.

36. Distributed mind– Integrational Realism
“When, for instance, I use a pocket calculator I feel no temptation to say ‘Ah! The machine is doing my thinking for me’ … So is my pocket calculator, given the right circumstances, my mind or part thereof? No, I don’t think so” (Harris, 2004)
Again, in contrast integrational realism rejects all such notions as exemplified by this quote from Harris

37. A Integrational Realist perspective on ISs
Derived from the sine qua non for human existence
Brains evolved to control the activities of bodies in the world
Currently in a nascent state
Potential to address profound issues in IS research
IS conceptualization
Epistemology
Ontology
“Representation”?
“Distributed” mind?
“Shared” understanding, knowledge, meaning, etc.? ….
Sine qua non - an indispensable condition, element, or factor; something essential

38. That’s it!
Practical illustration, concrete, example