I think that you believe this represents what we are talking about.
I did go on to say ways in which the environmental feedback function is more complex when it intersects the environmental portion of other control systems’ control loops. It is more complex for the same reasons that the behavior of a living nematode or whale or marmoset or mouse or human when placed on an inclined plane is more complex than that of one of Galileo’s metal balls when placed on the same inclined plane. When the environment includes other control systems, it is a more complex environment. The environmental feedback function for an individual’s control of a CV may include some or none of that complexity. Social phenomena always include some.
Suppose the red pentagon represents a segment of the environmental feedback path, the state of which is subject to control by another control system (not shown). It could be in the input side of the environmental feedback path (not shown) or it could be an effective segment on both the output and input sides relative to the perceived/affected aspects of the environment labeled CV. You’ve shown it on the output side. For the effects of system output to affect the CV, the segment represented by the red pentagon must be in a certain range of conditions. The first system’s ability to control that CV through that environmental feedback path (including the input side) is conditional upon control within that range by the second system (not shown).
If the East Chop road is washed out by the nor’easter, Fred cannot get to Cronig’s Market by driving along the East Chop road. To control that perception by an environmental feedback path which includes driving along that road, Fred must wait for the town’s Highway Department personnel and those of the state Department of Public Transportation, among others, to rebuild the road. The break in the road is a physical contingency in the environment (if you try to drive past the break in the pavement your car falls of the pavement and becomes undriveable, not to mention injury to the driver). The process of restoring the road, with its delays, is a social contingency. This was very well laid out in 1993 by Bill Powers, Kent McClelland (here and in the cited paper “Perceptual Control and Social Power”), and Chuck Tucker.
Of course Kent’s work has advanced since 1993. We are not limited to what Kent, Bill, and Chuck said then, but nor has anything of what was said then been abandoned. The challenge remains of quantifying data suitable for modeling in the familiar ways. Gosh, we might have to do something unfamiliar.+