Interaction Context Theory: The Interdependence and Mutual Exclusivity of Observation and Action

Social science has not achieved the pre-eminence of physical science because it lacks a theory of social dynamics. To overcome this problem and prepare for a future of interacting artificial agents, a theory is sketched of the social statics and dynamics in interaction contexts. From first principles, static and dynamic information construct a complementary state space of observation and action. Complementarity means that these two categories are, paradoxically, potentially interdependent and mutually exclusive at any moment. A subsequent article includes predictions from the theory for individual, small groups, and system interaction phenomena; descriptions of known and new effects; and the design of experiments to measure the effects.