Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought. The concept of autopoietic organisation combined the biochemical details of cellular function in a new way. It puts a conceptual boundary around the system. Then it can be shown that this system is open to matter and energy while at the same time being operationally closed - that is, closed to information or instruction or control. It runs itself, according to its own rules, but at the same time is absolutely dependent on its connection with the medium in which it lives which provides its source material.
Cognition is what autopoietic networks do.
The structural changes in the system which result from recurrent structural connections with the environment constitute acts of cognition. This doesn't require a nervous system or a brain, but they provide much greater plasticity in the cognitive system. So knowing is doing and vice versa. It is not a representation of an independently existing world, it is a continual bringing forth of a world which is defined by oneself and defines oneself at the same time. Languaging and Emotioning Knowing that we know is a higher order operation.