While it is customary to think of humans as being unique among life forms, humans have a number of basic characteristics in common with other animals. Similar to other animals, humans are "open systems." Open systems are entities that are able to function and survive through ongoing exchanges with their environment. James G. Miller (1965) was one of the first scholars to observe that there are two general ways in which these systems interact with their environment. One involves a give-and-take of matter, and the other involves a give-and-take of information. The first process consists of an intake of food and oxygen, the processing of these materials for energy, and finally an outflow of wastes and carbon dioxide. The second activity involves attending to and acting on information. This second process can be termed "communication."

Viewed in this way, communication is one of the two basic processes...