Re: Need a word for...

[Chris Despopoulos <despopoulos_chriss -at- yahoo -dot- com>]

I think an official term for this condition could be "feedback loop".  Cycling is also used in this context.  I've worked on pneumatic control systems that entered into a cycling state because of a feedback loop...  So maybe cycling is what you want.  The cycling occurs because the system feedback recreates the state that caused it to produce the feedback in the first place.  So maybe a repetitive feedback loop?  Or cycling induced by a feedback loop?  

WikiPedia doesn't seem to support "feedback loop" on its own to describe your state.  

Feedback loop; the causal path that leads from the initial generation of the feedback signal to the subsequent modification of the event.

A feedback loop on its own can be a good thing.  In your case the feedback has entered an endless loop condition.  

Here's an interesting use of the term:
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/GlobalWarming/story?id=1607112&page=1

<quote>

What is a "Feedback Loop"?
Scientists: 'Feedback Loops' Are the Single-Biggest Threat to Civilization From Global Warming
Scientists say the warm weather adds to global warming because of "feedback loops."
In a feedback loop, the rising temperature on the Earth changes the environment in ways that then create even more heat. 
....

Scientists working in the Arctic report that feedback loops are already
under way. As the frozen sea surface of the Arctic Ocean melts back,
there's less white to reflect the sun's heat back into space -- and
more dark, open water to absorb that heat, which then melts the
floating sea ice even faster. More than a third of summer sea ice
disappeared in the past 30 years.

In the ground next to the ocean, scientists say, warming has also
awakened another enormous danger -- billions of tons of carbon locked
up for eons by what was once frozen ground. 

</quote>


      
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