THIS MAY BE MOOT, BY NOW; GOT STUCK IN MY OUTBOX. Glen,
I like the idea of turning these discussions into publications, although I doubt that I have the firepower. Let's just keep that as a thought. Explicating a metaphor like "layer" is for me a serious and important art. It starts, I think, by the metaphor maker identifying his absolute favorite example of a layer situation. The situation that unequivocably instantiates "layers". The next step will be to identify in the plainest way possible the crucial features of this example ... what makes it such a good example of "layers". Then, and only then does it make sense to apply the metaphor to the situation we are trying to elucidate with it. It seems to me that the onion metaphor is not perhaps what everybody has in mind, because the layers of an onion are more or less independent of one another. But I shouldn’t try to speak for you. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ -----Original Message----- From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of glen ? Sent: Thursday, June 08, 2017 4:34 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam@redfish.com> Subject: [FRIAM] tools, trollers, and language We quickly polluted that thread, too. But it drives home the point that an email list is _not_ a (good) collaborative production tool. Aha! I haven't heard from Cliff since my work for the PSL<https://www.psl.nmsu.edu/>. He supposedly works up at PNNL. Thanks for that article. Yes, I took Owen to be calling Russ' post a trolling post. But "troll" is like "complex", meaningless out of context. I'm completely baffled why "layer" isn't understood ... makes me think I must be wrong in some deep way. But for whatever it's worth, I believe I understand and _agree_ with Nick's circularity criticism of mechanistic explanations for complexity, mostly because of a publication I'm helping develop that tries to classify several different senses of the word "mechanistic". The 1st attempt was rejected by the journal, though. 8^( But repeating Nick's point back in my own words obviously won't help, here. Yes, I'm willing to help cobble together these posts into a document. But, clearly, I can't be any kind of primary. If y'all don't even understand what I mean by the word "layer", then whatever I composed would be alien to the other participants. One idea might be to use a "mind mapping" tool and fill in the bubbles with verbatim snippets of people's posts ... that might help avoid the bias introduced by the secretary. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_concept-_and_mind-mapping_software I also don't care that much about the meaning of "complex". So, my only motivation for helping is because y'all tolerate my idiocy. On 06/08/2017 12:52 PM, Steven A Smith wrote: > I admit to being over my depth, at least in attention, if not in ability to > parse out your dense text, and more to the point, the entire thread(s) which > gives me more sympathy with Nick who would like a tool to help organize, > neaten up, trim, etc. these very complex ( in the more common meaning of the > term) discussions. My experience with you is that you always say what you > mean and mean what you say, so I don't doubt that there is gold in that > mine... just my ability to float the overburden and other minerals away with > Philosopher's Mercury (PhHg) in a timely manner. > > I DO think Nick is asking for help from the rest of us in said parsing... > to begin, I can parse HIS first definition of "layer" is as a "laying hen"... > a chicken (or duck?) who is actively laying eggs. A total red-herring to > mix metaphors here on a forum facilitated by another kind of RedFish > altogether... a "fish of a different color" as it were, to keep up with the > metaphor (aphorism?) mixology. > > I DON'T think Owen was referring to you when he said: "troll", I think he was > being ironical by suggesting Russ himself was being a troll. But I could be > wrong. Owen may not even remember to whom his bell "trolled" in that > moment? In any case, I don't find your contribution/interaction here to be > particularly troll-like. Yes, you can be deliberately provocative, but more > in the sense of Socrates who got colored as a "gadfly" (before there were > trolls in the lexicon?). Stay away from the Hemlock, OK? > > I'm trying to sort this (simple?) question of the meaning (connotations) of > layering you use, as I have my own reserved use of the term in "complex, > layered metaphors" or alternately "layered, complex metaphors"... but that is > *mostly* an aside. I believe your onion analogy is Nick's "stratum" but I > *think* with the added concept that each "direction" (theta/phi from > onion-center) as a different "dimension". Your subsequent text suggests a > high-dimensional venn diagram. My own work in visualization of Partially > Ordered Sets (in the Gene Ontology) may begin to address some of this, but I > suspect not. > > https://arxiv.org/pdf/1312.4935.pdf > > I may continue to dig into this minefield of rich ore and interesting veins, > but it has gotten beyond (even) me as a multiple attender who thrives on this > kind of complexity (with limits apparently!). > > I think I heard you suggest that YOU would volunteer to pull in the various > drawstrings on this multidimensional bag forming of a half-dozen or more > branching threads... I'll see if I can find that and ask some more pointed > questions that might help that happen? > > I truly appreciate Nick's role (as another Socrates?) teasing at our language > to try to get it more plain or perhaps more specific or perhaps more concise? > Is there some kind of conservation law in these dimensions? -- ☣ glen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
