[DMB]
The levels are discrete because they represent existing structures
that have been "tweaked in another direction" and "co-opted for other
functions" and yet the newer function has to "grow out of more
elementary ones" and it "never gets around" them. I think Ron can see
how this basic concept reconciles the two quotes and I think Arlo can
see how it supports the case he's been making in the "Consciousness a
la..." threads.
[Arlo]
Not that familiar with Wilbur, but "transcends and includes" captures
pretty well the way I see the evolutionary hierarchy of the MOQ. That
is, there must be a "catalyst" on the lower level upon which the
higher level emerges. Between the inorganic and biological levels
Pirsig points to the unique properties of the carbon atom, and from
these properties spring the potentiality for transcendence (in
retrospect, at the time, as Pirsig notes, nothing in those properties
in-and-of-themselves suggests the power to unleash a biological world).
Tomasello gives us consideration for the catalyst between the
biological and social levels, and this same idea is also the main
thesis of Hofstadter, namely the evolutionary appearance of
neurobiological complexity in primates (and, I'd argue, certain other
species). Like the carbon atom, nothing in this complexity
in-and-of-itself suggests a power to unleash a social world, but it
is from this that the potentiality for shared (social) activity
derives. To make it short, while the catalyst between inorganic and
biological levels is the unique properties of the carbon atom, the
catalyst between the biological and social levels is the unique
properties of advanced "brains".
I'd argue that the "catalyst" between the social and intellectual
levels is (was?) the evolutionary complexity of man's social symbolic
system that led to the potentiality for recursion and self-reflexive
consideration (Hofstatdter, here, is a great resource). Thus there is
nothing in man's social-symbols themselves that reveals the
intellectuality it undergirds, but it is from this "recursion" that
the intellectual level emerges. To make it short, while the catalyst
between inorganic and biological levels is the unique properties of
the carbon atom, and the catalyst between the biological and social
levels is the unique properties of advanced "brains", the catalyst
between the social and intellectual levels is the unique properties
of symbolic recursion.
Whether or not you agree with my specific catalysts suggested here, I
think that this highlights that any MOQ level has to grow out of
"something" on the level beneath it. It just does not appear out of
the blue, with no relation to the levels beneath it except to
dominate them. So if the fractal boundary between the biological and
social levels is NOT neurobiological complexity (on one side)
allowing shared attention (on the other), I'd be interested in
hearing other's ideas as to what it IS. Same with
social-intellectual. My interest, then, is not so much looking at a
pattern and asking "is this social or intellectual?" (a valid and
valuable endeavor, btw), but asking what stradles the fractal border
between the levels (my answers are given above).
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