Hi Krimel
[Krimel]
What it explains is that, it is not the levels that matter but how we
structure them. We detect patterns. We do it better than any other animal.
No machine can match us. Patterns are made of static and dynamic quality,
active and passive elements. The MoQ provides a nice general purpose rough
outline. It photographic terms it is a "wideshot," an overview. But in
living moment to moment we do not look at the world in terms of its
inorganic, biological, social or intellectual levels. We think in terms of
the velocity and trajectory of the cars around use in traffic. We consult 3D
cognitive maps of where we are in relation to where we are going. Which
levels we consider and what those levels are made of depend entirely on the
present context and our previous histories.
I agree that we usually, in our day to day business, see the world as
velocities, cars and other "objects". And during that time, we don't really need
to explain the objects more than that.
But when we *do* need to explain those objects, i.e. in science, we need some
way to compartmentalize those objects. Until now, they have always failed
against the unsurmountable obstacle of how the mind affects matter, the subject
vs. object. So that has become the two most basic "stuff" that the universe is
made of.
But I really think that we *can* define a set of levels that can be used to
dissect *any* object in *any* context in the entire universe, without failing
against some unsurmountable obstacle.
But I think that the MoQ says
that what is really important in any context is what changes and what holds
still.
Exactly! I thought of saying something like this in the SOM thread. Before the
MoQ, science has always tried to explain all processes as if it never changed.
And if something disturbs that status quo, science tries to come up with a
static explanation and incorporate the changing into the closed box again. In a
sense, they have tried to capture DQ.
But as you say, change is very important in our reality and using change, the
MoQ and SOM can be very clearly compared like:
SOM tries to explain the world in terms of "what is".
MoQ makes a distinction between "what is" and "what becomes".
And this comparison clearly shows that the MoQ is a higher ground from which we
look at our reality.
[Magnus]
There *is* a way to make strict level definitions that is both discrete and
dependent. Do I have to tell everyone one by one that my new essay contains
one or two answers to the questions raised here recently?
[Krimel]
But let's set that aside for a moment. I'm not sure how far I want to push
it and because you deserve comment on your essay. I think you are headed in
the right direction in several respects. I too have an interest in seeing
the MoQ applied to science. I am not sure what to make of the quantum
business. I don't know that it makes sense to talk about quanta having
histories and I am certain it make no sense to speculate about "before" the
Big Bang.
Point taken. The quantum level/pre big bang stuff is of course pretty
speculative.
*But*:
The speculation shows how to reason about lower levels. Since a higher level
*adds* some new type of experience to our universe, it means that a universe
without that new level is made of all *other* (lower) types of experience. I
agree it's rather difficult to imagine a world without time and space, but
whatever we do find in that level, it won't depend on time, space or gravity, I
guarantee it. Let's wait a year or two and see what the LHC collider digs up.
But complexity, probability, evolutionary and information theories all seem
intimately related to the MoQ the way I see it. I especially appreciated
your use of information theory near the end of your essay.
You notion of discreteness as orthogonal lines is a bit like James' idea
that our memories of things in the world and things in the world have
separate histories that intersect when we are in contact with them. But I
don't think the levels actually achieve this and I'm afraid your additional
levels don't solve the problem.
Don't you think my levels are orthogonal? Which ones? And in what way?
The problem as I see is: what static qualities do living things have that
distinguishes them from inorganic things? I would say that living patterns
participate in their own stasis or persistence. They replicate. They encode
experiences of the past and iterate them into the future. Biological
patterns are recursive and actively participate in the recursion.
Teleology emerges at the biological level. In its most primitive form, life
is a balance of inorganic static patterns that drives replicating molecules.
In its most advanced form it involves budgeting money for Junior's college
education.
The drive to persist, to live and to replicate is a necessary condition for
the living. Nature strongly discourages any alternative. Biology is in many
ways the study of the variability of those replicating patterns in terms of
both genetics and behavior.
Inorganic patterns do not participate in their own persistence. They do not
replicate. They are static across long spans of time. Their interactions can
be described with relatively simple equations even down to the quantum
level.
But it's exactly that kind of reasoning, starting with the definition of life,
that is the cause of all kinds of problems about the levels. That was almost the
first obsolete baggage I tried to get rid of in the essay. The rest of your
problems is a direct consequence of that life. The purpose of the MoQ (including
the levels) is not to be able to explain life, it's not a metaphysics of life,
it's a metaphysics of the universe.
I haven't thought through the social level. Perhaps Arlo has. But I suspect
I am just throwing up the same kinds of arguments that led you to write your
essay in the first place. So never mind me...
Ah, yes, I didn't read this last part before I wrote the above.
Nice talking to you!
Magnus
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